As Scott and Olivia begin their investigation, Olivia immediately butts heads with the lead guy, Homeland Security agent Phillip Broyles (Reddick). He ships her and Scott off to investigate what appears to be a minor lead of suspicious men at a storage facility.
Once they arrive at the facility, they find something specious in the dumpster and Scott begins opening lockers to see what he can find. They quickly discover what looks like a lab with live but deformed animals. Scott spots a man coming out of another locker and pursues him, with Olivia not far behind. The man stops, turns and sets off an explosion that engulfs Agent Scott and knocks Olivia off her feet.
She wakes up at the hospital. She learns that Scott is alive, but chemicals in the storage locker explosion have coated him with a residue that is killing him. Olivia quickly digs in to find a connection between the storage facility and the plane. A scientist named Walter Bishop pops up over and over again in her research. Unfortunately, Walter (Noble) has been in a mental institution for 17 years. He can only be visited by family, and his only family is his estranged son, Peter (Jackson).
Olivia convinces Broyles to let her pursue the lead, and she ends up dragging the wayward but brilliant Peter from Iraq to Massachusetts. Walter, who teeters between brilliant clarity and muddled ramblings, is happy to see Peter. Olivia and Peter discover that what Walter was up to in his basement lab at Harvard 17 years earlier may very well have something to do with what happened on Flight 627.
To get the information Walter needs to save Scott's life, Olivia's investigation turns down a dangerous path of discovery that will lead her toward the shocking truth about explorations in fringe science and something called "the pattern."
Is the truth still out there?
No one can deny the similarities ... in fact, Fox's Fringe has more X-Files in it than The X-Files had once Mulder hit the road and abandoned the series. Despite the similarities of tone and subject matter, Fringe distinguishes itself nicely, thanks to a talented cast and behind-the-scenes conspirators, Lost's J.J. Abrams and Transformer's writers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci.
The two-hour Fringe premiere offers a terrific introduction to the series, which deals with extremes in fringe science that just might have a mysterious effect on the human race. The pilot episode is well written, with a balance of excitement, scariness and humor that keeps us entertained while the mystery is being uncovered. By the end of the episode, we start to get a hint about the bigger picture that Olivia and her unorthodox team is facing.
However, the Fringe script succeeds largely thanks to the wonderful Australian actress Anna Torv, in her breakout role as Olivia Dunham. Her Olivia has a vulnerability that makes us care what happens to her while still projecting a strength that makes her believable as a FBI agent.
While Joshua Jackson's Peter comes off a little glib and smooth in the pilot, this first Fringe episode isn't really about him. Hopefully we'll get to know him better in later episodes. On the other hand, John Noble is perfectly cast as Walter, with a depth of performance that is convincing whether he's childlike, muddled or brilliant.
There's a lot to like here in this promising pilot, from the production values to the strength of the story. That doesn't mean the episode is perfect. Fringe tends to operate in the world where travel is instantaneous, red tape is nonexistent, FBI agents don't have to answer to their bosses, and crimes can be solved in a few hours, after a concussion and a heavy dose of LSD.
That said, ignore the silly stuff and let's hope the writers keep the unbelievable bits to a minimum in the future of Fringe, while expanding on the scary and fun stuff. After all, Olivia Dunham is on the trail of the truth, and the truth is out there.
Fringe takes us to the land of FBI agents, conspiracies and scientific mysteries. What's not to love? And with J.J. Abrams and his team at the helm we're going to be in for a bumpy ride that has every potential to keep us hanging on to the edge of our seats.
-—Kathie Huddleston
