Screencaps of the paintings.

especially since the witchy cheerleader wasn't physically hurt during the prank.

No, but Claire WAS, given that even if one survives falling twenty feet and breaking multiple bones including one's neck it can be presumed to cause pain. And I'm deeply bothered that the show chooses to depict such things as if they aren't problematic. Didn't HRG say he wanted to save her from suffering precisely those kinds of injuries because he didn't want them to push her past her pain threshhold? Turns out he needn't have bothered.

eh. I mean, I guess I can just read it as Claire is deeply fucked up, but then I can't also be expected to see her as the engenue anymore.

I think Claire is - or was - only moderately fucked up. Flyboy is leading her down the path to deeply.

Didn't HRG say he wanted to save her from suffering precisely those kinds of injuries because he didn't want them to push her past her pain threshhold?

Ok, she did cut off her own pinky toe and only flinched and hissed a little. One could presume that her pain tolerance is higher than average humans, and so "pushing her past her pain threshold" probably amounts to extreme torture, not just a short drop and sudden stop.

(Not that I don't think it's kinda fucked up, but y'know... superpowers + questionable teenage ethics could = fucked up.)

Well, the adage is that teenagers think they're invulnerable ... and here you have one who KNOWS she is.

the prank: they achieved the aim of public humiliation, sure, but not before they also achieved psychological and emotional trauma. I hope at the least the show acknowledges this and follows through on it, because while Claire was upset afterwards, I can't remember if it was for the right reason. It was like countering a knife with a tank.

Parish: now that scene in K-ville (die!) makes sense! I thought they were referring to a town or something that had "Parish" in the name.

The one thing is that West continues to ping me as a probable psycho. He said something along the lines of "We're better than everyone because we have powers." (That was from memory, so not an exact quote.) This along with the whole "Aliens and Robots" thing makes me think he sees everyone without powers as things. He is well on the road to Sylar's attitude. OK, he still sees those with powers as fully human; but he is only in high school, and he already manages to be pretty patronizing to Claire. If I had more faith in the writers, I'd assume this going to payoff down the road West turning to extreme evil. But it is possible they see this as normal sensitive teenage male angst.

He said something about how his parents didn't matter because he has parents. (Totally paraphrasing.)

ETA: I mean because he has powers.

My powers of typing are disappearing.

In terms of the prank: I don't know. The kind of bullying Claire was fighting against is pretty traumatizing. I don't see the way the fought back as more extreme than constant continued humiliation (not so much of her, but of everyone). That kind of bullying can drive people to suicide, or totally break them in other ways. Claire and West never put her in physical danger. Suppose it had been done without superpowers. A fake hanging, and a hiding place the cops couldn't find for Claire and West to disappear into?

Would cheerleader bitch be anymore traumatized than she would be if she HAD been "seeing things" because she was extremely drunk?