59 replies to this topic

[skydog]

From TVGuide.com:

When the Division probes bizarre cases of people turning into ash, the investigation also reveals clues about Broyles' past.

[AimingforYoko]

The Fringe Division takes on a puzzling investigation where victims are inexplicably disintegrating into ash. The shadowy case casts light on Special Agent Phillip Broyles' past and leads the team to the possibility of foreign Fringe Science. Emotions run high as the alarming events stack up and revealing personal details emerge about the leader of the Fringe Division.

That was coldblooded, Broyles. I wonder though, if he knew it wouldn't take. So were they insinuating this was some sort of alien? I hope not.

[cycat]

It appears that an entity hitched a ride back in the cosmonaut, eventually fusing with him, so yeah: alien. I think Broyles thought he was solving the problem, not deferring it.

That ash effect was really well done.

[peridot16]

I thought Broyles was just going to wound the guy, guess he got tired of playing hide and seek. It was sad to see how he lost his wife due to his job.

The random agent at the end was creepy. So was the news that the guy started breathing again.

Walter seemed more agitated than usual tonight, he knows that Peter will find out the truth soon.

[cycat]

The random agent at the end was creepy.

YEAH he was! And he's played creepy before, although I don't know where I know him from. But wherever it was, he was creepy.

ETA: "Thirteen Ghosts"! He was the creepy lawyer. Phew! That would have kept me awake tonight.

Edited by cycat, Nov 5, 2009 @ 10:29 PM.

[GreenPhoenix]

Was the random agent at the end played by the same guy who portrayed Martouf during the early seasons of Stargate SG1?

I saw a special on spontaneous combustion when I was a kid and it freaked me out. I've gotten over it since then and I know this was different, with Walter making a point of distinguishing the two, but I still found the ash scenes a bit unsettling.

Edited by GreenPhoenix, Nov 5, 2009 @ 10:26 PM.

[Mars in Gemini]

OMG, I have missed this show. Broyles! That adorable little kid! Walter and Peter's warped yet somehow heart-warming holiday memories. Astrid, as unflappable as ever. Olivia, as composed as ever. Alas, no Gene this week. But David Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes" playing in the scene right before the opening credits...oh, wait. That was only in my head, lol.

Even in bits and pieces Broyles' back story continues to fascinate. More, please!

This one reminded me just a little bit of The X-Files episode, "Soft Light." But more ominous.

Mrs. Dancik--seeing those flowers from Randy should have sent you scurrying out of that penthouse, pdq! Flowers are always a bad omen!

Anybody else thinking "Brundlefly" when they were discussing the victim and the organism? Well, it was worth a shot.

Visitors, just say no to licorice in Walter's lab. Don't succumb to thirst, either.

I'm kind of hoping everybody gets trapped in Walter's lab at least overnight during the holidays. Cliche, maybe, but the dynamics here are like no others.

[skydog]

I got lucky I saw this episode at all - I was just flipping through the channels, and just by chance I happened to see the last few minutes of Bones, and saw the preview for the "new" Fringe. WOOHOOOO.
Of course there was nothing listed, at all, on my DVR/Cable listings thanks to....MLB! [shakes fist at MLB]

The episode was VERY low key, as if TPTB were expecting no one to tune in, thanks to....MLB.
It was nice to have a Broyles-centric episode, finally, but I feel that plot-wise, this was not the strongest show this season.
The acting was stellar (as it has been all season), but the episode felt "disconnected" from the rest of S. 2, as if it was intended to be a filler episode. Didn't hate it (I'm at the point where I love this show so much, I can't hate it. It's consistently a notch above most TV fare airing this fall, SciFi or non) but it was just so-so, IMO. I miss the Alt!Verse stuff, I guess.

Cute touch with the kid parroting Broyles in the restaurant, and loved the awesome FX of the portrayal of the "ash-people" - very cool and uber-creepy.


Edited in order to delete the duplicate-thread stuff which formerly appeared at the beginning of this post.

Edited by skydog, Nov 6, 2009 @ 6:10 PM.

[Coco27]

What have they done to this show :(
This was so boring.

[Canadadreamgirl]

It was nice to have a Broyles-centric episode, finally, but I feel that plot-wise, this was not the strongest show this season.
The acting was stellar (as it has been all season), but the episode felt "disconnected" from the rest of S. 2, as if it was intended to be a filler episode. Didn't hate it (I'm at the point where I love this show so much, I can't hate it. It's consistently a notch above most TV fare airing this fall, SciFi or non) but it was just so-so, IMO. I miss the Alt!Verse stuff, I guess.

