Fringe: S04 Ep22 – Brave New World – Part 2

What happened?

Olivia and Peter had a run-in with Jessica, who it turned out was working for William Bell. She shot September, but was then killed by Olivia who once again exhibited developing powers. With an injured Astrid pointing them in the direction of where Walter was taken, they tried to locate where William Bell had taken him.

William Bell had taken Walter to the safe spot for his continued intention to collapse the universes into one new whole – a brave new world where he can play God. He states that this was once Walter’s ambition. Olivia and Peter arrive to thwart the plan, though Walter has to kill Olivia and then rely on her regeneration in order for it to succeed.

Olivia tells Peter that she is pregnant, whilst September appears to Walter to grimly inform him that “they” are coming.

Thoughts

No way around it, really. I was disappointed. The messy first half I was willing to forgive if this second part came along and delivered the goods. Well, it delivered goods. I just didn’t particularly like them. In all honesty, and maybe this is just me, but I thought Fringe had gone a little bit too stupid.

It’s a fairly crazy thing to say, really. To remark that Fringe has gone too far when it’s a show that has basically plied its trade on the principle of going too far and selling it, but I definitely felt that way. The tipping point for me was when Walter put a bullet in Olivia’s head and then he and Peter stuck a big pipe through her brain, got the bullet out and then watched as she healed in seconds and returned to consciousness.

That, for me, that was just one step too far.

I didn’t believe that such a level of self-healing power ought to have been possible (serious, what is Cortexiphan because the stuff appears to be able to do anything!), and furthermore I don’t believe that Walter could have been so absolutely certain it would turn out that way. I wondered if it was perhaps the only way the writers could make good on September’s warning about how Olivia was destined to die in every single version of future events he had ever seen, so she had to die but Fringe also had to have her come back to life as well.

If that dire warning had never existed then perhaps there were other things that could have happened – like Olivia being plunged into a coma or removed to another dimension or something! Sure, they’re kind of ludicrous, but somehow an outlandish solution wouldn’t have felt as much like a cheat as just shooting her in the head and then having her heal back to life.

Furthermore, how come William Bell didn’t do anything about it? He plainly watched Walter load the gun and surely it must have occurred to him what he intended. He knew as much, if not more, about what Olivia’s capabilities allowed for since he had engineered her to generate the energy sufficient to collapse two universes (as you do). So this masterplan of precision, this act of new world creation he has strived for years towards, he allows it to fall apart in the final moments and then disappears with a bit of a heavy sigh and  ring of his bell.

Good grief.

Where did he go? Well, that was actually one of the more interesting possibilities, with the only logical explanation being that he went back to the other universe. Is it possible that this William Bell is actually the one from the alternate universe? There’s no reason to believe an alternate version doesn’t exist in some capacity, and if Nina was convinced she saw her William Bell die then that makes it all the more reasonable to figure this Belly is the duplicate alternate.

There’s no way of knowing, but it’s a possibility. I suppose I am leaning towards it not being the alternate William Bell purely because Fringe seems to want to streamline itself and no longer be concerned about the alternate universe. I know the fifth and final season has been confirmed but is going to be a shorter run of episodes so it would make sense to leave the alternate universe alone.

I really liked the detail from William that the notion of creating a new world, a world where they could become God-like due to feeling like their current world was Godforsaken, had been originally spawned from Walter’s grieving, pained mind. Having cruelly lost his own son, and caused the death of the Alternate Peter, with the guilt at the disaster his crossing over had created he had turned his back on God and coldly contrived plans to form this brave new world. That he had to have William take away pieces of his brain to remove the notion feeds well into the narrative we already know, but I particularly liked it because I’ve noticed Walter has had a curiously religious faith for a man of science that has, up until this episode, been left unaddressed. Now we know that the part of his mind that rejected God had been removed entirely, and so the incongruence of Walter being a believer now makes more sense.

