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Fringe: season 2, episode 8
“August”
November 19, 2009 - 10:11p.m.
Because I work at home, by myself, I spend some portion of each day roaming around the house talking and/or singing in a funny voice. I also spend some portion of each day locked inside my head, in pained ...
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Fringe: season 2, episode 7
“Of Human Action”
November 12, 2009 - 10:11p.m.
Can hypnosis make you do something that you don’t want to do? The common assumption is no, but it’s a provocative question, because what it seems to imply is that even if to all outward appearances you are ...
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Fringe: season 2, episode 6
“Earthling”
November 5, 2009 - 09:11p.m.
Thanks to the Yankees (yeah, I know, I know), we got an unexpected visit from Fringe tonight… a visit as unexpected as Randy’s foiled anniversary surprise for his wife Natalie. And how about that anniversary surprise, huh? Dude tells ...
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Fringe: season 2, episode 5
"Dream Logic"
October 15, 2009 - 10:10p.m.
Howdy, Freak-Fans. Noel's out sick today with, well, the same thing everybody else seems to have lately, so I'll be covering this week's episode of Fringe, "Dream Logic." Best wishes to Noel for a speedy recovery, and ...
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Fringe: season 2, episode 4
“Momentum Deferred”
October 8, 2009 - 10:10p.m.
“Why are shape-shifting soldiers from another universe stealing frozen heads?”
With that question alone, “Momentum Deferred” went up a full point over last week’s dreadful Fringe episode. And I gave it another full point for introducing two potentially useful ...
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Fringe: season 2, episode 3
“Fracture”
October 1, 2009 - 09:10p.m.
Full disclosure: We had some severe thunderstorms and tornado warnings in Arkansas tonight, so my Fringe viewing was not seamless. The local Fox affiliate broke in with weather updates about three-quarters of the way through the episode, and then again ...
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Fringe: season 2, episode 2
“Night Of Desirable Objects”
September 24, 2009 - 10:09p.m.
In preparation for tonight’s Fringe I finally got around to reading Jeff Jensen’s Entertainment Weekly’s cover story on the new season (which had arrived while I was in Toronto), and by the time I reached the end ...
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Fringe: season 2, episode 1
“A New Day In The Old Town”
September 17, 2009 - 08:09p.m.
I was originally planning to write a big throat-clearing reintroduction to Fringe as we move into the second season, but man, forget all that… how about that Freak-Meet? And how about what happened immediately afterward? I saw this first Season ...
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Fringe: season 1, episode 20
"There's More Than One Of Everything"
May 12, 2009 - 10:05p.m.

It's hard to take things in all at once--especially when you're talking about 20 episodes of oddities, curious, and, let's be honest, occasional cliches. Watching "There's More Than One Of Everything," the last episode of the ...
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Fringe: season 1, episode 19
“The Road Not Taken”
May 5, 2009 - 09:05p.m.

I thought Agent Broyles’ opening line tonight—“For those of you just joining us...”—was at once clever and useful. Clever because it winked at the audience a little, acknowledging that Fringe is about to wrap up Season One, and ...
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Fringe: season 1, episode 18
“Midnight”
April 28, 2009 - 10:04p.m.

