FRINGE - “The Arrival”
Season 1 - Episode 4
Now we’re talking. We’re introduced to “The Observer”, who might be a weird guy, or an alien, or a robot, or a weird alien robot, or maybe just some kind of ageless journalist. Whatever he is, he shows up to observe a strange drill-like capsule blasting up from within the earth, and when Olivia’s investigation of the capsule gets her asking questions about him, Broyles admits that they’ve been keeping an eye on him for years. He’s shown up at almost all of the other Pattern-related events, but they don’t know anything else about him either.
And for its part, the drill-capsule isn’t offering much in the way of answers, but Olivia tracks down Colonel Jacobson, a witness to a similar event in the ’80s. A capsule just like this one popped up in Quantico, and about 48 hours later, it tunneled explosively back down into the earth.
Some guy with a crazy energy gun starts showing up and wrecking things, shooting up the warehouse where the present-day capsule was first taken for analysis, and then going after Colonel Jacobson. Walter knows all the Observer’s favorite hangouts, so after meeting him in a diner for a cryptic discussion, he takes it upon himself to protect the capsule from the angry guy with the big gun.
Angry-gun-guy shows up at Walter’s lab looking for the drill capsule Walter’s already hidden, so he abducts Peter, hooks him up to wires, and psychically tortures and interrogates him. Extracting the info from Peter, he tosses the younger Bishop in his trunk and heads to the cemetery where Peter’s grandfather was buried. Olivia finds out where it’s going down from Walter and rushes to save Peter, arriving just in the nick of time to shoot the angry-gun-guy and watch the drill capsule do its thing, vibrating like crazy and then rocketing back down through the earth. See you in another 21 years, mysterious drill capsule! The Observer is there too, and he seems pleased with this outcome.
Peter has gathered himself and shows up to tackle the Observer, who can apparently read Peter’s mind, confusing him long enough to shoot Peter with an apparently-harmless stun gun and vanish again.
With everyone safe again, Walter is finally forthcoming with Peter about the Observer, explaining that years ago there was a car accident and Walter and Peter were both saved by the Observer, so Walter sort of owed him a favor and that’s why he protected the capsule. Seeing all this craziness first-hand is enough to rededicate Peter to the team—he was having doubts about sticking around in the beginning of the episode.
That’s probably not my finest synopsis, but that’s okay. Almost all the revelations of the episode come in the form of questions, not answers, but I like it. I’m just a big nerd, so maybe that doesn’t float your boat, but I like the Observer character a lot. A dollar says by the end of the series he’s thrown into conflict between his role as impartial observer and his desire to help in some way. It’s also cool to have an episode that doesn’t plainly tie directly back into a Massive Dynamic scheme. Maybe they’re the ones firing rocket drills around inside the earth, but that isn’t even hinted at in this episode.
It’s fun to see a genuine mystery. Walter never really hits on exactly what the deal is with the drill capsule, and we don’t get any inside information as the audience either. That would be annoying if that’s the way every episode ended, but it’s actually a nice change from closing the episode with some kind of ominous reveal that our characters aren’t privy to.
Oh yeah, the traitorous (OR IS HE?!) agent Scott shows up in Olivia’s apartment. Or maybe in her mind in her apartment. Either way, I told you so.
