Michael is gone. The Child Observer can’t be tracked. That’s because he is being held by Windmark at Liberty Island. “It is in your interest to communicate with me,” he tells the boy. Windmark digs at the boy with a line of questioning geared to expose the boy’s purpose.
A humming sound can be heard as Windmark carefully asks his questions. Suddenly his nose begins to bleed. The Observer Boy just stares at him blankly. Windmark asks about the plan, the words echoing in the air around them.
Suddenly Windmark gasps and his eye fills with blood. As he stands, he asks for complete diagnostic testing on the boy. “Find out what it is.”
They are not on the same frequency, are they? As if unable to dial in, Windmark is being manipulated by Michael so that he is completely in control.
Long Jacket, Short Fuse
Peter gets a call from Agent Broyles and Michael’s whereabouts are pinpointed. Astrid puts him and his holding space on the map. Olivia decides they should bypass the sensors by grabbing Michael through the other side. Can Olivia still cross over? Can she get the ability back? Walter seems to like that idea and smiles.
Olivia considers taking Cortexiphan again, just as she did when a child. If it could temporarily react in her system, she could have a shot at getting to the other side. Peter lists the risks and Walter says he cannot do anything about it. “Etta died so we could finish the plan,” Olivia says but Peter doesn’t want to lose her again. She assures him: “I can do this. Without him, we lose everything.”
Sad faces all around and an air of resignation. Peter asks what she might find if she gets there. Astrid says the Universe Window could help them determine if the Observers took down Liberty Island during the invasion.
Meanwhile, back at the Island, Michael is readied for testing and Windmark starts bleeding out of his nose again, other nostril. “Alert me when you have the results,” he orders, fleeing the room.
The Window crew sets up near the shore across from the Island. The Universe Window isn’t TOO obvious, is it? It’s an old musty, rusty flat screen TV-looking thing with monitors like a World War II bomber dash. The Island is going to be tough to beat and Anil is called for a safe house and medical equipment. They expect the worst.
Lab Assistants and Resistance
Donald, however, arrives at the old lab, greeted by no one. Walter sets up the hologram of the plan and begins to work on putting the requisite pieces together. Like a sci-fi Jacques Pepin, he is firing and slicing and stirring all sorts of strange concoctions and pours what looks like a cranberry juice cocktail into a yellow beaker, sealing it tightly.
The crew comes to Tobin, a field surgeon, for assistance and he gives them adrenaline in case of cardiac arrest. it’s time for Olivia to go under the cortexiphan. The site is set and she readies herself. She is so damn calm, and seems confident about what to do.
Walter injects directly into her brain stem. Peter sits in front of her, offering support. And boom! She’s on the road to Unwellville. groaning in pain. Peter talks her down, his image distorting, coming in and out of focus — her heart rate is too high. Tobin wants Walter to quit it. But the doctor is on a roll… and Olivia is way too into it.
Peter holds her and Walter swears there is no better authority on Cortexiphan than him, the creator of it. He wants to go one more and Peter demands that he stop.
Olivia is shuddering, not doing well. Everyone stands by and he gives her one more injection during which Olivia screams, then falls forward onto Peter.
The diagnostic test says Michael is not normal (Duh). His emotional centers in his brain are way too big. The Observers will make the report but we all could have told them that.
Olivia sleeps. “Sacrifice is hard, son,” Walter tells Peter, “but you are no stranger to it.” “Neither are you, Dad, you sacrifice a lot,” Peter answers. At this crucial juncture, Walter commends Peter’s strength and insists it’s time to wake Olivia up.
Olivia is living through memories of Etta but shudders awake. She is still seeing distorted images. She only has 3 1/2 hours to get in and get out before she’s stranded. Each jump in time burns up the drug in her system and Walter warns her to come back if she senses dehydration or other symptoms that she is running low on Cortexiphan.
They drive her to the Island. Walter kisses her head and Astrid tells her they will wait for her at Battery Park. Peter gets out to walk her out. ‘You’re coming back with the boy for Etta,” Peter says. “I love you.”
They part, Olivia more than aware of how high-stakes this jump is.
Double Dose of Liv
The world starts distorting around her, eventually Peter fades away and Olivia is back in the other world. With Olivia tracked as a breach almost instantly, we see Fauxlivia in the building as Olivia is caught outside. “Dunham,” Bolivia answers her Bluetooth, smiling excitedly.
Real world Olivia meets up with Bolivia and she tells her she was in amber for 22 years. She asks for help. She tells her about Etta and everything gets distorted so she can’t really hear what’s going on. “I don’t have much time,” she tells the agents and Olivia explains the plan. Transport to Liberty Island is arranged.
Preserve the Pieces
Back at the real world lab, Donald is fixing up his machine. Its main pulse glows red and then slowly shifts down, fluttering in and out of transmission.
In Manhattan, 2069 Windmark gives his report on Michael. “A capacity for emotional responsiveness” greater than normal humans is the diagnosis. But no one knows how it has happened and they are unable to comprehend and measure his responses. But Windmark does warn that the Boy is going to be used against them by the humans. “A more prudent path is to destroy it,” Windmark says. “Understanding what it was” is what’s important, he’s told. “Preserve the pieces.”
