AmyStrange.org and the UNeXpLaiNed ©Copyrighted by Dave Ayotte & Caty Bergman
OUR BLOG: 2011 JAN
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2011-JAN-14 [FRI] 08:47 PM
Fox's
"Fringe"
is, in our opinion, the best show on TV, now or ever:
http://www.fox.com/fringe
We actually started looking forward to this show long before the series premeired in the Fall of 2008. It reminded us of the X-Files, but ended up going in a totally different direction. One of the reasons this website exist is to explore the fringes and fringers of society and science, and we figured this would be an interesting and fun way to explore Fringe stuff, and in this it far surpassed all our hopes and desires and then some.
There are only two categories of entertainment, in television and everywhere else (and in our agreed opinions), and those categories are "chick flicks" and "action movies". If it ain't got lots of action, which usually involves blowing something up, then it's a "chick flick". And that's pretty much all I will agree to right now. I don't particularily care for the term "chick flick", but it is a good descriptive device, so who am I to judge?
Chick flicks are smarter movies anyway. Any moron can blow up a car, but it takes talent to describe it so vividly that you actually believe, that if you do this "one" thing, it will save the relationship. See what I mean? You forgot all about the blown up car and are now "thinking" about the relationship aren't you? Ha ha. Got you.
All movies are either one or the other, and some smart people are able to combine the two and make something truly amazing like "Casablanca" which successfully combined the two categories into one movie.
And that's what we think "Fringe" is. A "chick flick" and "action movie" combined together in such a way that it reminded us of the magical things that we liked about "Casablanca".
"Fringe" started out as your basic detective TV show except with an "X-Files" kind of kick in the pants. "Fringe" is "theoretically" that part of the FBI that investigates odd occurences, code named "The Pattern". Every once in a while someone would throw out words like "parallel" and "alternate" universes, amd everyone would laugh their fool heads off... err, I might be mixing two TV shows together? But definitely by the end of the first season, one of the main characters is unwittingly forced to visit that "alt world" they had been dropping hints about throughout the whole of the first season.
All of which leads us to the first season's cliffhanger which changed "Fringe" from a cop show with "X-Files" overtones to a purely science-fiction TV show like "Stargate". Except, it wasn't that kind of show.
At about (around, therabouts, more or less) the time "Fringe" started getting its act together, A slightly amazing over the top thing was going on in one of the film and movie departments at one of the major film production houses of its day. Someone decided to remake "Star Trek", and get J.J. Abrams (of "Lost" fame) to direct it. And, not just remake it mind you, but recast it (buzz kill) and give it a wholey different begining. WTF? A (surprise, surprise) alternate universe kind of thing.
Personally, we both thought it was a darn good movie, but as far as we were concerned, it did gave Abrams a direct line to Leonard Nimoy. Casting him as William Bell was a brilliant move, and also of interest, was that this was the only fictional TV show Nimoy had ever acted in since "Star Trek". He plays the saner of the two mostly insane mad scientist that you'd ever want to meet. who made "big-time" money from his partners genius. Rolling in it kind of money. His partner goes certifiably insane and he whoops it up with billions of dollars. This is no chump-change enterprise.
You can't help but love the guy, but the first thing you think of when you see him is "Spock". It's a subconscious kind of thingy that just defines how you think about things.
What the hell has Spock gotten himself into now.
The other mad scientist, the craziest one of the two, Walter Bishop, is played by John Noble as Walter Bishop is just plain fun to watch, but at the same time, I want to just smack him for being so much the naughty child, but then you remember he is an adult, and wonder if that might somehow be legal? Smacking an old guy around?
There's a fine line between mad scientist and just plain crazy. Noble walks that fine line with an aplomb. He owns the part. He is Walter Bishop. He is... the mad scientist.
The first season was freaky enough as Walter got his bearings and fell over a couple times, but considering that he's spent the last seventeen years of his life in an institution for the sanely challenged. The delightfully agonizing way he tried to deal with it. Endlessly talking about food and pretending he didn't give a rats petunia about the lives he ruined with his experiments, but he really does care about it, deeply. And then when he finally breaks down and honestly realizes what he's done. To these children. To Olivia. It made me cry. It was a masterful performance.
And as if that weren't hard enough already, we also have been learning things about his son Peter, and when that finally came crashing down on him at the end of season two, it's like whoa, where the freakin' hell can they possibly go from here?
And if you were one of those people who was wondered that very thing, you will not believe what they been up to this season, 'cause they went there, done that, and then went down the road a piece and then done did it again.
WTF?
During the first two seasons, Fringe Anna Torv (Olivia Dunham) was basic seen by most critics as, to be kind, a "bad" choice to play Olivia. If you had read most of the fan sites during the first and second season and read the comments, most people were not impressed with her in the least. Most of those people have lately changed their tunes quite drastically and it's good to see that some of the honest (and thus the best) critics admitting that they were wrong. It lightens my life.
====================
====================
The
"Fringe"
TV Show Encyclopedia:
http://www.fringepedia.net/wiki/Fringepedia
The best "Fringe"
reviewer, we've ever read, can be found here ("REVIEW:
Fringe
- 'Marionette'"):
http://www.accidentalsexiness.com/2010/12/10/review-fringe-marionette/
LAST UPDATED: January 16, 2011DEC <<<< 2011 >>>> FEB