Fringe – Episode 10: “Safe”
The plot threads of various recent episodes begin to pull together, but it seems like an incredible amount of work for a relatively modest pay off. Plus the bad and imaginary science we’ve come to expect.
The Plot:In the middle of the night at a bank in Philadelphia, and mysterious gang of bank robbers disable the security system. They set up the frequency machine seen at the end of Episode Eight (”The Equation”) and use it to turn one of the walls of the bank vault permeable. A trio of robbers enter the vault, steal the contents of a safety deposit box, and exit back through the wall — all except one robber who gets stuck in the wall when it turns solid again. His compatriots shoot him and leave him behind.
Agent Dunham and team are called to the scene. She recognizes the robber as someone who used to be in her unit in the Marines. Dunham talks to the robber’s estranged wife and realizes that she never knew him, Agent Scott did, and his memories are mixing with hers. Peter Bishop recognizes that the numbers of the stolen safety deposit boxes are related to something Walter says every night as he falls asleep. Walter recognizes the numbers as a Fibonacci sequence, and then realizes the boxes being stolen are his — he just doesn’t remember what he hid there. Peter is able to prey lose a memory and it seems that Walter invented a machine that can reach back in time and pluck someone from anywhere, anywhen. He never used it himself, but recognized it could be dangerous, so hid it away.
Meanwhile, in Germany, Mr. Jones (from Episode Seven) is meeting with his lawyer. Jones clearly is up to something, and he seems to be coordinating the bank robberies back in the U.S.
The FBI traces the robbers to their final bank, but just misses their theft. They are able to track down the thieves immediately afterward and capture one. He doesn’t divulge any information until Peter scares him with the fact that he has gotten radiation poisoning from frequency machine used during the thefts. He tells them about an upcoming meeting at a field in Westford. Looking at the map, Dunham recognizes the name Little Hill (from Episode Seven, again) and realizes that the meeting must be occurring at Little Hill Field. She and the FBI mount a raid on the field.
At the same time, the thieves set up the machinery stolen from Dr Bishop’s safety deposit boxes and use it to pluck Mr. Jones from prison in Germany. He arrives safely at Little Hill Field. They also kidnap agent Dunham because Jones has something in mind for her.
1. Lot of Hassle
It seems the thieves are going through an incredible amount of hassle to break one man out of prison in Germany. Certainly with all their money and technology, there would be an easier way. Their plan is something Rube Goldberg would come up with if you gave him an iPhone and a loud radio.
2. Shaking Hands
Tremor is a rare symptom of radiation poisoning, and generally only shows up as a late symptom during the secondary phase of high dose and lethal radiation poisoning. The robbers would be a great deal sicker by that point.
3. It’s A Secret
Patient Confidentiality doesn’t quite work the way the doctor thinks it does. It applies to what the doctor has learned and deduced through patient interview, examination, and testing. It also applies to what the doctor is told in confidence. I can’t imagine that who the patient hangs out with and talks in the hospital qualifies, especially when any random orderly can tell you.
For the record, according to Washington DC statutes, patient confidentiality can be broken when they are outweighed by “interests of public justice.”
4. Big Bird
Hepea is a made up disease. For one thing, Bird Flu did not become important (and was not known to be transmissible to humans) until the ’90s, well after the time when Walter was locked away in the asylum — so how did he learn of it? And how did Peter catch it? Even more, why would a doctor in the 1930s be a key expert when it was 60 years before there were any human cases.
5. The Eyes Have It
Once again, we hit the last thing seen by the eyes before death cliché (last seen in Episode Two), only this time with color printing.
December 4th, 2008 at 9:33 am
Come on, Scott. someone eventually used the time space transporter to go back to the 30’s and 80’s. They infected Peter when he was a child and another person in the 30’s, and gave the secret of the cure to a doctor in the 30’s, all for the reason to get Walter to invent the time space machine in order to save his son so the pattern could steal and then use the time space transporter to break Mr. Jones out of a maximum security prison in Germany. It’s so simple, perhaps you need a refresher course!
December 4th, 2008 at 10:33 am
“Their plan is something Rube Goldberg would come up with if you gave him an iPhone and a loud radio.”
I love you, man. :D
December 4th, 2008 at 10:59 am
The only reason to watch this show is the actor who plays Walter. “Agent Dunham , are you tripping?”
I lol’ed
December 4th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
My biggest disappointment was that, as originally presented, the device was terramount to a time machine. Which is cool. But then it gets used as a simple teleporter, and I think, “Really? That’s the best use you have for this thing?”
It also appears to be one way, so I wonder what Walter was planning to do with his doctor after he grabbed him from the past.
December 4th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
And here’s the sign of a truly bad show: the time machine/teleporter, having been used once, will never, ever be seen again. Something so incredible useful, amazing, and outrageous, is a one-off to be used and thrown away by lazy writers who don’t care.
December 4th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
If they didn’t plan on using it again, I would think they would’ve just made it a matter transporter with no mention of it being able to work across time. That’s either laying the groundwork for a future reappearance of the time-space transporter or bad writing. Anyone want to guess which it is going to turn out to be???
December 4th, 2008 at 10:46 pm
Who says it can’t be both? It might be worth it, though, if we keep getting more Walter-induced laughs.
Speaking of which, and along the lines of, “Are you tripping, Agent Dunham?” I was mildly disappointed that the contents of the “supplements” Walter took went unspecified. I personally choose, however, to assume that it was some manner of home-brew recreational drugs. His ready assumption that Olivia and Peter were rousting him so they could have the room for getting it on was good for a laugh, though.
December 5th, 2008 at 7:47 am
This is already a bad/guilty pleasure show. A lot of the episodes don’t tie in with any of what’s going on, unless the writer’s plan on making everything relivent only in the last two episodes.
-What the hell did that “space bullet” have to do with anything? Or the Watcher (”observer” my ass) for that matter?
-Rapid-Aging Man? The Jello-Bus? Electro?
-I still don’t understand why it is called the “Pattern.” Nothing, until the last episode, even hinted anything they cased down had anything to do with the previous case, except that Walter had his hand in everything at the start apparently. And that’s not even a pattern itself, he’s just the focal point.
My favorite line was Peter trying to find out about the deposit boxes from Walter, who angrily denied any knowledge of them, then casually states where it is when Peter just changes the question.
…I reread the comment on bringing back the time/teleporter, and if they do, and it’s so Olivia can go back to the first episode, negating the entire season, I will be pissed.
April 19th, 2009 at 8:00 pm
Actually this you should be fully aware that any teleporter by definition has to be a time machine. Thanks to general relativity moving through space also means moving through time. They didn’t simply transport the guy from Germany they sucked him out of the past too….just that instead of reaching back 30 years or something like it they reached back ohhh… 10 seconds, maybe less.
It would have been hilarious to have the machine completely break down after the first use and destroyed, with the guys oh so disappointed about it, it also would have closed a problematic loose end.
October 15th, 2009 at 6:43 am
[...] episode is debunked at Popular Mechanics and Polite Dissent, and you can read more about it at Fox, IMDb and the A.V. [...]
February 7th, 2010 at 3:46 am
It’s not uncommon to get the answer to a question when casually asked of a distracted person who can’t remember tht information when he’s focused on it and trying hard to do so, especially one who is as…uh…confused as Walter tends to be. The two methods access memory differently. This comes up not uncommonly in case interviewing, among other situations.
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