He did take Elle's power using empathy. Apparently Peter has Empathic Mimicry... Is this the same power?

I'd say it is. It makes sense to me; however, Sylar has not yet learned how to harness that part of his power yet (plus it doesn't make for good story unless he is slicing people's heads open right? haha).

I feel like we don't really know what Peter and Sylar can actually do. I am pretty sure HRG said Sylar can transfer powers to anyone. I took it to mean he could not only take but give.

HMMM!!?


(at work, procrastinating)

Peter and Arthur had similar powers.
Arthur needed to toch someone to take their ability or their life.
Peter just needs to be within a certain proximity.

Gabriel's ability is similar in that he is able to mimic but preferes the kill and view method.

Seems like a family trait.
We know now that Gabriel is not biologicly related to either Arthur or Angela Petrelli.
Maybe he is a cousin to Nathan & Peter... That would keep the family trait idea working.

I would say it was a variation

I'm not convinced that Arthur and Peter shared an ability, Arthur had to take people's powers in a similar fashion as Sylar did, whereas Peter just soaks them up

I'm thinking that perhaps Arthur could also give the abilities that he had taken. Maybe they chose to inject Nathan when he was born because Arthur hadn't reached that point with his power yet. With that line of thought, maybe Arthur had given Sylar that ability to gain his trust.

Or perhaps it was just bad writing..as it doesn't seem like the "Sylar is a Petrelli! HEHE JK" idea was really planned out. Seems like the writers simply changed their minds 3 episodes ago.

(I'm convinced they shared an ability, considering Peter should have absorbed it at the hospital after Heidi was paralyzed. Retcon epic fail.) But anyway, if you compare S1 Peter's ability with Sylar's "empathy" theft from Elle, they're very similar. Peter had to remember the emotional experience of someone to activate their ability, it was only later they removed that aspect of his power and started the path to plot-killing-invincibility. I just like it that Sylar is so unable to connect with people he needs to cut their brains open and divulge the information mechanically. And then he eats it. With cake.

I thought he could give powers too, i was expecting the Sylar/Arthur/Peter show down to include Sylar forcing Arthur to give Peter back his powers



Haha yeah i know what you mean, i just meant the method of them taking powers isn't the same.

In fact i would say there's a scale of how the abilities are given, i'll try and explain it better

Basically....

Peter can just absorb them and use them at will
Arthur can absorb them but has to physically touch them to use them
Sylar can absorb them but has to look at how it works in the brain to use them

I think Arthur is like a middle ground for both men, he's similar to them both and was an important way of showing us this season that Sylar and Peter are more similar than we imagined but also very different too. We saw them basically switch places for a while this Volume to see what it'd be like in each other's shoes and it was certainly weird.

I like the idea you mentioned that Sylar is just unable to connect with people, it's a very good point and is certainly true of the character, it's what makes him such a great lonewolf type Villain as he can't be seen to connect with someone who he will feel is a lesser person than he is and others would probably think he was weak in that sense.

Looking at it like that, i can see what the writers were trying to do this season but it didn't come off very well. The swap between Peter and Sylar should've happened in the same episode.

MagnificoG,

[b]"(I'm convinced they shared an ability, considering Peter [b]should have absorbed it at the hospital after Heidi was paralyzed. Retcon epic fail.)"[/b][/b]

Why would Peter ever use that ability, especially since he gets others abilities just by being near them? That would be redundent and doesn't fit his personality.

"But anyway, if you compare S1 Peter's ability with Sylar's "empathy" theft from Elle, they're very similar. Peter had to remember the emotional experience of someone to activate their ability, it was only later they removed that aspect of his power and started the path to plot-killing-invincibility. "

The only good thing that came out of the amnesiac storyline was that Peter learned he could call on his powers on instinct and they came with emotional tags, for example TK= murderous intent (that was in the pub before he even remembered Sylar.) Plus, the whole 'remembering-how-people-made-him-feel' method was never that effective since it caused him to almost overload and Claude had to knock him out.

"I just like it that Sylar is so unable to connect with people he needs to cut their brains open and divulge the information mechanically. And then he eats it. With cake."

lmao Serial killers generally don't have very good people skills, unless its manipulating.

Personally, I think both Peter and Sylar have the same ability- to synthesize their DNA to use different abilities, they just access it differently.

So it seems that Empathic Mimicry is Sylar's true core ability and Intuitive Aptitude is something he absorbed (where the experiance associated with the ability was likely removed by the Haitian). IA and TK remained after shanti virus infection as they were likely aquired via empathic mimicry, the writers mentioned that and Arthur hinted that this was the real core ability.

