Hello Henry picks up right at the point that "The Hummingbird" left off, with Henry discovering that his covert corporeal counterpart, Edward, has murdered an old college friend of Henry's, Dr. Castle. This leaves Henry in a rather tight moral dilemma. How does one find justice for a murder that you committed yourself? This moment starts a physical and mental tug of war between both Henry and Edward that just might get the two of them killed with one single bullet.
Communicating through their little secret gadget phone, Henry and Edward are able to leave quick messages for the other one right as they're feeling a personality switch coming on. But even though they're able to relay very quick information, it still doesn't mask the fact that both of them can't stand each other. Edward won't act like a kind, loving, or even rational father when he's in Henry's home, and Henry won't stop trying to find ways to mess up Edward's top-secret operations. And while Edward might be fully capable of faking his Henry moments, it's really Henry who's become the hero, having to use his wits and grit to pull off Edward's job. At this point though, Henry has a laundry list of reasons to resent Edward, but Edward is needlessly hostile to Henry. Henry is the more unstable one at this point, so it doesn't really make sense that Edward would be trying to needlessly mess with him.
At the spy-org "Janus," Edward is being closely watched by both Mavis and Tromboll, but for different reasons. Mavis wants to make sure that Edward's co-spy Raymond is able to accompany Edward on his missions in case of an unexpected outbreak of "Henry" - and Tromboll thinks that Edward should be able to handle his missions on his own. Tromboll wants Edward to either sink or swim at this point. Either because he believes there's nothing wrong with him, or because he believes that something is wrong with him and wants to uncover the truth about Edward recent spotty results.
Henry has a lot of outlets to try and ask for help, but all of them come with a fair amount of risk. Should he tell his psychiatrist, Dr. Skinner, about Dr. Castle's murder? Should he play snitch to the overly inquisitive FBI Agent that approached him while walking his dog? Without being sure that he'll actually get the help he needs, Henry needs to weigh the risk involved. Especially since he's dealing with a company that gave him a toxic heart-attack in the last episode, just to make a point.
So while "Hedward," as Raymond refers to him, heads on down to Mexico to buy some weapon schematics, his wife Angie must help console Mary Grady, who is the wife of Tom Grady - who is Raymond's family personality. She's fed up with all of Tom's secrets and the last minute business trips. These husbandly-quirks are something that Angie can relate too as well. Angie suggests that Rose fly up to Portland, where Tom is supposedly business-tripping, and surprise him in his hotel room. But Tom is not in Portland, because Raymond is busy tracking a spy. This all leads to some great moments of suspense for both Raymond and Tom, but it also makes me feel that both Raymond and Edward need to be a lot more caring and careful when dealing with their "mild mannered" personality's families. Let's face it. They're both a couple of rotten jerks when it comes to "putting up" with their milquetoast alter-IDs. They should realize that they need Henry and Tom, not only as covers for their spy jobs, but because if that world gets messed up, they'll be freakin' killed!
Kudos to this show for not having the wives of these men be completely clueless. Mary gets close to their breaking points, and both she and Angie even notice that when they get phone calls from their husbands when they're away on business, that the boys sound rather distant and disingenuous. The show plays with a lot of neat tricks and treats and is able to demonstrate how Henry, with no training at all, is even more effective and clever than Edward. Edward is a blunt instrument, whereas Henry needs to use his emotions and intelligence to actually figure things out and find reasonable solutions.
There are, however, a couple of points in "Hello, Henry" when the phone messages that they send to each other border on being too contrived. After Henry is forced to jump out of a plane, he looks at his for phone a message - there's one from Edward instructing him on how to use a thumb scanner, which is what he has to do next. But no message instructing him on how to jump out of a plane? It's as if somehow Edward knew that he was going to change into Henry right at the moment that he needed to use the scanner, but not right before he had to skydive for the first time ever.
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