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J.J. Abrams' Fringe

GNC

GNC

King-Sized Canary
Joined
Aug 25, 2001
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Nothing to do with the famed producer's hairdo, but his new TV show. Here's the trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4I6iGbPRi4U

Looks more Alias than Lost, has anyone here from North America seen it yet? Is it worth watching?

And will it be shown in Britain?
 
From the trailers, it looks more like the X-Files, plus Doomwatch, dealing with fringe science and science gone wrong.
 
So far, three episodes have aired and we've watched them all. Without giving you any spoilers it will be hard to articulate my reaction to it.

The premise is a little X-filesy, but instead of having to fight to be allowed to investigate, Our Heroes are recruited.

Scully and Mulder had more chemistry in their eyebrow hairs than Our Heroes do in their entire bodies. But of whom is this not true? ;)

I felt badly jerked around by the first episode's third-act turn, but am still watching. It's not so bad it couldn't win me over if we got a serious upturn in a week or two. So far we have little hints and peeks of things that might be interesting, but the key is whether I remain more annoyed by than sympathetic toward the characters. I ought to feel a lot of compassion for the female lead, but I don't.

Their investigative and medical procedures are, um, a little - irregular. Yeah, that's a good nonspoilery word. Irregular. Viewers who can tolerate characters they don't like in well-constructed plots may hang up on this.

The villains and problems are pseudoscientific rather than occult and the guy spouting the technobabble spent the last 17 years in an insane asylum. It's definitely SCIENCE! rather than science. The right temperament can have a lot of fun with this element. They are not using standard fringe concepts so far, no psychic kids or time machines, so the plot won't be immediately obvious to anyone with a moderate knowledge of Forteana.

Glimpses of mysterious and annoying uberplot, but you knew that when you saw Abrams's name. Far too soon to tell which visible stringpuller is a good guy, which a bad guy, or whether either term is applicable.

Defining visual conceit: You remember those little typed labels that would appear at the bottom of the screen during XF (so charmingly spoofed in Middleman)? Well, they don't tell you the time and they don't type it in an unobtrusive corner in Courier, they CGI massive 3D sans serif letters saying "Harvard University" or whatever and plant them in strategic places on the landscape, where they look like serious hazards to traffic.

Unless it tanks (and Abrams is due for a failure), I expect you'll see it in Britain after the usual time lag, whatever that is.

For what it's worth.
 
Showing in Australia already, 8:30 pm on Wednesday. Haven't watched it as It is up against Spicks & Specks on the ABC. Might set the PVR.
 
The misses and I haven't yet decided whether it's more entertaining to mock it, or approach it on its own terms. We'll probably loose interest quickly.
 
Thanks for the info, everyone. If it doesn't turn up here I could always get it on DVD, but it sounds a bit underwhelming if Peni's and Philo's estimation is right (and why wouldn't it be?).
 
I have heard that it is coming here. Meanwhile I've been offered a DVD of the first 2 episodes. But reading the above I won't be expecting anything marvellous.
 
Well the ads for it out here were jst a bunch of disassociated images thrown together with a bunch of fit-inducing strobelighting so I decided not to watch it in protest.

I'm cranky I did that now that I've seen the second episode. I was going to miss it again but The Man was watching it and called me in halfway through the intro scene as he knew it was something I'd like.

Yeah now I'm hooked. I couldn't describe it any better than PeniG did. Her analysis was spot-on. It's pretty similar to X-Files but without any of the really PARAnormal stuff (I keep hoping that'll turn up) but I can live with that. Weirdly enough, even thought I don't like any of the characters themselves, I do enjoy watching them. Especially the crazy scientist and his son. hey have some pretty amusing interations. The main girl annoys me, partly because the moody-girl-with-a-past-she-can't-face thing pisses me off to the max, but mostly because she looks like someone and I can't work out who. Actually she looks like a lot of people but none of the ones I've thought of so far are the one I was thinking of to begin with.

Anyway, I do think it's a show at least some people on this board would enjoy. Watch an episode or two and see what you think. And tape Spicks and Specks for me coz I always forget it's on.
 
I just watched the first episode and didn´t feel that impressed. The characters didn´t really interest me, though I found the third act turn was really the only interesting thing happening. There was no real explanation to how the "incident" happened or worked. If this is anything like Lost, I guess there will just be endless mysteries with no answers ever provided.
 
