The Pattern

Lots more questions in this episode, with mysteries that both advance and confound the plot. Whereas the initial episodes all seemed to stand alone, we are now seeing a lot more continuity between episodes, with events and characters beginning to reoccur. While I liked this episode overall, the fact that it asked more questions than it answered — the main plot seemed like a mere vehicle to bring up more mysteries — left me a little unenthusiastic.

Quick Summary: After a corporate presentation, a man gets attacked by one, then a swarm of butterflies with razor sharp wings.  To avoid them, he jumps from the window, plummeting to his death.  The camera pans back to reveal the Massive Dynamic building.  The Fringe team is called in; Walter remarks that the body possesses lacerations that seem to have come from the inside out.  Olivia also sees John Scott in the crowd of onlookers.  Later, she gets an email from Scott with an address.  The address is a spooky basement holding a box of toads.  The Massive Dynamic employee was given a powerful, toad-derived hallucinogen that caused his body to damage itself.  Meanwhile, Peter gets a call from an old friend.  The two meet and obviously have some romantic history; she tells him that, if she can find him, then others can as well.   She also has injuries from an abusive boyfriend, whom Peter knows.  Peter tracks the two down and confronts the boyfriend.  Later, we see the boyfriend telling another mysterious figure that Peter Bishop is back in town.  While Peter is off involving himself in domestic issues, Olivia asks Walter to help her get rid of these John Scott visions, which involves going back into the sensory deprivation tank.  Reluctantly, he agrees.  There, Olivia is able to walk through Scott’s memories, where she swears he notices her, even as Walter assures her that’s not possible.  Scott’s memories unlock the case, as Olivia sees the MD employee selling secrets to Scott and two other men.  Upon getting out of the tank, Olivia is able to track down one of them.  This strange Spanish gentlemen promises to tell her secrets about Massive Dynamic in exchange for protection.  Olivia confronts Nina Sharp, but Spanish guy is killed by the same hallucinogen that began the episode.  Nice symmetry.

What We Learned: Many more questions than answers this week.

1. Walter gets an erection when he has to pee.  File this under “TOO MUCH INFORMATION”.
2. Peter definitely has some criminal, shady past in Boston.
3. Olivia needs a vacation.

Questions:

1. Was Spanish guy right?  That is, is The Pattern all just some urban legend designed to cover up Massive Dynamic using the world as it’s laboratory?
2. What sort of trouble dogs Peter’s past?  Who was the woman he met with?
3. Why is Olivia getting emails from dead people?  How can Scott see her in his memories in her head?  (That was confusing to type).
4. How compromised is Broyles, if at all?  Is he covering up for Massive Dynamic?

My pet theory is that, regarding question 3, Scott is still semi-alive and frozen by Massive Dynamic.  So he exists in the “ghost network” and is thus able to communicate with Olivia.  He may have been a double undercover agent who pretended to be a traitor and working with the bio-terrorists in order to really find out what Massive Dynamic was up to.

Favorite line:  I will actually have to go with Walter’s bit about putting Olivia in the tank not like basting a turkey.  Far less creepy than the, um, line I mentioned earlier and appropriate for an episode that aired Thanksgiving week.

This was the best episode yet!  It made me glad I stuck with the show thus far.  If you are not watching it by now, I think you should check out “Mr. Jones” and get on board the Fringe-train.

Quick Summary: An agent (Loeb) collapses in Broyles office due to a worm-like parasite attached to his heart.  In order to remove the parasite, Dunham has to fly to Germany to interrogate a prisoner who was (is?) somehow involved in The Pattern and meets and old flame.  The Bishops have to interrogate a dead man associated with the plot, using brain waves and electrical shocks on Peter.  The dead man has to answer a question in order for the prisoner (the titular Mr. Jones) to give up the chemical compound that will kill the parasite.  Jones asks (“Where does the gentleman live?”), the dead man answers through Peter (“Little Hill”) and the parasite is removed.  Along with the chemical compund, Jones serves up some paranoia (“Can you trust the people you work for?”).  It doesn’t look like it, as Loeb is a mole and engineered this whole stunt to learn about Little Hill.

What We Learned:

1. There are terror cells opperating across the world, only they deal in fringe science.  One of these cells is ZFT, who was involved in Loeb’s infection.  ZFT and these other cells are somehow involved in The Pattern, either observing it or causing it or both.
2. Walter has performed experiments on Peter before, as he was aware of Peter’s relative tolerance for electric shock.  This was hinted at previously, especially in “The Arrival”.
3. Dunham has a history of being romantically involved with people she works with.  She and the German agent (Vogel) were involved in the past.  Of course, she and John Scott were involved.  And there is the obligatory tension between her and Peter.
4. The agency is compromised in several ways.  First, it was John Scott.  Now, it’s Loeb.

Questions:

1. What is “Little Hill”?  Who is “The Gentleman”?
2. Who are the Loeb’s working for?  ZFT?  Someone else?
3. What exactly has Walter done to Peter in the past?

I also appreciated the nice characterization in this episode.  Peter’s irritation at Broyles impatience with Walter gave us a lot of insight into the very mixed feelings he has for his father.  The tender and pained look Walter gives to Peter when Peter calls him “daddy” shows some of the same from Walter’s perspective.  Broyles gets some increased depth, as shown by his concern (then distrust) of his friend Loeb.  Broyles also gets to deliver J.J. Abrams patented “missive to the audenice” in his speach to Olivia about savoring the small bits of knowlege discovered and the minor victories while not getting impatient about the Big Picture. Finally, there is Olivia.  I didn’t like the character very much at first.  I found her uneven and occasionally inexplicable.  Now, I understand her better.  I am not sure if the writing has gotten better and/or the actress has found her groove, or it’s just taken me this long to get her character, but after last night’s episode I like Olivia.  She’s a woman in a boy’s club.  She kinda likes it there, but struggles to find her own (feminine) self in an job dominated by men.  I am starting to get her.

Favorite Lines:  There were all the usual and wonderful Walter-isms, of course.  The non-sequiter about the fruit cocktail from Atlantic City was amusing, as was the back and forth between Peter and Walter about previous brain-reading experiments (“You tried this on Jimmy Hoffa!?”).  But my favorite belonged to Broyles who, upon entering the lab and seeing all the crazy things happening, says “This is scientific!?”.  That could be another name for the show!