Peter Petrelli
Template:Heroes character box Peter Petrelli is one of the series' protagonists on the NBC drama Heroes, played by Milo Ventimiglia. He can mimic the powers of other superhuman characters.
Character history
Discoveries
In the premiere episode, Peter Petrelli is a nurse living in New York City. He is sensitive and compassionate, wears his heart on his sleeve and is described as a "dreamer". Peter is also defined by his complex relationship with his older brother, Nathan, to whom he feels very close, even claiming he has a sort of metaphysical connection that allowed him to know immediately when Nathan suffered a serious accident in the past. Differences between Peter and Nathan, an ambitious politician who is so focused on his congressional campaign that he shows no compassion when their mother is arrested for shoplifting, have caused tensions between the brothers.
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.
Drawing a crude stick figure image with one figure levitating a few feet above the ground, Peter gets an idea. Attempting to discover the truth, Peter stands on the edge of another rooftop later that evening. Nathan arrives, and Peter threatens to jump if Nathan doesn't tell him what really happened. Nathan admits that they both flew: Nathan first caught Peter, lost his grip, and then Peter flew some way down to the ground before falling. Peter at first doesn't believe it, thinking Nathan is only telling him what he wants to hear, but then Peter realizes he is levitating just as they argue. However, Peter's later attempts to fly, when he is away from his brother's presence, are unsuccessful.
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, while also noting that Peter looked different "without [the] scar". He finally tells Peter to go and visit Isaac Mendez, the precognitive painter and Simone's former boyfriend.
"Save The Cheerleader"
Peter visits Isaac and convinces him to see past their differences. He learns that Isaac has predicted a nuclear explosion will happen in New York soon, and they both become convinced that saving this unknown cheerleader is somehow connected to averting the catastrophe. While in Isaac's company, Peter also confirms that his superhuman ability involves copying other superbeings' abilities, when he manages to mimic the painter's powers, finishing one painting that apparently shows the cheerleader killed by a figure that resembles Sylar.
In the episode "Nothing to Hide," Peter has a dream about Simone's ailing father. In the dream, he tells the sick man that he can fly. Simone later comes to his apartment and tells him that her father has died. Before he died, her father told her that he had dreamed of flying with Peter and is worried about the state of the world. However, Peter told him that there are people who care and who will save the world from destruction. Simone then tells Peter that she has sold the painting by Isaac to a man named Linderman in Las Vegas. Peter believes the painting will help him to save the world.
Peter goes to Nathan's hoping that his brother can help convince Linderman to give up the painting. When he gets there, he finds, Nathan, their mother, and Nathan's family attending a brunch with a newspaper reporter. Peter joins them and is surprised when the reporter implies that Nathan may have cheated on his wife, Heidi, with a blonde in Las Vegas. Peter then claims Nathan was arranging for a private clinic to treat Peter's mental illness. That night, Nathan talks with Peter about what happened in Vegas. Peter is unhappy Nathan cheated on Heidi, but Nathan tries to explain himself. Before he leaves, Nathan says he was temporarily kidnapped, and warns Peter that people will want to lock them up if they realize the two of them have powers. Peter is skeptical of Nathan's story.
In "Homecoming", Peter's brother Nathan Petrelli destroys the missing painting created by Isaac Mendez, which depicts a dead Peter. He intends to stop Peter from going to the homecoming game and getting killed. However, Simone shows Peter a photograph of the painting and has taken the liberty of tracking the school down for him. Peter goes to the high school in Odessa, Texas and meets Claire Bennet. Sylar soon shows up to kill Claire, and Peter tries to hold him off while Claire escapes. During their battle, Peter tackles Sylar and the pair fall off the roof of Union Wells High. Sylar survives the fall, but it seems as if Peter hasn't. However, when Claire shows up, Peter mimics her healing powers. As he begins resetting his bones, he asks Claire to call the police. Claire's father has already taken the liberty of doing so, so they show up while Peter is still covered in his own blood and arrest him.