The most successful scene centred on September trapped in the warehouse by that strange glyph. His remarks about how such technology was not supposed to be known alluded surely to William Bell knowing a lot more about them than they even realised. He had figured September was a potential loose cannon who might interfere with his plans to collapse the universe (the one Observer who has a history of doing more than observe!). Such foresight and planning only undermines how easily his plan was thwarted by Walter and his gun, but I’ve already said my piece about that!

Jessica proving to be working for William Bell was a nice surprise (though she certainly put herself in extreme risk for the cause – running the risk of spontaneous combustion all on the principle that she would be saved by Olivia’s healing  powers). As calculated gambles go, William Bell is more than a little prescient. Not only was Jessica taught enough to trap an Observer she also had the high-powered faster-firing gun to put a bullet in one. Pretty cool.

Not sure how I felt about the resolution to the mystery of how September came to be shot. I mean, I’m glad it was addressed in a satisfactory manner. It quickly became apparent that the incident of meeting Olivia, of ‘dying’, was all something that was part of his future. For once Peter and Olivia were in a position where they knew what was going to happen when September didn’t. Presumably the September that appeared at the end of the episode was the one that had been renewed, saved by Peter – and it appears he is very much taking a stand against his own people.

The last scene did have something of an anticlimactic feel to it, though given the nature of what has been going on behind the scenes of Fringe, with question marks about whether it would ever get a fifth season, I suspect this last part was added on and the preceding scenes about Olivia being pregnant, and Broyles becoming a general and giving Nina a new job, all of that was like a closing coda of happy endings that may have actually been designed to finish off the entire show. I’m glad they weren’t. It would have felt like a bit of a happy whimper rather than a rousing climax.

Olivia’s declaration of pregnancy was a weird moment. For some seconds I was wondering if the fact that she had died and been brought back had somehow changed her perspective, or imbued her with some knowledge she was about to impart. That this scene was coming right at the end of the episode made it seem all the more loaded with a bombshell – but there just wasn’t one. Maybe when the scene was conceived (ha!) and filmed it was with the view that the ‘future episode’ wouldn’t have appeared and so we, as an audience, wouldn’t already know that Henrietta existed.

I suppose that future episode did dilute much of the drama. We knew that Olivia couldn’t really die, or even that Astrid wouldn’t die. We knew that William Bell’s mental plan of forming a brave new world could not come to fruition, either. I imagine the original Fringe design may have been never to have the ‘future episode’, that way the show could have wrapped up the story of William Bell (presumably by having him die rather than just disappear) and had Olivia rid of Cortexiphan and the universes severed and pretty much all of the plot threads would have found resolution.

The end of the episode briefly mentioned that Olivia’s Cortexiphan powers were set to wane and she would become a regular person (although we know that Henrietta will be born with innate powers that, at least, allow her mind not to be read – surely a by-product of her in utero Cortexiphan exposure). I do wonder how the fifth season will push through the story of Olivia and Peter and the rest becoming entombed in Amber and balance that with the jump to 2036. Perhaps a flipping back and forth, episode by episode, similar to how the show used to cross from one universe to another. I could see that working well, though I’d be amazed if Olivia doesn’t appear somehow in the future, alive, probably encased in Amber somewhere else!

Getting ahead of myself now, though. This finale did end on a low, oddly anti-climactic note, that has to be as a direct consequence to the pressures on the show production that really left the writers in a tricky spot between tying the show up whilst leaving enough scope for continuation. In that respect they did well. I still require resolution over the matter of the First People that Sam Weiss used to be so intent on, that suggested Olivia, Peter and Walter were destined to somehow become. The show has its fifth and final season to address these matters, of course, which is good and welcome news. For all my niggles here I still enjoyed the episode, and I still really like the show, and I hope now they have an endgame set in stone all concerned can rally everything together and give us fans the send off we’ve been waiting for.

What was the best part?

