NBC's "Heroes" began the second half of its first season last night in predictably excellent fashion. It wasn't as exciting as some of the earlier episodes, or even the crackerjack fall season finale. But for an episode basically designed to bring newbies up to speed and remind established watchers of our expansive cast of characters and their abilities, it actually got a lot of things done. To wit:

-Hiro began his sword quest. We know that, eventually, Hiro will get himself the must-have accessory for any hero-in-training, the samurai sword. The "future Hiro" who visited Peter on the subway back in, like, episode 3 had one, and Isaac painted Hiro facing off against a dinosaur with one during one of his future-vision things. I got worried for a second last night when Hiro and Ando made way for the Museum of Natural History in NYC (getting a lot of play in the showbiz lately, between this and that Ben Stiller flick; I prefer the Met) and rather easily seemed to find the sword in question in one of the exhibits. Thankfully it was all a red herring. The sword Hiro took was a fake, and real one is owned by --- wouldn't you know it? --- The Linderman Group. And so Hiro's quest begins anew, and he's tied in to the man who one way or another is connected to all the heroes we've met. Also of note: The scabbard on this ancient sword features the same symbol that's on Nikki's back when she's Bad Nikki, and which Isaac painted repeatedly. Ando says it's a combination of two Japanese characters, one meaning gift from god and the other meaning something else I can't remember. I love Easter Eggs like that. Anyway, let's see Hiro jump to the past, get this crazy Japanese sword, and fight some dinos. Yee-haw!

-The Claire plotline is breaking my heart. As she explained to Memory Eater Guy (they really need to give him a name), everything in her life up until now has been fake and she needs something real that's hers. And so, even as she lies to her father by claiming to have lost all the memories of her abilities, she reaches out to ex-friend Zack, who Memory Eater Guy whammied for real. The rest of the episode is Claire trying to convince Zack that she's not crazy and to reestablish a friendship with him that she desperately needs right now. And I'll tell you what, that Hayden Panettiere is a damn fine little actress. The acting on this show is generally so-so, but she's fantastic. I'm curious where this story is going, though, since the actor who plays Zack was cast to star in the new Terminator TV show.

-I'm generally a huge fan of the Nikki/Jessica character, but this jail thing just bores me. We know she'll get out of it. The only thing that interested me last night was that she no longer needs reflective surfaces to trigger her personality switches; she's even doing them in front of other people. And also, it seemed like it was Nikki --- not Jess --- who used super strength to snap that guard's baton. I wonder if she's going to be able to assimilate the Jess persona into her own, and just be straight-up super strong all the time. Hey, it worked for the Hulk for a good while!

-Mohinder: Zzzzz...

-The Petrelli clan: Peter spent almost the entire episode in a coma, reliving the future visions from last episode over and over again. And I think the writers realized Nathan was coming off as too much of an ass, hence the touchy-feely bedside scenes with Pete. But then again I wonder, Nathan knows that Peter thinks he's the bomb that goes off, and Nathan seemed very interested by Hiro's take that a "villain" was responsible for the bomb and needs to be stopped. Could Nate be planning to kill his own brother, albeit to save the world?

-Isaac: Sure does clean up good. But now that he's clean and can access his abilities, he's more of a plot device than legitimate character. The whole love triangle with him, Peter, and Simone doesn't interest me in the least, since Simone is the only character on the show more boring than Mohinder.

-Sylar: How'd they get him back in that cage after the Eden death match?

-Two new heroes: From what little we saw, we have Dude Who Explodes (there goes my theory that it was Radiation Roy's powers that Pete will absord to make him 'splode) and The Invisible Jackass. I'm sure he'll get fleshed out more next episode, but Invisible Jackass' character is nearly identical to the crazy subway guy from "Ghost" who taught Patrick Swayze how to interact with the physical world. Think about it and you'll see I'm right.