My feelings exactly Xanatico. Halfway through I was thinking "why am I watching this shite?" But by the end it had pulled me in and I may watch the second episode. But if it's going to be one of those ridiculous Lost type deals, meandering on with no point to it, I think it's best to just give up now.
What hard decisions we have to make in the 21st century.
 
Insulting, patronising sci-fi soap opera.

Those pretentious images flashed up on screen accompanied by the lingering close up at the end and then capped off with a "Open your mind" statement.

Joshua Jackson's inept attempts at sarcasm just confirming my opinion that anyone who progressed from a terrible teen drama is a smug, know it all twat.

The fact we wasted 90 minutes trying to save a bloke who ended up dead but was still going to be questioned anyway.

The mad scientest who was working on all this twenty years ago, has been locked away out of all contact since then and still somehow knows everything that needs to be done to save the day.

JJ Abrams believing everything he does is pure genius and beyond the comprehension of his target audience.

The fact it's just an X-Files rip off with the big bad government replaced by a big bad multinational company because they are now the ones who rule the world.


In short about the only bit I did like was the cow and the Spongebob scene. So what's that? 30 seconds worth?


Having said all that there's feck all else to do on a Sunday night.
 
The radio ads were so annoying that the thought of watching that show makes me slightly sick.
 
Parody shows will have a field day with those giant letters hanging around the place.
 
I also enjoyed the American view of what life currently looks like in Iraq. A nice plush hotel with lots of flat screen televisions and everybody just strolling about without a care in the world.

And yes, the giant letters. BAGHDAD. IRAQ!

I think they should spell them to reflect the regional accent. NU JOISEE (New Jersey. Geddit?) :lol:
 
The first time that came up (I think it may have been BROOKLYN) we saw it from the point of view of the car driver, I thought it was going to be like the opening credits of Naked Gun. :D
Actually it would have worked much better as a comedy.
 
My husband watches fringe i have yet to sit down and watch it!

He said he enjoyed it alot and found it interesting and does agree it has a similar plot to the x-files in regards to mulder and scully.
 
Anyone still watching?

I caught up on the Sky One repeats before the show restarted and, while I think there are problems with the two main characters, the big backstory kicked in at just the point where I was getting a little tired of the Monster of the Week format and it hooked me back in. I looking forward to see where it goes and hear the end of season episode is pretty good. It is bold laying out such a big story and relying on the second series being commissioned to really get stuck into it but JJ Abrams has probably got a lot of Brownie points for Lost (which I haven't be able to pick back up after Murdoch and Branson resolved their tiff but I'm waiting for things to cycle round again until I find the point where I stopped watching) so I suspect he'll get the green light. I won't fret if it stops here but I think it would be a shame if they weren't allowed to tell the full story.
 
Somehow, i never even realised we had a thread on this.

Was talking about it with my psychotherapist this morning, about how good it is to have a main character in a show that's mentally ill and actually quite reasonably portrayed, i.e. not played up or down but for the most part just is.
 
BlackRiverFalls said:
Was talking about it with my psychotherapist this morning, about how good it is to have a main character in a show that's mentally ill and actually quite reasonably portrayed, i.e. not played up or down but for the most part just is.
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Best character in it as far as I'm concerned - it must be a hard task being asked to act the part of a (literal) mad scientist and, personally, I think he carries it off. Pacey the Exposition Monkey and... the Blonde One don't come across so well and I think it is just the parts (especially the former - did he not say at the audition: "excuse me but my character just seems to follow his dad around explaining stuff and occasionally acting as a shady go-between to move the plot along - isn't there a chance of him actually having a character and some motivation?"
 
I've been following the series from the beginning, and I sympathize with most of the comments made here so far ...

IMHO the most 'solid' aspect of the show is John Noble's portrayal of the 'mad scientist' Walter Bishop. By mid-season I was getting increasingly irked at the frequency with which the writers were playing his character for comic effect. However, by the season finale they'd developed enough back story to reframe Walter as a heavily conflicted soul who was not entirely an outsider to the dark initiatives being investigated weekly. By the season's close I'd come to see him as the most substantive dramatic 'center of gravity' for the cast.

