|
|
FRINGE |
Olivia Dunham - Anna Torv Peter Bishop - Joshua Jackson Walter Bishop - John Noble Astrid Farnsworth - Jasika Nicole Etta Biship - Georgina Haig 
OTHER FRINGE SEASONS Season 1 Season 2 Season 3 Season 4 OTHER JJ ABRAMS SHOWS Lost OTHER PARANORMAL INVESTIGATIONS Eleventh Hour Millennium 
|
Transilience Thought Unifer Model-11It's 2036 and Etta Bishop has united her father and grandfather of the legendary Fringe Division that fought against the Observers' rule over Earth. The hunt is now on for her mother, Olivia. FRINGE completely reinvents itself, shaking off all the X-FILES cop show signs of the past and becoming a full on freedom fighters of the future show, jettisoning most of the minor characters and much of the mythology that it has built up. Here, a small family group fight against invading aliens (OK, they're future humans, but what's the diff?) using high-tech and old time savvy. The human element comes from the family core as Olivia is reunited with Peter and the daughter who is now 21 years older. There is intrigue as Walter is taken and tortured for information and a daring rescue is undertaken. It makes very little sense, relies on some handily-just invented technology and is extremely unlikely, but none of that matters as it races along. This is the last series, so hopefully all the gloves are off and we're in for quite a ride. Written by JH WymanDirected by Jeannot Scharc & Miguel Sapochnik Top In AbsentiaThere is a plan to defeat the Observers, but it is as scattered as Walter's brain. The team break into his old lab to look for clues and find themselves with a hostage that they don't want and learn things about each other they're not keen on. For the second week in a row the team walk into a highly-guarded Observer outpost, in this case through some very convenient maintenance tunnels that nobody ever looks at. The lab is equally conveniently abandoned and they are able to work there alone apart from a single guard who stumbles on them and provides the ethical conundrum. And this is what's good about this episode. Aside from all the asinine gubbins about building a precision laser from some old bits and pieces, there is a moral core that looks at the fate of the prisoner and pits mother against daughter without taking sides about which is right. Can they afford to be merciful when the enemy is not? Why fight for Humanity if it loses its ... er ... humanity? This is the human core that drives the episode and keeps it going. Georgina Haig is a fine addition to the team as Etta Bishop (Peter and Olivia's daughter) and their dynamic is keeping the show afloat at the moment. Written by David Fury & JH WymanDirected by Jeannot Swarc Top The RecordistWalter's videotaped clue leads the team to an isolated band of people keeping the history of Mankind recorded whilst slowly calcifying. And FRINGE bounces back with a sharp episode that appears to be doing nothing and going nowhere, but is actually setting up its characters and making them important enough that the sacrifice at the end is moving and meaningful. OK, so the closing monologue overdoes it a bit on the saccharine front, but up until that it's been pitched beautifully. The problem of the group's illness is a nice sidestep that hides the suckerpunch that's coming and the story sets its audience up by seeming to be more stupid than it actually is. FRINGE is back on song. Written by Graham RolandDirected by Jeff Bennett Top The Bullet That Saved The WorldThe plan to save the world is hidden in a subway that is highly guarded. The team decide that the only way to get it out is to cause their very own Fringe event. Another heavily-guarded Observer site to be infiltrated? Really? This episode, though, has an agenda very much like the previous one. Using the seemingly straightforward, silly and repetitive storyline to hide the suckerpunch that lies in wait. The twist here is shocking. The new state of affairs seems to right that to upset it in such a way is both cruel to the characters and unsettling to the audience. If they're willing to do this then what else are the writers willing to come up with. FRINGE does it again. Written by Alison SchapkerDirected by David Straiton Top An Origin StoryThe team find a way to hurt the Observers by using their own delivery system from the future, but it requires Peter to torture an Observer to get the information he needs. Can what he has been learned be trusted? After the emotional suckerpunch of the last episode, this one takes Peter to some very dark places indeed. It is becoming hard to tell exactly how far he would go to get revenge on the Observers and what he would not do. This is cracking character stuff, though it does leave the plot side of things floundering a bit and the big climax promised fails to deliver and a smaller, more personal one has to take up the slack. Written by JH WymanDirected by PJ Pesce Top Through The Looking Glass And What Walter Found ThereWalter sets off alone to regain the next piece of the puzzle to find that it has been hidden in a pocket universe where the normal laws of physics do not apply. The darkness continues to descend on the FRINGE team as Peter learns a little about what he can do with his new Observer powers and Walter finds that his newly reassembled mind is turning him into a man that he is not