We know from previous episodes that William Bell had a skyscraper in the alternate Earth and was a big military contractor, but we don’t know the name of the company or the location of the skyscraper. If Olivia regains her memories, then it should be pretty easy to find out out what company the Fringe Division buys their firearms from and where their headquarters are.
BTW, I didn’t understand the bit about the pen during Peter’s interview. Did I miss something from a previous episode or was that some kind of hint to a later a development?
The alternate universe has been degrading ever since Walter first destabilized it by crossing over to kidnap Peter. Their only method for sealing the tears in the fabric of their reality is to encase them in amber.
Walternate doesn’t just think it; their universe really is in danger from Walter and anyone else on our side that is able to cross over. There is some discontinuity, though, what with that bad guy who teleported out of jail opening a doorway back to that universe. That should have been seen as the worst idea ever, but none of the other-siders seemed to think it was a problem.
ETA: I am also curious about the pen conversation at the end. Felt like a Chekhov’s Gun to me.
Pretty sure regular Walter also said the universes were in danger (something about snowglobes colliding) but it could also be a little from column a, a little from column b.
I dunno that I’d say it was boring, but I definitely missed Walter and Peter. Walter is one of the best characters on TV now, and Peter’s pretty cool as well.
Well, other people can do what they want, but unless/until they officially use the name in an episode, like they have with Walternate, I’m not using Fauxlivia. I just don’t like it.
We know exactly where it was, it was the World Trade Center.
I absolutely loved this episode? Why do I say this? Because it was over in like two seconds. I wasn’t even that annoyed by the predictabilities, e.g., when the guard entered his code in the keypad I knew Olivia was going to escape, I knew Bubbl…I mean Henry was going to trash his transponder to help Olivia as soon as the Fringe folks mentioned Olivia in a cab, etc…
Like others, I really like the detail and differences in the alterverse, e.g., World Trade Center, JFK, non oxidized Statue of Liberty, zeppelins, etc…
I have a few questions about this episode. Why (or how) does Olivia have a tattoo on the back of her neck? Did Walternate think Olivia’s transformation into Fauxlivia required that much attention to detail? How would Walternate even know about the tattoo? How would acquiring the memories of Fauxlivia make Olivia a better (apparently much better) shot? Marksmanship is as much about experience and feel as it is about knowledge. That part of the episode just felt wrong and presumptive to me.
I have a feeling Charlie will begin to suspect who Olivia really is and will help her anyway.
I didn’t mind the lack of Peter and Water in this episode. For me, it worked.
The freak of the week episodes are what originally attracted me to Fringe, but I like what’s become the main arc much better.
No, that last bit is a reach and a half. Marksmanship is about muscle memory. It’d be like implanting someone else’s memory in you and now you’re all of a sudden left handed. Memory != muscle memory, which is why there is a term called “muscle memory” in the first place.
There would be distinctive calluses and development in the muscles and tendons, that would be missing in Olivia. That might need some explanation.
The big mistake the writers made was showing Olivia with a rifle and her Olympic medal. A crack rifle shot isn’t necessarily a good pistol shot. They are really different skills sets. They should have shown her with a target pistol.
I forgot about that. Did Olivia know she was in the WTC? If she did, then it would be odd she didn’t go there instead of trying to go to the Massive Dynamics building. The view from the upper floors is pretty distinctive, but if she could see the other tower, then it would be immediate giveaway.
My understanding is that muscle memory means that with enough repitition the muscle control gets handled by the brain stem/spinal cord, as in it becomes an automatic reaction like breathing. After glancing at your cite for a few minutes I quickly lost interest. I never thought that muscles actually contained memories; I’m not quite that stupid, but thanks for the clarification just in case.
The thing that really got my goat about the whole memory thing was that they specifically said they were injecting “memory lymphocytes”, which are real things. The problem is, they’re called that not because they have anything to do with memory, but because they are responsible for your immune system’s “memory”. These are the white blood cells that have reacted to infections in the past, so the body keeps a few copies around in case the same bug shows up again.
I mean, OK, invent some bullshit to make your story interesting, but don’t take something that has an actual meaning and pretend it means something else. That way madness lies.
The whole memory implantation thing bugs me (in a storyline with 2 alternative universes!) But all in all a neat episode. So is the taxi driver going to help Olivia more in the future?
Agreed. It’s hard to tell though, because the two episodes in question are vastly inconsistent with each other. In episode 1, she gets on an elevator and is magically transported to the alternate universe in an elevator in the WTC. But then in episode 2 they change it and say she was magically transported from her vehicle (which is why when she returns to it, she suddenly flies out the window). So I guess it depends on which episode you count as cannon.
But I do think it’s weird that didn’t know it was WTC, or couldn’t easily figure it out from one of those electronic public phone book things we saw. And more so, that Bell didn’t have some kind of contingency plan to help her out…
Did she go to the top floor, though? I don’t think she did. The top floor is the only distinctive one that was open to the public IMHO. It was an awsome view but the rest of the building just looked like a building. (Of course, our chaperones told us it was just “an international banking building” but that was back in the 90s.) If I’d been magically propelled to any other floor, I don’t think I would have known it was the world trade center unless I’d been told, and considering she’s from up here too she probably didn’t spend much time in the WTC either, so she also wouldn’t be overly familiar with the views out the windows.
When she looks out the window in William Bell’s office, it looks like she is above the 90th floor in the South Tower and can see the North Tower. They actually got the part right that the regular windows are only 18 inches wide. The windows on the observation deck are much wider and run floor to ceiling.
