Polite Dissent

I thought this was a well done, poignant episode of Fringe. Mostly, the story was just a confirmation of things we already suspected, but it did throw in some new wrinkes (like whatever happened to Dr Warren?)

The Plot: Most of this episode takes place back in 1985, where Walter Bishop has invented a “window” that lets him see into the other universe. At that point, he has no idea of how to cross between universes other than, scientifically, it is probably a “very bad idea.”

Meanwhile, young Peter is dying of an unnamed genetic wasting disease. Walter is unable to develop a cure, but other universe Walter is hard at work one on. Our Walter is using his window to watch him, hoping he’ll develop a cure in time to save Peter. Sadly, no cure is found in time and Peter dies in his father’s arms.

Other Peter is still alive, though still very sick, and other Walter remains hard at work on a cure. Miraculously, he discovers one, but a poorly timed visit by one of the Observers causes him to miss it. Our Walter notices, however, and is able to use what he saw to produce the cure. It is too late for his Peter, but he resolves to find a way into the other universe to save that Peter.

Walter heads to the lake and sets up the apparatus he has developed to open a gate to the other universe. His co-worker Dr. Warren and Nina Sharp arrive to talk him out of it, but he can’t be dissuaded. He opens the gate and walks through, the gate snapping shut behind him. Unfortunately, Nina was still trying to hold him back, and her arm was injured by the dimensional gate.

In the other universe, Walter arrives at the lake house and convinces his other wife (who believes that he is her Walter) that he has found a cure, but has to get Peter back to his lab immediately. Peter is bundled up, and he and Walter head out. Walter takes Peter across the lake to the gate, which Walter reopens and they enter our universe. As they arrive, the ice over the lake cracks beneath their feet, and they fall into the freezing water. As fate would have it, the Observer is there and rescues them. He tells Walter that Peter is very important and must live. He then gets out of the car and walks away. Walter takes Peter to his lab and gives him the cure, which seems to help. Unexpectedly, his wife arrives looking for him, and is overcome with emotion when she spots other Peter. She makes it clear to Walter that, despite his original intention, he will not be returning Peter back to the other universe.

1. Oh The Humanity!
The other universe has zeppelins, which are cool. Need I say more?

2. I Knew I Should Have Paid More Attention in Class
The Casimir Effect is an actual consideration in quantum physics. Near as I can tell, it deals with metallic plates in a vacuum. Walter certainly had the metallic plates, but he seemed to be missing the vacuum. But — hey! — zeppelins!

3. Wonder What Green Would Have Meant
So a pink solution is bad, and a blue solution is good. Was the writer of this episode, perchance, male?

4. 1.21 Gigawatts!
According to Dr. Warren, the wormhole will require a tremendous amount of power that will devastate both universes — yet Walter manages it with a small generator. Either Dr. Warren is bad at math, or those generators put out way more power than I thought.

5. One Prozac a Day, Husband’s a CPA
The faux-1985 opening sequence was well done, as were the location titles (nice 80s computer font).
Back to the Future was a nice touch. Especially the Eric Stoltz part as he was the only other actor seriously considered to play Marty McFly.
By the time Nina whipped out her giant cell I thought they were pushing “the 80s” a little too much (and apparently it takes only three or four digits to reach William at his hotel in France)

A solid story, and the science, though Fringe, wasn’t over explained, it just was. The clock regains a minute and moves back to 11:57

This week’s Fringe cipher was: PETERS.
A list of all previous Fringe reviews is available here.
Karl has much more to say.

There something unsettling about the sea captain in this public service ad. Maybe I’m just being cynical — or it’s the effect of living in this day and age — but was it ever proper for a grizzled sea captain to lead a group of pre-teens through town?

In that last panel, you just know the captain is thinking, “There’s no place you can go Johnny that I haven’t been. God help me.”

Is it just me, or does this PSA remind anyone else of the opening to SpongeBob SquarePants?

This was a double duty public service ad, appearing in both December 1963 and June 1966 DC comics. The script was by Jack Schiff with art by Sheldon Moldoff.

More PSAs

Tags: comics psa trip world sea captain jack schiff sheldon moldoff

I never realized that bowling alleys were such a hotbed of weight loss — good thing I signed up for the spring league. Click on the image for the full ad.

While not as good as last week, I thought this was still a better-than-average episode of Fringe, even if did return to the Walter-caused-the-monster-of-the-week formula

The Plot: A young lawyer has lunch with a man who is clearly ill and claims to be an old classmate of hers. Shortly after lunch, a blistering rash develops where he touched her and soon spreads over her entire body. She dies before help can arrive. The Fringe team is called in to investigate the case and attend the autopsy. Walter concludes that she has been killed by a fast growing sarcoma (a cancer of the connective tissue). He is able to identify where the cancer started — at a handprint on her wrist.

The team visits the law office where the victim worked and discover she was working on a case against a pharmaceutical company. The Red Herring pharmaceutical company, I believe.

The team is called in on a similar case — a man who died almost immediately from a rapidly spreading tumor. They realize that someone is somehow giving the victims cancer. Based on an eyewitness who saw the killer in the café at the beginning of the episode, the team theorizes that the killer has some kind of cancer himself and is able to gain beneficial energy from his victims while infecting them with his cancer.