Cute touch with the kid parroting Broyles in the restaurant, and loved the awesome FX of the portrayal of the "ash-people" - very cool and uber-creepy

Was it worth waiting for? Yes, it was, I agree, skydog, it's better than most things on tv. But not a key episode. I like how you put it, skydog! It felt odd, and I couldn't tell if it was just the music, or the melancholy pervading it, or that Broyles still didn't look at all happy or excited, though when he smiled at the kid I made a surprised noise and my husband laughed. I think I said something like "He smiled! Broyles actually smiled!!" I really missed the closeness the characters were showing in previous episodes, and there was almost no humour or banter. And, this was the first episode I think where Peter doesn't ask Olivia, "you okay?". So either she is ok, or the writers forgot. She was really low-key and it was odd to see her let Broyles take charge, although she had to - he is her boss after all.

I did like it, and the ashes were creepy and cool, and I'm so glad the little girl at the end lived! I think I had my hands on my face, holding my breath with those horrible open closet doors and that darkness. Very good effects in this episode.

I'm kind of hoping everybody gets trapped in Walter's lab at least overnight during the holidays.

That's great! Me too! Oh that would be a awesome episode!!

We did get to see Walter and Peter play with tinker toy, that was cute too. And I got that Walter was tense too. I think we all are, waiting for that click to go off in Peter's mind....

And I felt sorry for the brother, trying to save the cosmonaut. It was an interesting episode, even if not exciting.

[supposebly]

I can't believe they ripped off one of the worst and most boring X-files episodes ever, Space. For shame.

The only thing that gripped me apart from the dusty effects which were really frightening (that poor wife!) was the brother trying to keep this thing in Alex. How horrible. How many years has that been?

I did not care about Broyles taking.it.personal. Possibly because I can't imagine him having feelings. I still find him very scary and I'm surprised he had a wife. I'm actually convinced he will turn out to be a robot, more of the cylon than of the terminator persuasion.

Right, the Russians were just waiting around the corner with a lead casket with Russian lettering on them to take the cosmonaut away.

I wish the writers would open a basic high school chemistry textbook once in a while.

[Hughes]

I love this show!

I was horrified, spooked and freaked all at the same time. The special effects were really well done, and the cinematography was just sensational. That 24 guy can direct another episode any time he wants.

Was it just me or was Walter even more jittery this episode than most? He seemed so much like pilot Walter where you expected most of what he said was going to so removed from what they were dealing with you couldn't help but laugh.

The writers can center an episode around Broyles as often as they like. I wouldn't mind a bit. ;-) Lance plays the character with such stoicisim that it's like a break in the clouds when he smiles (at the little boy in the restaurant mimicking his movements) and the softness in his features when he went to tell his ex that he closed the case that ended their marriage.

Olivia as the emotional buffer during an episode is always a treat. I love how the writers continue to play on the vulnerable place her characer is at this season. Her comment to Broyles about who would protect him if they go off menu by continuing their investigation. It was like she realized for the first time how much she'd come to depend on his protection of her. Touching moment.

Good episode.

Edited by Hughes, Nov 6, 2009 @ 12:51 AM.

[MTBradley]

What was the cause of the gap in deaths between Timor calling Broyles and then dropping out of contact and the deaths in this episode? Was it that Timor had figured out how to use electricity to control the shadow, a treatment that suddenly ceased to work?

It disappoints me that the show couldn’t give Reddick and Broyles what they deserved here. The “but by that time I only cared about protecting us” bit just wasn’t very well-written. And are we supposed to be surprised that Broyles’ intensity would drive away a spouse?

The last scene was pretty cool, though.

[LaraAriadne]

The random agent at the end was creepy. So was the news that the guy started breathing again.

I was too busy waiting for the agent to be hit by a passing car to be creeped out. Didn't his momma teach him not to stand in the middle of the street? However, the reveal that the cosmonaut was still alive was freaky.

I liked the darkness of the episode. I keep thinking about everything Timor did for his brother, out of misguided love and the hope he'd get better. The scene where Timor was shocking his brother, then praying that he'd start breathing again, I thought to myself that for his brother to survive that, there must be some fight left in him. Certainly Timor believed that. But the truth is, his brother died a long time ago, and the whole time, it was the creature keeping the body alive, not some piece of Alex still in there. The way the creature killed Timor so easily is only more proof of that.

[WhiplashChick]

The scene where Olivia and Broyles were sitting and waiting in the hospital was great. He was his usual stoic motionless self and she was fidgety and uncomfortable and anxious to say something to him. Before they even said anything, it told so much about these characters. It's the quiet, character moments like that puts this show on such a high level for me.

[pyralis]

I really hope that the casting of J R Bourne in an episode where an alien takes over someone's body was intentional, b/c it made me laugh and I needed that after the creepy ash effects.

[Mercyme84]

So, where was the Observer? I usually miss him the first time thru and forgot to DVR this episode.

Edited by Mercyme84, Nov 6, 2009 @ 10:14 AM.