That's interesting. That would mean Gabriel's "moment of clarity" expression just before he struck Brain Davis in the back of the head was the moment he acquired TK, and not after inspecting the brain. It would mean he absorbed IA from either his adoptive father or perhaps from a business acquaintance in the watchmaking field, long enough ago that IA actually prevents his core ability from functioning unconsciously like Peter's, rather influencing him to obtain powers by physical inspection of the brain. (Which he then eats.)
Mrs. Gray: "I'll make you a tuna sandwich.."
Gabriel: *thinking about the encounter with Isaac* "No, I'm not hungry..."

Sylar and Peters power are similar but different.

Sylar can get you power by empathizing but he has to try to do it. Sylar's power also gives him an unsatisfiable hunger for knowledge.

Peter just has to be near someone and he automatically has the power.

Since Sylar has to consciously empathize with someone he gain knowledge of his ability right away.

In Peter's case he just gets the power of anyone he walks by that has a power resulting in Peter not even knowing he has the power until he stumble upon it.

Ok here goes. Call me up on anything thats stupid or doesn't make sense.

IA is Gabriel/Sylar's core ability. Its this that gave him the flare for watch repair he is now famous for. His ability to transfer the power of another special is directly linked to to his IA, thats the whole point of the amateur brain surgery, however, It is during villains when Gabe/Sylar thought that he was a Petrelli, he started to connect emotionally with who he thought was his brother. I believe he subconciously figured out how Peter's EM worked and thus was able to assimilate the ability as his own.
I also think that Arthur didn't have a clue that Sylar could absorb abilities without killing. I think he just threw him in with Elle to see what would happen.
The reason Sy has reverted back to his killy ways is because of the whole being lied to, manipulated, Elle you knew all along debacle that was Eclipse Part2 and our father. He has retreated emotionally and simply isn't interested in connecting with people in order to mimic their powers. Plus, he's grown as a killer, actually enjoying it, further rendering his brand of EM moot.

I really like the idea that Sylar's core ability was EM and that he acquired IA either through the Company or unknowingly through a random client.

However it has been mentioned many times on the show that the ability which manifests usually reflects the individuals personality. Both Peter and Sylar felt unimportant in their lives. Peter was living under his brother's shadow and Sylar believed he needed to be more than just a watchmaker's son. So their abilities are the same in that they both allow them to take power from others for themselves.

In a sense the abilities both also involve understanding the individual who's power they are taking. For Peter it's understanding them emotionally (what he struggled with in S1) while for Sylar it's understanding the mechanics of the ability.

Peter has always been the guy who thinks with his heart and his ability reflects that; he acquires power with no harm to the other person. Both Arthur and Sylar take it away permanently.
Sylar is a lot more petulant when it comes to feeling important. Only he wants to be special, only he wants to have that particular ability.

It might just be that they do have the same core ability but Sylar found out the hard way that taking away powers using his method becomes dangerously addictive. It could also explain why Peter couldn't take Sylar's ability in the future; Peter already had it. Sylar only had to teach Peter how to access the ability the way he accesses it which is what produces the hunger. Same way Sylar was taught by Arthur how to use the ability the way Peter accesses it.

This isnt true since his first aquired ability was TK and he empathize with the victim. Thats why he still has TK according to the writers. It was the only ability he got by empathizing. His core ability is IA but he can use that ability to empathize like peter. The only difference is he has to focus to do it and peter doesn't even try to do it.

- Sylar CAN'T mimic power nor can he absorb them like peter
He can use his IA to "connect" to someone and get their power without sculping but to do that he will have to get to know the person, get emotionaly bond and so on... a very long process and very time consuming one so he doesn't bother. Most of all since the other person would had to be willing to cooperate.

- Peter absorbed powers automaticaly and were able to mimic them at will.
However, he had to know that he has these powers to be able to activate them so if a power wouldn't kick in by itself or he would use it accidentally, he could have it but never use it (like many of sylars powers he had but never knew about them).


- Arthur could absorb abilities from others either by stripping the power of the host or keep holding until they were dead (life drain?).


That's what the writers came up with afterwards and used as excuse so he won't go back to the powerless mode he was in S2 cause if he were to keep a ability normally he would have kept only his IA. Since IA = no action, no scalping, everyone can beat up sylar to pulp alone, they kept his TK so he can actually do something and "sold" it like this after tons of requests of fans why he kept tk if he lost all his other powers.

Also called a make up.

I think it was more like this:

Writer #1: Sylar's too powerful. Let's make him have lost all his stolen powers from the virus.
Writer #2: But we've already shown him using TK!
Writer #1: Oh. Fine, he kept TK, we'll just leave that a mystery until we've come up with something.

