1x10: Safe

[wendelah1]

During the extended teaser, one of the team who is breaking into the bank safety deposit vault, says when some equipment malfunctions, "He can't leave that in there, we're screwed if he does." So what do they do instead: they leave behind a dead man with a bullet in his brain--stuck inside the wall! All of the critics seem to love this episode but I'll need to watch it again to figure out why.



Writer: Jason Cahill, David H. Goodman
Director: Michael Zinberg
Originally aired: 02 Dec 2008

Synopsis: When Mitchell Loeb's bungling band of safety deposit box bandits leaves behind a man stuck in a WALL, the Fringe team is called to investigate. Naturally, all of the crimes link back to our very own Walter Bishop: the safety deposit boxes all belong to him!

Most Memorable Quote:
WALTER BISHOP: "Oh! Do you two want to use the room?" (to Olivia And Peter, after being rousted from bed in the middle of the night)

I LOVE WALTER THE MATCHMAKER!

Links:
Transcript
Sarah Stegall
Can People Walk Through Walls?

Fanfiction: nope. Please leave your recs, self-recs, and newly written post-eps in the comments.

Comments

[laurus_nobilis]

I really like Walter in this one. Well, I like him in most episodes, true - but this is one of the first times we get to see just how much he's forgotten, even if we don't quite know why for now.

And then there's Peter, who "doesn't remember" being sick as a child...

[wendelah1]

And let's not forget Olivia's just a little too convenient for the writer to be believable memory lapses about her history with Walter, with Peter, with crossing over...

The flaw in the myth-arc of this show is that it hinges on people forgetting stuff until the writer needs them to remember.

[estella_c]

I don't think of it as a flaw, but as a theme. The primary characters have all endured great trauma (except for Astrid). People are amazingly able to forget painful confusion. My husband can hardly remember his childhood.

I found Oliva and Peter's barroom scene charming. I love that Olivia--corn-fed, polite, soft-spoken--drinks whiskey doubles and does card tricks. You can see the two of them bonding here, though O is still tormented by Peter's braintracks. Maybe this little outing is a temporary escape from her burden of worries.

That poor lawyer.

I thought I recognized the interior in the Philadelphia establishing shots, but was wrong. I'm guessing the monster Fidelity Bank Building on Broad Street. It's been used so often.

[wendelah1]

And my husband remembers his traumatic childhood all too well.

I think repressed childhood memories are less common and the theory is more controversial than television writers in particular would lead us to believe. If you want to see it as a theme, I have no problem with that. I'm going on my third time through this series and for me, this theme is less compelling and much less believable every time I watch it.

[estella_c]

I would not wish to bore you with an outmoded theory. That my husband was virtually seduced by his mother gives it a vitality to me.

Glad you have no problem with the notion. Think I'll keep it in the act.

[wendelah1]

You're not boring me. You didn't write the series. I still love the characters; it's the scripts that I'm finding rather tiresome this time around. Even the first time through when I binge-watched seasons one and two in two weeks, I was not in love with season one.

[estella_c]

Actually, most people seem unimpressed with season one. It's a wonder there was a season two. I've loved F since the beginning, but I suspect that's because I always focus on relationships, personalities, and oddities rather than the raveling and unraveling of plot. It is confusing and sometimes tedious. I remember thinking there were a LOT of X-Files borrowings, but have decided to be amused by that.

[casually_cruel]

Really? I didn't realize season one was unpopular. I've got a lot of love for seasons one and two. I would have been pleased if the show had just continued on as a case-of-the-week type show. Not to say I didn't enjoy the direction they did take it.

Then again I've only recently started watching the X-Files and hadn't seen any episodes when I first watched Fringe. I guess I can see why it would seem old hat to those who had.

[wendelah1]

Really? I didn't realize season one was unpopular. I've got a lot of love for seasons one and two. I would have been pleased if the show had just continued on as a case-of-the-week type show.