I’m torn between two scenes. For sheer freakish oddity the scene where Jessica was brought back from the dead and her eyeballs were rolling around and blinking independently was just so weird I loved it. No pun intended, but I couldn’t take my eyes off it. And the very nature of what exactly was going on – what aspect of Jessica had been revived to communicate – is really quite creepy. It was certainly a memorable scene.

However, surely the best scene had to be where Olivia and Peter happened upon the constrained September, and then Jessica showed up to reveal her true colours. The strange symbol that kept September locked in place, the origin of the bullet wound, and Olivia flipping out some swift hand deflections to take down Jessica – it was a short scene that packed in a lot of good stuff. Shame the rest of the episode couldn’t measure up, really.

What do I think will happen next?

I can well envisage Fringe splitting plotlines between the ‘present’ day (dealing with Olivia and Peter and their pregnancy/new baby and, with Walter, collaborating with September about actions to be taken against the upcoming invasion). Either by switching timelines every other episode, or perhaps even during episodes, the future plot in 2036 can also be continued up to the point where it becomes the dominant story and concludes the Fringe storyline.

I fully expect Olivia will emerge alive, somehow, in 2036 (otherwise how will she continue to be the star of the show!?). I also imagine that thwarting The Observers may result in Olivia and Peter and Walter becoming the ‘first people’ and altering history, or becoming a part of ancient history. . . OK, my thoughts are running aground, but mostly I am hopeful that all of these big ideas the show has ushered in and left on the sidelines will get pulled back into the narrative in a meaningful way.

If Fringe can do that, and make the resolution satisfactory, I’ll be a happy fan. Not asking much, am I?

Fringe: S04 Ep21 – Brave New World – Part 1

What happened?

Instances of spontaneous combustion are investigated by Fringe Division where it transpires they are perpetrated by Mr. Jones, working for William Bell. Walter and Astrid go to check out some leads and find themselves held at gunpoint, captured by Belly and his men. Meanwhile Olivia is developing new powers - healing and physical control of other people - when she and Peter track down Mr. Jones. Only too late does Jones realise William has sacrificed him when he is bested and killed by Peter and Olivia.

Thoughts

I think it was intentional, how this episode began almost as though the series had hit the reset switch. Like with the severing of the two universes we had been cut back to the way things were back in season one. The episode began with a suitable strange occurrence that resulted in the unpleasant death of a person and before you knew it Olivia and Peter and Walter were on the scene checking out what happened and drawing potential conclusions.

Really? I was thinking. A case of the week episode just before a season finale? Really?

Turned out no, not really, though that slip and dodge of expectations was really one of the only positive things to emerge out of an episode that I otherwise thought was a bit of a mess. The matter of the spontaneous combustion was a case in point. It was discovered to be an act of violence perpetrated by Mr. Jones, using nanobots. Further investigation yielded the truth that these nanobots were in fact designed by William Bell. So, Mr, Jones is working for William Bell. OK.

How long has that been the case? When Mr. Jones was intent on reducing two universes into one new whole was that really under the design and bidding of William Bell all along? Was William Bell also tucked away in the safe zone, waiting for the universes to collapse so he could be a part of this new world of bat monsters? It sounds a little ridiculous but I have to assume it’s the case. Unless William Bell is playing an even longer game, and he actually knew that Mr. Jones would fail in his merging universe plans and all Belly was after was for the bridge to be closed.

There’s mileage in the idea that William Bell has been playing Mr. Jones for the longterm gain, especially considering how he became unstuck here. It seemed to be the case that Belly had sent Mr. Jones to release the nanobots primarily so Walter would find them and realise who designed them. After that, Mr. Jones was then directed to ambush Olivia and Peter following the concentrated sunbeam attack whereupon it appeared to be a set-up, because William figured that Mr. Jones’ attack would fail and he would be taken out of the picture.

