Fringe 3x21 Review

[iaria]

The Last Sam Weiss

This was an excellent episode. This show is always at it best when it centres itself around Olivia and while this episode was actually divided fairly equally between Olivia, Peter and Walter this is the first episode in awhile that we’ve had our Olivia being so front and centre and it was wonderful. It felt like once again Olivia was an essential part of the mythology beyond her relationship with Peter which is how it should be.

- That ending – wow. That was pretty awesome! Now was Peter in yet another universe – oh, yes, please, I want all the universes, give me more and more – or was he in the future of the Blue Universe? My first thought was the former and it’s what I hope is true but the latter could work and be very interesting as well. If it’s the former than that would mean that Peter jumped into another Peter’s body; if it is the latter than he jumped into his future body. Either way it left me positively gleeful and I couldn’t stop grinning after the episode ended.

- Back to Olivia – I was really happy when the lost piece of manuscript revealed that Olivia was part of the whole thing and then may have actually squeed when Olivia’s abilities were brought up again – specifically her telekinesis – and Walter told her she just had to practice. I have only been saying for two plus years that I wanted Olivia to explore her abilities. She could be so powerful! Why wouldn’t she be trying to learn to control her abilities especially after returning to the blue universe? I was actually expecting that Olivia would have to jump back to the red universe in order to turn the machine off and then she would free red Olivia and they would end up working together. That would have been awesome. But Olivia learning to control telekinesis, which was the first ability we saw her use works for me too.

- “I wish you could see yourself the way I see you. You have no idea how extraordinary you are. If you could embrace that there is no end to what you could do.” Awwww. ♥ I loved that scene. It feels like the Walter/Olivia relationship has been pushed into the background and this was just such an amazing scene and so well acted by both. Their expressions...!

- The Astrid/Walter scenes were excellent. I really loved that moment when he snaps at her meanly and she just stares at him with this sympathetic and understanding expression as he looks ashamed and apologises. I love how well she knows him, accepts him for exactly what he is and likes him for who he is. I love their relationship.

- I loved the visual of Olivia and Peter walking hand-in-hand up to the machine.

- “I love you Peter.” That was lovely... except Peter doesn’t say it back. What the hell? Considering that they don’t know what is going to happen next, that he’s supposed to be in love with her the fact that he didn’t say it back felt very, very weird. Was that supposed to be a hint about something? It’s strange but pre-2x22 I didn’t think Olivia was in love with Peter, though she clearly cared for him a lot and there was an attraction there, while Peter did have much stronger feelings for Olivia. This season Olivia has sold me on her being in love with Peter but I’m not as sold on Peter loving Olivia. It’s kind of strange.

- The flashes that Peter had as he was entering the machine were kind of fascinating in that there was clearly a purpose to them. Is this part of what Sam meant when he told Nina that whichever Olivia Peter picked would decide which universe would be saved?

- I found the fact that Peter didn’t just get amnesia but that all his knowledge had seemingly reverted into what he would know if he had lived in the red universe rather fascinating. How the heck did that happen? More importantly does that mean that somehow the blue Peter we’ve known for the past three seasons could be replaced by a ‘red’ Peter personality? How exactly would that work?