Cult Spy: Tangled 'Heroes'

Assuming you’ve been trundling along at UK pace - and not cheekily doing some heavy duty downloading – you’ll have been subjected to some quite stunning revelations on Heroes over the last fortnight. Since the first chapter of the epic series hit our screens, we’ve seen how seemingly disparate characters are gradually being revealed to have interwoven links to each other, sometimes totally oblivious to the fact. So here’s a rundown of where we stand now in terms of several key interlocking narratives of the show. (We considered creating a massive Venn Diagram for a visual demonstration, but budgetary issues put paid to that dastardly scheme).

Most recently, we’ve learnt that self-healing cheerleader Claire is in fact that daughter of gravity-defying politician Nathan Petrelli, along with flame-fingered Jackie. This revelation came totally out of the blue and is rather ironic given that Nathan did his best to stop brother Peter heading off to save the cheerleader from the menace known as Sylar. Claire’s also just struck up some kind of alliance with the mysterious mind-wiping Haitian, who had earlier prevented Matt from doing any mind-reading when the teenager was taken in by police for questioning.

Don’t forget too that the whole ‘save the cheerleader, save the world’ mantra was spawned by the over-excitable timestopper Hiro, who appeared from the future to tell this to Peter. She’s also linked to portentous painter Isaac, for he visualised Claire being threatened at her school.

Claire’s surrogate father Mr Bennet, who’s far too cool to have a first name (and best left hidden if it’s something like Harold), has delved his fingers into many hero-related pies across the narrative. It turns out he had a history with the late, Mohinder-deceiving, mind controller Eden, rescuing her from a life of depravity.

The spectacle-wearing man managed to have the party-trick laden trio of Nathan, Matt and Sylar in his custody recently, aided by The Haitian, who is currently being a tad duplicitous by not following the order to wipe Claire's mind. The invisible Claude has also had dealings with Bennet in the past, which led to his apparent death at the time. Or so they thought...

Poor Niki is another character at the centre of the web, particularly thanks to her body often being inhabited by the vicious spirit of her seemingly deceased sister Jessica. Niki is of course married to DL Hawkins, who can pass through solid objects, and has a son in the form of machine-manipulating Micah. But it’s Jessica who seems to have dug her claws into a few others, such as sleeping with Nathan as part of a blackmail plot.

Having been released from jail last week, she wasted no time in embarking on another malevolent mission, which resulted in her pushing Matt out of a window, where he was lucky to escape death. The mysterious name of Mr Linderman has also been strongly linked to her, but the full facts have yet to emerge – rather like the man himself…

So, after reading the above there’s no reason to be at all confused by the tangled web of inter-character relationships on Heroes. Well, until it emerges that Hiro is actually Claire’s post-op transsexual daughter from the future. Keep your eyes peeled for that one…