Fringe - FOX TV sci-fi/drama (part2)

I love the two universe theme of Fringe. . . I'll keep watching that as long as that's a factor. Hate the monster-of-the-week aspect.

I didn't see Stormare on any of the Alcatraz clips nor is he listed in the cast on wiki:

* Sarah Jones as Rebecca Madsen, a San Francisco Police Department homicide detective
* Jorge Garcia as Dr. Diego “Doc” Soto, an Alcatraz expert and comic book enthusiast
* Sam Neill as Emerson Hauser, an enigmatic, knows-everything-but-tells-nothing government agent
* Parminder Nagra as Lucy Banerjee, Agent Hauser's technician
* Robert Forster as Ray Archer, Det. Madsen's surrogate uncle
* Santiago Cabrera as Jimmy Dickens, Det. Madsen's supportive cop fiancé
* Jonny Coyne as Edwin James, the iron-fisted warden of Alcatraz
* Jason Butler Harner as E.B. Tiller, the merciless associate warden

 

'Fringe': Is It Over For The Fox Show?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/...d=maing-grid7|main5|dl3|sec3_lnk1&pLid=126067

 

It's an interesting idea to be sure. I'll see what he does with it. As I've said before Abrams comes up with great ideas but often fails when it comes to complete execution of his ideas.

I put down any failure/success with "Fringe" over the last three seasons to the producers that he brought on after he left the show. Pinker does a pretty good job with running the show (I can't remember his partner at the moment) and Goldsman unfortunatley has the same flaw as a writer that Abrams has (although he has written a number of clever films including "A Beautiful Mind" which made nice use of the unreliable narrator to tell the story and suck in the audience).

I personally think that the current season has been pretty good although the soap opera involving Olivia and Peter got kind of tiresome by the end of last season.

Pulling Peter out as a character and then reintroducing him was an interesting approach. My one complaint is that they reintegrated him much too easily into the Fringe team.

I'll stick with it because even with the decline in quality of this season (and to me it hasn't been that much) I think they can easily carry it through to a satisfactory conclusion (one can hope!) this season.

 

I'm only going to give it a chance. . . because it's Hugo (Jorge Garcia) to be honest. Would be nice if Stormare were on the show but he's not.

 

I liked the Alcatraz pilot.

 

I was disappointed myself. Looking forward to Fringe on Friday.

 

I thought "Alcatraz" was entertaining if nothing else. It's too soon to predict which direction its going to go in (for serialized vs. "Fringe" styled seasons long storytelling).

I suspect that this is the last year for "Fringe". Fox gave it a pass because they wanted "Alcatraz", the demographic audience is good (18-49 year olds) even if the ratings aren't exactly a blockbuster and Warner gave Fox a deal for the series on pricing compared to past seasons I'm sure.

Still, Fox's lack of interest to move it to another night where it might have been able to recoup some of its lost audience (that might have been too late anyway) and because it was their boneheaded decision to put it on Friday at 9pm (hoping for an "X-Files" style resurrection)against shows that have a similar audience ("Grimm", "Supernatural") along with the increasingly complex storyline (that doesn't appeal to the dim audience members out there) will probably spell the death of the series.

It's too bad because the characters are appealing and even when the storytelling is sloppy, it's more ambitious than most TV shows out there in terms of the writing.

 

While I'm a big fan of Fringe, I just can't see the main story lasting another full season. I'd be more than happy if they wrapped it up in the current season than to dilute the story line any further.

 

they certainly seem to be heading in that direction.

 

Is this just your conjecture? Any article about it etc?

 

There were rumors about that I read about but I can't find them now (about Warner reducing the price to Fox to keep the show). As far as it being the last season comments from the head of Fox kind of hints at that about how they can't keep taking a loss on the show, etc.

I must be alone in this because I'm enjoying the Peter-less universe (although obviously Peter has returned) episodes.

Maybe I'm in my own private universe...

 

Okay, it's your conjecture then. You state it this last time as if fact.

Anyway, I was so glad to have episodes of "the bigger picture." Looks like we're back to monster of the week next week. Sigh.

 

I KNOW!! Somebody should tell these guys: If I want "The X-Files", I'll watch "The X-Files"!!!

 

Amen.

