Portrayed By - Santiago Cabrera
Superpowers - Precognition (Draws the Future in his Pictures)
Age - 28
Gender - Male
Occupation - Artist, Author

Character history

Isaac Mendez's story began in the first episode, where he was a struggling, tortured artist living in New York City. His girlfriend and art dealer was Simone Deveaux. However, Mendez was addicted to heroin,and had little success quitting permanently, which put a strain on hisrelationship with Simone. This strain is worsened when Isaac realizedhe could see ambiguous future events and paint them when high onheroin. Isaac at first assumed the paintings to be "evil" and tried todestroy them, but Simone saw them as artistically impressive. Near theend of the pilot, Isaac overdosed. Simone brought help in the form of nurse Peter Petrelli, and Isaac survived.

After he recovered, Isaac seemed to have accepted his "destiny" to save New York from a large, nuclear-level, mushroom cloudexplosion he saw in one of his precognitive trances. Isaac had alsocome to believe he needed the heroin to "paint the future", and nolonger cared about quitting. Simone doubted Isaac's powers and wouldnot stand idly by while he ruined his life using heroin, so she lefthim. During their conversation, Simone also mentioned that Isaac's comic book, 9th Wonders!, may be late as he continued with his precognitive painting.

In the fourth episode, Simone came to Isaac requesting new paintings for a showing at her art gallery.Isaac offered earlier works instead, saying that he needed the newerones to tell the future. Simone doubted she could even sell the olderones and was still unconvinced of Isaac's powers. Isaac proclaimed heknew about her kiss with Peter the previous evening. Simone assumedthat Isaac had followed her, but he showsed her his drawing, saying hehad made it seven weeks prior. Isaac then said he needs money for"painting supplies", by which he meant heroin, which he hoped wouldhelp him find a way to stop the nuclear explosion. Simone left andIsaac broke out his "tools" to shoot up. At one point in the episode,he said "I'm gonna be a hero". After shooting up, he experienced avision of Claire Bennet at her school around Homecoming time, being chased and cornered by a shadowy figure.

In the fifth episode, Peter came by to find images of "the cheerleader" that a future version of Hiro Nakamuratold him to save. However, Isaac was distraught over the current stateof his life and felt he'd wasted his time. Peter disagreed andpersuaded Isaac to look past their differences. Peter found the kind ofpainting he was looking for, though Isaac explained he could not finishit, as he was out of both heroin and money to buy more. Peter stillbelieved they should keep trying and, through his ability to mimicother people's powers, managed to paint the picture himself, saying hecould see the finished work in his mind. The phone rings after hefinishes. Issac explains that it's just some Japanese man (in fact it'sHiro) that he can't understand, and Peter realizes that it's Hiro.

In "Better Halves",Isaac and Peter realize they don't know who the cheerleader was orwhere she lived. They noticed that one of Isaac's canvases of thefuture was missing. Isaac realized that Simone had taken it to sellwith his other paintings. He didn't remember what he had painted,because he was high at the time. After Peter left to try to track downthe painting another way, Eden McCain visited Isaac's apartment, claiming to be a fan.

In the following episode, Isaac and Eden were in a paper plant in Odessa, Texas where Mr. Bennetworked. Bennet told Isaac that he helps people with special powers tobetter use them, and suggested that he could teach Isaac to use hispowers without heroin. However, Bennet desperately needed Isaac tofinish a painting of an attack, which he believed would let him protecthis daughter Claire. Isaac tried again to paint without the drugs, butafter that proved unsuccessful, Mr. Bennet had Eden persuade Isaac totake heroin willingly and paint an image.

In "Homecoming",Isaac painted a picture of a man glowing brightly, which Isaac laterdescribes as "a man exploding", rather than anything related to Claire.Then, in "Fallout",he began painting again, though he didn't believe the paintings to beanything more than art since he hadn't taken any drugs since paintingthe previous image. After Eden told him that Claire had been saved, herealized that the future could be changed. Eden gave him a phone and anaccess card, suggesting that he do something. To that end, he calledHiro and arranged a meeting. After meeting Hiro, seeing the futureissue of 9th Wonders!, and realizing that his most recentdrawings were in fact of events from the then-future, he decided toagain paint without heroin. Relaxed and advised by Hiro to concentrate,he successfully activated his powers, drawing a picture of Hirofighting a dinosaur with a sword.

Powers and abilities

Isaac has the power of precognition, which allows him to depictimages of the future while in a trance-like state. While in this state,his pupils and irisesfade into light white color and he becomes unresponsively focused onpainting the images in his mind. Very little context comes to Isaacwhen he sees the future. He can't tell anything about the people orplaces beyond what he sees at that moment. Thus, he is often surprisedto find out weeks later what his work is actually depicting. Also dueto the previous heroin use, Isaac was not able to clearly remembercertain images after he painted them, as he stated in "Better Halves."