The team (finally) decides to do some investigatings and finds three other similar cases scattered across the United States. Olivia recognizes one of the names, but she is not sure from where. A little while later, in the middle of a game of Clue (hence the episode’s title) with Sam, the bowling alley owner, she realizes that all the victims were part of Walter’s Cortexiphan trials in Jacksonville. Walter theorizes that the Cortexiphan must made the victims more susceptible to this kind of energy transfer. Later, looking over the list of her Jacksonville classmates, she is able to deduce the identity of the killer. As luck would have it, when she walks outside, there he is waiting in her hallway. She recognizes him, but he quickly realizes that she is a cop (well, FBI agent, technically). They wrestle around her apartment, and she finally subdues him with a candlestick (another Clue reference) to the temple. He tells her that a mysterious man visited him while he was sick in the hospital and told him that, thanks to the Cortexiphan trials, he could cure his own cancer. Technically, it was true, but more of Midas-touch than anything else. Could this have been the same mysterious man who “activated” Nick, another Cortexiphan patient, back in the first season?

1. She Must Have Kept Rolling a “1″
Once again, Agent Dunham – and the rest of the Fringe team – are horrible detectives. Look for more cases? Who would have thought of that? Cross-reference the victims’ pasts to see if there were any connections – like a childhood in Jacksonville, perhaps?. Never!

2. Atypical Atypia
It’s often true that the more advanced a cancer is, the more irregular it is (we like the term “atypia”). Most of these changes occur within the cell itself, usually within the nucleus. That, of course, would make it particularly hard for them to fluoresce under black light since they are not surface changes.
I’m impressed that Walter was able to diagnose sarcoma just by a superficial glance at the lesion. Every other expert would need an actual tissue biopsy.

3. So “Miranda” Became a Lawyer…
Unless my eyes deceived me, Miranda Green was played by Diane Kruger, probably best known in the US for her role in the National Treasure movies. She also happens to be Joshua Jackson’s girlfriend in real life.

4. Turn Your Head When You Cough
While there are no contagious human cancers, there are some in the animal kingdom that are. We do know that there are contagious causes of human cancer. For example, the vast majority of cervical cancers are caused by a certain type of human papilloma virus (HPV), which is infectious – it is essentially a sexually transmitted disease. Now, not all HPV infections go on to cause cancer – most resolve on their own – but it is a contagious cause of cancer.

5. He’s Still Dying, He Just Doesn’t Realize It
Medically induced comas have no use in treating cancer.

6. I Have Got To Get Me One of These
A scanner — like a computer scanner — that can identify genetic codes from what is scans? What – are they on bar codes on the outside of the cells?

A return to the villain-somehow-tied-to-Walter formula, but for all it’s myriad (though minor) flaws, I still found it an enjoyable episode. The Fringe Doomsday Clock gains another minute.

This week’s Fringe cipher was: ENERGY.
A list of all previous Fringe reviews is available here.
Karl has much more to say.

Another public service ad featuring an eavesdropping and overly righteous Superman. This time it’s nice to see that it’s not just schoolchildren that Superman flies around the world at the drop of a hat. For once it’s two old bench warmers — apparently Harry Truman and Red Skelton — that Superman takes along for the ride.

Superman has x-ray vision, so he can easily what the kids are studying in the fourth and fifth panels. But what about Harry and Red — how are they seeing in those rooms? Is Superman just describing what he sees (in which case, why bring the two of them along), or is he somehow showing them what’s occurring? I can just picture Superman and the two old guys furtively peeking in the window like a trio of peeping toms.

For once, it’s not an “America alone will save the world” theme, though all but one of the panels do seem to imply that interpretation.

“Durned” — I think that’s the harshest word I’ve seen in any of these Public Service Ads.

I wonder if people intentionally say stupid things around Superman so he’ll give them a free trip around the world.

I think one of the old guys is Mr. Stanton who Superman schooled in the classic PSA “Hop on the Welfare Wagon.”

This PSA appeared in various DC comics from November 1951. This particular copy was scanned in from Adventure Comics #170. The script is by Jack Schiff with art by Win Mortimer.

More PSAs

Tags: comics psa superman exchange student jack schiff win mortimer

While I appreciate the writers’ desires to try something different, three low-medicine episodes of House in the first sixteen episodes of the season is too much. Generally, the episode was good, though the clichés were pretty thick.

Since this was really five mini-storylines in one, I’ll deal with each one separately.

1. Chase/Cameron
I thought it was well done and almost painful to watch (as in the “I’ve had relationships end badly, too” way), though the ending cliché sex cheapened the arc for me.

2. Taub/Foreman
While I ‘m not surprised that Taub, and even Foreman, would be snooping around personnel records, I found the whole “let’s take drugs so we can be like House” scene was hard to believe. That’s far out of character for them, especially uptight

3. Thirteen/Wilson
Enjoyable, but did we really learn anything? We already knew Thirteen was a good liar and Wilson is a pushover. Nice flash at the end.

4. Cuddy, P.I.
Is there nothing Cuddy can’t do? Doctor, administrator, mother, and now detective. She must have one hell of a resume.

If the baby was located just outside the maternity ward, then the staff clearly didn’t do a very thorough job of looking for the baby.

Based on all the hospitals I’ve practiced at (and had children delivered at), the proximity alarms should have gone off. They go off anytime anyone leaves the ward with a baby, and that includes stairwells and back hallways. In fact, the alarms are often so sensitive you are warned to avoid going near the doors at all when holding the baby

5. House
The concept of House having to watch a patient he turned down die was clever and the for the most part, well done. There was a little too much of the “wise dying man” cliché for my tastes.

