Fringe 3x18 Review

[iaria]

Bloodline

I really enjoyed this episode. In fact I enjoyed it more than the previous one which I think is the first time I've enjoyed an alt!Livia episode more than a blue Olivia one, largely because the last episode was all about Bellivia, but also just that I love the trio of Olivia/Lincoln/Charlie.

Ack, I can’t believe there are only four more episodes left this season. That makes me go ): but then the fact that these aren’t going to be the final four episodes of the series makes it better again.

• For a minute there TPTB got me and I thought that Olivia was dead. Actually as soon as Lincoln and Henry found her I was suspicious that they were going to kill her and by the time she went into labour while a crying Lincoln held her in his arms I was sure they were going to kill her. My reaction: ‘oh, they had better not. No. Absolutely fucking not!’ When she appeared to die I was in shock that they’d actually done it – and that they’d killed Olivia in childbirth at that – and luckily didn’t have time to feel anything more before she was revealed to still be alive. If she really had died I would have been pretty pissed off with the show.

• I am pretty pleased that my fanon that Lincoln is completely in love with Olivia was made canon. Or rather that all the subtext I was picking up on was completely meant in that way. I ship Olivia/Lincoln, both of them actually with blue Olivia a bit in the lead perhaps, so the show making it canon, if only in an unrequited way thus far, pleases me.

• I loved the return of Henry and how he was used in this episode. Once again Henry saves Olivia. In a way blue Olivia also saved red Olivia because it was she who made and nurtured a relationship with Henry strong enough that he felt compelled to watch over her. And, oh, that made me so happy. Henry’s been watching over Olivia because he’s been worried about her! Aw! And then he drives to her rescue and delivers her baby because he’s awesome like that. His appearance in this episode was a complete surprise and I really hope that this isn’t the last we see of him.

• I was suspicious from the get go that Walternate was behind Olivia’s kidnapping. This is Walternate. There is no way that he wasn’t well aware of what killed Rachel and that Olivia possibly had it as well. In fact I figured that despite Olivia reasonably freaking out that she wasn’t actually in as much danger as she thought. I assumed it was Walter working to save his grandchild. (Of course this is Walter so he wouldn’t hesitate to kill her to save the baby.) But his little act with Lincoln did fool me a bit, it made me uncertain. Then I was figuring that possibly Brandon was behind it. I should have known that it was always going to be Walternate.

• I thought for sure that Lincoln and Charlie would leap to the thought that Henry was Olivia’s baby father.

• I love so much that Lincoln and Charlie are now, mostly, in the know about what has been happening and that they’re suspicious about what happened to Broyles and of Walternate. I love the idea of them conspiring together. I really want for them to be allies with blue Olivia the next time they meet, not enemies.

• I felt really bad for Olivia but as soon as they strapped her down I was just waiting for her to kick ass and save herself (I was having flashbacks to that season one ‘Olivia saves her own damn self’ episode) and sure enough Olivia proved that she continues to kick ass in any reality. I hope that she, or Walter, approaches Elizabeth and tells her that she has a grand-son.

• At the end there I thought that the nurse had come to take the baby away and that the episode would end with the baby kidnapped and possibly Olivia’s mother dead.

• All this talk about Rachel and her dying in childbirth makes the fact that we never saw red Olivia interacting with blue Rachel or Ella stick out even more. That was just a bad misstep on the parts of TPTB. I’ve always thought that they’d made a mistake when they didn’t give them a scene together and I think it even more now. That scene would have probably been moving anyway, and it would have made red Olivia more sympathetic earlier, but with that in the past it would have given this episode more weight and this episode in turn would have made that moment have a lot more emotional resonance.