Later in the season:
Writer #2: We still haven't explained why Sylar still has TK.
Writer #1: You think we have to? Fine, what have you got?
Writer #2: Well, it was Sylar's first power so maybe he did something differently that made it a core ability but maybe it was so difficult or painful that he does things differently after that.
Writer #1: So he did what at first, rearranged his DNA with a hairpin, then started rearranging his brain with TK? Nobody would buy a virus screwed that up. What else you got?
Writer #2: Well, it could be that Sylar only changes the parts of himself he needs to but it takes time for his DNA to change.
Writer #1: Same problem. It has to be something that the virus would screw up.
Writer #2: Well, other than that all I could think of was that Sylar could always absorb powers like Peter?
Writer #1: What would that change?
Writer #2: Well, we could say he only empathized with the TK guy before braining him.
Writer #1: Hmm. I like it.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!! Shame on you for eavesdropping! I approve this^ post, even though it's mean.

They better explain it because quite frankly they seemed to use it to show how Peter and Sylar are related...then they say they aren't brothers?! What the ****!

UM...I was under the impression that the writers came up with everything since they made it all up. So any reason they give IS The reason it happened because it is their story.

Oh and Arthur didn't have life drain. Adam died because of the total loss of his power.


You don't have to be related to have the same powers. And not all related have the same powers.

I know that, but he is shown to have Peter's power of empathy and IA. They made it out like this to make it seem more like they were related...

Arthur drains Regeneration, Adam dies because it's the only thing stoping the aging, so his chronological age catches up with him in seconds and he turns to dust, clearly they weren't on good terms before he was locked up.




Sylar seems to have Empathic Mimicry (or some variant of it) as his true core ability and he absorbed IA from another source (which he used more often as it helped him with what he did). Some thought that Jesse Murphy was the half-brother of Echo DeMille listed on his file because they both have sound manipulation, but it turned out to be a coincidence.

They are defiantly similar but not the same.

Peter, as you said, has Empathic Mimicry.

But Sylar watch someone use their power, understands it and then learns it.
Not the same thing in the end when you think about it.

Same thing goes with the brain thing, he digs around a bit and learns how the power works.


Or have I gotten the whole thing wrong with his powers?

i want to learn more about how sylar can give powers

All these powers and a huge sissy when trying to use them... Hopefully he remembers who he is fast, because the originality of this show has gone down the crapper.

Pretty funny the decline of this show coincided with Peter being neutered.

Can't be arsed to see if there's any other threads like this, so i made my own.

I've been rewatching season 3, and noticing how little sense most of it makes... but anywho, my point is, does anyone else think that it's possible that Gabriel was born with Empathic Mimicry then got Intuitive Aptitude from his dad?

Possibly. Maybe. WHAT EVIDENCE DO YOU HAVE?!

^^ Sorry, mood swings in the afternoon.

lol, no worries

however, there's no real evidence, it's just the fact that he seems to have EM without killing anyone for it, and if he started off with EM he would've been able to get IA from daddy when he killed mommy, but then turned out like Peter did when he took IA from future sylar

Hm....well, then..um....YOU LIE?

lol, I'm joking. POSSIBLY. 'Cause Arthur did say that Sylar had EM in his head but hadn't activated it in Season 3 Volume 3...so,,possibly.

yeah, that's one of the things which led me to believe it...

but it could all be explained easily if the writers planned ahead of time... or at least be clear with the viewers

They want to confuse us. D:

I've skimmed over this thread and some people have similar opinions to me, but I'll post my take on how Sylar's ability works (including "The Hunger") and how it's related to Peter/Arthur's, based on the depictions we've had from the show.

BE WARNED - HERE BE TECHNOBABBLE.

Ok, here goes.

Gabriel's base ability is Intuitive Aptitdue. This enables him to understand the structure and operation of complex mechanical or biological systems. He used this as part of his every day working life to know how the internal components of a timepiece or clock was off by just experiencing the external components and how he was even able to know that Charlie had an aneurysm and that it was due to a clot occluding the artery in her brain, et cetera. When the existance of Abilitied Humans was made to him, he quickly clicked what his ability was and that he could use it to study an A-H's brain to learn how their ability works and use the knowledge to access said ability himself. He essentially reads brains like a textbook. A car mechanic reads a textbook on how to fix a car, then he can fix the car. Gabriel "reads" a brain, then learns how to use the ability. He DOESN'T absorb them - he LEARNS how to use them. This is the reason why the Company "drew a blank" when searching for abilities other than Telekinesis in his DNA in season one. Which brings me to my next point -

Point one. Sylar does not have Empathic Mimicry (Peter and Arthur's ability). Sylar is capable of accessing Empathic Touch-Mimicry as an EXTENSION of his Intuitive Aptitude. This was the reason given (by the writers) for Telekinesis being the only ability aside from IA in his DNA in season one, and thus the only ability which stayed with him after he was cured by the Shanti Virus. He empathically connected with Brian Davis due to the guilt he felt from murdering him. Again in season three, he empathically connected with Elle when he had a heart to heart with her and convinced her to let go of her anger and forgive herself. Both times, Sylar absorbed their abilities using Empathic Touch-Mimicry, an extension of Intuitive Aptitude.