So was House telling the truth when he said he was still mooning over Lydia, or did he obliquely mean Cuddy?

No medicine or mystery scores for this week as their wasn’t enough to evaluate. I’d give the soap opera a strong B+.

The review of the previous episode of House
A list of all prior House reviews

Thor #602 “Uncertain Destinies”
J. Michael Straczynski, writer
Marko Djurdjevic, penciler

What’s good for the goose is good for the gander; or in this case, what’s good for the gander is good for the goose. I’ve picked on Donald Blake enough for now, so I think it’s time to pick on Dr. Jane Foster.

Myocardial arrhythmia, while technically true, is horribly redundant. Saying someone has an “arrhythmia” implies the heart (i.e. “myocardium”) — there really is no other part of the body that has arrhythmias. This would be the same as Foster driving her car to the dealer and telling them she needs her “automobile transmission” repaired. What she says is accurate, but nobody talks that way.

I am out of town in Chicago for C2E2 this weekend. Thus the Fringe review will be postponed for a few days.

Karl was able to get his review posted.

UPDATE: My Fringe review of White Tulip has been posted.

Tonight’s episode of House wanted to be clever, but just ended up being muddled. It was a “let’s throw everything against the wall and see what sticks” episode.

William is a knight at a Rennaissance Faire, and he’s actually been living there full time for the better part of a month. After fighting Horace the Black in a tournament, he staggers then suffers a seizure; the whites of his eyes are also bloody. As luck would have it, he is admitted to House’s service.

The initial diagnoses include concussion, subdural hematoma, or an allergic reaction to something at the Faire. House orders a head MRI, which is negative, but William starts vomiting during the test. This is a possible indication of food poisoning, but the idea is discounted as William is the only one with any symptoms. Meanwhile, Foreman and Thirteen check out the Faire. They find evidence that William had been sick prior to his battle — and also discover that the Faire’s king had a wicked sense of humor, forcing his knights to eat all kinds of disgusting foods. House suspects William may be allergic to one of these, so has the team perform scratch tests (an allergy test) for them. At the same time, he also wants to treat William with epinephrine to minimize his symptoms. Shortly after receiving the epinephrine and starting the scratch test, William suffers chest pain and develops an irregular heart beat (a tachycardia, according to Foreman). When William’s shirt is opened in preparation for defibrillation, a vesicular (blister) rash is seen.

The differential diagnosis now consists of an allergy to the preservative in epinephrine injections, Wolff-Parkinson White syndrome (a condition with a rapid heart rate), or MRSA (methicillin resistant Staph aureus — a nasty infection that spreads easily and can be difficult to treat). House suspects the latter — skin cultures are ordered and William is placed in isolation. Meanwhile his chest pain is getting worse and now he’s developing back pain.

House shows up and announces that the rash, and possibly the rest of the symptoms, is due to poison ivy. House found this out when he got a poison ivy from handling William’s sword, and now he wonders if they’ve been burning it in campfires, and William breathed in the smoke and got some in his eyes.

William develops heart problems again, only this time his heart rate is too slow. Chase injects him with a large amount of epinephrine despite the fact that he might be allergic. The heart stops for a second, but ultimately the treatment works. As bradycardia (slow heart rate) would not be symptom of poison ivy, this causes the team to once again re-evaluate their differential diagnosis. The new differential consists of leukemia, environmental toxins, or trichinosis (a parasitic contracted from undercooked pork). House has the team treat the suspected trichinosis and check a muscle biopsy. The tests for trichinosis come back negative and Foreman is starting to wonder if it may be a fungal infection. William now complains of leg pain, reporting that his legs feel like they are “on fire.” When the sheet is yanked back, it reveals grossly edematous (swollen) legs. Thirteen reports that William now has rhabdomyolysis complete with kidney failure. Taub suspects William has cancer. Foreman and Taub ultrasound the liver looking for the tumors while Thirteen and Chase investigate William’s apartment. The ultrasound reveals a number of lesions which at first are thought to represent tumors, but they appear more vascular than tumors would be. The investigation of William’s apartment reveals the chivalrous knight to have also been practicing the occult.

The team suspects William may have been poisoned by some of his occult rituals/concoctions while House suspects lead poisoning (until the past few years, most metal miniatures had a high lead content). Tests for lead poisoning are negative. Meanwhile, William’s heart rate and blood pressure are getting worse.

House visits the Renaissance Faire himself and heads to the Apothecary shop (basically, a medieval drug store). He finds a number of mislabeled herbs, the most concerning of which is water hemlock mistaken for a wild carrot. The Apothecary admitted selling a small amount to the Faire’s king. When questioned, the king replies that he thought it was a wild carrot and admits to using a small amount in one his knights’ challenges, but denies any poisoning attempt. None of the other knights became sick. Lab tests show a small amount of hemlock in William’s system, but the standard treatments aren’t working, and Taub insists that something else must be going on. A talk with Wilson’s ex-wife/current girlfriend gives House the inspiration he needs to realize that William has been abusing anabolic steroids. These made the hemlock more potent, explaining why only William suffered the ill effects. (So you got that? Rash was poison ivy. Heart, liver, muscle was the steroids. Hemlock was apparently everything else).

