Fringe: The Box

I am amazed with this show. Every episode raises ratchets up the intensity of the battle between worlds. I thought I would be bored with the Folivia story line almost immediately. It had been done previously in this series with the fake Charlie of season two and it seemed they squeezed all the drama out the doppleganger from another dimension they could.

I was wrong, however, because the fake Charlie was in fact a fake Charlie. Folivia is Olivia, just raised under different circumstances in a different world. In the great child rearing debate, Fringe seems to be throwing in for nurture. As proven when Folivia killed the deaf man with almost no remorse.

Two points for the Fringe creative forces for erasing Folivia’s tattoo. That two second scene made this storyline much more plausible. That noted, I would have liked to see how she got Peter out of that apartment without him seeing the blood seeping into the living room.

Walter is now the sole owner of Massive Dynamic, which changes things considerably. It remarkable how the depiction of that company morphed from evil empire to the most significant defender of this world over the course of this series. It’s almost as dramatic a turn as Wolfram and Heart made on Angel. Will Massive Dynamic change Walter or will Walter change Massive Dynamic? I am guessing that for now, Walter will leave Nina in charge of the day to day operations.

I would like to compliment the Fringe creative powers on creating a wonderful villain for this series. Walternate and the world he inhabits are familiar enough for us to emphasize with, different enough to serve as a cautionary tale, and fictional enough as to not offend, alienate, or smear any nationality, religion, or ethnic group. Fringe is not “us against them”, it’s “us against us”, and it makes for fantastic drama.