I have to say I was a little dismayed to see Mr. Jones taken down the way he was. Considering how much of a calculating and controlling person he has been so far, to be caught out so untidily felt disingenuous. Sure, he probably couldn’t have factored in Olivia having the power to assume control of Peter’s body and fight through him but, never-the-less, it still felt a bit cheap to me. Mr. Jones deserved a more sound finishing off. Pleasing parallel that his demise resulted in a splitting apart of his face, mirroring him being split in two during season one.

The two attacks – nanobots and sunbeam – didn’t seem to serve any other purpose, which is what informs my view that the episode felt like a bit of a mess. It’s my implied understanding that the two attacks were orchestrated purely to manipulate proceedings but that wasn’t entirely clear, and it raises the question of what purpose it was Mr. Jones himself thought he was doing it for! I mean, if someone asked you to go and plant spontaneously combustible nanobots in a public place, or direct a sunbeam into a city you’d surely have some pause to consider what you were doing it for, no?

There’s potential that this whole piece of business has been left deliberately vague because it’ll get tied up in the finale. I’m not banking on it but this is a "Part 1" so the episode does get some grace. Of course, the other result William Bell gained from all of his machinations was Walter (and Astrid, in rare action girl mode!) being delivered into his hands. This I am certain was his intention all along, and ultimately what he needs is Walter’s brilliant mind to assist him with whatever his next move is.

My guess is that those good old Cortexiphan trials they began so long ago are reaching new developments. Olivia herself is rapidly discovering new powers. Not sure how useful she will find the capacity to physically control other people, though it did make me think that perhaps she will one day force Walter and Peter and the rest to encase themselves in amber at the crucial moment. . .

Back to Belly, though. Nina’s assertion that she saw him dead certainly carried no weight, not just with Walter’s statement that he had seen him when he was in the mental hospital days after he was deceased but, of course, with the fact that he showed up alive and well during the episode! Curiously, however, Walter made a few remarks that point towards this William not being the same man he knew due to the atrocities he was committing. I’m not sure where Fringe is leading with that angle but I like to think it’s pertinent, that William either underwent some drastic change or he’s not really the William Bell of old at all (for whatever far-flung reason!). Visiting Walter in hospital certainly suggests he was saying goodbye in some fashion, though where he was leaving to is a mystery.

For now I’ll stick with the idea that he’s had a radical ideological and moral shift to serve the purpose of some perceived higher goal rather than his body being taken over by some other nefarious entity.

Despite the discussion the episode generated out of this post my impression of the episode was not a favourable one. I think I may have muttered a remark to myself about how it had been something of a mess when I was confronted by the closing credits. It lacked focus and momentum. Possibly that’s because it’s feeding into the finale and so is all about set-up, but because there’s such a veil over what exactly is being set-up I don’t feel any kind of anticipating excitement about what the next episode may hold.

I’m hoping it’s all set to blow me away with a whopping surprise. Fringe finales have all been pretty special over the course of the years but I don’t recall ever going into onto with the sense of shoulder shrugging, nonplussed feelings this precursor has filled me with. Like I said, I’m hoping it’s just going to blow me away.

What was the best part?

Despite it ultimately not making much sense of having any great purpose, the moment the sunbeam was blazed into the night was a thrilling moment. Olivia and Peter stared out of their window at the source of this brightness, and then Broyles was caught agape looking at what was in front of him. Before it was revealed I wondered if there was some kind of alien invasion event occurring (which would have been nicely foreshadowed in that throwaway remark Walter made to the ginger one out of Lost, enquiring if she was extra-terrestrial!).

For some dizzying moments I thought Fringe had just started out like a run-of-the-mill episode purely to deliver this leftfield, knockout surprise of an alien invasion raining from the skies! In all likelihood that would have been stupid for the show, but for those few moments it was actually a rather exhilarating notion.

What do I think will happen next?

As with previous mysteries lately, it's all about what a certain man intends to do next. It used to be the question of what Mr. Jones was up to, and now it's about what William Bell is up to (although presumably Mr. Jones has always been working for William). I interpreted the episode as William drawing Walter to him and getting rid of Mr. Jones, but quite what he intends beyond that I don't know.