As usual, major complaints are in red, minor complaints are in blue, and nit-picking ones in green:

North American hemlock (water hemlock) has cicutoxin, which is not a piperadine (as opposed to European poison hemlock which has coniine, which is a piperadine). Thus tests that show piperadine in William’s blood would NOT be an indication of water hemlock poisoning.

Gastric lavage and activated charcoal wouldn’t do anything for hemlock poisoning 2+ days out.

What is the point of running allergy testing when you’re giving medicine to treat the allergies at the same time?

The patient is dying of hemlock poisoning and only suffers a single mild seizure? One of the classic signs of the condition?

There are two types of MRSA: community acquired and hospital acquired. Both are nasty, but the latter is much, much worse than the former (which is what William would have contracted)

Water Hemlock is extremely poisonous, even in small amounts. The other knights would have had some symptoms as well, even if not as severe as William’s.

Again, fungal tests take weeks to get results, not “spore tests” overnight.

What was up with that whole occult/witchcraft angle? That came out of nowhere and added nothing to the episode, other than proving once again that TV writers can’t separate the wiccans, pagans, and occultists.

Why would a king who thinks that making people eat cow brains, eyeballs, etc. is the height of fun, even conceive of making his men eat a small sliver of wild carrot as a “challenge?”

The medical mystery was a little better than average: C+. The final solution was a mess. Anything that takes three answers isn’t clever: D. The medicine was haphazard, but better than average: B-. The soap opera was pretty good: B.

The review of the previous episode of House
A list of all prior House reviews

The two most common themes in the old DC Comics public service ads seem to have been “Stay in School” and “The United Nations is Good!” A close third, however, was the “Be Nice to Old Folks” theme. This PSA is one of those.

Apparently in the DC Universe, the elderly just sit at home doing nothing and slowly pining away — that is unless some youngsters deign to stop by. Then, magically, their life is better.

This PSA appeared in DC comics from March 1964 and the script is by Jack Schiff with art by Sheldon Moldoff. Like other recent PSAs I’ve posted, this is another PSA from later in the program; from the time when the quality really begins to suffer, in my (humble) opinion.

More PSAs

Tags: comics psa toys old folks jack schiff sheldon moldoff

A solidly enjoyable episode, even with Walter’s Mary Baker Eddy-ish crisis of conscience. But then, I’ve always been a sucker for time travel stories

The Plot: The lights start flickering aboard a car on a commuter train and then a thin man in a trench coat suddenly blinks into existence. He exits the train at the next station, barely avoiding bumping into a beggar. When the beggar climbs aboard the train, he discovers that everyone aboard that car is dead. The Fringe Team is called in to investigate. Meanwhile, Walter is writing a letter to Peter that finally tells him everything. He puts the letter in his pocket and joins the rest of the team.

At the scene, Walter’s first thought is that everyone died of heart failure. Agent Dunham, an astute investigator for once, realizes the lights are out only in that one car. Digging deeper, Peter finds that every battery on that car — cell phone, laptop, MP3 player — all are dead as well. Walter has the bodies moved to his lab where he discovers that the victims are low in ATP, one of the main energy molecules used by the human body. He hypothesizes that whoever this strange man was, he somehow drained all the energy out of everything in that train car.

The FBI is able to track the man’s movements with surveillance cameras and they eventually identify him as Alistair Peck. A raid of his house reveals that he is an MIT astrophysicist. Peck enters the house while it is being searched and is detained by the agents on site. When Dunham questions him, he spouts out some confusing answers and then suddenly fades from view.

Now we’re back on the commuter train that started the episode, this time seeing it from Peck’s point of view. As he exits the train, this time he tells the beggar that he is sorry for putting him through this again. He also leaves a fingerprint behind which allows the Fringe Team to identify him sooner this time. The search of his house reveals walls of mathematical formulas, but this time, Peck doesn’t come home during the search. Checking at MIT reveals that Peck was a brilliant scientist who studied time travel. His research was over almost everyone’s heads and he quit a year ago. The MIT professor they talk to is able to provide Dunham with some of Peck’s recent research, which she then hands over to Walter. Reading through the research, Walter realizes that Peck has discovered how to travel through time, but it takes a tremendous amount of energy. Meanwhile, Dunham has learned that Peck’s fiancée died in a car crash just about a year ago and the team suspects Peck’s ultimate goal is to go back in time to rescue her.

The Fringe Team tracks Peck to his old lab at MIT. Walter goes in to see him alone, hoping a fellow scientist who has also lost family will be able to talk him out of his plan. He explains all the regrets he has about bringing Peter from the other universe and how he feels that God in now punishing him. As the conversation ends, the SWAT team enters, and Peck once again fades from view. This time, he reappears at the lab at his house, where he works feverishly to complete his formulas so he can jump back to save his fiancée. A SWAT sniper just misses, and Peck fades from view, appearing in the empty field he described to Walter in their conversation. His time jump worked! He rushes to find his fiancée and climbs in her car just before she drives off. He holds her hand and tells her that he loves her – and then a truck barrels into the car, killing them both.

Now we’re back to the scene where Walter is writing the letter to Peter. This time, instead of carrying it around, he throws it in the fireplace to burn. The mail comes, and within it is a letter from Peck – he had carried it to the past with him and left orders for it to be mailed on this specific day. In it is a simple drawing of a white rose tulip — the sign Walter was looking for that God has forgiven him.