[DEM]

The Observer was in the airport behind Broyles when Broyles was on the phone with Dunham.

Did anyone else notice in the park-bench scene the guy with the black baseball cap who walked by Broyles and the Senator twice? At first I thought he was some new-fangled type of Observer, then I thought maybe he was the cosmonaut icognito.

[pretorian]

It was nice to have a Broyles-centric episode, finally, but I feel that plot-wise, this was not the strongest show this season.
The acting was stellar (as it has been all season), but the episode felt "disconnected" from the rest of S. 2, as if it was intended to be a filler episode. Didn't hate it (I'm at the point where I love this show so much, I can't hate it. It's consistently a notch above most TV fare airing this fall, SciFi or non) but it was just so-so, IMO. I miss the Alt!Verse stuff, I guess.

I thought it set up Broyles as a "Company Man" who married the job rather than his family, with glimpses of the man he could've been on the scene where he was playing with that kid at a radom restaurant only to dissapear before he could say goodbye, like he must have done to his own family, right before he hang up the phone.

The contrast with the particular family moments at Fringe division as Walter solves the equation while Peter and Astrid look him in awe or when he collects the ahes as he remembers embarrasing moments of Peter's childhood only make Broyles look a lot lonelier.

Edited by pretorian, Nov 6, 2009 @ 10:56 AM.

[ReadIshmael]

I really liked this. The ash effect very cool and creepy, as was the walking shadow, and the ways they revealed how each person had (or hadn't, thank God, in the case of the little girl) been dusted were really clever. And it was nice to get a little more of Broyles, for a change (I feel like, besides his testimony before Congress, he's really been even further in the background than normal so far this season), I enjoyed Walter working on the formula with Astrid and Peter looking on, amused, and although they kept Peter pretty low-key he still had a lot of very little moments that expressed his affection for Walter and Olivia. A very good episode for me.

[Hughes]

I enjoyed Walter working on the formula with Astrid and Peter looking on, amused...

I think I was mimicking the same goofy smile that Peter had on his face during that scene. And I loved how Astrid just kind of moved out of Walter's way a little unsure what to do with herself just to look over at Peter like, 'I should probably just stand over here with you, huh?' ;-)


ETA:

I thought it set up Broyles as a "Company Man" who married the job rather than his family, with glimpses of the man he could've been on the scene where he was playing with that kid at a radom restaurant only to dissapear before he could say goodbye, like he must have done to his own family, right before he hang up the phone.

Nice point. I also thought the reminders that the Fringe division isn't new; nor the fact that it's come under heavy scrutiny, threat and fallen out of favor with the government before. The CIA agent showing up at the end with the not so benign threat just reinforced that Broyles hand in keeping this division alive has come with a steep, personal price, yet it's never truly secure.

Edited by Hughes, Nov 6, 2009 @ 2:01 PM.

[pretorian]

Is a nice contrast between Broyles and Bishop, as the first one alienates the only family he has left (his colleagues), Walter involves his family in his own work.

[Hughes]

Ah, yes, the tinker toy chemistry compound scene. Cute. What made it even better, Peter didn't object, he just went to work with Walter doing what was asked of him.

[Aloha Girl]

Oh my God you guys, I actually did a happy dance when I realized that Fringe was back on!!! I think I actually said something along the lines of "Thanks for playing, Flashforward!!!And now Buh-Bye"

I actually find myself agreeing with just about anyone who has posted so far.

Yes, it was an understated episode that did not tie in to the overall mythology of the show (or did it??? For some reason, I just think that creepy CIA agent at the end of the show is going to return in some form or another - and am I the only one who thought he was oddly reminiscent of Cancer-stick Dude from the XFiles?);

and yes, it was oddly melancholic and full of despair; maybe a prelude to what it is going to feel like when Peter finally remembers???

and yes, Broyles is one odd, odd man;

and yes, yes, yes, Peter's look of complete and utter love for his father as Walter plugs away at the formula is completely, intensely and overwhelmingly heart-wrenching because you just know that when the house of cards comes down, it's going to come down that much harder because of it, not in spite of it.

As the episode ended, I found myself thinking that it was not that great of an episode; and then, I found myself wanting to rewatch it this morning, to the point it became a distracting thought at work. So what does that tell you??? It tells you that this. is.a.truly.awesome.show.

oh, and am I so late on the train or did you all totally notice, like, a million years ago, that the handprint that signals commercial break has 6 fingers???...oh, okay, then. I really am slow on the uptake, now, am I???


Edited to add: And I COMPLETELY freaked out during next week's preview with Peter trying to apparently resist mind-fucking-control and not shooting at...Olivia? His dad? Oh-Hell-to-the-No!Don't you dare go there Show! don't you!!!

Edited by Aloha Girl, Nov 6, 2009 @ 3:19 PM.