I'm hazarding a guess that William isn't planning on the impending arrival of The Observers at this moment and is certainly not in league with them - that's something that's going to take the whole world by surprise. So I can only figure that William wants Walter with him to complete the Cortexiphan experiments they began together, now potentially coalescing in some form of good result with Olivia's recent power developments. Walter will resist it, for sure, but we saw in the 'future episode' that Walter will be very angry with what William ultimately did to Olivia. However, before such unpleasantness, Peter and Olivia have to have little Henrietta so whatever does happen to Olivia can't happen in the very near future.

Unless one of her new powers is to have an immaculate conception with an accelerated pregnancy period. And considering Fringe has once before had Olivia go through an accelerated pregnancy it's not too wild to figure the immaculate conception part isn't completely off the cards!

Fringe: S04 Ep20 – Worlds Apart

What happened?

The two universes are confronted by a crisis when the Fringe departments discover that Mr. Jones’ plan is to merge both universes together until they crumple and create one singularity, one universe he can control to his own ends. When the plan to use Nick Lane to track Mr. Jones down and stop him fails, both Fringe divisions are faced with the only viable alternative: to sever the bridge between the worlds permanently.

Thoughts

I am going to give myself a minor pat on the back here for predictive instinct. Sure, when I recently suggested that Mr. Jones’ plan might have been to merge the two universes to create a unified whole I actually thought it was too crazy to really, truly be the way of things – yet in the same breath it was difficult to imagine anything else, too. And so it was. Mr. Jones was collapsing two worlds to eventually create one world, and the neat get-out clause was that he had a plan to survive such an event via the safe zone he had created for himself. I liked that the episode about the small town – Welcome to Westfield – that was ravaged in a merged universe turned out to be a minor instance of the major grand plan; the writers basically gave us the truth about what Mr. Jones was up to on a small scale quite a while back.

This episode was also clever in setting up the usual concept of there being a terrible occurrence set to befall the world and only Olivia and co on hand to try and thwart it. The ruse here was that, ultimately, despite them finding leads and getting Nick Lane on their side to help out (another nice touch: the Cortexiphan kids being intrinsic to the plot, Walter and Belly's terrible tests once again threatening to destroy worlds!), their plans to save the world were not going to work out the way the formula usually dictates. Our heroes didn’t save the day, at least not in the way they wanted. Their victory was a bittersweet compromise.

It definitely did feel like a sense of loss, one side saying goodbye to the other. In some sense it made the distance that has been between them throughout the season more acute. What I mean is a bugbear of mine has been how much we haven’t seen the two sides interacting. We haven’t seen Olivia and Alt-Olivia getting to know one another, sort out their differences and work themselves out. Same goes for Walter and Walternate. The only characters that have had that kind of relationship were Lincoln and Astrid with their respective counterparts, and they were always enjoyable moments. Far from being a criticism, this lack of resolution actually added to the pathos of this episode. The characters just didn’t have enough time and didn’t realise it until time ran out.

It had taken this long before Walter and Walternate actually came face to face, and I liked that Walter was concerned he would be considered a fool or ignored by his counterpart. Perhaps the fact that Walternate was, for the first time, confronting the man that kidnapped his son (and in this universe prompted his death) ought to have been given more consideration, but most likely the episode didn’t want to distract too much from the drama in focus. The moment where they talked briefly was a wonderful moment, and the same goes for Olivia and her counterpart (although the dialogue about the rainbows felt a bit twee at first, the later pay off line about always looking up rescued it).

The fact that they were all saying a permanent goodbye was really emphasised by the sense that there was so much more they could have done and said together – if the show had seen to it that they were all cosy and knitted together like a family it might have been a different, more emotionally-rending type of scene, but I think the feeling that there was more that could have been done worked. There was some minor tension generated from the notion that Peter could disappear once the bridge was severed, yet this wasn’t a prospect that was completely played up and mined for extra stress. The bridge was closed and Peter remained. Since, like The Observer said, this was his world now and he had dragged his Olivia into it then anything else would have felt like a wrench too far.