1. I remember you! You’re dead. We killed you!
Heart failure and heart attacks are two different things. A heart attack occurs when the heart is not getting the blood and oxygen it needs and part of it dies. Heart failure occurs when the heart is not pumping as strong as it should. While a heart attack can lead to heart failure, but they are not the same thing.

2. I’d buy that for a dollar!
A Faraday cage is a box of fine mesh made of some conducting material (gold is common). It blocks EM waves of a wavelength larger than the holes in the mesh. I don’t know what Peck was wearing, but it wasn’t a Faraday cage. (Plus if he was in a Faraday Cage, he wouldn’t be able to use his fiancée’s cell phone).

3. Dead or alive, you’re coming with me
Loss of ATP is the main cause of rigor mortis (ATP is required for muscles to relax, so when it is no longer available, the muscles stiffen up). All those corpses should have had severe rigidity.

4 . You better pray that that unholy monster of yours doesn’t screw up.
I love all the science fiction shows, books, and comics where people have wires and implants of all sorts in their bodies, yet never get infections. Metal or plastic implants within the human are so easily infected it’s not funny. People with them have to take extra antibiotics whenever they undergo certain procedures (dental work, colonoscopy). And those are the deep surgically implanted ones like artificial joint, heart valves, or pacemakers. More superficially places implants, like the wires and all on Murphy Peck, become infected at the drop of hat. I’ve never seen one go for over a week or two without getting infected, and that was in the clean hospital environment, not a dirty old house or train station. Peck would be a walking mess of MRSA.

5. Murphy… I’m a mess…
So God is punishing Walter by killing a bunch of other people?

6. I want a recount! And no matter how it turns out, I want my old job back!
The time travel aspect of the story seemed to leave questions unanswered (which I’m actually fine with; I like time travel stories that are though provoking and raise questions).
For instance, what happened to the 9-months-previous-Peck who was standing in the field when now-Peck appeared? Did he wink out of existence? Was he drained of energy and killed?
It seems to me that Peck killed his fiancée, or at least caused her death. He delayed her a few seconds when he entered the car and grabbed her hand. If he hadn’t been there, she would have had time to drive off and avoid being hit by that truck (though, apparently, she would die in another accident). I can see how Peck would love his fiancée enough to want to die with her, but it seems to me he loved her so much his instinct would be to first save her life.
Also, did he stop to mail the letter in the past, or was the nice-clean letter somehow found on his mangled and crushed corpse?
I’m a big fan of time travel stories. Some of my favorites: By His Bootstraps and All You Zombies, both by Robert A. Heinlein; The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers; the various Time Patrol stories by Poul Anderson; the Paratime stories by H. Beam Piper; and the best of all, The Men Who Murdered Mohammed by Alfred Bester.

7. Massive and immediate retaliation is the best policy
Finally, a question unrelated to this episode that just occurred to me: how do we know the Bell Olivia met with was the Bell from our dimension, and not the other one?

A good episode that left more questions opened than it started with, but in a good way. For the third episode in a row, the Fringe Doomsday Clock gains a minute.

This week’s Fringe cipher was: SECRETS.
A list of all previous Fringe reviews is available here.
Karl has much more to say.

An average episode of Fringe. Nothing remarkable, but nothing particularly bad, either.

The Plot: Two teenagers are sitting in a car by an abandoned warehouse when they hear a disturbance from within. The boyfriend goes to check it out and is surprised and killed by one of the shapeshifters from the other universe. The shapeshifter take his form, and then his girlfriend meets the same grisly fate a short time later. When the girl’s body is discovered the next morning, the Fringe Team is called in after the medical examiner notices three puncture marks on the roof of her mouth. A quick search of the warehouse reveals the boyfriend’s body in the same condition. A three foot diameter protoplasmic blob is also discovered. When Walter cuts into it with a scalpel, it bleeds mercury, which leads him to hypothesize that it is a shapeshifter embryo and must be how they travel between universes. He has the embryo taken to his lab.

Television signal interference was reported at the same time the shapeshifters appeared. When the interference is analyzed by the science geek at Massive Dynamic, he discovers that it is interference caused by sunspot patterns – only the interference is slightly out of phase with the sunspot interference from our own universe. However, both patterns will be perfectly in sync at 3:31PM the following day, leading Agent Dunham to believe that something big is planned for that inter-universe conjunction.

Across town, the two remaining shapeshifters report to Newton, the leader of the otherworld forces in our universe. They decide to proceed with their plan even though they are down an agent.

With a bunch of car batteries, Walter attempts to “jump start” the embryo. It seems to work at first, but is ultimately unsuccessful and the shapeshifter dies — but not before he croaks the name “Daniel Voss Verona.” The FBI captures Verona, a medical examiner at Boston General, but when they discover he is human and they are unsure of his part in the plan.

Meanwhile, one of the shapeshifters has taken on the shape of a bank president and he and Newton plant a device in the floor of the bank vault.

Walter decides that Newton is going to use the convergence to bring something, or someone, across the universes. He suspects that Newton will accomplish this using “harmonics.” Newton has three devices generating harmonic waves set up equidistant from the transfer point. Using Verona’s location as one point, and the bank as a second (the bank president’s dead body has just been found), the team decides that an abandoned bridge over the Charles River is the likely crossover point. Walter has also worked out a method to stop the conjunction by setting up his own set of waves that will cancel out Newton’s waves.