[Hughes]

And I COMPLETELY freaked out during next week's preview with Peter trying to apparently resist mind-fucking-control and not shooting at...Olivia? His dad? Oh-Hell-to-the-No!Don't you dare go there Show! don't you!!!

Yes show, dare! Do it. Do it. Do it! ;-)

And you're right. There is this impending dread looming over all these episodes regarding the Peter reveal. On one hand, I can't wait to see the fall out from that. On the other, I just know it's going to break my heart in pieces, because it's not only going to adversely affect Peter and Walter's relationship, it's going to infringe on the entire group.

[avenger314]

To me, the scariest part was Agent Broyles smiling.

The ash effect was very well done. Even if the premise was a ripoff of 'The Astronaut's Wife.'

This very much seemed like a standalone episode. They did that 'previously on' that introduced the characters, didn't mention William Bell, and introduced the Pattern idea without going into too much detail. I'm sure we'll be back to the overarching continuity next week.

"Don't touch the touch!" (At least, that's what I think Walter spurted out when Astrid turned off the recordplayer).

[Canadadreamgirl]

The scene where Olivia and Broyles were sitting and waiting in the hospital was great. He was his usual stoic motionless self and she was fidgety and uncomfortable and anxious to say something to him. Before they even said anything, it told so much about these characters. It's the quiet, character moments like that puts this show on such a high level for me.

Nicely put!

How much do I love this show? At 6:20 am I was sitting on the bus on the way to work, the sun still not up, and reading a book, and suddenly I started thinking about Walter, and Broyles. And I watched it twice last night! Mostly to get the little moments, like ReadIshmael says:

although they kept Peter pretty low-key he still had a lot of very little moments that expressed his affection for Walter and Olivia. A very good episode for me

that one look he gives Olivia was hot when he comes into the scene of the guy's apartment! But mostly, I was thinking over the feeling of the episode, and what I forgot to put last night, like the cinematography which was amazing at times. I liked the moodiness, and I caught that Broyles lost his family, but I like your point, pretorian:

Is a nice contrast between Broyles and Bishop, as the first one alienates the only family he has left (his colleagues), Walter involves his family in his own work.

. Then Hughes nicely finished that off with the dread that I know I certainly walk around half-thinking about most of the time:

There is this impending dread looming over all these episodes regarding the Peter reveal. On one hand, I can't wait to see the fall out from that. On the other, I just know it's going to break my heart in pieces, because it's not only going to adversely affect Peter and Walter's relationship, it's going to infringe on the entire group.

And I COMPLETELY freaked out during next week's preview with Peter trying to apparently resist mind-fucking-control and not shooting at...Olivia? His dad? Oh-Hell-to-the-No!Don't you dare go there Show! don't you!!!

WHAT?? My stupid channel in Canada didn't show this! OMG I have to see this preview! what do you mean Peter is pointing a gun at Olivia or Walter????

and I really like Broyle's smile, and I really really liked his ex-wife. I hope we get to meet his kids one day. It's nice to know he once had a family. I wonder if Olivia picked up on that she is in danger of being like him, having nothing but the job, if she isn't careful? I agree, she showed sensitivity this episode, although I loved her face when she came in while the opera was playing. I loved Walter going from blackboard to blackboard and Peter and Astrid just watching and helping if they could, too. there are plenty of quiet moments in this episode. I just know that Tomas' love for his brother and what he did to try to save him is going to haunt me for a while too. I think this is going to be an episode that grows on people, it certainly is on me.

[pretorian]

To me, the scariest part was Agent Broyles smiling.

I can't argue with that, for a good guy he could be very creepy.

[Patty G]

Had to watch it on Hulu because my DVR didn't record it. It wasn't on the listing either.

I didn't like this episode much, but I don't know how much of it is having to watch it on the computer. There are some nice moments, esp. the part with more character moments on Broyles, and the dust effect was great.

[never enoughjam]

The ash effect was very well done. Even if the premise was a ripoff of 'The Astronaut's Wife.'

I'm never sure whether to call something like this a "ripoff" or not. Sure, the idea had been done before, all the way back to the first season of The X-Files and beyond. I don't have a problem with that. I liked the story the first time I saw it, and seeing it again with a new twist was fun. It's like a love story--you've seen a love story before, you'll see one again, and all you really can ask for is probably just a new way to tell the same story again. It's not like there's all that many new stories out there.

So I really liked this episode. The ash effect was very well done, but what I liked even better was the shadows, the flickering lights that went on and off by themselves, and the zoom in on the dark closet in the little girl's room. Any of those moments were just as frightening as seeing someone half-dissolve into a soft pile of ash, or watching a shadow walk down a corridor.

ETA: For those keeping score with The X-Files, next week's ep looks like a remake of "Pusher", one of the best.

Edited by never enoughjam, Nov 6, 2009 @ 5:22 PM.