Fringe: The Cure

Okay, fans.  I accept full blame for jinxing Fringe.  A few good episodes, and I got excited.  Who knew how bad it could get?  Repetitive story elements, weak dialogue, stereotypical plot developments … Therefore, I shall recap for you and save you the trouble of watching.  Because I have your back like that, America.

And so: One quiet evening in Milford, Massachusetts, a white van stops in a peaceful neighborhood.  Two Hazmat-suited people throw a woman out the back doors and onto the street, then drive away.  Meet poor Emily.  Emily stumbles along until she enters Holly’s Diner.  Diner scenes always remind me of Angel.  Dazed, Emily walks past a few other patrons, and sits absently at the counter.  Waiter Ben notices bruises on her wrists.  He offers her some “wicked good” soup, and calls for Marty.  Over soup and crackers, he bores us all with a story about how much he liked crackers as a kid. This guy gets character development?  Marty the Cop arrives and questions Emily.  She remembers she’s from Boston, but not much more.  Except that “they” did things.  The music builds tension, and this being Fringe and I’m eating dinner, naturally, something disgusting is about to happen.  She starts to cry and prattle on about medicines, and Marty decides to bring her in.  As she resists, he calls in a 51-50 on his walkie, and Ben, trying to sneak out, gets all bloodshot in the eyes, curls up and collapses.  The other patrons cry out and throw themselves around in pain and terror, and look so ridiculous that if William Shatner walked in, the Enterprise would be under attack.  Emily backs up and away to the exit.  Suddenly, her head explodes all over the glass door.  Gross!  And awesome.  And gross.

The next morning the gang meets outside the diner, where Olivia snaps at Doc for humming, nicely establishing that Olivia’s cranky today.  Broyles explains that Emily was reported missing three months ago.  The victims were exposed to heavy doses of radiation, which may have come from Emily, who had three times the amount.

Doc, Peter, and Olivia enter in Hazmat suits to examine the scene.  At Emily’s headless corpse, Doc diagnoses her as having had the fatal Bellini’s lymphocemia, which appears to be in remission.  The disease is fictitious, which makes Doc’s surface exam a little more plausible on the Completely Implausible Scale.  Doc wants Emily and Marty brought back to his lab, excess radiation notwithstanding.

Olivia visits Dr. Patel, Emily’s rheumatologist.  He seems shocked at her death, and says he can’t medically explain her remission, and didn’t specifically use radiation therapy to treat her.  He offers up all of Emily’s medical records.

Doc’s lab.  Doc points out the ligature marks and injection points on Emily’s body, which suggests she’d been bound and drugged.  Most likely, Emily was released in order to conduct field tests of whatever kind of radioactive weapon “they” had turned her into.

In Acton, Massachusetts, Claire Williams, another Bellini’s sufferer, has disappeared.  Olivia and Agent Francis backstory outside of Claire’s house.  He understands that Olivia might take this particular case hard today of all days, and finishes by wishing her a Happy Birthday.  Stoically, Olivia claims to be all right.   Inside, they show Ken Williams a picture of Emily.  He says he doesn’t know her, but Olivia’s suspicious.  He explains how the disease devastated his wife, Claire, and their marriage.  About six weeks ago, Claire unexpectedly went into remission.

Cut to a lab and Claire strapped to a bed, surrounded by medical equipment.  She says she’s tired of seeing incapacitated victims, surgeries, and warehouses on this show, week after week.  No, she doesn’t.  In another white room, a Man in a Suit watches computer screens of Claire.  A woman approaches, removes her gas mask and hard hat, then shakes her hair out like they do in Pantene commercials.  WTF?  Pantene tells the Suit that Claire is an even better candidate than Emily.  During the commercial, I go wash my hair into silky smoothness.

Doc’s Lab.  Doc experiments unmercifully on a papaya, “the friendliest of fruits,” until it explodes, demonstrating that the people in the diner were microwaved.  Emily had radioactive isotopes in her blood, which time-released to cure her disease.  However, when another substance was injected into her bloodstream, all of the isotopes collapsed at once.  This sent out a colossal microwave blast from her head, and … “kaboom.”

A visit to Emily’s parents’ home reveals that Olivia’s in such a foul mood today, she doesn’t care about crashing wakes; Peter thinks the case might be Pattern-related (the entire audience collectively says, “Duh”) and Ken Williams lied: Claire and Emily were friends.  Olivia later forces Ken to explain that he lied to protect all of the Bellini victims, who, like Emily and Claire, eventually started treating themselves.  Dr. Patel (aha!) has the full list of patients.

