Why was Nathan's kill order ignored when the squad went after Sylar? At what point does "take him alive" start sounding like a good idea?

Just the writers taking liberties with probability a bit and hoping we'll suspend disbelief.

I hope it's not something as lame as that. I thought maybe the president was less zealous/cold-blooded as Nathan and wouldn't sign off on civilian executions, and so countermanded his order. Curious to see how they move forward in future confrontations now that they see what happens when stun darts are used..

That is also possible. Then again Sylar is a serial killer. Hmmm, tough one.

Well, their next big surprise will be when he stops and shoots their bullets back at them. I am curious what they do after that, though. Too soon for Sherman tanks?

Hmm, they just didn't manage to do so, it seems! A huge fight occured (it was actually an awesome fight), and Sylar won it! There is nothing in those show that exclude failures, you know?

I don't know.. If this was Grand Theft Auto, how many stars would he have?

I figured Angela had something to do with the disobeying of the the orders.

They underestimated him. They feel all high and mighty after capturing so many specials and ignore the President's orders, say "Whatever" and just do what they want. Neither the Hunter nor HRG was there to give them direction. I'm thinking that Nathan's order wasn't a kill order, but rather to shoot the DARTS in the back of the neck. Sylar, however, has clearly demonstrated that no chemicals could hold him back. Which would you rather have, Sylar in a plane with a dozen specials, or him running around causing havok on he search for his father?

What nathan meant was to "deactivate him" or kill him with a bullet in the back of his head.
To be honest they could had accomplished that easily through a silencer since he was distracted.
He got the Darts on him anyway and even the scene was ridicoulos doing as if 4 darts wouldn't put him to sleep as a "borrower" of claires ability while Claire as originator already was druged but oh well.. they want him walking free around so they do anything to keep it that way.

My theory is that Nathan isn't really in charge of the operation. He thinks he is. Meteoric rise makes for a great fall-guy later on. I think the government wants Sylar for study, for a super weapon, whatever. "Hello Osama. My name is Sylar."

All they need to do is figure out how to control Sylar. Since they only know Sylar by reputation, they easily might 'misunderestimate' the difficulties involved, just as the Company and Pinehurst did.

Clearly Nathan's order was countermanded. Angela may have high placed operatives of her own in the US government. In fact, as early as the episode with Matt finding Molly it was implied. The red-haired female Agent--who may be CIA, NSA or someone else altogether--totally discounts all the "Sylar" evidence.

Someone has been protecting Sylar for a long time. I'm betting its Angela. As I've said elsewhere, she may be his "godmother" or aunt.

I don't buy that it was Angela, but I do think he's being countermanded once in a while. Possibly by a hidden special.

It can't be Angela since:

- it's not her operation, it's nathans
- she would be rather happy to have sylar dead instead of having someone that wants to kill her around.

My theory: Maybe the government went behind Nathan's back (Which I assume will happen again until Nathan gets attacked and then joins Peter and the gang) and figured a man with such strength would be more valuable of an asset to the government alive then dead, a super-weapon.

Also, because I think the writer's enjoy giving Sylar much more leeway then the rest of the cast. The entire episode of Duel is proof of that (Sylar vs. shard in head and surviving, sylar vs. doyle). What I am saying is that the writer's love Sylar. They love him so much that they don't always have everything he can do make sense to you and I.

I think Angela has already proven that she values Sylar for his abilities. She doesn't shrink at him killing and already fed him a girl last season. The only question is whether she has learned her lesson from last season or not. She THOUGHT she could control him only to find out otherwise and which had disasterous results. She should have learned her lesson but she is very power hungry, and this sometimes clouds one's judgment.

Nathan has been manipulated by Angela before. She no doubt is manipulating this entire operation for her own benefit in some way.

My only excuse for Nathan's squad is that nobody seesm to know how powerful Sylar is, including us - the audience.
We still aren't certain what powers he has, which ones he lost etc. Last season it seems only Arthur knew Sylar had obtained Elle's power. Nathan doesn't know Sylar at all. He may have no idea about Sylar's powers other than TK and regeneration. As such, he may not have given sufficient warning to the crew who obviously have been told to kill as a last resort. Maybe the president, feeling guilty, made the order to supercede Nathan's order and kill only if nonlethal attempts fail, not knowing the true potential threat someone like Sylar could pose. They all lack the proper information about Sylar's abilites - and so do we.

TK alone is dangerous enough, and it's all he used.

Sylar can use TK to shoot lighting bolts from his hands?

And to recover from taser darts?

WOLFBRO: Hmm... my bad, must have missed that.

SHADER: touche`, that I saw but for some reason disregarded.

I think Angela might have had something to do with it, but I'm more sure that Noah had something to do with it - doesn't seem to make sense when you think of how much Noah hates Sylar, but it makes sense if you first think of Noah as a big picture strategist who knows having Sylar amongst the count of Heroes against Nathan and the feds is huge. Gives them a real edge. Sylar might be evil, but evil is self-preserving, and he would fight Nathan regardless of his less-than-cordial relationship with the rest of the good Heroes, after all.

The writers kind of hint that Angela and Noah are resisting Nathan from within in the latest Behind the Eclipse.

Now we have Nathan lecturing Danko and the others in Building 26 about how their task is to bring the targets in alive, COMPLETELY contradicting what he told him about Sylar in the 1st episode of the volume. The guy in the diner had Sylar cold, but still didn't fire. The self-contradictory writing of this show is taxing even my vast love for it.

I had always just assumed Sylar was given special treatment. Even the FBI has enough on him to warrant that.