Point two. Sylar is also capable of accessing Empathic Touch-Absorption, another extension of his Intuitve Aptitude. He operates this in a similar manner to "reading" brains. As shown with James Martin and Nathan, Sylar studies said A-H for an extensive amount of time, learns about them and their history, the how's and why's of the actions they take and the reasons behind their motivations and essentially gains and understanding of HOW THEY WORK. After Intuiting said A-H, Sylar can absorb their ability through Empathic Touch-Absorption.

Once again - the abilities that Sylar learns how to use (Freezing, Nucleogenesis, Precognition etc) are not hardwired into his DNA. He simply learns how to use them, meaning the data can be erased due to Shanti viruses or what have you. The abilities he gains through empathy (Telekinesis, Electricity, Shapeshifting, Flight) are absorbed into his DNA, meaning that when he is cured from whatever virus, he will retain control of them (ala season three). The exception that proves the rule is Brian Davis. Sylar killed him and gained his ability using Intuitive Aptitude, but unbeknownst to him, kept it via Empathic Touch-Mimicry.

On a side note - it seems that Samson never tapped into the empathic side of Intuitive Aptitude.

(Now - THE HUNGER. The Hunger is NOT part of the Intuitive Aptitude ability. It's a psychological disorder linked to the ability. Gabriel used IA as part of his every day life, and it wasn't until he discovered the existance of Abilitied Humans and the realization that he could intuit their abilities, that he gained a hunger for understanding more abilities. The Hunger is such a strong psychological disorder that even when Sylar was infected with the Shanti Virus, the disorder stayed with him. Think of the Shanti Virus like the "Haitian pills" from season two, or indeed the Haitian's Ability Negation ability. The virus, the pills and the Haitian's ability stops you from accessing your abilities, making them dormant; they don't remove them. The virus made Sylar's learned abilities dormant, but it couldn't remove the abilities in his DNA (Intuitive Aptitude, Telekinesis). This also explains why Daphne retained the use of her legs whilst around the Haitian, and why Adam never turned to dust. THE ECLIPSE takes abilities away COMPLETELY, meaning that Sylar lost his Intuitive Aptitude (which he even made a passing comment about) and any subsequent psychological disorders - The Hunger - that came with it.

Peter and THE HUNGER. Peter gained The Hunger when he unlocked Intuitive Aptitude because of his similar emotional problems to Gabriel. Peter had an overwhelming "need" to understand how to save the world. He met Future Nathan, who realized that his past brother didn't trust him and urged him to read his mind. Peter did, and gained an understanding of Nathan's thinking, but because Peter was essentially the most selfless Hero of them all, he failed to understand how a person (Future Nathan) could literally be evil, thus provoking his Hunger to tell him that the best way to understand would be to "read" Nathan's brain. The same can be said for when he tried to kill Angela.)

So finally, Arthur, Peter and Sylar ARE all Empaths. But while it comes naturally to Arthur and Peter, Sylar must put conscious effort into literally connecting with someone on an empathic level, or he must put conscious time and effort into fully learning about somebody to absorb their ability.

Once again, this is all just my take, and if you DO put the time into reading it, I'd love to hear some thoughts!

so much to read, good job, i like what you think about the hunger very interesting i kind of agree on that now

...

"Hory Crapu" ~ Hiro

It... all... makes... sense...

I liked the Sylar got IA from his dad version of it, and have had it in the back of my mind for awhile. Sampson shows no evidence of being able to do it empathically at all. Peter had EM separately from IA completely, which went haywire when he activated it. EM seems to work differently depending on the host at the time of manifestation, so a young IA saddled sociopathic Sylar would have no way of using his empathic mimicry.

Ok I was looking on the internet to see what everyone else thinks about sylar being empathetic, and thought i'd post a thought i've had, in the first season mohinder explains that peter changes his dna to be able to use all his different abilities, because sylar has so many, perhaps it is possible that because he changes his dna to use his abilities so often that with his intuition he may be able to change his dna to use powers he hasn't acquired?