"Heroes" Season Three, "Villains," begins September 22 on NBC

Annnnnd we're back!Yesterday we posted part one of the BEHIND THE ECLIPSE Summer Spectacular featuring "Heroes" writers/producers Joe Pokaski and Aron Coleite. Today, we present Part II of the in-depth Q&A. But before we get in to it, we wanted to make sure all you "Heroes" fans were aware that Joe and Aron also have some interesting comics coming out. The first two issues of Aron's run on "Ultimate X-Men" are now on sale with a third just weeks away. You can read an interview about his work on the series right here on CBR. Not to be outdone, Joe Pokaski is the writer of August's "Secret Invasion: Inhumans," and we've got an exclusive preview of the issue right here. Check 'em out.Alright, on to the Q&A!Today we start with a guy named Louis. Once upon a time, you stated that you drew influence for "Heroes" from the Myth of the Nine Unknown Men. Any plans to elaborate on that? It seems like an interesting thing to play with.Stay tuned. (For a couple more years).

Big teases! Rangy1011 from Germany asks: We saw many interesting objects in the vault: three playing cards (Queens), a wooden horse, a brain in a glass, a pyramid... But as Hiro comes into the vault, Adam is reaching for a golden key. He didn't seem as if he wanted to have a mere look at it, he seemed to know exactly what he was doing. Is the key going to be a future subject? Or are we going to find out anything about the other objects?The key is going to play pretty huge into season 7 mythology. That's all we can say. And we can tell you that the Wooden Horse is full of Tiny Greek Men. Other than that -- keep your eyes peeled for recurrences of these objects in real time and flashbacks. Dawn Maker wants to know: Is Peter's absolute genuine belief in the goodness of people the reason why he never read Adam's mind to learn the truth? Or was it because Adam's had 400 years to learn how to stop mind reading from occurring?Little of both.Dawn continues:

Also, if Claire's and Peter's regenerative power is the same, then why is Claire the only one who can 'heal' those with the virus?Peter's power is technically to mimic other people's powers -- but there may be a distinction as what his blood can do in relation to Claire. Adam, on the other hand...Karen Miller, who had a question yesterday, snuck back in today with more. I love Elle, and I think she's one of the best new additions (if not THE best) this season. We saw a lot of parallels between Claire and Elle in the latter half of Volume 2, with Elle being Claire's dark shadow, in many ways. Will you follow up on this in Volume 3?Heck, yeah!Also, will Peter and Elle ever meet again?Heck, kinda. Simpkins wants to know:

In "Out of Time," Caitlin is ripped away from Peter and deported to 2008 Ireland. Last we saw 2008, the Shanti Virus (presumably Strain 138) wiped out 93% of the population. That future has apparently been averted. Caitlin has just entered a sort of 'no man's land.' The question presents itself: Has the future, and the present that she is now in, changed around her, as it did for Ando when Hiro left for April 2006 back in episodes 108-111 to save Charlie, or has she and the entire future that surrounded her disappeared into nonexistence? Did she die during the outbreak? If the her present changed, are there plans to visit her in the future, either by time travel trip or reaching the date in the narrative? Are there plans to bring her back to the present?Our heads are spinning from the permutations. Peter's trapped Caitlin in a future that doesn't exist anymore. It's pretty hard to get back from that. (We would've seen Peter try to get Caitlin back in the remainder of Season 2, but in Season 3 -- he has a whole other slate of problems to deal with.)Fighting Spirit 77 asks: Last year I heard two things. One: we would learn about Linderman's wife. Two: Adrian Pasdar said (regarding the end of season one) that we would find out what happened to Nathan's father, he was dead for sure, but we would never guess who killed him. Have these ideas been scraped or changed in some way? Both ideas really intrigued me. I was actually surprised not to see Mrs. Linderman in the picture of the 12. You'll get the answer to one of those questions in "Villians." The rest is TBD. Fighting Spirit 77 continues:

It also brings up the question: How far in advance do you break your stories and ideas? Do you have ideas about characters and motivations that may not even come to light for a few years? And how far in advance do you tell the actors these kind of things? Meaning if say someone has a power and the audience doesn't know it yet (cough, Angela, cough, Angela) would you tell the actor to play it in the subtext, or just let them find out in the script themselves? Maybe even base the power or motivation off of things the actor seems to be playing or doing in past episodes?We break our stories as far in advance as possible -- but reality always ends up creeping up. We absolutely have some ideas for characters or episodes that aren't perfect until they are. There's a high-concept for episodes 10 and 11 that we tossed around early last season. And a few great concepts that we're pocketing until the right moment in our character's lives. Sometimes we let the actor play it blind (if the character truly doesn't know) and sometimes we collaborate with the actor on the reveal. As Tim established in the Pilot -- powers generally come from personality -- so the actors are collaborators through their performance. Other times, they are let in on the surprise so they can inform it -- the example that comes to mind is Nathan really being Sylar in "Five Years Gone." Adrian was able to study Zach's performance and character and split the difference in the scenes leading up to the surprise.Hugo from Canada writes in with the following: Something has been bothering me since episode 2x03, "Kindred." Sylar loses his powers and kills Candice/Michelle/Betty ... but did he also absorb her power (it's just unusable like all the others)? If/When Sylar gets all his powers back, will he also get Candice's? If not, since he has seen her brain, could he use Charlie's enhanced memory to remember it and do whatever it is that he does with brains to obtain her power? Or does he need the actual brain to perform the power theft?

