This week we’re back in the “red universe”, dubbed by Fringe fans due to the color of the opening title sequence. The red universe is the alternate universe that Olivia is stuck in believing she is Fauxlivia after being injected with her memories. It looks for sure now that episodes will alternate between what is happening in the blue universe (our original) and the red universe, a concept which I am liking so far. Here’s my brief recap and review of Fringe’s episode 3.03 “The Plateau”.

We learn through Walternate the reason why they are jumping through loops to have Olivia believe she is Fauxlivia. Walternate somehow knows Olivia has the ability to travel between universes unharmed and wants to run tests on her to acquire this ability. To do this, Olivia must be willing to submit and she will only do so if she believes she is part of the team. Of course, things would not be interesting unless Olivia was seeing things no one else can. In previous seasons Olivia saw her old flame John Scott on occasion, helping her with cases. In this case Olivia is seeing projections of original Olivia’s memories, most notably Peter.

Seeing Peter is not the only thing going wrong with the memory injections. While investigating the crimes of this episodes freak of the week we see that injections didn’t pass through knowledge of red universes protocols, meaning Olivia doesn’t know how to do certain things but plays it off like she has just forgotten. This problem actually saves her life as she chases the bad guy. Peter shows up again at the end and tells her she only lived because she isn’t from this universe, and all the Peter/Olivia relationship fans get to see them kiss. Even though the kiss was just in her head, I’d imagine it somewhat satiates the appetite of fans waiting patiently for Olivia’s return home (blue universe).

This was a great episode not only because we got to dig deeper into how different the red universe is (I.E. pens and avocado’s are rare, and oxygen levels are unstable in some areas and require Fringe members to carry around a little oxygen gizmo) but we also get to see Olivia’s brain struggle to accept her implanted memories. We also get a hint that Olivia will once again enter the sensory deprivation chamber when she submits to Walternates experiments. I would definitely bet that once she enters again, we will see original Olivia’s memories go head to head against her implanted ones. It should make for great TV!

Verdict: Episode 3.03 “The Plateau” gets an A- in my book.

Fringe is back ladies and gentlegeeks!

Last week in “Olivia”, we got to see our Olivia being held at a facility and being injected with memories of alternate Olivia, which fans have dubbed “Bolivia.” Walternate’s motives for trying to have Olivia believe she is Bolivia are yet to be known although I’ll guess that it may have something to do with Olivia’s abilities.

Olivia, being her usual self, escapes and befriends a taxi driver who she tells her story to. After some time the taxi driver comes around and ends up believing her and dropping her off at her moms house in hopes that she finds the answers she’s looking for. Remember folks, our Olivia’s mom died when she was 14, so the meeting between them sparked a great emotional response. Sadly, the adrenaline from Olivia’s escape ends up triggering the memory injections to work and our Olivia ends up beginning to believe she is Bolivia. Hope comes in the form of the noble taxi driver following Charlie’s car as he drives off with Olivia.

Olivia interacting with Charlie again was great to see, Olivia interacting with this whole new alternate team in general will be interesting to see. Fringe division in this universe seems to be highly militarized as opposed to our universe where the division is just composed of Peter, Walter, Astrid, Olivia and Broyles. It was sad to watch Olivia lose her identity, but I can’t imagine the storyline getting interesting if it was just her running from Fringe division until she finds a way out. Good premiere, but can’t wait to dig deeper.

This week in “The Box”, we’re taken back to our universe with Peter, Walter and Broyles struggling to decipher what the Peter-manned “doomsday device” will do if successfully built. Peter and Walter also have unresolved tension from the end of last season when Peter discovered that Walter stole him from the alternate universe as a boy.

Bolivia is in our universe now and is working with Jerome Newton, who led the alternate universes secret initiative in our universe last season. William Bell is pronounced dead and leaves special items to both Nina Sharp and Walter. Peter shares some special moments with Bolivia who he still believes is his Olivia. Bolivia joins Walter and Peter in one of their “freak of the week” storylines that has them looking for a “box” that kills anyone around it by using ultra super sonic sound waves (it makes a “little person” explode!).

The Box ends up being a missing piece of the unbuilt “doomsday device” revealing that pieces of the machine are in our universe, which may explain why the alternate universe is infiltrating it. Walters inheritance from William Bell ends up being the primary stock of Massive Dynamic, so yes, Walter Bishop now owns Massive Dynamic.

We actually see Bolivia kill a helpless person in this episode which is a big deal. The writers are setting the tone and telling us that Bolivia is definitely the bad guy, she won’t show the mercy or compassion our Olivia would. Watching Peter and Bolivia spend quality time together is sort of bittersweet for fans hoping for a relationship between Peter and Olivia, because we’ve never really seen them get as close to each other as they do in this episode. The Box being a part of the Peters machine and Walter inheriting Massive Dynamic were both pretty predictable plot points, but I still thoroughly enjoyed this episode because I can see the plot shaping and taking interesting turns.

The verdict:
3.01 “Olivia”: B-
3.02 “The Box”: B+

Next week it looks like we’ll go back to the alternate universe to see the effects of the memory injections on our Olivia, can’t wait! Here’s the promo and a sneak peek.