What happened?
Fringe team investigate why it is that Olivia is experiencing the memories and feelings of the Olivia that Peter knew, to the extent that the ‘old’ Olivia appears to have merged with the current Olivia permanently. Cortexiphan is discovered in her blood, and Walter and Lincoln discover the supplies of it at Massive Dynamic have been taken.
Olivia and Peter also investigate the case of a schizophrenic named Sean who was actually the product of an experiment after which he was able to hear the thoughts of his genetically-produced brothers. With the case resolved, and Peter coming around to the idea of succumbing to the attraction he feels for Olivia, suddenly she is snatched away. Olivia awakes trapped in a dingy room and, opposite her, a kidnapped and bound Nina.
Thoughts
Fringe is certainly stepping things up a notch, layering in confusion and mystery with giddy aplomb. Honestly, I’m not sure if the full extent of my lack of understanding about what’s going on is because I’ve not been keeping up with everything ir because the answers to the riddles have not been revealed yet and thus I am supposed to be as in the dark as I feel I am.
Let’s get the boring stuff out of the way first. The boring stuff here was the case of the week that Fringe felt indebted to include when, really, everyone viewing couldn’t care less about the boy Sean and his schizophrenia that turned out to not be schizophrenia. It felt tired, the whole issue of another deranged man of science having concocted some experiment and used it on people to terrible and tragic effect. We’ve seen it countless times and, yes, it does land heavily in the theme of the show but the fact of the matter is: we get it. This plot didn’t feel like it was bringing anything new to the debate.
I did like the scene with Astrid and Sean in the cafeteria. The show did something incredibly clever with the sound. Beginning with the ambient noise of conversation in the cafeteria we closed in on Astrid and Sean talking and so were unaware that the cafeteria was emptying and yet the sound of people talking was remaining, slowly putting us in Sean’s position and hearing the voices he was hearing. It was a clever, sophisticated little moment when the camera pulled back to reveal Astrid and Sean were alone with the voices he could hear.
Olivia and Peter’s relationship was the core of the matter here. Contrary to what I thought might happen, not only did Olivia retain memories of her ‘other self’ she pretty much assumed them into her personality and ran with them like it was a new outfit. I’m not sure I completely accepted that this was a person suddenly becoming imbued with an entire lifetime of feelings and memories that were not her own since, surely, that kind of mental foreign invader would crack a person up. Olivia is hardy, though, so I guess we just have to admire our leading lady for the courage and strength she possesses. She did get the scene where she told Peter that the situation was just as difficult for her as it was for him, which was important and I’m glad got aired. Peter was being understandably distant and self-centred over what was happening. From his point of view he had not only once betrayed his real Olivia by confusing her with a false one, but he was also wary of fully believing she was his Olivia just in case she disappeared again.
As it turned out, she did disappear, in a style very reminiscent of that book/movie The Vanishing. She goes into a gas station and doesn’t emerge. I figured the episode was going to end on that note, leaving us with a gaping hole of a mystery about where she had gone. Instead Fringe went and showed us where she was, but then threw another curveball into the mix by having a captured Nina stuck with her as well.
OK, so now I am confused. I am figuring that the Nina who has dosing Olivia up with cortexiphan is, surely, Alt-Nina? And that Alt-Nina came across to Over Here and supplanted the existing Nina a bit like how Alt-Olivia once did something similar to Olivia. Fact of the matter is I can’t recall if there even is an Alt-Nina; I’ve totally lost track of that. But I can’t believe that fake Nina is a shapeshifter because wouldn’t that mean that the original Nina would have to be dead? So on the basis that shapeshifters kill the form they inhabit, I am assuming that the fake Nina is Alt-Nina.
However, we also saw that Mr. Jones was working with this fake Nina, so does that mean that Mr. Jones is on the side of ‘over there’? Oh, it really is all too confusing! The point of the matter is there’s a bad Nina in charge and phase two, capturing their cortexiphan’d Olivia, seems to have taken effect. Quite what their intentions are really aren’t worth me guessing at because I am absolutely sure to be way off the mark. The one thing I have been consistent about when it comes to Fringe is being totally out of tune with where it’s going. That isn’t a criticism of the show either. It means I get to watch and be surprised.
Last point to address, however, before I completely wave the white flag, is the matter of Peter being at fault for what is happening to Olivia. Walter seemed to lay the blame at his door, but it’s a curious truth that Walter is also becoming more like the Walter that Peter knew. He’s certainly a different man from the one that was a shadow of a man, living in the lab and far more incomprehensible to most people. Since Peter has been around they have fallen more into step with the relationship we saw Peter have with ‘his’ Walter, so I can’t help but feel that there’s a similar dynamic occurring there as there is with Olivia and Peter. The difference for Walter is that he isn’t getting the memories like Olivia is, and the important thing about Olivia’s memory recall is that she is getting stuff that Peter didn’t know about and, as such, it can’t be entirely down to him.
Whilst Peter might have opened a kind of door between his old world and this one that the old Olivia is bleeding through into, Olivia herself, with the aid of Cortexiphan, is surely just as much a player in it. Both of them are unwittingly creating this effect but it’s happening none-the-less. I did predict in a previous post that the natural progression of Peter’s presence in this universe may be a subtle merging of sorts with the universe he knew. It still sounds crazy, just not as crazy as it did previously!
What was the best part?
The scene just before things took a turn for the worse was my favourite here, where Olivia and Peter talked in the car and laid their cards out. They admitted they were scared, but I also liked Olivia not willing to just put up with these feelings she had for Peter and deny herself speaking out about them. For the first time I think I can really believe in Olivia’s feelings for Peter being strong and meaningful – previously it’s felt like a relationship that came out of nowhere and was more explained to be loving and tender rather than actually being shown to be so on-screen. Olivia, here, pulled a lot of that back around. And, then, of course, the moment she left the car you just knew it wasn’t going to be a happy ending. No happy endings come easy on this show!
What do I think will happen next?
As expressed above, I really don’t know what the large-scale arc of things is. In the immediate next episode is has to be about Peter trying to find Olivia. Walter and Lincoln certainly had their suspicions about Nina, too, so perhaps they may close in on discovering she is not the person they think she is. However, I reckon their chances of finding Olivia are rather slim. I expect Alt-Nina and Mr. Jones will get to deploy the next stages of their plan, using Olivia, and it might be down to her to get herself saved and stop whatever it is they are up to.
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