I have to wonder if Alt-Broyles and Alt-Nina are still in the main universe Over Here, though. I get the impression they must be, since that was where we last saw them. Interesting, really. What on earth are they going to do with them now? Lincoln, also, disappeared to the other side so he could hook up with Alt-Olivia. That’s clearly been an idea that was seeded a few episodes back, perhaps to thin down the cast members and make things more manageable and focussed. I mean, I don’t know where the rest of this season is going to take things but I get the impression that we’re not going to be treated to too much ‘Over There’ action any more. I might be wrong on that, but Over Here has always really been the key driver of the plot and things that happened Over There were generally only shown because they effected Over Here. Now the bridge has been severed then that appears to have been removed.

I say “appears” because there is still the matter of Mr. Jones, and he still possesses the capacity to move between worlds using that material he gathered. There are implications therefore about what that may mean for Over There. The bridge being severed will mean that their world will no longer heal, but if Mr. Jones punches another hole to the other side and journeys over there will that not create further disruptions and chaos all over again? Possibly that danger is what the remaining episodes of the season will concern themselves with; dealing with Jones and his army of mutated bat-monster acolytes! This episode did actually feel like a finale, really, so the remaining episodes are like an intriguing overhang to the cliffhanger, and I am certainly interested to see where Fringe plans on moving to next.

One very plain oversight (potential oversight, perhaps) is that the importance of Olivia to Mr. Jones hasn’t been made apparent. He went to great trouble to kidnap her and test her and he delivered a threatening promise that she was capable of so much more than even she knew. Yet, had the bridge not been severed, Olivia would have been wiped out with the rest of the universes, so what was it about her that Mr. Jones had been after? Would Olivia have survived also? Or was it always Mr. Jones’ plan to have them sever the universes? It did seem like a quick and easy fix that he surely would have allowed for, so maybe it was what he wanted them to do all along and his masterplan is not yet complete.

The obvious pressing concern is formed from what was shown in the previous episode. It was established there appeared to be just the one universe in the future, so we have to figure that the bridge severing the link is one that really is permanent. And when it was stated that Olivia and Peter and Walter once saved the world I suppose we have now seen the instance where they did just that. They stopped the two worlds from collapsing and now each world is apart, as the title suggests. Now what remains are for The Observers to step into the picture and begin to take control of Over Here, and there’s also the matter of William Bell set to do something dastardly to Olivia, all before Walter and Peter and Astrid entomb themselves in Amber. . .

Fringe may have to go down some kind of future-averting ruse to avoid getting stale, but there’s every reason to believe that just because they’re now down to one universe the scale of their problems is going to be lessened any.

What was the best part?

The final farewells take the honours. Walter talking with Walternate was a fine scene, and one that ought to have been allowed more time to breathe (since it’s almost surely the one and only time we’ll ever see it) but what little I got I enjoyed. Same too for Olivia and Alt-Olivia, another pairing I wish I’d seen more of but didn’t get to. As mentioned, that sense of waste was probably the entire point so my feelings of remorse are precisely what were intended.

What do I think will happen next?

It has to be about cleaning up house of Mr. Jones once and for all. I wouldn’t be surprised if he tried to spring Alt-Nina out of her prison cell. As also stated, it occurs to me that Mr. Jones might have intended for everything that has happened to have happened. Maybe he wanted everyone to think he intended to collapses the universes when really he just wanted them to shut down the links from one to the other. I don’t really believe that, but at the same time it feels odd to me that he didn’t make precaution against such an obvious block to his goal. I know he sent Broyles to plant a deactivating device on the bridge in a previous episode, and I have to assume the goal there was to destroy the place but keep the bridge open making it so that the link could not be closed. . .?

Whatever, I have to believe that Mr. Jones still presents a great threat and, even if Olivia is part of his Plan B, his Plan B has probably got the makings of a whopping season finale written all over it. 

