Fringe Reactions

[frea_o]

WHY. WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.

I think I’m in the denial stage of grief at the moment, guys. That whole thing was amazing and Blair Brown just about slayed me, and then Anna Torv came up to finish me off with a one-two punch to the heart. I hate this show. I love this show. This show is nothing but pain.

I was all good until I watched the episode, I really was. I got a lot of stuff done, did some work on Secret Santa graphics for the be-compromised folks, made plans, put bubble wrap on my window in the hopes that it will cure some of the heat leak in my apartment (I’m less freezing than usual, I guess?), wrote some fun Peggy Carter and Maria Hill as buddy cops fic, and thought idly about wrapping presents. AND THEN I WATCHED FRINGE.

I’m so mad at everything.

I need some fic and some feel-good reads to get me through this. Last year, the distressing Christmas episode came from Chuck, but that wasn’t a good sort of pain, that was Fedak, you’re the freaking worst, and not in a good way. The episode Santa Suit legitimately makes me angry whenever I think about it because it was an insult to my intelligence and to characters I loved. This year, Fringe is just hitting all of the notes in the lovely pain centers in my brain. To borrow a Tumblr phrase: “Right in the feels.”

It saddens me that there are only four episodes left. On the other hand, I’m really glad that, like Chuck, it was given a chance to end organically. Unlike Chuck, it has a good writer heading its writers’ room, so I’m approaching the ending of the show with hope.

Sorry to bash on Chuck so much, but I remembered how unironically terrible Santa Suit was, and I realize that I haven’t been insulting the show enough.

Comments

[allisnow.livejournal.com]

Right in the feels indeed :(

I never really bought into the warm-fuzzy relationship that Orange Nina and Olivia were supposed to have, but Olivia's face in this episode just brought it all home. I found the episode a little slow overall, but mostly because I spent it biting my nails and watching how little time remained and thinking I NEED AN EARTH-SHATTERING KABOOM TO HOLD ME OVER UNTIL JANUARY.

And I don't know that the Big Reveal was Earth-shattering, but it surprised me. I hadn't guessed THAT for the identity of the mysterious Donald.

This show is all the things.

[frea-o.livejournal.com]

I screamed the minute she turned the gun on herself. Like, let out an actual scream. I have learned from the experience that I probably should not expect help from my neighbors in the event that I am attacked.

I completely understand what you mean about not seeing the warm-fuzzy relationship between NIna and Olivia until then. I'm going to choose to blame that one on Lincoln Lee, for myself. They focused on him too much in S4 when we could've had more stuff like Olivia and Nina and everything. But OH, Oivia's face. It makes absolutely no sense that the Observers and Loyalists wouldn't have tried to lock down that facility (it speaks of hubris and arrogance, I guess), but that whole scene with Olivia seeing Nina.....

Punch to the gut.

I actually wasn't expecting anything earth-shattering. This episode felt like the final blow before the team starts fighting back. I do get what you mean by a little slow. I've never liked the Observers or September, so I definitely did not call him being Donald either.

Poor Hastings.

[allisnow.livejournal.com]

I had a sneaking suspicion that this was not going to end well for Nina, and when I saw that she hadn't been able to escape or hide or anything before Windmark came in... I kind of wasn't too surprised. But I do want to know what the boy showed her.

I'm going to choose to blame that one on Lincoln Lee, for myself. They focused on him too much in S4 when we could've had more stuff like Olivia and Nina and everything.

Yeah, and then he dropped off the face of the universe. Or was it the face of the timeline? Or both? I get confused.

I like September. I've missed September. He's the one Observer who seems to have any soul, other than the one who died saving the girl (and I'm blanking on his name, but I think it was another month?). So September is Donald... but I'm still wondering if the boy is September...

[frea-o.livejournal.com]

Geez, her voice breaking when Olivia called her was what started the tears for me. Just the amount of fear and knowledge. I've seen some theories that Michael showed her all of the love she had for Olivia, or possibly how everything was going to go down (because there's definitely a twist coming, there's been a twist coming since the flashback of the pie place that Peter and Olivia were at showed posters from 2033, and the blankets in their flashbacks of Etta disappearing are different, as are Peter's shirts). Sort of an "It's going to be okay?" I guess?

And Lincoln....I think the writers realized their character wasn't working. They're some of the most creative and experimental writers I know, so I do think they pay attention and course-correct where other shows don't, and they realized blue Lincoln was a little too much like Olivia without Anna Torv's kickass acting ability, so they found a way to get him gone.

I think you mean August, the one that saved the girl twice. And my problems with September are the same ones I have with every Observer in that they've been so passive this entire time, and then when they do attack, they're kind of incompetent. I liked September before it was obvious that the Observers were taking over. I would have preferred their plot to remain in the background the entire time, honestly. The other universe stuff is ten times more fascinating to me, plus I love Fauxlivia and alt-Astrid. :)

[allisnow.livejournal.com]

(because there's definitely a twist coming, there's been a twist coming since the flashback of the pie place that Peter and Olivia were at showed posters from 2033, and the blankets in their flashbacks of Etta disappearing are different, as are Peter's shirts).

Day-um I didn't catch any of that. Sneaky bastards! :D

You know, I was just starting to kind of like Lincoln right before they shipped him off. Although I think it was the actor more than the character who grew on me, to be honest.

August, that's it. I liked August. And when it comes to September I guess I'm mostly intrigued by how he fits into everything... saving Walter and Peter and whatnot. And hopefully that will be revealed - to some extent - when the show comes back from hiatus. I liked the alt-universe stuff, too, but I think after they prevented Bell from destroying ours they realized that they had to go in a different direction, with a different antagonist. Or maybe they had all of this planned from the beginning... who the hell knows ;)

[frea-o.livejournal.com]

To be fair, I didn't catch any of that, either. I do a weekly podcast with a couple of friends and had that pointed out to me. And I agree, Seth Gabel seemed awesome.

To me, Bell trying to destroy the universe made so much more sense than Bell being this benevolent old guy who designed weapons and stuff. Some of the things he pulled just made me go, "Are we sure this is a good guy?" Because possessing Olivia like that (I got really mad at the show at that point, I remember, because hadn't enough happened to Olivia and clearly Season Five is laughing in my face now) was not the mark of a benevolent dude.

Who the hell knows should be Fringe's motto.

[allisnow.livejournal.com]

Nobody who worked with Walter back when he was Old "I-Am-God" Walter could be anything other than equally messed up, so Evil!Bell made sense to me.

Nothing this show has done to Olivia has surprised me, because I was a huge devotee of Alias and poor Sydney had her entire life ruined multiple times in terrible, horrible ways. She was never possessed by another consciousness or had her boyfriend cheat on her with an alternate version of herself, but things sucked for her in other ways.

Also:

[frea-o.livejournal.com]

Yeahhhhh when you kill off the main character's fiance in the pilot and then have her discover the body and then go back to work with the people that did it, you kind of understand what you're getting into, huh? It worries me sometimes that these are the characters we're considering strong, the ones that continually just have horrible things happen to them again and again.

Perfect screencap is perfect. Have you been reading the Pop Culture Nexus recaps??

[allisnow.livejournal.com]

Have you been reading the Pop Culture Nexus recaps??

Nope... *is afraid of getting sucked in*

[frea-o.livejournal.com]

Oh, come on over to the Dark Side. It has stuff like this:

[allisnow.livejournal.com]

lol!