Kindred - the sword and the mug

The sword

We don't know Hiro's path through time in the story ahead, but it looks like he wrote those messages way back in 1671 (and for an unknown period of time after?), hid them in the handle of the sword, and made a cap that said, 'Ando open.'

So after Hiro left the past, Kensai continued to use that sword and never noticed the message.

Lindeman had the sword and didn't notice the message.

Ando had the valuable sword hidden in the filing cabinet (huh?) and never noticed the message.

And Hiro didn't notice it when he used it in modern times.

So Ando pulls the sword out of the filing cabinet and with a mere glance, he notices the message.

The mug

The mug - Sylar's murder weapon - had a happy face and said, 'Have a nice day'

Rather humorous, I thought.

S'Okay. A hollow tang makes it a show piece anyway, not a functional sword. I've seen someone nearly decapitated by a toy sword swung like a real one, and the tang broke.

Superhero stuff is fantasy, after all.

at that point when hiro felt he needed the sword or when he actually had sword in hand, he had not yet gone back in time,,therefore he had no knowledge of the message. the hiro that comes back from the past will know about the message. this is not a sequential thing,,,ie the hiro born and raised in japan is not a continuation of that being who went back in time. the sequence is this,,,,(a)20th century hiro born > (b)empowered hiro > (c)hiro in the past > (d)hiro returns. a and b do not know about c.

lenderman and the message: he collected many many many many treasures. the sword was not on display,,,rather it was 'filed away'. we don't know whether the sword held any importance to him other than being a collectable from the past. his 'greatest' treasures were on display.

kensai and the sword: kensai now knows all about hiro and his origins. he is indebted to hiro. if he notices the message and knows that hiro wrote it for a friend in the future, he would leave it out of respect and possible importance. heck,,hiro could've even TOLD kensai he placed a message in the sword, for all we know.

it wouldn't matter. let's assume he does notice the the hilt. it's for ando. who else from the past would write it but hiro himself? and even if he opens the hilt, and reads the messages, he knows he wrote it from the past,,,so the scenario is moot. there's really no need to show this scene other than filling a loophole for the viewers.

in fact, maybe reading his own message impels him to complete the mission he started(he gets ready to come back to the future and decides to stay a while longer)

O

i can easily see this as a valid point. the whole concept of this time/ past and future thing is as how one would want it perceived. one can either think of it linearly upon which michelle and i were debating. or one can think of it as you say. there's no condition that says it must be so this way or that when it comes to traveling through time..

mcfly's parents kiss in high school, mcfly gets better, he is no longer disappearing, and his image starts to reappear in the photo...why not happen that way.

there has to be some point when the thing that is changes because something in the past was altered, because if one starts to think too linearly, then the whole romance of fictional time travel loses it's

On Oct 17, 4:36 pm, Michelle Steiner

again, it still doesn't matter. say he notices the iinscription. how, he wonders, does ando's name appear on the end of the sword? well, he MUST have written it because who else could have done it?

the thing is,,,it's all a moot point because any awareness of the inscription would have been of no consequence to anyone, easily explained, and probably not worth tv time to explore. it's one of those cutting room floor issues.

The first thing to realise is that that in Heroes, the past doesn't 'want' to be changed. The moments in which you can actually do anything that makes a meaningful difference to history are few and far between, and you have to work very hard for a long time in order to change anything in a lasting way. Otherwise, 'coincidences' which are really the universe trying to avoid paradox will cause history to revert to its former course as much as possible. Thus nobody happened to notice the message on the hilt because that was the easiest way to avoid a paradox.