Fringe: S04 Ep19 – Letters Of Transit

What happened?

In the year 2036 the world has become enslaved by The Observers, with humans divided into those that are subservient and those that are staging a rebellion. The crippled Fringe department functions to maintain law and order over the rebellion, but in Etta and Simon there is still hope for a better future. The discovery of Walter encased in amber reignites that hope.

Together the group return to Peter and Astrid, encased in amber, and Simon sacrifices himself to rescue them. Walter also finds William Bell in amber, but only cuts off his hand due to what he once did to Olivia. Etta introduces herself to Peter, revealing that she is his daughter, Henrietta.

Thoughts

Wow. Right. OK then. Just when you were foolhardy enough to think you knew what an episode of Fringe would hold in store up it comes and delivers a leftfield turn that throws everything out of whack. My instant reaction to the episode was a mixture of shock, delight, confusion and a quiet sense of worry that this was all just a little bit too much.

If ever it felt like my understanding of the Fringe universe needed a refresher course – a feeling this season has had me pondering a number of times – then this episode really hit home the requirement. Let’s start with the first major piece of confusion: what timeline is this? I have to assume that this 2036 is a direct future from the timeline we’ve been staying in during this entire season. If that isn’t the case then I really am lost, so we better stick to that.

The next question then becomes: what universe are we in? Is this the future Over There, or Over Here? Again, I have to assume it’s Over Here since this has always been the primary universe. Though I don’t recall there being any mention of an alternate universe at all. That makes me wonder if Mr. Jones’ plan, potentially, to eradicate Over There may have succeeded and produced this singular universe. I did speculate that he might have even been engineering a plan to collapse both universe and form one universe out of it, which sounds utterly preposterous but, hey, did you see what happened this episode!? Preposterous is not out of the question.

There was the small detail made between Simon and Etta about coffee – with Simon remarking about how he used to recall drinking the stuff. That leads me to believe that we are still Over Here (since coffee was a rarity Over There), but naturally there’s been some blight to this universe that has stopped even coffee from common availability. The Observers apparently have a predilection to water (liked the exchange between Broyles and The Observer, Windmark (I think he was called!) that birthed the remark that water just hydrated Broyles and nothing else).

I suppose the how and the why of the universe set up isn’t massively important (at least in relation to this episode) but it would be worth clarifying if the alternate universe did still remain. If the next episode remains with this future timeline then perhaps that matter will be addressed. For now I am going to assume that there is one timeline, and it’s the timeline we know as Over Here. And the general gist of things appears to have been that the Fringe team saved the world once before (perhaps that was the deal with Mr. Jones that we are yet to see), and then The Observers showed up. Walter managed to concoct a plan to remove them but was forced to Amber himself, Peter, Astrid and William Bell before he could unleash it. Olivia, it appears, died at some point earlier. And for at least four years Peter and Olivia (for whatever time she was around) raised Henrietta. Most of that is relatively straightforward, except for the surprise that William Bell was around!

It would seem that during this entire season’s universe it is one where William Bell remains, alive, although he has not been seen or mentioned. It would make a certain kind of sense since we have only seen him die in a universe that has since ceased to exist. Still, you feel a man of his presence ought to have at least been given a mention before this point, but perhaps that too is something that comes with a lot more revelation and explanation.

After the brilliance of the opening scrawl, and seeing Etta confront The Observer (who apparently could not read her mind, most likely a latent talent she possesses as a product of being a daughter of Olivia) Fringe did a great job in presenting a disconcerting, threatening world. It actually made perfect sense that The Observers could rise up to be this all-controlling force. With the powers they have they make for a near-unbeatable enemy. A major question I have is how much of their foresight and changing of the future may effect their existences? It seems like a massive paradox that they could arrive from the future and hijack the past without them creating ripples in time that would wipe out their own history. Sticky point. These paradox issues do threaten every single time travel plot you ever encounter so they really ought to be taken into account these days!

