'Heroes' Gives Another Knockout Performance

Heroes already took its fair share of lumps. Now, it can't stop giving them out as they repeatedly smash previously-held expectations about Season Four week after week. With the fine balance between exposition and action behind Season One's success restored, certain characters attempt to advance, while others beat a hasty retreat. Even still, there will always be certain aspects of the program that require a dry-erase board to fully explain.

In the meantime, Claire and Gretchen survive Becky's murderous maze at the slaughterhouse, and smooth over any awkwardness with the other sorority pledges by implying the water bottles they received were all drugged, and caused them to bug-out a la The Hangover. The pledges buy into the ladies' story, but Gretchen realizes the next minute she steals alone with Claire could be interrupted by Becky's icy scythe of death. It surprises the viewer why Becky didn't just skewer Gretchen's brainstem with the meat hook if she truly wanted her dead. But, maybe that's because Gretchen alive, and afraid of Claire, obviously torments Claire more than Gretchen deceased.

Speaking about tormented psyches, Sylar and Parkman are not exactly Thelma and Louise as the two travel companions haphazardly lurch from Los Angeles to New York. Unable to control his physical identity, Parkman does his best at pushing Sylar's buttons and infiltrates the villain's consciousness. He prompts Sylar to unknowingly stow a handgun inside his carry-on luggage at LAX, and gets him roughed up by airport security before getting added to a "no-fly" list. Then, to add insult to injury, he causes a flat tire for their rental car when Sylar unwittingly cruises through a highway debris field.

Not to be outdone, Sylar gently reminds Parkman who commands the driver's seat by bludgeoning to death a Good Samaritan that stopped to help with a tire iron. Parkman can play all the head games he wants, but that doesn't stop Sylar from manipulating his body to commit cold-blooded violence. He might not be able to master Parkman's telepathy, but he doesn't mind holding humanity hostage until he gets all his questions answered.

Peter, though, has not learned to control his latest absorbed ability, and starts jeopardizing his health to heal all of New York's 8 million residents. Emma at least notices, and intervenes before Peter's big heart bursts from the duress. They also revive a random little girl that mysteriously collapses so that Emma can justify why she quit medical school.

Several years ago, Emma failed at bringing her drowned nephew to life again after a babysitting mishap. So, she punished herself by giving up on her dream to someday be a doctor, and settled into clerical help.

Likewise, Parkman has a Sidney Carton-moment and decides to sacrifice himself before Sylar can lay a hand upon his next victim. To accomplish this, he causes Sylar to doodle a threat against the Burnt Toast Dinner that prompts waitress Lynette (Sally Champlin) to alert Midland's finest. Surrounded in an old-fashioned, Texan standoff, a distracted Sylar then gets overtaken by Parkman and mimics pulling for a handgun. Now pumped full of lead, both Sylar and Parkman are hanging by a thread as their ambulance hurtles through the night – and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

How will Becky exact revenge upon Noah for her father's murder? Can Cletchen's flame still burn despite their separation? And, does Angela truly believe her son, the senator, has been hiking the Appalachian Trail all this time?

Hopefully we'll find out next Monday when "Nathan" drops by for a visit.