The bats have left the bell tower.
The victims have been bled.
-Bauhaus
Early on, it looked like tonight’s episode of Fringe was going to be even more of a freak-of-the-week outing this usual—almost to the point of ...
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Fringe: season 1, episode 17
“Bad Dreams”
April 21, 2009 - 09:04p.m.
The last thing you want to see in a Fringe opening sequence is a toddler in a stroller—especially if a mother is pushing that stroller onto a mostly empty subway platform, while the toddler plays with balloons bearing creepy-looking ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 16
“Unleashed”
April 14, 2009 - 10:04p.m.
Tonight’s Fringe was directed by genre journeyman Brad Anderson, who’s been at the helm for a couple of the series’ strongest episodes to date. Anderson knows how to direct creepy, suspenseful action sequences, and how to balance them ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 15
“Inner Child”
April 7, 2009 - 09:04p.m.
Hey, remember Fringe? That wacky sci-fi/horror/detective/conspiracy show that started out with a cool premise, quickly got repetitive, and then suddenly developed a consistent narrative drive and sense of whimsy just before Fox stuck it on a shelf ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 14
“Ability”
February 10, 2009 - 04:02p.m.
Does it still qualify as a Freak-Meet if we already met the freak a while back?Specifically I'm talking about the mysterious David Robert Jones (played with maximum oil by Jared Harris), whom we met back in Episode 7 ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 13
“The Transformation”
February 3, 2009 - 04:02p.m.
Okay, first things first: Best Freak-Meet yet. And I feel justified in reverting to my old term here, because freaks don’t get any freakier than Marshall Bowman, an airplane passenger who’s going about the usual airplane passenger business ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 12
“The No-Brainer”
January 27, 2009 - 03:01p.m.
A funny thing happened during the two weeks that I wasn’t around to write up Fringe: The show got good. The gooey weirdness, pulse-pounding police action and puckish wit all started to coalesce into well-written, well-paced episodes that didn ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 11
"Bound"
January 20, 2009 - 04:01p.m.
Hello again, Fringe fans; Noel’s still out fighting the good fight at Sundance, so you’re stuck with me for one more week. And what a week it is. “Bound” picks up where “Safe” left off, with the resolution ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 10
"Safe"
December 2, 2008 - 11:12p.m.

Hey, gang–Noel is out being a movie critic somewhere (thinks he's all special with his screenings and his Best of lists and everything), so you're stuck with me as a guest reviewer tonight. Sorry about the late ...
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Fringe: season 1, episode 9
"The Dreamscape"
November 25, 2008 - 11:11p.m.

Butterfly attack!!!!
AAAAAAAAAH!
This week's Freak-Meet wasn't about getting to know a person–or at least not for very long. We're only briefly introduced to Mark Young, a harried young executive pitching a product–or service?–called ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 8
"The Equation"
November 18, 2008 - 10:11p.m.

Big night for the Bishops on Fringe, as Peter gets to put his mathematical skills and his criminal skills to work–the former in recognizing the connection between a series of musical notes and an unsolved equation, and the latter ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 7
"In Which We Meet Mr. Jones"
November 11, 2008 - 10:11p.m.

Welcome back, Fringe-ophiles! Maybe it's because the two-week absence made my heart grow fonder, but I enjoyed this episode, which ramped up the action and the weirdness, while putting a few more pieces in play for the series ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 6
"The Cure"
October 21, 2008 - 10:10p.m.

There's nothing like cancer–or any disease, really–to remind us that no matter how much we romanticize our consciousness and our emotions, we're still just sacks of meat, stuffed with bones and tubes and a complicated system ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 5
"Power Hungry"
October 14, 2008 - 10:10p.m.

Judging by the comments on Fringe's previous episode–two long weeks ago–a lot of you felt like the show was taking a step in the right direction by moving deeper into mythology and away from the "each episode ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 4
"The Arrival"
September 30, 2008 - 10:09p.m.

"The Arrival" was the weirdest episode of Fringe yet–a deep-down sci-fi spookfest that minimized the show's procedural side and instead raised far more questions than it answered. In fact, I can't think of any questions that "The ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 3
"The Ghost Network"
September 23, 2008 - 10:09p.m.

Watching Fringe immediately after watching House really drives home the procedural structure that Fringe is holding to, especially in the first few minutes, when as with House we have to figure out what's significant about where we are, who ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 2
"The Same Old Story"
September 16, 2008 - 09:09p.m.

Now that we've gotten the "Man, that sucked!"/"Aw c'mon, it's not so bad!" stuff out of the way, it's time to settle into what is often the pivotal moment for any TV series with potential ... -
Fringe: season 1, episode 1
"Pilot"
September 9, 2008 - 01:09a.m.

Premieres tonight on Fox, 8:00 p.m. ET
Note: This review reveals minor details about the plot of tonight's episode, though none of its major twists; nevertheless, the spoiler-averse may want to wait until after the episode airs ...