The team arrives at the bridge just as the convergence begins. Two cops try to stop them, but Dunham realizes they are shapeshifters and a gunfight starts. Walter , and then Peter, set up Walter’s apparatus on the bridge. When a problem develops, Peter stays behind to fix it while Walter and Dunham head to safety. After a loose cable is plugged on, Walter’s device works and cancels the convergence, but not before somebody crosses over. Peter is also knocked unconscious by the force of the waves. Waking up in the hospital, he realizes the truth: that he is the Peter from the other universe. He has words with Walter and then kicks him out. He checks himself out from the hospital and disappears. Meanwhile, Newton is helping “Mr. Secretary” – the person who crossed over – recover from the effects of the transfer.

1. No Stiffies
Apparently Rigor Mortis doesn’t exist in Fringe. Ten or so hours after death, the girl and her boyfriend should been very rigid and not as floppy as they were.

2. A New Record
For the second week in a row, Agent Dunham shows herself to be a gifted investigator.

3. Fancy Equipment, Part 1
Amino acids are way to small to be seen and identified with a microscope.

4. Fancy Equipment, Part 2
I’m impressed the scientist’s computer could predict with exact precision two days’ worth of sunspot patterns for not one, but two universes.

5. Crossed Wires
If Walter was using car batteries to jump start the embryo, why did the fuse in the lab’s power supply blow?

6. Exacting Precision, More or Less
Using a Triple-A map, a thick pen, a crude protactor, and very inexact measurements (4 or five blocks is “close enough”), Peter is able to find the exact spot the convergence will occur. He must be quite the genius.

7. An All-too Common Cliche in Movies and TV
Pills take time before they start working. A capsule like the one Newton took would need to travel to stomach and be broken down, releasing the medicine, which would then need to be absorbed into the bloodstream and spread throughout the body. For most pills, this takes at least thirty minutes; not the three seconds Newton’s pill took.

8. Thanks to Mythbusters, We Know the Bridge Won’t Fall
Newton’s wave must be propagating in a predictable pattern for Walter’s machine to have any chance of success.

9. My Prediction
Mr. Secretary is otherWalter.

There was nothing specifically wrong with this episode, per se, but it just didn’t resonate with me. It may just be that the last couple of episodes have been excellent, and this one, while quite good, was not as good, and paled by comparison. It did advance the uber-plot nicely.

No change in the Fringe Doomsday Clock this week.

This week’s Fringe cipher was: BRIDGE.
A list of all previous Fringe reviews is available here.
Karl has much more to say.

Though I enjoyed the fairly understated soap opera on tonight’s episode of House, I found the medicine to be frighteningly bad.

Julia is 35 year-old woman in an open marriage. She is just about to start a fling with her boyfriend when she develops sudden excruciating abdominal pain. She is taken to the ER where all the “usual suspects” are ruled out and she is eventually diagnosed with intestinal blockage (by which I suspect they mean a small bowel obstruction). She is admitted to House’s service not because her condition is particularly interesting, but because Thirteen knows he’ll be intrigued by her open marriage.

The team’s initial diagnosis of herpes colitis (a widespread herpes infection of the intestine) seems to be unduly focused on Julia’s suspected sexual escapades, rather than any real evidence — or the fact that there are many far more likely causes of bowel obstruction. A barium enema is ordered: it shows no evidence of herpes colitis, though Julia’s pain does resolve during the procedure.

Thirteen wants to discharge Julia from the hospital now that the blockage has cleared, but House wants to runs some tests to find out why she developed the intestinal blockage in the first place. He orders an upper GI with a small bowel follow through (have the patient swallow barium, then take a repeated series of x-rays as it slowly makes its way through the intestine). The x-rays are negative, but Julia develops a racing heart rate during the test which is later explained as an “arrhythmia.” Taub attempts carotid sinus massage to slow the heart rate (the massage should activate the parasympathetic system, which slows the heart rate), but it doesn’t work (though clearly something did as her heart rate and rhythm is normal for the rest of the show). With intestinal and cardiac symptoms, the team now suspects a parasitic cause. Neither Julia’s husband nor her boyfriends have been out of the country, so something exotic seems unlikely. A search of Julia’s house turns up evidence her husband was telling the truth about his limited travels, but also a loofah sponge, which the team now suspects she got amebiasis from (an infection by amebas).

