I’ve never been too much of a fan those stories. I like as little filler as possible.
A well placed story here or there, like the one with the time traveling Peter Weller was pretty good. But I like a series to stay on track most of the time.
A Peter recursive loop?
I like the freak of the week shows, too. I like it best when they intersperse an ongoing arc with freaks of the week.
…the “freak of the week” episodes put me off the show: I stopped watching after season one and had to be convinced by my brother to come back to season two. And boy, I haven’t regretted it!
One of the little, more subtle things I really like about the show is the extras get lines. The agents get names. They even get the opportunity to participate in jokes, for example this episodes “why does noone respect my desk?” “Because your too nice!”
The nurse who confronted an escaping Peter last week was competent, yet busy. And the characters are always so nice to the extras, my favourite was last week when Olivia was confronted by the nurse when she went to the hospital; Olivia calmly showed her badge, explained why she was there and acted all realistic-like! Its little touches like this that make me love this show…
I thought the point was that Walter didn’t go over an save the other Peter and both Peters died. If Joshua Jackson is coming back season, then that doesn’t make any sense. Did we somehow create a timeline where both Peters survived? That would mean that we end up with two time lines where the main difference is one timeline had a William Bell and the other one didn’t.
Or a well integrated episode. Example A: the little dude exploding in the subway tunnel (courtesy of mystery machine part). Certainly my favourite moment of the season.
Finally got to watching it.
Hot damn, I love a good paradox. The floor’s been painted, and the audience is trapped in the corner until next season. I just hope the writers know a way out that delivers and makes sense.
It’s my guess as well that Walter failed in getting Peter back to our side to cure him. I’m thinking since Olivia(s) can also use the machine, maybe she can somehow use it to save Peter? The manuscript from the “first people” still exists. Perhaps this way they’ll come to realize that Peter should’ve been saved, and somehow use time travel again?
I need to ponder this one. Thumbs up for me.
Also, I wonder… When 2026 Walter convinced Peter to bury the parts millions of years in the past, he replied, “What do I need to do?” then we flashed back. But… He was still active in the machine. Perhaps 2026 Walter and Peter figured out a plan that we’re not privy to yet, during those last several seconds?
One last remark. I just rewatched the ending. The Observer said, in response to being right about them not remembering Peter, verbatim: “How could they? He never existed. He served his purpose.”
Hrmmm. Never existed means never existed.
I wonder, since he brought the other side over, if that was the paradoxical change they intended on. In 2026, Peter said, “we can’t know the repercussions.” I wonder if Walter knew it might erase Peter’s existence. The Observer taught Walter a lesson in having to let go of Peter in an earlier episode… Walter thought he’d have to let Peter die, and it would be the machine that killed him… In 2011. Well, in whatever future timeline we saw this episode, obviously Peter didn’t die, so perhaps it finally occurred to Walter, that it wasn’t that he had to let Peter die, but cease to exist? If so, makes me wonder how that timeline played out the first time around.
It just occurred to me that the creators and writers know what they’re doing. They wanted to make people talk, and we are talking.
Just thinking about it they obviously know what’s going to happen, and this speculation on our part and the suspense it created is calculated to have us tune in next season.
I’ve loved time travel fiction from an early age so this paradox fascinates me. There are ways to explain what happened and work around the paradox, and it’s probably a lot easier when you have a bunch of writers pitching ideas.
So they have the answers. The question is, are they good answers?
So I’m rewatching the episode right now, and I’m really hoping we get to see more of this future next season. I want to know more about Walter’s trial, Walternate’s journey to our side, and the creation of Fringe Division.
That never happened. Peter changed the future.
When he first stepped into the machine his mind got taken 15 years in to the future.
Later on when Walter was talking about Peter making a different choice he mentioned finding a way to bring Peter’s consciousness from 15 years ago into the present (their present).
That’s what happened. Peter saw that future and changed it.
As for why Walter went to prison you have to look that up on-line. Something on the Fringe Web-site, or texting something somewhere; I don’t remember.