Sylar did not absorb Candice's power. Or Michelle'. Or Betty's. He will not get her power back when he reboots (although the Charlie theory is pretty rad). We'll be exploring exactly what Sylar does (and does not do) with the brain in the first hour of the new season. Eoin Cunningham did some great research and asks: Back when we saw that Peter Petrelli's apartment number was 1407, some fans (including me, geek that I am) picked up that this was also the number of the X-Men's mansion. So when I saw Angela Petrelli open door 1909 into Nathan's hospital room, I immediately started doing my homework to see if it meant anything. It didn't take me too long to think I was onto something. The Futurist Manifesto was written in 1909. Briefly, it was written in order to help usher in the modernization of Italy, which ties in with "Heroes'" theme of evolution. It also launched an art movement, Futurism, which ties in with its recurring motif of paintings. The manifesto promotes among other things the idea that 'beauty exists only in struggle,' and the clincher is article 9 (there's that number!) which states that war is "the only cure for the world." Seeing as this is not only the belief of Adam Monroe, Linderman and their followers, but specifically Angela's idea of Nathan's destiny, can you tell me if I am onto something here? Nice stuff, Eoin. Guys? Should "The Futurist Manifesto" be required reading for all "Heroes" fans?We have not read "The Futurist Manifesto." And we're beginning to wonder why. We like both of those words.Eoin, you're too smart for your own good!Alisha B has some questions about Kensei.

Okay, so now we know Adam is Kensei and Adam is killing the older heroes by placing the Helix over their faces as a death threat. So, has the mystery of the Helix symbol been revealed, seeing how it was the symbol of Kensei and seeing how Kensei started the Company with the group of Twelve? Or are the mysteries of the symbol just being revealed? Also, how does the symbol and Adam relate to all the mundane appearances of the symbol?You want some summer reading to do? Look up Fibonacci. And Fractals. And patterns that occur in nature over and over again. Fun stuff for the beach. A lot of people asked about Tim Kring comments printed in Entertainment Weekly, towards the end of Season 2, in which he admits mistakes were made at the beginning of the season. George T asked: Did the writers know Tim was going to do this? Were these missteps something he discussed with you? It was a great list he came up with - did he actually come up with these from fan comments? Or did he realize from his TV experiences as well? An interesting question -- how did the writers room feel about all this?Sadly it's true -- we aren't the perfect storytellers that we thought we were. We were human and have made mistakes. It takes a big man to admit his mistakes, it takes an even bigger man to publish them in a national magazine.

There seems to be some confusion as to who stopped the hurricane, as evidenced by the many questions on the subject we received, so we'll hand t over to Miles Nelson:Lately, we've been seeing abilities being used in different ways, or been shown more powerful forms of them (i.e. Matt and Maury). Will there be more father/son connection/expansion of abilities this season? For example, Nathan and Mr. Petrelli: are their powers connected? I read a theory that Nathan's ability to fly comes from him being having Aerokinesis, or the ability to control air (and gasses such as oxygen, hydrogen, etc). And last episode we were told that a member of the group of 12 stopped a hurricane from destroying the east coast. Could Mr. Petrelli have had Nathan's power and used it to control the weather and stop the hurricane? Please tell me if I'm on to something.You're on to something? Or you're on something? Oz wrote to ask: I've been trying to figure out whether Hiro actually changed the past, or whether he just created the myth of Kensei by essentially being the Kensei he grew up adoring. The fact that the myth had Kensei cutting out his own heart for Yaeko's sake seems to imply that originally Adam-Kensei and not Hiro-Kensei was the mythological Kensei (!!) but still, I can't seem to wrap my brain around the idea that he could have changed history so much without actually changing history just because Yaeko promised to keep the myth alive. So basically, what I'm asking is: did Hiro change the past, or was Hiro always his own... hero?We like to believe the second version -- but we crafted the story to keep this kind of debate going. Good for us. Yay Team Heroes! Melissa asked:

Have you ever considered making an episode that revolves entirely around the original heroes? A look many years into the past, to show us these previous Heroes, their powers in full-effect and view, and shed light on their relationships? I believe that kind of episode would surpass "Company Man" and "Five Years Gone" by many miles.Episode 15 of season 2, "1977" was to do exactly that. CajenMB had a question about Adam. Concerning Adam, this seems to be another example of a deliberate name, once again with a biblical tie-in. Does Adam represent the first individual with extraordinary abilities?Hmmmm......

Riddler Rob of Long Island, New York asked: For starters, I'm big into debates, and there is one that is driving us over at Heroeswiki insane. You guys nodded to "Electrokinesis" in a past BTE. Can we consider this a coined term, or is something along the lines of "Electricity Generation," "Electricity Manipulation," or "Electrogenesis" more accurate?" Consider no term coined. This is the real world. Second, we've seen the past "Rapid Cellular Regeneration," which could be shortened to just Regeneration, and the more recent "Adoptive Muscle Memory," which some people originally called "Photographic Reflexes." Will we see any more powers scientifically renamed to the masses by Suresh?Heck yeah. And we'll see how close he can come to accuracy. Riddler Rob is chatty today and has one more for you.

Do you think any staff of the "Heroes" production team (anyone from writers to producers, etc.) will make cameo appearances on the show? I think it'd be cool to see a couple of you guys show a power... just try not to get killed by Sylar. Foz McDermott, who is the assistant to Co-Executive Producer Jim Chory, did show up as a bouncer in episode 208 "Four Months Ago" - and you can see a lot of names and faces of our crew in props and desk-plates around the show. Finally, we couldn't let the fans have all the fun so one question from us -- any hints as to what you guys have planned for Comic-Con in July?All we can say is we're gong to have five episodes shot by then. And we're bringing some of it with us.Sounds like it's going to be tough getting into the "Heroes" panel again this year! Get their early, folks! Thanks, guys. We'll see you at San Diego and this fall, when BEHIND THE ECLIPSE returns!Now discuss this story in CBR's TV/Film forum.