Fringe: "Immortality"

Once I rearrange the Fringe timeline based on the events of tonight's episode, I'll offer up a review, after the jump....

In his review of last week's episode, Ryan McGee posited that Fringe was headed in a new direction; based on Sam's end of the episode revelation, the episodes for the rest (or maybe only part) of the season were going to be driven by the question of which 'Livia Peter would choose. I agreed with his assessment, and I was pleased to think that this might be true. Despite some critics proclamations that the ending of “The Firefly” pointed a way forward for the show, I wasn't so sure, and soon enough it became apparent, through “Reciprocity” and “Concentrate And Ask Again,” that the idea of Walter being able to give up Peter, while a dramatically interesting one, isn't something the show could visit every episode. But which girl Peter was going to choose? Now that has resonance.

Yet the more I thought about this, the less I liked it. Though it is an interesting idea, there is one flaw that undercuts any dramatic tension it could possibly create: We met Olivia, Ourlivia, first. Regardless of who Peter loves, we are all 'shippers for Peter and Olivia, not Peter and Fauxlivia. If any world is going to be destroyed, it's going to be Earth-2, not Earth-1. Fringe isn't the kind of show that could pull off something as dark as destroying our universe, and I don't think the writers would risk fan reaction trying. (But the creation of Earth-3? Now that's a possibility....)

Yet all of this may be undercut (or at least made more complicated) by the last ten or so minutes of tonight's episode, in which we learn that Fauxlivia is pregnant. Here I must admit that the type of logic used above (concerning who can and can't die, etc.) actually heightened the effect of the twist for me. Maybe this was the writer's plan, but because I had already called that the scientist had planted the bugs in Fauxlivia (at least this is what I though before the twist), and I knew that she couldn't die, since that would wreck the momentum of last week's twist, I was so distracted with the things that were creating false drama, that I wasn't prepared for the things that would be actually interesting.

When they first pulled out the ultrasound, I thought, mildly “Oh, she's pregnant [Eyeroll.] Great.....” But then it slowly dawned on me. Wait, Frank can't be the father. It has to be Peter. Which means that this is going to further complicate which side he's going to choose. And, OH SHIT, this kid is Walternate's grandson. Now things are going to get really interesting.

Though since this only took up a fraction of the episode, it was a good thing the standalone case was fairly interesting. Me? I'm not a bug guy. They creep me out a little. Yet there was something about their creepy, disgusting nature that kept me hooked. Don't ask me why, but I was legitimately interested. (Note to the writers: This does NOT mean that I want more bug-based storylines.) The same goes for Dr. Anton Silva, a character who managed to balance the creepiness of doing rogue science with the sincerity of trying to save the world. Yet Silva also stood for something greater: The ethical line in science, the one that Walternate refused to cross when he said he would not experiment on children, and the line Walter did cross when he experimented on those kids in Florida..

(Yet the cortexifan-like drug made from Olivia's blood still remains Over There, and just like Silva, somebody is going to cross that line. The only questions that remain now are, who's that person going to be and what's going to come of it?)

And their were also a lot of other small yet great beats this hour played, as the show usually does when we go Over There. When saw Lincoln adjust to his new role in the Fringe Division, something that was psychically manifested when we saw him adjust the height of his chair in the office that used to belong to Alt-Broyles. Alt-Charlie got hit on by Bug Girl from the forensics lab, and suffered some good natured ribbing from Fauxlivia. And Walternate, well, he's got a mad case of yellow fever.

Buried in all of these beats were those from Frank, as he and Fauxlivia played cutesy little games, and we worried about whether she would say yes to Frank's proposal. (Seriously, good job show for making me care about something so innocuous.) Somehow all of this both distracted us from the early establishing scenes where we reminded of Fauxlivia's feelings for Peter, and it helped to heighten the sadness at the end of the episode when Frank found out the truth. And that is how you pull off a good twist.

What did everybody else think?


Additional Thoughts:

Other differences that exist Over There: Samuel Clemens never adopted the moniker Mark Twain; Alt-Charlie is infected with spiders, not worms; and sheep died out ten years ago.

I'd like to think that every time Kirk Acevedo is credited with a “Guest Appearance,” it's like to show is apologizing for killing off his character in early season 2.

Is it just me, or does the guy who plays Lincoln Lee keep looking more and more like Joel McHale?

This week in Twin Peaks references: Reiko, Walternate's mistress, is played by Joan Chen. And Silva's second victim ordered a slice of Cherry Pie.