The episode "Six Months Ago" reveals why Peter believes he has a metaphysical connection with his brother when, during a dream, he sees Nathan and Heidi get into the car accident that paralyzes Nathan's wife from the waist down (a scene which also shows Nathan using his ability to fly apparently without meaning to do so). Peter proves there is some hint of a brotherly connection to Nathan when he asks the latter about "the other car" involved in the accident, a detail no one else knew except for Nathan, Heidi, and any persons riding in the other car.
In "Fallout," Peter is in jail when he has a vision in which he is visited by his brother, who apparently metamorphoses into Sylar, causing Peter to wake up violently. Later, Peter finds himself using the telepathic power of LA cop Matt Parkman during an interview regarding Sylar's attack on Union Wells High. He tells them Claire Bennet was the real target, and after they interview her she visits Peter, believing he shares her powers. On the contrary, Peter's health is deteriorating for unknown reasons. Claire leaves Peter's cell, telling him that he is her hero; a short time later, Nathan gets Peter out of jail. On their way out of the building, Peter passes out and has a vision in which he sees the other main characters in a city street just before beginning to ignite. As his brother walks up to him, he begins to yell out and explode. After recovering from the vision, Peter tries to explain it to his brother, but stops breathing and falls unconscious.
Waking up
Soon, Peter becomes comatose. His family watch worriedly by his bedside, and two weeks later he has only gotten worse. As Nathan fears the worst, Peter continues to have the same vision, with some variation. Eventually, a new face appears in his dreams. This man, a tall Englishman in need of a shave, is shown laughing as the events unfold. Another new scene indicates that Peter may be mimicking Ted Sprague's radioactive powers. Eventually, Peter wakes up, and decides that his next destination is "the desert". Out at night, he uses a cell phone and makes travel plans, looking for a place where nuclear testing has been done. Las Vegas is recommended. As he's put on hold, he notices the Englishman from his dreams stealing from a purse. Peter confronts the man, who is shocked that someone can see him. Soon, the man accosts Peter, and tells Peter to leave him alone. Instead, Peter tracks the man, who joking called himself "Claude Rains", and asks "Claude" to teach him. "Claude" declines, and tells Peter to stop following him. Peter returns to his apartment to pack his things. Soon, Claude comes by and seems willing to reconsider Peter's offer, though he insists it won't be easy. After Claude leaves, Mohinder and Nathan come in before Peter can follow. Mohinder believes that if he allowed to test Peter he can help him. Peter says he doesn't have time to be Mohinder's guinea pig. Nathan is insistant that Peter not going running off again. To get away, Peter pretends to reconsider, then runs out the door. Due to the sight of an open window, Mohinder and Nathan run down the stairs to catch Peter. However, this was further misdirection, and Peter is actually hiding invisibly with Claude.
Powers and abilities
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 an otherwise fatal fall in "Homecoming".
Visions
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 died. A more recent vision shows Peter exploding in downtown New York while other characters looked on. Among these characters are D.L. Hawkins, Niki Sanders and Micah Sanders, a family whom he had never met before. Later, Claude, another character Peter had yet to meet, appeared in a slightly altered vision Peter had while comatose.
Side effects
When mimicking certain powers in the presence of their inherent user, Peter and that person may sometimes experience unusual side effects. When Future Hiro appears to Peter near the end of "Collision", everything else is frozen in time relative to them. While the time freezing is Hiro's doing, it is unclear whether or not Peter may be passively mimicking Hiro's powers to remain unfrozen. Later, Peter passively mimics Claude's power of invisibility to both see Claude and remain unseen by everyone else.
The side effects are not always so harmless, however. When Peter mimics Matt Parkman's telepathy in "Fallout", they both get acute headaches from the sudden ability to hear each other's thoughts, similar in principle to audio feedback. Milo Ventimiglia also revealed in an NBC internet interview that Peter is vulnerable to negative effects. If Peter absorbs several powers in a matter of minutes to a few hours, he can suffer from the multitude of abilities operating in unison. This, combined with a particularly shocking vision, even resulted in Peter being comatose for two weeks.