I think this show initially drew viewers from the Lost audience, which I quit watching after three episodes. Other than having a complicated, hard-to-unravel mythology, it doesn't have much in common with that show.

I came to Fringe late, after I binge-watched seasons one and two in about two weeks in order to be up to speed for season three when it aired live. And I only began watching the show because a trusted friend said I'd like it. The guy who's the driving force behind Fringe had a habit of taking his shows completely off the rails by the third season so I was pretty leery. But I think this show really came into its own once it introduced the concept of the alternative universe, with all of the implications.

Then again I've only recently started watching the X-Files and hadn't seen any episodes when I first watched Fringe. I guess I can see why it would seem old hat to those who had.

The Fringe writers were very obvious about drawing from The X-Files MOWs at the beginning, and were having fun doing so. The X-Files body-swap episode can be glimpsed playing on someone's TV screen during a season one episode. Like estella_c, I decided to be amused.

The Fringe formula of MOW+Mad Scientist-who-used-to-work-for-Massive Dynamic, and tying everything back to Walter's work--that is getting repetitive--for me. But I'll try not to ruin everyone's fun.

[seekingferret]

Withholding comment until we talk 1x11, because I see the two as a single story, really.

[wendelah1]

Fair enough. I think of them that way, too.

[casually_cruel]

Some quick comments before the hiatus ends and we move on to the next episode:

Olivia's nickname was Han Solo, which I find amusing since she kind of Han Solo's Peter in the previous episode ("If you need me, I'm here." "I know.") ha.

I think the scene in the bar was the first time I thought "Gee, what a nice platonic relationship showing that men and women can work together closely and not be romantically involved. We get that so rarely." I remember vaguely hoping in the back of my mind that it would stay this way, but realizing on some level that it was pretty unlikely.

[wendelah1]

Olivia's nickname was Han Solo, which I find amusing since she kind of Han Solo's Peter in the previous episode ("If you need me, I'm here." "I know.") ha.

I didn't see the allusion but I see it now.

I think the scene in the bar was the first time I thought "Gee, what a nice platonic relationship showing that men and women can work together closely and not be romantically involved. We get that so rarely." I remember vaguely hoping in the back of my mind that it would stay this way, but realizing on some level that it was pretty unlikely.

I agree. That was one of the things I liked best about The X-Files--that it took them seven seasons to (maybe) get the leads together (I didn't ship Mulder and Scully or Peter and Olivia). But yeah, considering that Fringe begins with Agent Dunham in bed with her partner Agent Scott, I think keeping Peter/Olivia platonic was never part of their plan.

[corwinofamber]

The Walter/Peter and Olivia/Peter interaction in this one was superb. The science was there to serve the story, once again, although they do a better job at it than most shows by including believable consequences - radioactivity.

Olivia's photographic memory gets mentioned and becomes a part of the plot again.

Walter basically told Peter the entire backstory of the show, although he left something important out.

Dropped plotline: Broyles and Sharp conflict over Olivia. I always wanted to know what that was about, dropped after the first season.

I think season 1 is only poor in comparison to seasons 2 and 3. It had to follow the format of a procedural until it got on it's own feet, and honestly, it's better than most.

[wendelah1]

The science was there to serve the story, once again, although they do a better job at it than most shows by including believable consequences - radioactivity.

But remember, On Fringe, Radioactivity is Real but Cures are Junk Science. Their junk science is the best.

Olivia's photographic memory gets mentioned and becomes a part of the plot again.

Ha ha, that's right.

Walter basically told Peter the entire backstory of the show, although he left something important out.

You lost me here.

Dropped plotline: Broyles and Sharp conflict over Olivia. I always wanted to know what that was about, dropped after the first season.

I wish they hadn't dropped it, too. My idea is that they both want her working for them, so there's a rivalry there. We find out later that Sharp knows more than she's telling--about what was done to Olivia, about what happened to Peter and what Walter really did, about how she lost her arm, about Bell, about the Other Side. And isn't it implied that Sharp and Broyles are lovers?

I need a Nina Sharp icon.