I am actually sort of rewatching it now. But I don’t think I will be watching with a terribly critical eye, just for entertainment.
Wrong thread! Oopsie Poopsie
Olivia looked the same throughout the show.
There were some plot lines in the early 13 episodes that were kind of rough and I’m not sure if they were properly concluded.
The basic plot ends up being:
The pattern is a result of Walter’s messing with the two universes to save Peter and the Observers are future people trying to study their own evolution and, I think, find a place to rule. Which ends up being their past. I guess.
Yeah, that’s the photo. Maybe it’s just airbrushing, as you said. She just looks really different to me.
I ended up going on an approximately 10-hour binge yesterday, from around 4PM Monday until 2AM today. That got me through a large chunk of S3.
While I agree that John Noble’s performance is the highlight of the show, is anybody else as impressed as I am with Anna Torv’s acting? I think it’s her … subtlety, particularly in the way she portrayed Olivia vs. Alternate Olivia. I mean, Broyles was essentially the same character in both universes, while Astrid and Alternate Astrid may as well have been two entirely different characters. But the two Olivias are just ever so slightly “off” from each other, and that seems to me to be a more difficult acting job.
Olivia’s most impressive scene so far in that regard (to me, at least) came in S3, Ep9. It’s the scene where Peter is finally confessing to Olivia his intimate relationship with Alternate Olivia. I have heard/read the phrase, “her/his face fell” many times, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen it portrayed so well. The camera focused entirely on her face, in close-up, while Peter was confessing, and she remained utterly motionless, with the same expression on her face, except there was this supremely subtle, almost undetectable change that slowly came over her face as what Peter was saying “sunk in”. I had a lump in my throat watching that.
On a lighter note, in the later episodes in which Olivia had William Bell in her brain, I thought Torv did an excellent job of channeling Leonard Nimoy. She had the cadence of his speech down cold, emphasizing words right where he would, right down to raising one eyebrow at just the right moments. My only nitpick would be the raspiness in her voice. The rasp in Nimoy’s voice was a physical product of his age. There was no real reason for it to be there when speaking via Olivia.
Broyles on acid: Too funny!
One other thing I like about the show is the relationship between Walter and Astrid. There really seems to be a genuine affection between the two characters, that is very different from the friendly relationships between the other characters. That brings me to the stark difference between the two Astrids. “Our” Astrid is a compassionate, empathetic person, while Alternate Astrid seems to be very OCD/borderline autistic.
I think Fringe’s alternate universe was the best example of one I’ve ever seen. And I agree that Anna Torv’s performance as Olivia and Fauxlivia (or Bolivia) was brilliant. When they focused on the Observers in the final season, I quit watching. I just liked the alternate universe episodes.
Whoa, did I call it, or what? S4, Ep 11 … Alternate Astrid crosses over, and the affection between her and Walter is spelled out. I love Alternate Astrid.