Oct 01 2008
Review: Fringe Episode 1-4
TV.com: The Arrival - The team investigates a strange cylinder, found in a deadly explosion at a construction site in New York City. The cylinder was in the middle of the explosion and was completely unharmed. Olivia uncovers a correlation between different disturbing events.
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Review: This week’s episode opens in New York City with the appearance of a very strange man. Every thing he does is strange. From the order of food he makes to the writing he makes in his notebook. His focus is on the construction site across the street, and all hell soon breaks loose there, and he makes a call stating something arrived. Back at the federal building, Peter is ready to leave his father behind after a difficult night. However, Olivia tells him he is needed.
This episode takes a weird turn when a device is found at the construction site. The device can only be described as alien in nature, and Walter works to figure out what it may be. An old colleague of Olivia’s warns her to stay away from it. This series taking an X-Files turn here, and this is something I don’t think quite fits the series. Fringe science is one thing, but aliens is another.
I found this series start to lose me in this episode. We have men in black, alien artifacts, aliens killing humans that know too much. I had been fighting to keep up with this series, but the fact that the science in this series wasn’t completely alien kept me going. Now we have the alien connection. We find out that Walter is protecting the cylinder found. He even speaks to the man called The Observer. Yes, the strange man from the start of the episode. He plays a big part this week.
Walter won’t tell anyone just why he needs to keep the object safe. We also see John return this week. We knew that would happen sooner or later. Peter is then taken in this episode as well. He is used to discover where Walter hid the cylinder, and we learn there is another Bishop. Olivia does find Peter, but not before the other man tries to escape with the cylinder. She is able to stop him though. The cylinder disappears, and the observer makes another call. This is witnessed by Peter, and the two have a strange exchange before he shoots Peter and gets away.
After this, Olivia tells Peter maybe he should go, but he decides to stay. It is then that Olivia gives him his federal credentials. Walter tells Peter a story about how they died and were saved by an alien, the observer. Walter protecting this capsule was repayment for saving the two of them.
This episode lost me by midway through. I wasn’t truly expecting an alien connection to pop up on this series for some reason, and that turned me off a bit. We don’t need another X-Files really. What did you think?
