Fringe (new JJ Abrams show) : Mad scientist, flesh eating virus, a cow and talks with the dead

Gods, this was awesome (even DESPITE the apparent plot holes with the Observers -- if they're not limited to time, they should've completely pwned any and resistance by now) (also, Observers still just white people, but seeing as they're an occupying presence now...).

Despite the obvious CGI, I kind of was hoping that we'd get Nimoy again.

Also, lol, completely lost track of which universe we're in now. Our Walter + Our Peter = Our U, but Henrietta is on the other side, no?

Also:

http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2wigbGH9e1qdw3xpo1_500.gif

Bolivia's baby with Peter was named Henry iirc, so Henrietta is maybe with Olivia.

So much awesome in chopping off dude's hand

Also kind of funny seeing a skinhead observer pimping a hoe

Henrietta iz a pretty good character so far

I wonder where Lee is going to be in this future. I like that Fringe can have people "time travel" (etc.) and move on all in one episode unlike Lost which had interesting time-travel plots but you had to piece together how it worked over a course of one million episodes. There isn't as much waiting for Fringe mysteries

I hope this episode, with the cheesy opening crawl, was a sort of parody, like the X-Files used to do in later seasons. Turning the Observers into baddies out of an L. Ron Hubbard novel can't really be where they're going, can it? This reminded me of that Dollhouse episode where we jump into the future and see a bunch of folks we've never seen before fighting against the bad guys who have somehow conquered the world.

the lack of consistency w/r/t/ what the Observers can or can't do killed a lot of the episode for me

I like the Observers as altruistic people. Seeing them having an actual stake in what's going on other than "gotta keep the timeline going" was weird, but the episode definitely had moments.

Anyone else feel like the Walter went from kind of amber brain-damaged to Walter pre-lobotomy? He seemed sharper and more curt than the our-universe Walter.

that's because they put the evil part of his brain back in.

I don't know if he's evil as much as he is capable of all kinds of stuff that he was scared of. The original reason was both to keep himself from doing things he didn't like AND to get rid of the parts of his brain that stored the ability to put together a universe portal device, right?

It's the brain stuff that Walternate never lost.

yah

I wonder where Lee is going to be in this future.

I was so OMG DESMOND <3 <3 I forgot Agent Lee existed. :/

Btw maybe I am dense but this was just pointed out to me re: the episode where Alt-LL dies, and they were discussing why LL and Alt-LL turned out so different despite living nearly identical lives. The only difference? Olivia was present in one and not the other. ;_;

you mean he met her earlier in one?

yep

I wonder where Lee is going to be in this future.

Huh? I'm probably going to be on ILX, complaining about the newest hit smellevision show.

Aww poo, you weren't talking about me. If only there were an alternate universe where I could go and be appreciated. /fishing

Renewed for a 5th and final season, 13 episodes. Don't L O S T this, Fringe guys.

That is actually GREAT NEWS. I've become surprisingly attached to the characters in this show.

Everything I had read recently made it sound like a 5th season was pretty unlikely, so I'm pretty happy about it.

If fans keep campaigning will they throw in a sixth? Doesn't hurt to ask.

Compared to Lost, it's not like there's a Big Secret left to unravel, it's more like, "How are they going to get out of this?"

It's sort of the opposite to BSG -- I'm more interested in the characters getting good endings than the producers tying up all the mythology stuff.

i am super happy about this news!

It's also, probably very intentionally, just enough of an order to trip the 100 episode level for syndication -- which may seem less important in the 'watch via Netflix' era or the like but that still very much has a place.

So the Double Rainbow Guy is from the other side?

which is double rainbow guy?

great episode - loved the scene between the two Walters (was kind of amused though how Peter's somehow morphed from a belligerent, selfish con artist into this perfect good son)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQSNhk5ICTI

oh you meant THAT double rainbow guy. lol sorry, thought you meant there was a character from one of the various timelines/futures who talked about seeing a double rainbow or something.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. TT_________TT

aw, spock ain't that bad

Not complaining about Spock per se... :(

action astrid : )

wait WHAT noooooooooooooooo : (

Didn't Astrid show up in the flashforward ep, though?

action astrid : )

― j., Saturday, May 5, 2012 9:40 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

wait WHAT noooooooooooooooo : (

― j., Saturday, May 5, 2012 9:44 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Didn't Astrid show up in the flashforward ep, though?

― Simon H., Saturday, May 5, 2012 10:04 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

My EXACT train of thought!!

And yeah, she's in the FF ep, but the shock of THE SCENE and my mistakenly assumption that this was the season finale combined to freak me out.

Asterix ;_;

Had to lol at how unnecessarily complicated DRJ's plan to kill Peter was, though.

"The Bishop must be sacrificed. And I will do it by luring him to two dishes rigged up to a satellite that can magnify the sun rays to concentrate on an oil well where the explosion would probably destroy the entire city of Boston. And when he gets there to stop it, I'll just kill him with nothing but a crowbar."

lol that is why he was only the bishop... but does that make Spock the queen?

Wait, he was diverting the sun JUST to kill Peter? Whoah and also lol

Man the product placement was so freaking ham-fisted in this ep, there was an entire exchange between Astrid and Walter at the scene of the spontaneously combusting people that seemed tacked on specifically to show off Sprint's pay-by-phone tech. Can't we be a little more, I dunno, creative with this shit?

Also somewhat bored with this one and felt DRJ's death was a MASSIVE anti-climax.

The product placement was hilarious.

I don't think that DRJ's death could be anything but anti-climactic: he's already died once before, and plus, it's the same episode that features Nimoy's return.

Only half of him crumbled away to dust! He seems to be good at recovering from losing half of his body as I recall.

nah, that was another version of this universe

Use Sprint phone tech, immediately die by spontaneous combustion - I'd say that's A+ product placement right there. At least until REGENERATING PIG-BRAIN LEMON CAKE made in an Easy-Bake oven.

LOL

Ok, so what was that?

(I guess Bell is alive, but was the implication that the one we saw interacting with Walter was an astral projection, or some kind of Fight Club dissociative crazypants hallucination?)

Nah he teleported out or escaped to another dimension

The very first time Olivia crossed over to the alt-reality, iirc Bell rang the uh, bell to send her back. Guess he did the same thing here with himself?

The part where Walter shot then stuck a metal rod through Olivia's head was kinda horrifying.

no surprises in a finale (it was all locked in early to work out how it did) is a bit disappointing. so the final series is 13 eps of the struggle against the past-colonising observers. hmm :-/

I was wondering how much of the planning for the last few eps of the season was done before they knew they were being renewed. I suppose just a few changes (no future episode, Bell dies instead of escaping, September says something about how important you all are and keep wuvving each other) and this could have been the series wrap up.

the thing with olivia dying and comping back was genuinely frightening.

er coming back.