Quick Take: Fringe, "Bloodline"
"I didn't give any thought at all to being a mom" - Fauxlivia
Review: Fringe, "Bloodline"
(S0318) In the Redniverse, Fauxlivia has told her mom and a few others that she's pregnant, and has started to see a doctor. Her sister died in childbirth because of a sickness called Virally Propogated Eclampsia, and there's an 80% chance that she has it too, which means she wouldn't be able to survive labor, and most likely the baby would die too. While she's waiting on her results, she gets tased in her home and wakes up strapped to a hospital bed in a secret lab. There's lots of scenes of her trying to figure out what's going on, and it comes down to a conspiracy: these doctors and nurses are accelerating her pregnancy for most likely nefarious means.
Meanwhile, Lincoln is not taking her missing well. He and Scarlie follow a lead Astrid came up and find Henry and his cab. He knows way too much about what's going on, and he points out that he saw Olivia once since she came back, which he didn't expect her to do, and she acted like she'd never seen him. Scarlie and Lincoln put two and two together and realize that they aren't being told everything. Lincoln goes to Walternate and gets the truth, as well as access to all Olivia's / Fauxlivia's files, since they're pretty sure her kidnapping and her pregnancy are connected, but they can't figure out why. But now the boys are suspiscious.
Once she's full term and almost ready for inducement, Fauxlivia manages to take a nurse hostage and get out, but the stress or the drugs put her into labor. She calls Lincoln, and Henry uses his cabbie skillz to get them there before the medics, but that means they have to deliver the baby. Lincoln tells her about her positive test results, and she makes him promise to take care of the baby. She's sure she's going to die. He is too, and he confesses that he loves her (though she was pretty whacked out from the pain and may not have heard him). Henry delivers the three month old baby, and she survives--the acceleration got the baby to full term before the virus could reach deadly levels.
Walternate goes to see her and we find out that Brandon was behind the whole thing, and it was all on Walternate's orders to get the baby born safely. Dun-dun-DUN!
Ever since we started getting alternate-reality episodes, they've been good. This one was very good. Tense, well-paced, full of emotion, a good mystery that wasn't at all drawn out like it could have been (it could have been stretched over the rest of the season or all of nect season, but it wasn't at all). They used the higher tech of the Other Side to move the plot along: if we'd had to wait for a natural pregnancy, we'd be stuck on that storyline for months, but this way, there was the feel of real drama and trauma, and we don't have to wait at all! There's three weeks until the next episode, but then there's only four left until the season finale.
No time to wait on a baby.
Now there's this little defenseless person that Fauxlivia can get all mamma-bear about and that Walternate can try to use to get Peter to choose the Redniverse. And with the Observers involved, I'm willing to bet that it's not even that simple. Peter's special, but maybe it's because this kid he's created is something special, too.
Now, if only they could bring this infusion of life into the Blueniverse episodes when the worlds come crashing together, that'd be great. Make that next season shine, writers!
More thoughts on "Bloodline":
Video: Fringe, "Bloodline"
Watch the whole episode on Hulu right now, while available.
