FOX's Fringe - Unexpect the Expected

RYAN:

Close your eyes for a second, and think back to the beginning of Lost. Sure, it looked cool, and sure, J.J. Abrams had a built-in Alias fan base, but was there really any hype? Did anyone have a clue of what to expect from such a risky, high concept show?

Of course not. ABC was rolling the dice, in desperate need of a new pair of shoes. Lucky for them, Lost came through big time, cleaning up with viewers and critics alike, taking home the Emmy for best drama, and changing the very landscape of television.

Now, fast-forward four years to Fringe. It’s FOX’s turn at the table, only this time, they’re convinced that J.J.’s dice are loaded, that there’s no way they can lose.

This is exactly what Fringe has going against it.

Nobody expected Lost to be the next big thing, but everyone’s expecting Fringe to be the next Lost. Viewers of Lost were set up for a pleasant surprise – viewers of Fringe, for disappointment.

That said, it’s not nearly as disappointing as it should be. In fact, it’s pretty good. Without all of the billboards and buildup, without the ninety-minute spectacle of a premiere, it might have sneaked up on us, and been one of this year’s pleasant surprises. But there’s nothing surprising about J.J. Abrams these days, not even how good he is, or how much he likes surprising us (or trying to, anyway – the show starts off with an in-flight disaster….sound familiar?)

Regardless, the show itself is decent, and certainly worth watching. It dives into the world of the paranormal with just as much spooky, icky glee as The X-Files, but still manages to root the weird stuff in enough psuedo-science and modern technology to keep you from rolling your eyes. The story has a few nice twists, and leaves the door wide open for die-hard fans to start crafting their own elaborate hypotheses as to who’s good, who’s bad, and what the hell "the pattern" is. It’s fun, which is a lot more than 90% of television programming can say.

But fun isn’t everything. The characters aren’t nearly as captivating as they could be, certainly not as much so as on Alias, or Lost. Anna Torv, for instance, who plays our heroine, is a little wooden at first (the material is more to blame than her performance.) Thankfully, by the end of the episode, with a couple of twists under her belt, we get the sense that she has enough to work with to take her character to new, more interesting levels. I only wish I could say the same for Joshua Jackson, who has all of the subtlety and nuance of, well, Joshua Jackson.

On the other side of the coin, though, there’s Lance Reddick, who fans of The Wire will be happy to watch in any role, as well as a near perfect turn by John Noble as a brilliant, mumbling, quite likely insane fringe scientist, a character who serves as the show’s much-needed sci-fi anchor.

All in all, Fringe is well-crafted entertainment, a dark, glossy, sci-fi serial that will leave you curious about where the hell it’s headed, which, in science fiction, is way more than half the battle. Try not to hold all of the hype against it, and you’ll enjoy it.

Grade: B

Fringe airs Tuesday nights at 8/7c on FOX, with an encore presentation of the pilot scheduled for this Sunday, September 14th at 8/7c.