Fringe: Fracture

By Rhea Dee
This episode improved greatly on balancing the monster of the week storyline with our characters overarching problems, as well as inching forward some of the mysteries about The Pattern, and Baldo. But, before we get to that, we have our monster/problem of the week: an exploding man. Kind of like Peter, from Heroes, except way less emo (and unfortunately, way less hot).

I think the major reason that this episode works better than the last is that the overarching focus isn’t solely on Olivia, and her problems. Now I love Olivia more than anything, but I think the show runs a bit smoother when they’re giving us peeks into all the characters lives and not just Olivia’s. Olivia is not the only one tied to the mystery of The Pattern and the alternate universes; at this point the only character that doesn’t have any personal stake with the overarching problem of the show is Astrid (she just works here).

Anyway, this episode manages to give us little peeks into the pasts/secrets/thoughts of all the characters without stalling the mystery of the (exploding) monster of the week. And what lovely peeks we get! I was especially fond of the Astrid and Walter moment, where she suggested Walter be more open minded to Peter’s apartment searching, in her clever roundabout way. The Astrid and Walter relationship is fascinating to me, since Astrid works very dutifully for Walter, doing all his eccentric requests. Since she spends all of her screen time in the lab, assisting Walter, it’s no surprise that she’s knows exactly how to (subtly) help him. It was nice to see her offer up a little advice to our Walter, and even better to see him take it–by the end of the episode he finally stops being stubborn about Peter relocating them.

Meanwhile, Peter and Olivia jet off on a mini-holiday to Iraq to help solve this monster of the week and we get a tiny (and I mean tiny) hint of Peter’s past. Namely, that he was some sort of badass. And that he held–holds–a lot of influence in that country’s underworld. Olivia seems fascinated by this, but Peter is as tight lipped about his past as she’s been about her struggles with her memory since her universe tripping accident.

Which leads me to Sam Weiss, bowling alley owner and Olivia’s new physical therapist. Sam has Olivia doing simple tasks to build up her motor skills, stuff like tying her shoes and keeping score of kids’ bowling games. Olivia however, experiences her first headache in this episode–the headaches that Sam warned her about. She sees flashes of what she went through, and when she tells Sam about it, he simply tells her that it’s her returning memory that is causing the headaches. He offers no more advice than that, and directs Olivia to the next mundane task. By the end of the episode, Olivia is fed up with Sam’s seemingly careless attitude towards her fragmented memory, so she stalks up to him and hold a gun to his head, demanding he tells her what she wants to know, now. (I think I’m going to dub this approach “doing things Olivia style”). Sam calmly turns around and Olivia realizes that her hands holding the gun aren’t shaking–and that she walked over to him without her cane. Very Karate Kid, Sam Weiss. I like it.

Despite being (obviously) enchanted by our characters and their struggles, the monster of the week is rather fascinating. I’m a sucker for corrupt military stories, and this one seemed to be playing into that…until the very end. For the entire episode I thought that the Colonel was just having his old unit target random people with black suitcases so that he could trigger the chemical inside them to carry out his terrorist act. And then, right at the end, it turns out he had a greater purpose. Those black suitcases? Those are delivered to Baldo. Yes, that Baldo. (You know, I’ve only been able to spot Baldo when he’s relevant to the plot. Other than that, I’ve totally missed all his Hitchcock cameos so far this season. How are you all doing on the “Where’s Baldo?” front?) The Colonel says that those suitcases hold information that is apparently very dangerous and puts humanity at risk. So what’s in the case? A picture of Walter.

Of course Walter would be the super dangerous problem. Of freaking course.

Next Time on Fringe: So now that Olivia has hung up her shakes and cane, does that mean we’ll FINALLY see some William Spock Bell? Stop teasing me show!

Last Thoughts: I hate that Walter’s in that suitcase. Yep, still stuck on that. Man.

Rhea Dee spends her time collecting vintage junk, daydreaming about Eli Roth, and pondering the genius of John Carpenter soundtracks.  She really likes horror films.

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