I liked Etta's character. I figured she was an offspring of Olivia reasonably early on, but I don't consider that a failing, I consider that a triumph in the casting. And whilst Broyles' ageing make-up looked a little weird it was good to see him on the frontline, standing firm. Also good to see Nina, who has successfully managed to straddle the grey area between trustworthy and duplicitous since the very beginning. Here she came across as sympathetic, gladly pleased when Walter managed to fix her arm for her. In the main she's ultimately a good person, but she's been bad in the past!

The sidetrack plot matter of Walter’s grey matter felt like an unnecessary and clumsy stupidity to drag out events. Walter waking up in a dumb but happy mode only for there to be established a quick fix to return his memories and demeanour felt rather silly. Did they really have to create such an obstacle with such a ludicrous resolution to make this episode work? Why couldn’t Walter have just awoken with faint memories that eventually returned and there be all manner of other things preventing them from getting to his ambered allies? It all felt wasteful and farcical and, since Walter’s mind was returned to full functionality at the finish, ultimately it didn’t take proceedings anywhere meaningful. All it did was slow down the process of getting somewhere meaningful.

Simon’s sacrifice felt similarly wasteful. I mean, couldn’t they have somehow suspended the amber at height, then blasted it, allowing the incarcerated to drop out with gravity? Again, it felt like Fringe didn’t realise it had created this astounding world that could easily sustain an episode running time and so threw in a whole bunch of diversions and tangents that needn’t have been there. If we never return this future plotline anytime soon then why did Simon have to die in it? It didn’t really add anything too powerful since his was a character that barely had time to bed in and show us what he was about (even though he did come preloaded with goodwill since it was, after all, Desmond – and what better guy to have around in a time-hopping plot!).

I don’t mean to be too harsh; an episode that is a brave and startling as this deserves credit. I certainly had my attention latched all over the screen in a manner that recent episodes haven’t been able to muster. And, moreover, I’ll definitely be tuning in enthusiastically for the next episode. The question is whether or not this future plot will be continued or if we’ll be returned to the ‘past’ and the matter of Fringe versus Jones. I suppose we do have to see them save the world, but since we know they all make it then it seems somewhat redundant. And if the present day plot concerns somehow averting the terrible future of The Observer-ruled world then it rather makes this episode feel a tad redundant. I am thinking of that portion of the last season’s finale build-up when Peter took a trip to the future. . . Does that still count or did that all get erased? I’m a little sketchy on that front.

Anyway, all in all, I’d rather be confused and enthralled than bored by routine, so I am all for Fringe taking these major leftfield turns so long as it can assure me it know what it’s doing, where it’s going, and that all the bits and pieces it’s carried along with it so far have all been considered and looked after.

What was the best part?

It has to go to the opening scrawl of writing that just about smacked me sideways across the face and left me agape, rapidly trying to absorb this sudden twist of plot. The manner of it reminding me a little bit of The Terminator, which I am sure was intentional. It was the sheer wow factor of starting another episode of Fringe in such an unexpected way that had me bolt upright in my seat, eyes wide. I can’t remember the last time a TV show managed that in the very first second!

What do I think will happen next?

It’s the usual way of things that Fringe leaves me confounded for good ideas about where I think it is going. But this time it has outdone itself. I don’t even know if the next episode is going to continue in this time frame or whether we’ll return to the ‘present’ day and the matter of Mr. Jones and all the rest of it.

If the next episode is going to sustain this future plot line then I’d fully expect there to be some clarification about what happened to Olivia. I can’t see the show going more than two episodes without having its leading lady! So either she’ll have survived somehow in the future, or the next episode will reveal something terrible happened to her and she didn’t make it (seems most likely) – which might lead us on to the prospect that something must happen in the past to prevent this terrible tragedy from occurring.

As ever, I don’t know what will happen next. And I don’t mind. Fringe works best for me precisely because I don’t know where the hell it is going to take me next!