keen to become again. This is fascinating stuff and the scene between John Noble and Joshua Jackson at the end is excellently played and quite moving, but once again the plot is left floundering a bit and includes a whole character whose presence seems to be completely irrelevant. Written by David FuryDirected by John Cassar Top Five Twenty TenThe next piece of the puzzle that the team have to find lies deep within an underground vault and to get there they are going to need the help of Nina Sharp. Peter starts to use his newfound powers. Whilst it is nice to see Blair Brown back as Nina Sharp, the story of breaking into the vault to find what lies within is really rather dull, as the whole 'videotapes leading to bits of the machine' plot has proven to be. Peter starting to flex his Observer powers and also being affected by them is a more interesting strand and opens up a whole lot of possibilities. Written by Graham RolandDirected by Eagle Egilsson Top The Human KindAs Peter grows ever closer to avenging the death of his daughter, his humanity is slipping away. Olivia, meanwhile, is reintroduced to the concept of faith. This episode had everything that it needed to be classic FRINGE, but it blows the deal just enough to make the stand out scenes, well, stand out. There's a top fight between Peter and a couple of Observers using Observer powers, there's emotional context with Peter being shown his daughter's dying thoughts and there's a battle for a man's soul. Unfortunately, that's only half the story as there's also a completely pointless side story about Olivia meeting a woman who has second sight (but doesn't say anything useful) that turns into a perfunctory kidnap story that a trained agent like Olivia would never walk so obviously into. It's a shame because we see one of the more interesting strands of the season come to an apparent end here. Written by Alison SchapkerDirected by Dennis Smith Top Black BlotterWalter goes on an acid trip just when the rest of the team needs him to help track down a radio signal of vital importance. Forget the search for the origin of the radio signal, this will always be remembered as the episode where Walter finds himself inside one of Terry Gilliam's Monty Python animations. It wasn't done by Gilliam, true, but it's a moment that will remain in the memory of any fan and is certainly the highlight of what would otherwise have been a rather ordinary episode. The weekly quest to find a piece of the puzzle to defeat the Observers hasn't served the show well and the surprise in what the piece turns out to be isn't enough to raise the episode out of the ordinary. It's down to Walter's hallucinations to do that. Written by Kristin CantrellDirected by Thomas Gormley Top Anomaly XB-6783746Nina Sharpe offers to help the team contact the Observer child Michael. She has a secret lab for them to use, but the Observers are closing in on them all. Nina Sharpe has been a character of questionable allegiances throughout the run of FRINGE, but here she shows her true colours once and for all and it is the character moments that are memorable, especially Nina facing down the Observers from her wheelchair. The rest of the plot is otherwise rather throwaway, having no other purpose than to showcase that Nina/Observer showdown. It's down to Walter's hallucinations to do that. Written by David FuryDirected by Jeffrey G Hunt Top The Boy Must LiveWalter's memories take the team to an apartment and an outcast Observer, who knows what must be done to make Walter's plan work. He also explains the mystery of the Observers' origins and Michael's true nature. This episode is the final info dump before the big two-part finale and as such is a bit less dramatic than it might have been. It is good, however, to learn about the Observers and Michael. The ending, though, rather negates the whole thing, apparently just to create a cliffhanger, undermining the whole thing. Written by Graham RolandDirected by Paul Holahan Top Liberty/An Enemy Of FateIn order to defeat the Observers, the group have to recover Michael from the very heart of the Observer Central. This will require Olivia to take drastic action with the help of some old friends, Walter to make a major sacrifice and everyone to release some memories. FRINGE has reinvented itself several times over in the span of its five year run. These final two episodes (shown in the UK as a single feature-length finale) bring things to a rousing climax, fusing the future with the present with the past in a very satisfying manner. No, the ending is never in doubt, but the survival of the team members quite frequently is so there is enough tension to go around even though the last few minutes are predictable. Olivia's plan to save the Observer child is inventive and a delightful move. There are also some very lovely character moments that will delight the fans, such as the return of the cow and Walter using Astrid's correct name. The scene in which Peter learns of the consequences of Walter's plan has some of the finest acting that the show has ever featured. The action is exciting and the show goes out on a high, miles removed from the chilly X-Files wannabe that it began as. Bravo. Written by Alison Schapker/JH WymanDirected by PJ Pesce/JH Wyman Top |
|
|
If this page was useful to you please sign our 