We might still get glimpses of it. They haven’t fixed the future yet. They set up this whole new world with new characters, I doubt they’ll completely abandon it.
Being a huge sucker for time travel myself, 100% agreed. I’ve been pleasantly surprised time and time again, when even a freak-of-the-week episode turns out to have something to do with the over all arc.
Was it the pilot, or even the 2nd episode of season 1 that those people were encased in Amber in that bus? I don’t think the importance of the Amber to mitigate the “soft spots” of the universes was even revealed until this season. That’s just one example.
I feel comfortable that they have a well mapped out plan for season 4. Hope the curve they threw us today pays off! I’ll bet we get to see how Broyles lost that eye…
(Also, if whatever Peter did after the Machine, how did it change the past to the point he never existed?.. Never conceived? Walter never married? Divorced before she became pregnant? His mother died before conception? Am I missing possibilities?)
Somehow I’m thinking that “that” version of Peter never existed.
If the next season is going to be the two sides working together, then Walter still crossed over. Maybe this time in his struggle with Nina the medicine vile didn’t break and he simply gave Peter the medicine and went back.
That would mean that Bell still went over to the other side, which seems like a good way to avoid having to deal with the character since Leonard Nimoy is retired from acting.
Also, that means Joshua Jackson still gets to play Peter, but a different Peter.
If my guess is correct, then they’ll (the fringe divisions of both universes) be dealing with the mystery of how and why the universes got joined together at Liberty Island.
Thinking about it, there’s one thing that bugged me since I learned that the Observers can time travel, all they had to do was go back in time and stop August (or whoever it was) from keeping Walternate from discovering the cure.
I know. Then we wouldn’t have a TV show. But still…
Which also implies that he was created and inserted into these universes to do just what he has done.
So, when Fauxlivia goes back out of the bridged area, she doesn’t have a son any longer because Peter never existed? Both universes have been arranged in a billion different ways because Peter never existed? I’m not sure if I love paradoxes, but they sure do bring up a lot of questions.
Also, it seems a bit obvious that the time-vortex they had to Amber over in Central Park (I forget what era he said it linked to; I thought Peter said the Paleolithic, but then Walter gazed in wonder and said “sauropods” I think… toooootally different eras. I might be misremembering) is probably the most convenient way to send the machinery back in time.
What gets me, is, is there any fathomable way at all to preserve delicate machinery for many, many millions of years?! I’ll let it slide, though.
I like the way you guys think.
That’s a little better, I guess, but it would have been more meaningful if it had been someone who actually stood a half a chance of not returning. Astrid would have been a good pick, for instance, because she’s important to the show but not quite as essential as Peter or Olivia. Broyles would’ve been a good pick had we already not been treated to a big, smoking mass of alt-Broyles earlier.
Let’s start with the good. Fringe excels at character. Everyone was in top form, but once again, Walter was astounding. In addition to his usual two characters, he convincingly created two new future versions that were unique. Future Walternate was more bitter and resolute and blinded. Future Walter was more guilt ridden and full of regret and also seems to have had a stroke at some point, and was convincingly overjoyed by seeing Olivia after many many years. Come on. Just fucking give the man an Emmy already. I can think of no one more deserving.
Seriously, just the single short bit where future Walternate says “Hello, Peter” was so full of nuance, he deserves an Emmy for the next several years. His lack of even being nominated is astonishing.
The bad. Well, the plotting (and science) is as usual a little suspect. It certainly won out in terms of impact. Lots of OMG and WTF. But tempered later by a series of severe fridge moments. Of course, it’s a cliff hanger, so it’s hard to tell at this point which plot points are “yet to be explained” and which are simply “Fringe wibby wobby look the other way”.
In particular, if Peter never existed, then none of the problems should have existed either, so why are they still all tense in the Liberty room?
Further, Peter seems a bit lazy. If he can punch a hole in each universe to create a shared problem solving room, or more importantly, actually destroy an entire universe, surely he could have used the machine to just close up all the holes in each universe and no more problems.
Does anyone have a link to that?
Doing some Googling I found this in a Fringe forum