Oh please let’s not stay in this particular ‘universe’ for much longer. It is depressing and boring. Everyone is without hope, no one smiles and everyone is upset. And I really, really do not like the-other-side-of-crazy Walter.
P.S. That was Stephen Root and was not Jean Smart, correct?
Yeah, I recognized Stephen Root right away, and I feel like I should know who was playing his wife, but I can’t place her. Definitely not Jean Smart.
It was Romy Rosemont, Stephen Root’s real wife.
Good episode. I don’t usually get choked up by Fringe but this one delivered. I wish they had edited the shot near the end differently of the wife prior to her writing in the big notebook. They held on her so long that it telegraphed what she was going to do. It was still nice when the husband saw what she had done, but it could have been stronger.
Spider-man fanny pack!
Oh and it occurred to me during this episode. Peter knows about The Observers. There is no way he knows that everyone else does not know.
I have a feeling that super-crazy Walter may have an idea. Can someone explain to me again why Walter feels so guilty about Peter being alive? Something about how he destroyed both universes and he doesn’t deserve an alive Peter. I just missed out on when the specifics were explained.
(checks her IMDB page)
:smack: Of course! She plays Finn’s mom on Glee.
I think you’re right about this. In the scene where Walter and Peter first meet, we only see the reactions of those outside the room when Peter mentions the Observer to Walter (Astrid asks, “What’s an Observer?”); it’s not even necessarily clear that Walter doesn’t know, from Peter’s perspective.
Here’s the exchange from later in that same episode, when Peter once again asks Walter for help. Remember in the earlier confrontation, Walter relates how his own son died and the alternate version drowned in the lake when he crossed over (no Observer rescued them):Walter: Every day, for the past 25 years, I’ve tried to imagine what you would look like as a man - my son. But I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve you. I realize now this was my punishment. You were sent to tempt me, to see if I would repeat the mistakes of the past. You shouldn’t be here.
Peter: Walter, no.
Walter: Wherever you came from, however you got here, it doesn’t matter. I can’t help you.
Peter: Walter, you don’t understand!
Walter: I tried to help a boy, a version of my son, 25 years ago - but that boy was never my son. And neither are you.This scene is well-performed, by both John Noble and Joshua Jackson; it’s incredibly effecting. My take is that Walter feels responsible for the deaths of both versions of his son, and cannot reconcile his own guilt with the appearance of his apparently grown son. Peter can’t be his son, because he already saw him die twice. And he’s terrified of the prospect of being involved in any more tragedy involving his son(s).
I don’t think it’s going to be as simple as this being a different universe. It’s got to be the same universe, but altered, like on Buffy when Dawn showed up but with pseudoscience instead of magic monks.
If it was a different universe, there’d be no reason for Olivia to dream about Peter or Walter to be seeing him in reflective surfaces before he popped out of the lake.
I’d kinda like to see Peter go visit the redverse, get Walternate’s reaction to the situation.
I’m surprised Walternate hasn’t come over to see Peter himself. Surely Walternate knows about Peter and his scientific curiosity should lead him to see his possible son for himself.
While this episode was OK, it also reinforced my feelings that wiping Peter out of existence was pointless, and this introduces yet another pointless snag in Peter and Oliva’s relationship. After becoming romantic Oliva is replaced by Fauxlivia. Then, after the real Olivia comes back she’s angry with Peter because he couldn’t tell her from Fauxlivia. Now, she doesn’t even know him. Ugh, I don’t really care to see Peter trying win Oliva back. I just want that to go away and for the show to move forward. The sooner things get back to normal, the better.
What’s that flat-screen tv, doing in Walter’s house? He’s not lived there since he went to the psychiatric hospital.
There was something bothering me about the TV but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
I liked the episode overall, but I, too, would prefer things to go back to some semblance of how they were before – especially for Walter. It’s just so heartbreaking to see him entirely robbed of the childish glee that used to make up for his not-quite-thereness; he seems to be utterly empty now.
I made my husband back it up on the TiVo and asked the same question! I was like… Hey! That TV is too new if this place has been closed up that long!!
That’s a good catch. And wasn’t it covered with a cloth which Peter removes? But lots of things were covered with clothes so… set decorator’s mistake or clue?
I’m thinking mistake.
In this universe - that is an old tv - they don’t even use “screens” anymore and everythign is just displayed in the air or thru ocular implants.
:D. The universe Peter is in is our universe (more or less) just one where he never lived passed the age of 10.
Like a reverse It’s A Wonderful Life.
It’s a really crappy life?
Let’s think this out. Bear with me…
Peter eventually uses the time machine at the end of season 3, creating a paradox in that He and Walter build that very time machine in 2026 to send the pieces back in time millions of years ago, where upon the 2008–2011 Fringe Gang will find and gather the pieces (not knowing it was themselves who constructed it and hid the pieces in the past), to then later be used by Peter to… a continuous loop.
But.
We’re missing the actual plan. When Peter comes out of the machine, he’s elated and says he “built” a bridge between the two universes to work together and… he fades away.
Here’s what I’m thinking, although there’s nothing yet to confirm it.
Since Peter used the machine to get to 2026, it became apparent they, themselves built it. Peter told Walter, that this time, he has to do the right thing, and finally let him go. Walter finally accepted this.
But we don’t know what they intended to happen. Did Peter say that because he thought they needed to change the timeline as we see it now, where he’s not supposed to live past age 10? And if so, how would that work, since it was an Observer who saved him. OR… was the machine designed with a dual purpose, to bring Peter forward and backward in time and to reverse the damage it’s wreaked over the last 15 years but creating some kind of bridge? Or perhaps they were led to believe they designed the thing by the Observers as a trick to “set events straight” and make sure both Peters died that day, by choosing not to pull him out of the ice.
Either way, look at it from the point of Peter. He seems to remember everything. He hasn’t had any dialog about this yet, but what exactly did he experience when he “fluttered out of existence”?
I’m thinking one second, he was telling the gang about the new UniBridge, then the next thing he knew he was gasping for air at the very spot he drowned in this new universe.
Peter’s been preserved. Maybe because the machine booted him out of the blue and red universes he knew, and tossed him into an altogether new one where he died, because the Observer didn’t pull him out (as according to their plans to correct the “omniverse”).
So, he’s stuck here, and the only option is to use the machine again. He’s going to need to find the Observer. He’s going to need to convince him he needs to go back to that day on the ice, and pull him out. And, while the Observer will be reluctant, he’ll do it because he’s obviously emotionally compromised in his “mission”. And this will bring everything full circle… and we’re back where we started, because the universe Peter finds himself in is the one that was supposed to exist.
The universes from the previous 3 seasons were ones where the Observer interfered in saving the life of Peter. But why? Because Peter convinced him to.
So, now that I wrote all that out, I can’t wait to see how way off I am. This show is fun.
IOW: This explains why the Observer pulled Peter from the ice in the first place.
If Peter can’t be erased, it only makes sense to try to get back home, and continue to repair the damage Walter caused.
Yeh?
And if successful, perhaps we’ll see him flutter back into existence, with new knowledge and a revelation.
OR, perhaps the Peter that got out of the machine was the Peter after the event’s of THIS season? Perhaps, he gained the knowledge of the how to build a bridge from this Amberverse?