I had the same thought. Having the same power as Nathan Petrelli is a bit of a bludgeon, or one hell of a red herring.
Nobody has yet mentioned my favorite part of the episode:
The awkward “look how well we’ve adjusted” Butler (nee Bennet) family dinner. A lot of funny camera work: tight one shots placed slightly below head level, left to linger for a second or two longer per character than needed.
So, are Maya and Alejandro Honduran, or are they just running through Honduras from Nicaragua? Didn’t they say they’d already run 800 miles or something ridiculous like that? Anyway, I was thinking maybe if someone threatened her sexually, she would go all succubus on their asses, so brain melting/eye bleeding was kind of a let down.
Apparently Nathan has a second power - superfast beard growth!* And yeah, it was clearly Peter he was hallucinating in the mirror - he had the trademark floppy hair.
Speaking of which, Peter + haircut = hot!
As for the time travel story, here’s my take. Obviously, Hiro has seen Back to the Future, since he’s referenced it twice at appropriate times (Great Scott!). But he may have thought his appearance was about to lead to Kensei’s death, thus changing the timeline he knows, so he had to save him to fix it. He didn’t realize that wasn’t Kensei. But yeah, this storyline was my least favorite of the episode.
Given that there were no coincidences last season, I’m wondering who the guy is who Ando bumped into, and what is the significance of the paper company (get it? paper company) whose name was prominently and lengthily displayed at Copy Kingdom?
*Glad to see Pasdar gets to loosen up this season, though. I thought it was funny, in *Shut Up and Sing *he told his son how sucky it would be to be a lawyer or something and have to wear a suit and tie to work every day. So what was his wardrobe all last season? 
Refresh my memory, please: how come Claire is reunited with her family? And do her brother and mother still have their memories or did the Haitan erase 'em? I’m confused because I remember the episode where the Haitan “kills” Bennet and Claire goes into hiding, but I don’t remember what came after that.
I reluctantly agree. I’m thrilled that Heroes is back, but this was a weak episode. Although I’m very happy Nathan is still alive.
They were reunited at the finale, and decided to find the family.
I presume there will be an episode or two explaining how things got to be how they are. Maybe I’ll be able to stay awake long enough to find out. This episode was an inauspicious bore.
The bearded guy Ando bumped into on the street was Nathan, who was on his way back to Peter’s apartment to have his bitchfest with mom.
Nice touch with Peter showing up with that symbol around his neck. I’m guessing Irish Guy is another somebody-with-powers.
I really don’t think Flying!Not!Gay!Not!Zack! is yet another Petrelli bastard. They seem to have gone out of their way to show that like powers do not inherit – DJ & Niki’s kid has powers completely unlike theirs, and Claire’s power is completely unlike Nathan’s flying or her mom’s firestarting.
I wonder if the Haitan is still working for Evil Mom, 'cause it’d be nice if she gets saved from Hoodie Assassin next episode. She’s fun.
Did I miss something? Where was straight Zach? I guess I am just simple. I liked last night’s episode just fine and I thought the LOLHeros were funny.
I didn’t find it boring, but agree with those who thought it was just OK. The most interesting storyline (Maya and Alejandro) was also the most predictable, which is a bummer.
Molly ending up with Parkman and Mohinder is odd, but I’ll buy it. However, can they redecorate that damn place? No little girl’s room should look like a Zagreb bunker.
We played “When is Claire going to hurt herself again?” all last season. Let’s move beyond that now, shall we? And I’d assume someone who has been through what Claire has would be mature beyond her years. I hope she surprises us and rats out the Peter Pan flying kid to her father, rather than go behind his back and reveal her abilities. I’m not counting on it though. 
Overall not great, but good enough. I’m really looking forward to more with Maya, Hiro, and Peter. And of course whoever it is that Molly is dreaming about. :eek:
BTW did we ever determine what Mr. Nakamora’s ability is?
According to various Internet sources (but nothing official that I can find - yet), Maya and Alejandro are Dominican. That doesn’t really affect much, although it does make me wonder how they got to Honduras (swam?), and why they are entering the US via Mexico instead of attempting to stow on a cruise ship, which in my naivete seems much easier. Inconsequential, though.
Dude, Hiro referenced BTTF in the episode. “Great Scotto.”
I liked the episode, but:
They’re repeating powers now - we already have a flying man. Although when I first saw the guy hovering outside of Claire’s window, I wondered if he was a vampire (it reminded me of a scene in that terrible Robert Sean Leonard movie, My Best Friend is a Vampire.)
