In the episode: “The Lion’s Den”, as well as the continuation of story arcs stemming from the previous episodes, we finally get a glimpse of the world ending threat that will act as a plot device into the whole mini-series. Here, according to Renautas, our protagonists will be facing off against a huge wave of solar radiation that would wipe out 96% of the entire planet! So I guess that Malina’s destiny involves the stopping of this. Elsewhere, Farrah and Malina are still on the run from Renautas and their using of Evo hunting technology in the form of Epic. In Los Angeles, we find that Epic has reached the police forces for their use against Evos as Captain Dearing, the corrupt cop Evo is captured. In New York, Luke returns home after his revelation to Joanne about his Evo status. In Carbondale, Tommy is being registered as a known Evo to the government. Meanwhile at Renautas, Noah, Quentin and Taylor all confront Erica about her plans with Evos.

As usual, Tommy’s arc seems to speed along as usual. We make important discoveries into who he is. Apparently he was adopted by his mother and have been on the run since. Of course when something like this is introduced, audiences such as myself tend to wonder at whether or not Tommy is a secret Petrelli given his desire to help people like Clare and Peter as well as the mysterious man with the hat and coin, Caspar Abraham pointing out that Tommy is special much like Clare, Peter and Nathan were in the past.

Like Tommy, Malina’s own story is speeding forward nicely. Here both Farrah and Malina confront agents from Renautas like Harris Prime, the Evo who can copy himself. Malina like many other “saviour” type characters from different sorts of fiction experience the loss of the mentor character early on in their hero’s journey. It’ll be sure to up the stakes for her character as she’ll probably grow into a strong female hero character on the show. I hope she gets in touch soon with Hero Truther aka Micah from the original show and his gang as seen in the Dark Matters prequel. The action scenes and visual effects however did come across a little cheap and it was easy to tell that it was a little fake. Speaking of the Dark Matters prequel, Phoebe makes a small appearance. I wonder what’s in store for her.

Not much was seen in Los Angeles as Carlos tried to confront the LAPD about the kidnappings Captain Dearing was responsible for in the previous episode. Although Epic was introduced and it gave a glimpse into how quick his buddies would turn on him. It’ll be interesting to see the dynamic of Carlos and James moving forward considering he now owes him one.

My gripe with this episode was that Luke’s arc was a little drawn out and dragged on for a good amount of the episode. To be honest, the kind of back
story explored here would’ve been better off in a tie-in comic. We didn’t need to know again about Luke and his family. We already knew that once upon a time before that fateful day in June that he had a happy life along with Joanne. The burning of the house down however does symbollically remind folk that he’s leaving the life behind and it’ll make audiences wonder what kind of plans lie ahead of him.

An interesting turn happens at Renautas as Miko’s story arc collides with Noah’s/Quentin’s. Noah, Quentin and Taylor all confront Erica about her plans to “save our species” as well as Noah’s lack of memories pertaining to June 13th as well as Clare’s death which of course don’t go as smoothly when guns are raised and Harris Prime enters the mix. All of a sudden Miko jumps in and retrieves Hiro Nakamura’s sword. She then goes back into the game and retrieves her father.

Overall the episode was rather satisfactory for the most part, except a little drawn out in some places. Here’s hoping that Hiro Nakamura’s appearance
as teased repeatedly isn’t a poor one. Apart from the Petrelli’s he was one of my favourite characters.