On the other hand ... I'm getting really tired of every new weirdness encountered being a derivative or spinoff of something Walter worked on years before. His personal involvement with so many of the 'phenomena of the week' contradicts the notion everyone would have left him to rot in an asylum for so many years.

I agree that Joshua Jackson's Peter Bishop character is a bit 'thin'. He typically seems to be floating around with little to do, and his role has yet to break out of its initial one-dimensionality.

My biggest problem with the show is Anna Torv's Olivia Dunham. To me, the Dunham character seems terminally incredulous or simply 'dense'. I find the character disturbingly 'wooden', and I can't decide if this is the fault of the writers or Torv herself. I can't help but contrast Dunham's demeanor with Scully's in the context of both having been personally 'manipulated / abused' in the past. Scully displayed open angst; Dunham goes no farther than insinuating transient brooding.

It bugs me that the boss (Broyles) character played by Lance Reddick (the new king of creepily-cool reserve) sometimes seems to have more depth than Dunham.

Having said that ...

The season finale reveals a satisfying helping of background / context and opens up a tantalizing new dimension for future storylines.

My personal verdict is 'a shaky and slow-developing debut season with decent prospects if everyone gets and / or keeps their respective acts together.'
 
EnolaGaia said:
On the other hand ... I'm getting really tired of every new weirdness encountered being a derivative or spinoff of something Walter worked on years before. His personal involvement with so many of the 'phenomena of the week' contradicts the notion everyone would have left him to rot in an asylum for so many years.
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My guess is that coincidences aren't anything of the sort. Its not just that each of these encounters throws a little more light on Walter and Dunham's past and their involvement with the events but it is also in "someone's" interest that this happens. It is odd to have two of the three main characters who are unaware of their past but we may have to consider them as sleeper agents who are being reactivated.

EnolaGaia said:
My biggest problem with the show is Anna Torv's Olivia Dunham. To me, the Dunham character seems terminally incredulous or simply 'dense'. I find the character disturbingly 'wooden', and I can't decide if this is the fault of the writers or Torv herself. I can't help but contrast Dunham's demeanor with Scully's in the context of both having been personally 'manipulated / abused' in the past. Scully displayed open angst; Dunham goes no farther than insinuating transient brooding.
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I have to say if it wasn't for Peter Bishop I might suspect it was some problem with the actor but I think they sketched out the characters in the pitch and they seemed to work in outline but it seems turning them into three dimensional characters has proven tricky, they even gave Olivia a sister and niece to try and give her... something. I am hoping they are sleeper characters waiting for season two to become activated because fixing those two would go a long way to making it "must see TV."
 
It wasn't on last weekend but the adverts say this Sunday is a double episode end of season finale. I'll be tuning in, as it sounds like a good one.
 
Yes Walter the amnesiac visionary scientist is becoming stronger with each episode while Dunham is becoming forgettable in spite of the character being woven into the story arc ever tighter.
I look forward to Broyles getting a meatier role, the character seems under utilized.
 
Well, to drag this thread back from the depths...

I was gifted the first two seasons on DVD. I've just switched to cable from freeview, and season 4 is coming up tomorrow on Sky1.

Could someone PM me with a quick run through of anything significant in season 3. Judging by the response here, I can't imagine it will take you very long, lol.

Thanks in advance.
 
If you start Season 4 without knowing what happened in Season 3 you're going to be extremely lost - especially since the Season 4 setting isn't anyplace (anytime?) you've seen before.
 
Yes the first three seasons really belong together and wrap up the story. It's season 4 that's the odd one out, so don't start watching that untill you've seen the other three. Or you're in for a lot of spoilers.
 
Thanks for the heads up, I'll hang fire on season 4 for now then.

:?
 
I'm not sure what to suggest for catching up ...

Fox doesn't archive past seasons' episodes.

The 3rd season is available on DVD as a 6-disc set (and Blu-Ray with 4 discs), but both are Region 1 encoding only (at least from Fox itself).

EDIT: Amazon.uk lists the 3rd season DVD set with Region 2 encoding.
 
I'm not so sure. The stand alone episodes aren;t too bad, and the wtf slant of having David Jones(!) back and the universe being wrong is quite nice.

And 'molly dodd' turning evil is good for a laugh too... didn;t we have her in pvc the other week? :D
 
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