 

In a previous post I stated that the part about renewing "Fringe" to get "Alcatraz" was my opinion and then in the second post I stated "I suspect" at the beginning the "deal" part I remember reading online (maybe Imdb) but I have no idea where it's at). No one really knows unless you're working on the show of course and even then I'm sure thinks can change.

As far as the monster of the week...I'm with you there but they weave elements of the big picture even into those episoes pretty well now (unlike the first season where we would see stand-alone episodes that didn't always tie-in as I recall).

I don't mind them (well, except the one about the guy stealing the donated organs from last season. It was a great idea that wasn't well realized to me and theending just didn't have any power for me because we didn't really care about the bad guy).

 

I thought it was a good episode. Of course, I tend to like any episode with Orla Brady, but I though they did a good job of blending the story arc with a returning/re-occurring adversary.

 

time for more bongs and LSD

 

I think the reason I'm okay that the show may be canceled is these monster of the week episodes, even when they have the big story woven in the tapestry is too thin for me. I never really got into the X-Files that much and so making Fringe more like X-Files is counter-productive for me.

Hoping these remaining episodes are great.

 

I don't mind the MOTW episodes as long as they tell an interesting tale. I like sci-fi anthologies, so I view the best MOTW episodes as fascinating short stories set in the Fringe universe. They make the world bigger, more diverse, less claustrophobic because not everything that happens is directly related to the mythology.

It reminds me of my biggest problem with the Star Wars prequels, that Lucas felt every single thing introduced in the original trilogy had to be tied up neatly in the prequels, such as Threepio being built by Anakin. Like I said, it makes the Star Wars universe feel claustrophobic, as if the only important things that happen in it are related to Anakin and the Emperor.

 

I think they hit a new low moment when they had all the duplicate characters sitting around the same table. Anybody who just tuned into the show for the first time, must have looked like this:



I really, really think they should've resolved the entire "Peter doesn't exist in this universe" situation in the first three or four episodes of the season, and then moved on to an entirely new story.

At this point, I think even Baldo is confused:



(BTW, Baldo had several appearances in this episode.)

 

...confusing yes for the viewer who has been gone for a while but "new low point"...how so?


I guess we have different definitions of "low point".

 

It's a low moment in that it's just so damned gimmicky. I'm like, "come ON!"

And viewers must have their heads spinning, with the constant cutting-back-and-forth between the two worlds. "Ah, it's the reddish-brown Statue of Liberty... we're in the Other Universe! Wait... there's a flash, and now there's no Twin Towers! We're back in Our World!"

Just tell the F'in' story and move along. At some point, this whole thing becomes one massive gimmick, IMHO.

I keep hoping for Baldo to save us! For that matter, before the show gets cancelled, I hope they at least explained what the hell The Observers are -- where they come from, what they do, what they want, and why they eat vast quantities of spicy food (from the first season). (And let's not even get into the little child Baldo from many episodes back, almost completely forgotten about.)

 

I don't find it gimmicky after all this time to switch between the two worlds--those transitions give viewers a clue as to where we are which helps to alleviate confusion for viewers.

It sounds to me like you might just be tired of the alternate universe storyline which, I'll admit, they have milked a bit too long but I still find it pretty fascinating.

As for the end gimmick--it made sense to me from a narrative point-of-view showing that they were ALL going to be working together against a perceived common enemy (Jones).

As far as Baldo it's hard to say where they will go with this season. I'm guessing that if they get another renewal they are trying to hold off the resolution for that until a fifth season and, if not, they'll do some hasty rewriting to incorporate a conclusion into the fourth (at least I hope so).

I don't think we'll get answers to things such as why they eat spicy foods--it's just something to distinguish the characters (much as their bald look) and I don't know that they've even thought that out for the characters. It's possible they have or it could be quirk that someone thought was a cool idea to introduce just to add to the weirdness of the characters.

"Fringe" is about as close to a series "created" by Philip K. Dick as we're likely to ever see on TV. Heck, if I were the Dick estate, I'd sue for a co-creator or acknowledged by credit like Ellison got for "The Terminator" flicks since they use many of Phil's themes and ideas.

 

The season started out really slow, but it's gained enough momentum to keep me interested. I've given up trying to make sense of all the different timelines, I'm just enjoying the ride.

I hope they continue it for another season.

 

Did Baldo get shot for not completely "erasing" Peter from the so-called "storyline"?