Originally, Isaac's powers were triggered by the use of heroin, andhe was unable to use his powers without it. During the episode "Hiros", Peter Petrelli copies Isaac's precognitive ability without the use of heroin. A TV Guide article from early October, 2006, revealed that he would eventually try to find out if his power works without using heroin.^[1] In "Seven Minutes to Midnight", Isaac attempted just this, unsuccessfully. He does so successfully in "Fallout", after relaxing and taking advice from Hiro Nakamura to concentrate.

Art work

Made for the show by comic book artist Tim Sale, Isaac's paintings are shown to be accurate predictions of future events. They are, in order of appearance:

• One of Isaac's paintings is the depiction of a man facing some sort of monster surrounded by fire and destruction. The image is named "Uluru" in 9th Wonders' picture gallery.^[3]This monster also appears in the online comic, where it asks thepainter, "Isaac, what have you done?" The monster has also been spokenof by D.L Hawkins while discussing the 9th Wonders comic book,also drawn by Mendez. A painting of Uluru is also seen among Isaac's"earlier work" that is rejected by Simone in the fourth episode.Another instance of Uluru appears as a screen saver on Hiro Nakamura'scomputer.

"Genesis"

• The depiction of a full solar eclipse which happens later in the first episode.^[4] Simone stops Isaac from destroying this painting.
• A hand holding a transparent container (possibly a glass) with a bubbling liquid inside.^[5] Isaac destroys this painting. Possibly the hand is that of Theodore Sprague, who is seen in "Seven Minutes to Midnight" boiling a glass of water with his radioactive powers.
• An unfinished painting of a girl appearing to be in a yellow jacket.
• The depiction of a burning bus which is confirmed to be a suicide bombing in Israel.^[6]
• The depiction of a fiery train wreck.^[7] Claire Bennet saves a man from this incident and Isaac sees the story on the news.
• A portrait of a man jumping off a building and seemingly flying.^[8] This is the painting that encourages Peter Petrelli to do the same thing.
• A large explosion and the resulting mushroom cloud in Midtown Manhattan.^[9] This painting is shown as being done on the concrete floor of Isaac's apartment.

"Don't Look Back"

• In the second episode, it is shown that the explosion Isaacdepicted is to happen at 11:52 AM EST on November 8 in the story'soriginal timeline.
• In Hiro's "five weeks into the future time frame" Hiro discovers the comic book 9th Wonders!, which details events of his and Ando's journey. Isaac wrote and illustrated the book.
• In Hiro's "five weeks into the future time frame", there are a great many paintings of a symbol resembling an RNA helix. This symbol appears in many places throughout the series.

"One Giant Leap"

• A picture of a girl walking away from a boy in a school hall. A previous scene indicates these are Claire and her classmate Zach, respectively.
• A couple kissing under a red umbrella. A previous scene implies that the couple is Peter and Simone.

"Collision"

• Peter standing amidst apparent floating locker doors.^[10] This later occurs in the episode "Homecoming", when Peter confronts Sylar and has locker doors hurled at him.
• Claire in an ampitheater as a shadowed figure approaches her. Comes to pass in "Homecoming".
• Hiro and Ando standing before a dank cityscape, under a banner with part of the word 'Homecoming'.^[11] Comes to pass in "Fallout".
• A close up of a scared-looking Claire.^[12] Comes to pass in "Homecoming".

"Hiros"

• A shadowy figure^[13]standing over the prostrate figure of a cheerleader (presumed to beClaire but it was apparently Jackie), whose head has been severed.(Finished by Peter Petrelli)^[14] Comes to pass in "Homecoming".

"Better Halves"

• Niki Sanders lying on the floor of her home's bedroom. He later wipes off a layer of paint which covered an RNA-shaped tattoo on her back revealing that the painting is actually of Jessica Sanders.^[15] Occurs in the previous scene of the episode.

"Seven Minutes to Midnight"

• An image of Charlie, a waitress, serving food at a diner.^[16]
• A flame engulfed car from the scene of Theodore Sprague's escape. Occurs at the end of the episode.

"Homecoming"

• A picture of Peter in front of Union Wells High School at 8:12 p.m., presumably dead.^[17] Occurs at the end of the episode.
• A picture of a person glowing bright red, later described by Isaac as an "exploding man."^[18]

"Fallout"

• Sketches of Hiro socializing with Charlie before her death.^[19]
• A picture of Hiro brandishing a katana while encountering a Tyrannosaurus.