Season 4, Episode 7
“You know, I’ve been investigating fringe
events for three years. I never thought I’d become one.”
As you might have noticed from these reviews, I never
been a fan of discussing the standalone cases of the week, unless perhaps they
have some sort of emotional connection or impact, and even then I rarely
discuss the actual plot itself. It’s not that I’m prejudiced against standalone
plots – I can recognize when one is well executed, though that seems to be a
bit of rarity these days – but rather I think the serialized elements of any
show make for better discussion. Standalone plots are meant to be disposable, and
discussing them always seems like an exercise in futility, and they kind of
make reviewing a show week to week a bit pointless. So what is one to do when an
episode is almost entirely a standalone plot, and not much else, and to top it
all off, the standalone plot is even that good? Shake your head mostly, and then
just scrounge for whatever discussion points you can.
But before I do that, I want to bring up one more thing
about tonight’s Freak of the Week, because I have a feeling if I don’t, someone
else will attempt to use it to prove the quality of this episode. I get that
there was supposed to be an element of love to Eugene’s (the aforementioned
Freak) story, since apparently his attempts to become opaque or absorb light or
whatever you want to call it were all in the name of being able to talk to his
neighbor Julie. (Or was it Julia? It’s not like the show had me in rapt attention
by the time that we learned her name.) However, there are three reason why I am
unable to buy into this love, which is sad considering that the show has done
such a good job of incorporating that emotion into past standalone cases.
First, and least important, is the fact that Eugene was
just creepy. He snuck into Julie’s apartment – naked, I presume – just to watch
her, and that’s not the kind of activity that makes you root for him to talk to
her, or that makes you sad when he dies after achieving his goal. (And
seriously, what kind of ending was that? Not only does it make the Fringe Division
once again fairly passive participants in this fringe event, but aren’t they
going to at least make sure that he’s dead. It’s just like that he would die, and
that’s the last that we saw of that.)
Secondly, there’s a weird disconnect between Eugene’s
goal – the gentle act of loving someone – and his means – the violent killing
of other in order to take their pigment. (Or whatever; again, this was not an episode
that held my interest.) While other Freaks have caused destruction in the name of
love – like in last week’s episode – it’s usually not as direct and conscious an
action, and more of a side effect. And even when there is direct and violent
action – and there was in the awesome “Marionette” – it at least feels
necessitated in order to reach a complex and complicated goal, like cutting out
body parts to reanimate your dead lover. However, killing people just so that you
talk to someone? Those aren’t exactly even stakes.
But third, and most important, is the fact that the show
seems to be returning to the well of love a bit too often these days. I get
that some of the show’s best episodes have used this theme to great effect –
the first I believe being “White Tulip”, though I could be wrong on that – but it
feel likes the show is turning to this conceit because it’s worked in the past,
not because it’s proper for the episode at hand. But I think the biggest
problem is that love used to be such a rare occurrence in the world of Fringe, so that its presence in a world of
selfish corporations and bloodthirsty monsters felt like a shock in and of
itself. The more the show included love, the softer the show’s universe feels, and
the less impact love as a concept has. (Even last week, which used the
motivation of love fairly effectively, didn’t feel as powerful as previous
efforts had.)
As for the serialized elements, which usually makes up
the meat of these reviews…Well, there wasn’t that much of it tonight, and even
the stuff that was there feels like a retread of last week, where all I did was
speculate on those elements. (It’s now become sad how much I’ve had to reference
the review for “And Those We’ve Left Behind” in order to inform this one.)
Peter, for whatever reason (I assume because the story demands it) continues
his belief that he can and should return to his own timeline, and now he’s
decided that maybe he’s going to use the machine that caused this mess in the first
place, because that’s a good idea. (Speaking of which, how does this timeline
know about that machine? Didn’t that have to exist as prophecy in the other
timeline for the present one to have been created? It seems like a paradox to
me.)
Elsewhere, Peter doesn’t seem to care that Lincoln is in
love with Amberlivia, because apparently now he capable of telling his ‘Livias
apart, and he’s so cool with it that he’s actually playing matchmaker between
the two of them. And speaking of Amberlivia (credit where it’s due: I picked that name up from Noel Murray), apparently she’s having migraines because every
once in a while Nina gases her apartment and injects her with what I can only
assume is anti-cortexifan. And this means she missed her second dated with
Lincoln! Oh noes!
In truth, I can’t be bothered to care for the same reason
I haven’t been able to care this whole season: the show has yet to prove that
the events of this timeline actually matter, and that there not just pulling a
fifth-season-of-Lost on us. Now, I
appreciate that there’s actually some mystery going forward for this timeline
that’s not about Peter, and maybe that will make things interesting come
January, but for now, we’ve just got a lackluster episodes to hold our interest
until then, and frankly I’m not sure it’s capable of doing the job.
When we return in
January: Peter visits Over There,
possibly leaves EWOP. We all hope that this actually leads somewhere.
Quotes and Other
Thoughts:
You’ve probably already figured this out, but this episode wasn’t supposed to air as the winter finale, though it did so thanks to the World Series. That
means that when we come back in January, the first episode will probably end on a
big cliffhanger, and then we'll just roll right into the next episode the week after
without enough time to really cherish the cliffhanger for all it’s worth.
Expect me to talk about that some more next year.
Okay, okay. Amberlivia and Linc’s timid courtship is actually
kind of cute, especially since I apparently don’t have to worry about Peter getting
upset about it.
Eugene’s is Patient #64595, he lives on the 14th
numbers, and the Fringe Division cornered him on the 23rd. No, these
numbers aren’t important, and I wish the show would stop throwing them around as
if they were.
Okay, this review went on a whole lot longer than I expected.
“Sir? I’m moving up in the world.”
“It’s possible. Of course, leprechauns are possible.”
“Is ‘repygmentize’ a word?” No. But apparently ‘pygmentize’
is. The more you know.
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