Olivia confronts Dr. Patel.  He mentions the drug company, Intrepus, and warns Olivia to walk away, that she doesn’t know who she’s dealing with or what they’re capable of.  Are you kidding me, writers?  Olivia demands a name; Patel frantically searches a filing cabinet.  We see his face, just before he puts a gun beneath his chin and kaboom!  Wait, I’m wrong.  He points the gun at Olivia, who’s smarter than I am, because she’s expecting it and points her gun back at him.  He gives her the name David Esterbrook.  Then he puts the gun beneath his chin and kaboom!  I guess I’m smarter than Olivia, after all.

Back at the Federal Building, Olivia sorts her mail.  Agent “How Can I Help the Plot Along?” Francis provides background on Intrepus and Esterbrook, who’s our Man in a Suit.  Esterbrook heads up Intrepus’ pharmaceutical research division and projects on viral warfare, human-animal hybridization, etc.  Olivia heads down to Manhattan (represent!) and has a pointless exchange with Esterbrook that makes me, for once, wish Exposition were around to explain why this scene exists.  It ends with a veiled threat from Esterbrook.

Harvard.  Angry Broyles approaches Olivia and reprimands her for publicly confronting Esterbrook.  He calls her overemotional and therefore untrustworthy, and orders her to run everything by him going forward.

Claire.  A technician drops a hairless rat into the room, and it climbs onto the bed and under the sheets, until she freaks out and the rat’s head explodes.  Outside, a pleased Esterbrook says they’re shipping Claire to the client in the morning.

At Harvard, Olivia can’t find anything against Esterbrook, and doesn’t appreciate Peter’s attempt at unicorn humor.  You know who else hates unicorns?  Mark Wahlberg.  Peter’s had enough of the ‘tude, and gets Olivia to talk about her alcoholic, abusive stepfather.  When Olivia was nine, he brutally beat her mother, so Olivia found his gun and shot him.  He survived, recovered, and disappeared.  Now, he sends Olivia a card every year on her birthday to remind her he’s still out there.  Ah.  Well, that definitely explains the ‘tude.  Peter suggests counseling (not really) and that she try Nina Sharp for help.  Huh?  Corporate espionage should reveal something about Massive Dynamic‘s rival, Intrepus.  Olivia doesn’t want to go there, so Peter quietly takes it upon himself.

At the Chariot Equestrian Center, Peter finds Nina Sharp.  She mentions that she knew Doc years ago, and offers Peter a bargain: the exact location of Esterbrook’s lab, in exchange for an unnamed favor in the future, no questions asked.  Oh God.  This development is right up there with “Walk away!  You don’t know what they’re capable of!”  Sigh, writers.

Harvard.  Doc discovers the cure for Esterbrook’s victims, and prepares a syringe.  Okay.  Peter gives Claire’s location to Olivia, and lies ridiculously about how he came by it.  Olivia believes him, and calls in a strike team.

The FBI storms the location.  Olivia finds Claire locked in her room (now conveniently unstrapped from her bed) and slips the syringe through a compartment in the door.  She talks a panicked, bleeding Claire into picking it up and stabbing herself in the jugular.  Doc’s cure works.

Later, at the Intrepus offices, Olivia arrests Esterbrook, if only to embarrass him in front of the press and his Board of Directors.  At the FBI building, Olivia checks her mail again, and meets with Broyles.  She understands that he thinks she acted emotionally, “and putting aside that men always say that about women they work with” (ha!), but being emotional makes her a better agent.  If he has a problem with that, he can fire her.  She doesn’t want that, and he doesn’t do it, so we’ll see, I guess.

Nina Sharp listens to the radio broadcast of Esterbrook’s arrest and MD’s rising stocks.  Olivia also hears it, and puts the pieces together.  She visits Peter at the hotel to ask about Nina Sharp’s price.  He refuses to tell her.  They share a warm moment of friendship as they realize how they look out for each other, and isn’t Olivia just all smiles now that the day is over and no card from her father?  Peter watches her go, crushing just a little…

Olivia arrives home to find a card that was slipped under her door.  She opens it.  No signature, just “Thinking of you” printed inside.

I wish this episode was worth such a creepy ending.

Next week: Nothing!  Three weeks until an all new episode, and Peter has conversations with dead people.  It has to be better than this week, right? Right??? Wait, did I just jinx us again?

Season 1, Episode 6: The Cure (originally aired October 21, 2008)

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