I don’t like it that the heroes spent an entire season trying to get rid of Sylar, yet he’s still alive. And as much as I like Nathan, the fact that he survived the explosion takes something away from his heroic sacrifice. What, did he soar up with Peter and then fling him away before he exploded?
And, most importantly, I liked Mohinder’s hair longer.
The guy he bumped into was Nathan, wasn’t it? All I saw was a big beard and a hooded sweatshirt… which puts the suspicion on Nathan for the rooftop gig, too, since that collision was clearly where the death threat was planted in the newspaper Ando was carrying. I think the significance of the paper thing was just that “Butler” needed to get a new job, and his resumé had nothing on it except working at a paper company!
I enjoyed that scene too, but I found myself wondering how many pounds of Pomeranian hair Mrs. Bennet has accidentally ingested over the years. Same thing last season when she was holding the dog while frosting a batch of cupcakes. Yecchh.
If they are, they’re the palest Dominicans I’ve ever seen.
Having just been there on vacation: yes, probably. I’m just saying. You know it’s true because I read it on the Internet.
After the disappointment of last season’s finale, this felt like a nice, quiet return to form. I think the episode did pretty much exactly what it had to and no more: reintroduce us to the characters and catch us up on their lives for the past four months. (Thankfully we were spared the update on Niki and her family for now. I know that won’t last, but it was a nice break.) Some of their situations were very predictable, some nicely surprising.
For one, I was pleasantly surprised we were all wrong about Kensei being Hiro’s Immortal Dad or ancestor. I’m interested to see where this goes, and how long Hiro will be stuck there.
Did not like the “new Zach” storyline. It felt like watching a repeat of last season. But I did like the awkward Bennet dinner scene and Noah’s copy shop scenes.
It was refreshingly nice to see Mohinder acting smart for a change.
Kudos to George Takei for his Japanese accented English that sounded nothing like his usual English speaking voice.
I thought the hooded guy was Sylar or maybe Peter at first, but now I’m thinking someone new entirely.
Saw Peter’s amnesia coming a mile away. But it’s actually not a bad solution to the problem of him being loaded up with powers. If he can’t remember he has them, or can’t remember the people he needs to remember to use them, he’s not an invisible, radioactive, flying, healing, mind-reading, Constiporting, telekinesing, prognostipainting, plot-wrecking machine.
I’m convinced they have no rhyme or reason as to what this symbol thing is. They have just used it in too many places for it to make any sort of sense if and when they attempt to explain it.
Molly’s acting seems to have improved quite a bit. I like her now, though my wife still finds her grating.
I liked the Honduran siblings, interested to see where it goes, and I hope her power isn’t a Niki/Jessica thing…
Smart of them not to bring Sylar back right away, but now I miss him!
Answers:
I could be hallucinating, but I’m pretty sure the subtitles said outright: “Manhattan - Mohinder Suresh’s apartment” before the Molly/Parkman scene.
Also pretty sure the bearded guy Ando bumped into was Nathan.
The mirror thing with Nathan was just a charred Peter looking back at him. Symbolic only, I think, unless Pete got the Jessica mirror “power” too…
A few questions of my own:
What happened to the Haitian, is he still out there or am I forgetting something?
What was up with Mrs. Petrelli mourning Peter? She said if Nathan followed the plan, Peter would be alive. Huh? I thought her plan was to let him go boom and put Nathan in the Whitehouse?
Why does Mohinder need funding and research to cure the virus? I thought his blood was the cure…
Doh! I’m a dork. That reminds me, though, I loved Nathan straight up telling his mom she’s evil. 
So… you’re thinking that Noah is trying to hide from the Company… by using his resume from the cover identity he had while working for them?
I actually suspected that the copy place is a subsidiary of the paper company cover for the Company, and that Noah is working there to get back-door access… maybe to their computer system. (maybe via Wireless)
He doesn’t need funding and research. That was his bait/cover story he was putting out to get in with the Company so that he and Noah could take it down.
Did Peter show a new power in the shipping container? That bluish flash didn’t match any of his known powers (usually no flash for the telekinesis, and not the usual Radioactive Ted sfx)
How else are you going to be able to learn about Darwin without a Bunsen burner all lit up in front of you? You know what they missed? Several beakers of colored water with a piece of dry ice in each one. Uuuummm, sciencey.
It doesn’t take four months to grow a beard. Not really a good look for Nathan, though.