Fringe – Officer down

Considering that I’m covering Fringe for Carla this week, I was glad to see the story was based in the other world, and stayed far away from the love life of Peter and Olivia. That means I didn’t have to spend much time trying to explain my disagreement with the seemingly universal feeling on the internets that last week’s installment was epic. Don’t get me wrong, I love Peter and Olivia together, but my reaction to last week was “OK, we’ve finally gotten that out of the way, what’s next.” Fortunately the answer to that question was an interesting look at Agent Lincoln Lee and a chance to check back in with the agents of the Alt-Fringe Division.

When Fauxlivia (That’s what I call her in my head, so that’s what I’m going with in this post) and Agent Lee were driving to the first crime scene, I was struck how different they were in personality. It might be a reach to call (this particular) Lee awkward, but I think uncomfortable is an accurate description. But in those differences the pair shined, and I am really looking forward to Lee spending some time working with the whole Alt-Fringe Division team. I have actually thought since this season started that some type of agent exchange program would be a logical operational idea.

It is a shame, though, that it took the death of Captain Lincoln Lee to bring that idea to fruition. I know that the Fringe fandom became big fans of the other-Lee in the past several seasons, and for good reason. He was a beyond competent agent, helped shape the audience’s opinion to the idea that people from the other side weren’t necessarily evil because they were from the other side and, possibly most importantly, he was a friend to “our” Olivia when she needed him the most – I am sure that female Fringe fan’s might have an additional reason to like the guy, but I digress. Regardless, his is a character I think the show will miss a great deal.

Was this the first time we have seen evidence of things getting better on the other side? I don’t know if I missed something earlier in the season, but it is nice to see that Peter’s efforts and unwitting sacrifice were more productive than just creating a door — albeit a very special door. As hard as it was to both live without Peter in the early episodes of the season and then see him return to a world he did not know, it is even worse when the audience can’t really appreciate any good that resulted from the operation of “the machine.”

One of my favorite aspects of all of the “other side” stories has always been the cultural and historical differences between the two worlds. It likely started when we discovered that The West Wing was still going on over there. This episode’s “Filmores” and the story on the newspaper about the three schools that didn’t meet the national average continued the tradition of the Easter eggs. Some are more obvious than others, but they are all fun to keep an eye out for. Though I still think “Show Me Card” is a silly name for a national ID card.

Notes & Quotes

• “[After finding out Batman on the other side was called Mantis] Seriously? Your superhero is an insect?” – Agent Lee
  “Oh what, because nothing says badass like a flying rat?” – Fauxlivia
• The actors on this show deserve incredible amounts of praise for their ability to play different versions of themselves, but Jasika Nicole’s performances have been especially stellar this season – and the scene where she reported Lee’s death to Broyles was a wonderful example of that.
• I rarely “notice” the wig that Anna Torv wears when playing Fauxlivia, but it looked especially “not-real” to me in the character’s final scene with Lee. Was I the only one?

Clacked by Ivey West
on Apr 07, 2012 @ 08:33 EST5EDT