Peter Petrelli
 Peter Petrelli These tensions are exacerbated when Peter starts having extraordinarily vivid dreams of flying. He tries to confide in Nathan, but his brother tells him that the dreams are a sign of psychological distress. Eventually Peter summons Nathan to witness as he jumps off a building to prove he can fly. However, it's Nathan who flies, catching Peter as he falls. Peter blacks out after the brothers lose their grip on each other, to wake on the hospital with muddled recollections of what has happened. Nathan claims neither of them flew and that Peter simply jumped, nearly killing himself. Between this and his mother's revelation that Peter's late father had been mentally unstable as well as suicidal, Peter is led to believe he's going crazy.
Peter decides to quit his job as a nurse, saying that he no longer feels right "trying to save the world one person at a time" but is meant for something more. As he is leaving, he confides to Simone Deveaux, the daughter of the dying man Peter has cared for, that he has loved her ever since he first saw her. The two of them spend a night together, even though Simone doesn't know how she truly feels about Peter, having just broken up with Isaac Mendez, a tortured painter addicted to heroin.
The first hints of Peter’s greater destiny come when he is contacted by a future version of Hiro Nakamura, a man with the power to manipulate time. This visit occurs when Peter is riding the subway, and all the other passengers are frozen in time. Hiro has come to give Peter a message: "Save the cheerleader, save the world". He urges Peter to be "the one we need", saying this was what Peter always wanted to hear. He finally tells Peter to go and visit Isaac Mendez, the precognitive painter and Simone's former boyfriend.
Powers
Mystery surrounded Peter's powers before and after the first few episodes. While every main character was said outright to have a power in press releases, Peter was simply billed as "trying to convince his brother he can fly". Eventually, Peter did indeed display the ability to levitate, but only while in the vicinity of his brother, who has the ability to fly. An article from the October 9-14 TV Guide explains that Peter actually mimics the powers of other nearby heroes.
Peter's ability to mimic powers only requires that he be near another hero, at which point he automatically mimics their ability. He seems to be able to use the powers he mimics instinctively, though some abilities do require some effort on his part to activate. In "Hiros", Peter successfully mimics Isaac's precognition in order to finish a painting. He believes his crude levitation sketch was also a product of Isaac's copied power. He was able to mimic Claire Bennet's healing factor after spending only a few minutes near her to heal from a potentially fatal fall in "Homecoming". Also, Peter mimics Matt Parkman's telepathy in "Fallout", causing both to get acute headaches from the sudden ability to hear each other's thoughts, similar in principle to audio feedback. As revealed by Milo Ventimiglia in an interview on NBC's Heroes website, Peter is unable to absorb several powers in succession without suffering negative effects from the multitude of abilities operating in unison.
Peter has also had several clairvoyant visions. The first two were related to his brother's flight ability, in which Peter himself was flying. He also saw Charles Deveaux in what appears to have been a shared dream, right before the elderly man passed away. The most recent vision was of himself exploding in downtown New York while other characters looked on.
Character details
Played by: Milo Ventimiglia
First seen: Genesis
Source: Wikipedia |
Characters 