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| Friday, April 2, 2010 06:02 PM |
| (Last updated on Friday, April 2, 2010 06:03 PM) | | On the Viewer - Fringe (Season 2, Episode 16 - "Peter") |
 by Fëanor |
As usual, beware of spoilers!
(A quick introductory note on episode numbering: according to my records, this is episode #15, but Fox is calling it #16. I think the discrepancy came in when Fox inserted an unaired episode from season 1 into the numbering for season 2. I think that's dumb, but I don't want to have a separate numbering system and keep getting confused and trying to figure out which episode I missed, so I'm going to adopt their number and leave it at that.)
We open in 1985. I love that they're using a different, era-appropriate font for the on-screen text.
Woah, '80s Walter is all strong and forceful, and he has a full head of curly brown hair!
Huh. Who's his colleague, Carla Warren? Should I know her?
The other universe has tiny, digital phones in the '80s, and still has zeppelins!
Oh, man, I love the cheesy, '80s-style opening titles so hard.
The window into the other universe is a very cool concept. Our Walter is spying on the other Walter (or "Walternate," as Walter calls him - heh), trying to find out how to cure Peter's disease.
And hey, there's Peter's Mom, Elizabeth! I can't remember if we've ever seen her before.
Watching Walter with sick little Peter is breaking my heart. Pete's trying to learn a coin trick, and tells Walter he wants him to have his lucky silver dollar if he dies. And then... he does. Argh! Brutal.
There are four people at the funeral - Walter, his wife, Nina, and Carla Warren - so at least those four people knew about the death of the real Peter.
Walter: "He knew he was loved... Didn't he?"
John Noble is such a good actor.
Interestingly, Walter doesn't immediately think about kidnapping the Peter from the other universe. When he opens the window for his wife, to show her the other Peter, he does it to comfort her, as the first step to moving on. But it doesn't really end up working that way.
Walternate had the cure, but he was distracted by an Observer and didn't see the tell-tale reaction.
Ha! The alternate universe version of Back to the Future stars Eric Stoltz!
Wow, very cool. The Observer came to Walternate's lab to watch him develop the cure for Peter, because it was an important event - because Peter is important. But because the Observer was there to observe the event, he changed it, and it didn't occur. Now he has to restore the balance. But how?
Walter's development of the technology to cross between universes came out of his desire to not see his son die again. I like that very much.
Carla: "Walter, you're trying to create a wormhole into another universe?"
Walter: "Yes. I think I just said that."
They were lying to the military, telling them it's impossible to move between universes, because they knew it was too dangerous to do.
Carla: "Walter, there has to be a line somewhere. There has to be a line we can't cross."
Walter: "There's only room for one God in this lab, and it's not yours."
Ha! I love Nina's gigantic, '80s-era mobile phone.
This is not playing out the way I expected it to. Walter didn't even go across with the idea of kidnapping Peter; all he wanted to do was give him the cure.
William Bell has been wanting to go into the other universe for a long time, and Walter's been resisting. He never had a powerful enough reason to want to do it - until now.
Walter: "All William Bell ever cared about was finding a way to increase the power and the wealth and the legend of William Bell."
Well, that pretty much answers my question of whether William is a decent guy or not.
Nina: "You know how much Peter meant to me."
Ew. What the hell does that mean?
Ah ha! So that's how Nina lost her arm. Very cool.
Oh no, the cure didn't survive the transition between worlds.
We see the scene we saw in the other universe again, but this time Peter's mother takes the place of Walter. In this universe, he's much closer to his mother than he is to Walter. In this universe, it's her that he wants to leave his lucky silver dollar to.
Elizabeth: "Bring him back to me."
Walter: "I promise."
I wonder if he'll ever keep that promise. I guess it's too late.
And now, the "car accident" Walter always talked about: when they cross back over, the ice breaks, and the Observer sees his chance to make things right. He jumps in and saves Walter and Peter.
The Observer: "The boy is important. He has to live."
Carla: "You're going to return him?"
Walter: "Yes. Once he's stabilized."
But he never does. It was what he saw in Elizabeth's eyes that made him keep Peter. But keeping Peter was the first crack, the first imbalance between universes.
A great episode. Very powerful, with truly great work from John Noble. Now, what will Olivia do, knowing what she knows? I'm very excited to see where this goes next. |
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