Contributor: John Keegan
This is the kind of relatively simple episode that can sneak up on you. Not only does it reach back to its forebears in terms of style; it also refers back to previous episodes from the original timeline and tosses in an unexpected wrinkle at the very end. In other words, it’s a perfect example of how “Fringe” is continuing to hit its stride.
In an opening reminiscent of “The X-Files”, vehicles approaching the town of Westfield, Vermont lose power, even as its residents begin to go insane and start killing each other. Fringe Division is sent in to investigate, and in a necessary move achieved through some hand-waving, Walter and Astrid join Peter and Olivia in the field. As a result, they become trapped in Westfield as well.
This is one of those rare instances where it doesn’t matter that the audience figures out what is happening before the characters. Should they have recognized the signs of universes merging? Perhaps, but only if the events of the original timeline proceeded exactly as we recall, where they’ve investigated similar incidents on a much smaller scale. Besides, the cause of this overlap is not as “natural”; David Robert Jones is artificially forcing the universes to merge.
The slow path to understanding in this case is also meant to raise doubt, when Olivia starts to react strangely during the investigation. If one doesn’t come to the conclusion that this is due to overlapping universes, then her symptoms appear to be similar to those of the residents. It doesn’t become clear until much later that her issues are unrelated, at least in part.
I’m not so sure that there isn’t a sort of cumulative effect taking hold, since Nina and Mr. Jones have been working together to dose Olivia with gobs of cortexiphan for some arcane purpose. The fact that her ability allows her to cross over between universes naturally, under the right conditions, would seem to apply. But why, then, would she essentially revert back to the Olivia from the original timeline?
The implication is that the nature of the “timeline shift” is not what it appeared to be. Instead of permanently altering the timeline, Peter’s excision may have actually created some kind of overlay on real events, a shift that is superimposed, for lack of a better term, on the original universes, which underneath the “new timeline”, still exists as it was. As confusing as that is, I’m sure that Olivia’s restoration will only serve to allow the writers to work the audience through the details of the concept at play. But it’s fairly clear, at this point, that this isn’t as simple as replacing one “timeline” with another.
Writing: 2/2
Acting: 2/2
Direction: 2/2
Style: 2/4
Final Rating: 8/10