Unfortunately, Julia’s symptoms worsen and she loses all movement in her legs. “Tests show no spinal cord injury, no cerebral lesion, and no hemorrhage.” The stool studies also come back and are negative for amebas or any other parasite. House suggests that Julia may have an electrolyte imbalance. Chase suggests that with the husband and boyfriends, she may have an abnormally high libido (i.e. her sex drive is too strong), which can be a sign of adrenocortical carcinoma (cancer of the adrenal glands). An MRI is ordered and it shows no cancer in the adrenals, but it does show a blood clot in the lungs which is confirmed by a VQ scan. The team now believes she has a clotting disorder and starts her on heparin (a blood thinner). The differential diagnosis consists of DIC (disseminated intravascular coagulation), Factor V Leiden, antiphospholipid syndrome, and Vitamin K deficiency. House has Thirteen run tests for all of them — which are, of course, normal. Thirteen now suggests pulmonary artery hypertension, but before any discussion can occur, the team is summoned to Julia’s room where she has once again developed severe abdominal pain. An abdominal ultrasound is quickly obtained and is normal. Chase thinks she may have a problem with her parasympathetic system, but Taub believes she has an intussusception (a condition where the intestine collapses down on itself like closing a telescope). In adults, this is usually caused by cancer. She is rushed to surgery where an intussusception is found. A subsequent biopsy reveals no cancer, just some non-specific inflammation. Chases reports this could be a sign of inflammatory bowel disease, but states that it wouldn’t explain the heart symptoms or the newly-developed kidney failure (oh, House season six, where would we be without our weekly kidney failure?) House disagrees, pointing out that inflammatory bowel disease can be associated with ankylosing spondylitis (an inflammatory disease of the spine), which can have heart and kidney symptoms. He wants Julia started on sulfasalazine and TNF (tumor necrosis factor α) inhibitors (both these medications work on autoimmune diseases, such as ankylosing spondylitis and inflammatory bowel disease).

Julia does not improve on the new regimen and her kidneys are actually getting worse. A kidney biopsy showed IgA nephropathy, for which Chase has kindly written the differential on the whiteboard — a list far too long to reproduce here. The team quickly decides it can’t be sickle cell anemia, celiac disease, hepatitis, cirrhosis, Alport syndrome, anti-GBM antibodies, or Henoch-Schönlein purpura (HSP). They ultimately determine the three most likely causes are hemochromatosis, Weil’s disease, and sarcoidosis and start treatment for all of them (which would include frequent blood draws and possibly deferoxamine, antibiotics, and high dose steroids). Once again, there is no improvement in Julia’s condition. The team starts to list other possible causes of her symptoms including polyarteritis nodosa and mercury poisoning. House looks at the lilacs her husband brought in for her from their garden and remembers that his father didn’t like them because they drew too many bees. The leads House to remember that Henoch-Schönlein purpura can sometimes follow a bee sting — and, sure enough, Julia suffered a sting a few weeks before. The classic rash (the purpura) is still missing, but a quick look in her mouth reveals the lesions at the back of her throat. She is started on IVIG (intravenous immunoglobulin — not a common treatment of HSP) and cyclophosphamide (a common treatment of severe HSP) to treat her condition and a full recovery is expected.

As usual, major complaints are in red, minor complaints are in blue, and nit-picking ones in green:

Once again, a halfway decent physical exam would have cleared this up right away (and it didn’t even have to be a good exam; a half-assed one would have worked.) Looking in the mouth? That’s really basic. This isn’t a third-year medical student mistake; it’s a first-year medical student mistake.

Herpes colitis is exceedingly rare, especially in patients who are not immune deficient. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of more likely causes. Regardless, a barium enema is not the recommended diagnostic test (though, of course, it does conveniently temporarily fix the patient’s problem without actually diagnosing it)
Technically, it is the DCBE (double contrast barium enema) which corrects intussusception, not the regular barium enema Julia seems to have received.

The ER ruled out all the “usual suspects” for abdominal pain and obstruction, but never ran a CT scan? Of course, this would have shown the offending intussusception right away and it would have been case-closed before it even got to House. (It is possible to diagnose bowel obstruction without a CT scan — it has a classic look on an abdominal x-ray for instance — but one of the first orders of business after diagnosis is to look for a cause, and that requires a CT scan).

Though we no longer follow the maxim “never let the sun go down on a bowel obstruction” (i.e. operate right away, time is of the essence!), Julia was receiving substandard care. The poor choice of tests I’ve already mentioned (and will probably mention again), but she should have had a nasogastric tube to help relieve her symptoms.

Very sloppy differentials tonight, right from the start. The team was jumping around each time a new symptoms was discovered without following any logic at all.

Why didn’t the abdominal ultrasound catch the intussusception? Or at least show a suspicious mass where it was?

If a barium enema corrected the intussusception the first time, why not try that again before rushing off to open abdominal surgery, which has much higher risks associated with it?

Thirteen wasn’t actually ruling conditions out, she was stating which ones weren’t treatable. That’s not medical care, that’s wishful thinking.

It is possible to have HSP without the rash. Depending on the study and the diagnostic criteria, as many as 5% of patients may not have the pupura.

Your standard STD panel does not generally include herpes testing because the answer is not as black and white as the other STDs. Unless you directly test a herpes lesion (which will give you a definitive yes-or-no answer, the test looks at antibodies — which are good at telling if the patient has ever had herpes, but not as good at identifying current infections. And as was pointed out, it does no good to test if the body hasn’t had time to make enough antibodies to detect.

Some clotting tests can’t be run once the patient is on heparin, though most of the important ones can (and boy those genetic tests came back fast).

The medical mystery started off slow, but picked up steam, I give it a B. The final solution seemed to fit, for the most part at least: B+. The medicine was very haphazard and illogical, but significant oversights and poor care in general. It gets a D-. The soap opera was pretty strong though, and I enjoyed it: A-.

The review of the previous episode of House
A list of all prior House reviews

I’ve head many times that most comics of the 1950s and ’60s were targeted at twelve year-old boys, and with most of the stories I’ve read, that doesn’t seem far from the truth.

