By Stacey Harrison
This is the Fringe blog, right? Creepy show with lots of kooky science, people with transparent skin, 3-D location titles and an occasional cow? OK, good. It’s been awhile — TWO MONTHS, people!!! — so I thought I’d make sure. And I even had to wait while that last American Idol clown finished his warbling so I could get my fix! I know, what’s a few more minutes after you’ve waited two months, but I’m not the biggest Idol fan anyway (re: never watched it, never plan to), so having it possibly wreak havoc on my DVR does not put me in the greatest mood.
I won’t justify the scheduling clowns who interrupted the great momentum the show had going by saying this episode was worth the wait, but it was pretty darn good. It was almost as though a new season had begun, making peculiar quirks like Walter’s goofy antics, Peter’s conveniently diverse work history, and Olivia’s ever-thawing aloofness seem warm and familiar.
We start out at a demolition site, where two construction workers are heading out before the implosion begins. One of them suddenly feels he missed something, so they head back in and find an underground chamber that wasn’t on any of the blueprints. Living there is a young boy, bald, dirty and more pale than a vampire at the North Pole. OK, so it’s going to be a creepy kid episode. Got it. But then Olivia — whose sister and niece are still crashing at her place — gets a call that a killer she once tracked has resurfaced. Known as The Artist, he sends faxes to law enforcement telling him they can expect a new victim to be on public display soon. As she’s about to go work on that case, Broyles calls her, tells her to collect the Bishops and come see about the boy.
Olivia seems to connect with the boy right away, and vice versa. Though he doesn’t talk, his eyes stare at her a little more intently, and his features seem to soften when she’s around. The mystery here is that although the boy appears to be about 10 years old, the chamber in which he was found had been sealed for decades. Walter hypothesizes that due to the lack of oxygen and other environmental factors, it’s possible the boy could be much older. But while he’s apparently been underground his whole life, he is able to write legibly — upside down, as a matter of fact. He gives Olivia a name, Sam Gilmore, and she assumes it’s his name.
Meanwhile, a guy in a wheelchair is chatting up a goth chick at a laundromat. She’s not so into him at first, thinking he’s some creep, until she sees the chair. No creep could be in a chair, right? So she feels bad and — hey, wait a minute. That’s … no, it can’t be. Really? Yep, it’s Alicia Goranson (she’ll always be Lecy to me), known to millions as the original Becky on Roseanne. She’s all tattooed up, which is appropriate, given her credit here is Tattoo Girl, and very much looking the part of someone who’s lived a hard life and has good reason to be leery of someone hitting on her around a bunch of dirty clothes. Unfortunately, her first inclination proves correct, as the guy coldcocks her once they’re both outside. Next time we see poor Tattoo Girl, she’s been killed, had her skin bleached and made to look like a Renaissance painting as part of the Artist’s latest work.
Between this and the way she was so unceremoniously dispatched in Boys Don’t Cry, I’m wondering if that decision to pull a Shelley Long and quit Roseanne is still haunting Ms. Goranson’s career. Or who knows, maybe she was just doing somebody a favor.
The good news is, her character at least still has relevancy to the story. Turns out she’s not known only as Tattoo Girl, but also as … Samantha Gilmore. So the Fringe division’s interest in the kid shoots straight up. Problem is, since the kid seems to be in good health, Social Services believes it’s time for it to take custody of him. But that Social Services guy seems to be a bit shady, what with him getting on his phone and saying, “I think we may have found another one” before shifting his eyes once again and skulking away.
The kid gives them another address that leads Olivia and Charlie to a potential victim, only they don’t know what they’re looking for so they’re unable to stop it. Walter posits that the boy is not psychic, per se, but like a blind person who may have more acute hearing, this boy, who was deprived of all outside contact, may be more attuned to other people’s emotions. And he’s become attached to Olivia. That doesn’t really explain how he was able to single out the killer’s signal, given that no one knows who the Artist is, but like anything with Fringe, you just sit back and enjoy it, and if a full explanation comes eventually, then so be it. You know, like how when the material found under the fingerprints of the latest victim consists of cow’s blood and plastic, Peter is able to draw on his experience sweeping floors at a meat locker in Tennessee to surmise that it must be plastic from a meatpacking plant. It’s just great that he happened to hold that rather obscure position, isn’t it?
Olivia also learns that the Social Services guy is actually CIA, and that he wants to take the boy immediately. Broyles and Olivia persuade him to give them one more day so that he can help them catch the killer. He agrees, with the understanding that there will be no fighting over this afterward. Sounds like me bargaining with my 5-year-old. Not an effective strategy, my friend.
The kid’s next clue leads them to set up a checkpoint to try to find the killer. This time, a guy in a van gets skittish and flees the scene. A victim is found in the back, still alive, and Olivia takes off after the Artist on foot. While he puts up a pretty good fight, she ends up shanking him. We never find out who the heck he is, or anything else about him, which might make it more appropriate to refer to him not as The Artist, but as The Red Herring. Still, you don’t get to see TV cops shank people very often, so I’m cool with it.
Olivia has a nice moment with the kid, even placing a smooch on his now less-pale forehead, and she tells him he’s not going away to any facility, but to a good family who will take care of him. She conspires with Broyles and the doctor who first treated the boy to make it happen. The CIA guy is curiously a pushover about the whole thing, knowing he’s been had, but not making too much of a fuss. Gotta wonder just how high a priority this kid was.
Then we get our big Fringe twist (although, not to toot my own horn but — AAAHHOOOOGAAAH!!! — I kinda saw it coming). As the kid is riding in a car through some leafy streets, he spots a curious passerby on the sidewalk. A bald guy, wearing a black coat and carrying a suitcase. The Observer! And he notices him, too. Could it be that the boy is an Observer in the making? Uh, what else could he be, really?
Highlights: Seeing Walter dance to some baby-making music while wearing a device on his head that brings to mind Doc Brown in Back to the Future. He’s trying to show the kid that a brainwave-reading machine isn’t all that threatening. And it works, getting the kid to crack his first smile. And that kid, even though he doesn’t say a word, gives a heck of a performance. Spencer List is his name, and he has a twin sister Peyton, who also has quite a career going. Could be some future stars in the making.
Thankfully, we don’t need to worry about any more hiatuses until the season finale airs May 12. That’s five more episodes before we can start pre-ordering the Season 1 DVD. And while no official word has come yet on Season 2, I wouldn’t worry.
To hear what Anna Torv had to say about the upcoming episodes, check here.