However, if that’s the case, then why do so many of the public service ads focus on an older audience? Did they really think a twelve year-old cared that much about laws? Or were they assuming that twelve year-old boys would remember this PSA four year in the future? (Or maybe they were hoping that one of Dr. Wertham’s delinquents would pick up the comic, read the PSA, and veer away from his life of crime. Personally, that’s the answer I’m going with).

Hauled before the judge that same day they were caught? And no lawyer or parent in sight. I’m hoping this is one of those “Scared Straight” things and not a huge violation of due process (which would be ironic, coming from a judge who’s lecturing them about the law).

This PSA appeared in various DC comics from March 1958. Jack Schiff, as always, did the script. The art this time was by Bob Brown, who only seemed to collaborate on a few other PSAs — which is a shame, because he brings more lively action in this PSA than in any other PSA I can remember. Check out panels 3, 4, and 5 — his art ads so much the story. It’s a pity more PSAs weren’t this animated.

More PSAs

Tags: comics psa law joyriding jack schiff bob brown

All bad doctors and purveyors of pseudoscience and woo will be taken care of appropriately (though probably not this severely).

The SHIELD #8
Eric Trautman, writer
Cliff Richards, artist.

The SHIELD is surprised to find that one of his enemies, the mind controlling Brain Emperor, has been assigned to his team. He is understandably upset and wondering if mind control is involved. His computerized suit reassures him: “Confirmed: No hostile action detected. Baseline EKG readings normal.”

I’m not sure who the SHIELD’s suit is referring to — are the “baseline EKGs” normal in the Brain Emperor or in the rest of the military staff?

It does strike me as unusual that an EKG — a heart test — is being used to detect mental influence; wouldn’t an EEG — a brain test — make more sense? (On the other hand, it does open up some interesting plot possibilities. For instance, if using mind control causes heart damage, then how far are you willing to push it?)

A nitpick: The term “baseline EKG” has a specific meaning, and it doesn’t fit here. When a patient is diagnosed with conditions that have an increased chance of heart disease (high blood pressure or diabetes, for instance), we will often obtain an initial EKG. This is their “baseline EKG” that we keep on file to compare against any EKGs obtained later to see if anything has changed. So someone having a normal baseline EKG just tells us that when the EKG was originally obtained, everything was fine. It tells us nothing about the current situation.

This is correct, it’s just too wordy. The vertobrosternal ribs are the first seven pairs of ribs, also known as “true ribs”, that start at the spinal column and wrap around to the breastbone (sternum). The remaining five pairs of ribs are known as the false ribs because they don’t attach to the breastbone.

If you haven’t figured this out by now, in medicine we like to convey as much useful information as possible in as few words as possible. This is especially true in emergency and trauma situations. That’s why we like abbreviations and acronyms so much.
There is nothing in the phrase “shattered third and fifth veterbrosternal ribs” that can’t be conveyed simpler by just saying “shattered third and fifth ribs.” (Though which ribs was fractured –the left or right — would be useful to know.)

I’d say this one can probably be blamed on whatever computer techie programmed the suit. In terms of medical programs, I’ve noticed you can tell which ones were written by doctors (good medicine, sloppy code) and by programmers (sloppy medicine, good code). I’m still looking for a program that does both well.

A failed attempt to make a musical/hardboiled detective episode of Fringe

The Plot: The majority of the episode was taken up by Walter telling Olivia’s niece Ella a story: a story that just happened to be a wannabe noirish, anachronistic, musical version of the Fringe mythology including everyone from Massive Sharp to the Observers (here called “The Watchers” — somebody call Stan Lee). And I have to say that it didn’t really work for me — mostly due to the fact that it was too campy (and not in the good way they were probably intending) and the quick realization that Anna Torv doesn’t have the acting chops (or at least the accent) to play a tough noir detective. It pulled me out of the story every time she talked.

Since nothing new was really added to the plot, I’m not going to go into much depth about the episode, other than to note that Lance Reddick and Jasika Nicole have surpisingly good voices (assuming those were their actual voices)

1. Cue the Bubbles
Musical cues included Yes (Roundabout), Tears for Fears (Head over Heels), Traffic (The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys), Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (The Candy Man), A Chorus Line (I Hope I Get It), and Stevie Wonder (For Once in My Life). Personally, I can’t believe they left out Heart from Damn Yankees.

2. She Must Have Bought the Extended Warranty
Olivia’s phone is knocked to the ground and smashed in her first encounter with the Observers Watchers, but is unblemished and working perfectly when she is locked in the pine box by them later.

3. I Must Be Crazy To Be In A Loony Bin Like This
I did like the One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest allusion, and whoever they had playing the nurse was a near perfect copy of Louise Fletcher’s Nurse Ratched.

4. I Don’t Mind If You Don’t Like My Manners, I Don’t Like Them Myself
For good noir and hardboiled crime fiction, I recommend anything by Raymond Chandler (personal favorites are The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye) and most everything by Dashiell Hammett (start with The Maltese Falcon and The Thin Man). Ross MacDonald shouldn’t be overlooked either (try The Galton Case or The Drowning Pool).

While I applaud the writers and cast for trying something different, it was an experiment that didn’t work. A noble failure (or Noble failure, if you want the pun), but still a failure. The Fringe Doomsday Clock moves one minute closer to midnight.

This week’s Fringe cipher was: HEART.
A list of all previous Fringe reviews is available here.
Karl has much more to say.