Walternate lectures at Harvard, Olivia is told. She and Lincoln get a moment to acknowledge that the future didn’t turn out how they had expected. Understatement abounds. They get Olivia to the right space and Bolivia swears it will work. Olivia disappears and… ends up slammed against a tile wall. She is in a lab. The child’s brain scan is projected on a screen. Drawing her gun, Olivia moves into the hallway.
Michael is being led into a lab on a stretcher, where he is laid out and X-rayed so his insides glow green, visible outside of his skin.
Olivia tracks down the hall, her vision distorting again. She raises her gun at a suited man at the end of the hallway and shoots. The man falls and she keeps moving. Entering the guard station, she kills another man and scans the monitors for the whereabouts of Michael. She rushes out.
Surgeons prepare a bone saw and other medieval-looking silver instruments to work on Michael as Olivia gets closer. It must be hard to walk so confidently between two worlds, but she does it. Olivia fights with an Observer and shoots him as an alarm blares.
An Observer warns the surgical team to hold steady until a “breach” is resolved. But Olivia breaks into the lab, kills the male surgeon, sees Michael and dresses him quickly. They disappear into thin air, but so does the Observer.
Olivia marches the boy down a hallway and the Observer shows up, ready to fight. But Bolivia and Lincoln shoot the Observer and rush Olivia and the boy on their way. “Be careful,” she warns them.
Bolivia walks them back to Battery Park. “You have a beautiful family,” Olivia tells Bolivia. “Go save yours,” Bolivia tells her. “Get your daughter back.”
Michael and Olivia arrive safely on shore. She warns that it’s known that they have crossed over so they have little time to get back. Peter kisses her head and she rests on him, as Michael rests himself against Olivia.
Windmark asks if the first guard he spoke to gave information to anyone. “Agent Broyles” told him to, he says. Windmark closes his eyes and opens them again — no sign of blood.
Donald knocks at a door. He tells the man there that “Walter Bishop is back. There is something I need you to do. You owe me,” Donald says. The man turns and Donald follows him into the room. Room 513.
Trigger Unhappy
Donald explains that his trigger can’t reset time if it doesn’t work. “If the plan succeeds, you will cease to exist,” he is told. The 12 agents, like August and September, are not all on the same page, it would seem. Some have built up emotional response systems, some not.
“I took a risk coming to see you because I believe the people of this era are worth saving,” Donald says.
Walter screams that the giant magnet needs to be at 22 degrees. Broyles gets a call from Peter with an update on Michael. However, it is clear that Windmark has other plans for Broyles, as he readies a booby trap.
Broyles throws some new files onto his computer and takes items from his desk. But at the same time, Windmark is listening to Broyles’ call from Peter.
Broyles gets what he needs and moves forward but Windmark appears and asks to have a word with him. This is no nice social call, clearly.
Windmark tells Broyles about the breach. “The fugitives knew precisely where we were holding the prisoner,” Windmark declares and says that he has heard rumors that The Dove may be among them. Broyles says that person should have been exposed long ago. Windmark smiles and stands. “Remain vigilant, Philip,” he says on the way out.
Everyone arrives back at the lab and tries to figure out why the boy walked off the monorail. Michael stares at the static on the Universe Window, smiling slyly. What is he thinking?
Future Travel Just Ain’t What it Used to Be
Donald asks that one of them go to find the Initiating Reactor which can help open a wormhole and use the magnet to send a cylinder into the wormhole to end up at the other destination in the future. A synchroscope is needed for perfect phasing between the two. Michael will be sent through the wormhole so that he will be examined in the future and live, thereby changing the trajectory of the universe.
Broyles is on his way, but he’s being tracked. Olivia says Peter will meet him at the steam tunnel but Broyles is aware that he is being followed. He says he can protect his thoughts if caught and Olivia says she will come get him. “Olivia, just get it done,” he says, hanging up the phone.
If he is captured, their whereabouts will be known so everything needs to be gathered, packed and taken out of the lab ASAP. “It’s our only chance,” Walter says. So hop to, everybody!
Peter searches the amber for the synchroscope. He finds a syringe and a tape addressed to himself by Walter. In it, Walter tells Peter that he’s okay, living many years from now to “ensure the future of humanity.”
Continuing, Walter asks Peter not to be sad, that their time together was stolen and they need to be grateful for it. “I don’t want to say goodbye,” Walter says, “but I will say I love you, son.” Peter tears up while he watches and Walter tells Peter, in real time, that he has been inoculated and is taking the Child Observer into the future.
Walter and Peter talk it out, “The boy and I will become a paradox,” Walter says, “and nature abhors a paradox. It has to heal itself. It does so by deleting me and the boy at the moment of the invasion. The boy and I will disappear at 2015.”
Peter understands that they must live out the rest of their lives in the future and Walter says he wants to give Peter his life back — his daughter, his wife’s happiness, everything. Crying, they hold each other, realizing this is the last time they will spend together. “You are my favorite thing,” Walter says to him, “my very favorite thing.” If you’re not tearing up, you’re an Observer. Just sayin’…
Olivia and Astrid go to find the part. They find a dead man, kill another while Windmark’s cronies tell him, part in hand, that this thing will help the humans create a wormhole to go forward in time in order to change the fate of them all. Windmark is not exactly amused (though it’s hard to tell!)
Broyles gets taken down, as he suspected he would, while the lab rats are freaking out over the lack of the part. Olivia pleads with Michael to tell her what to do next. He puts a finger to his lips and she watches him. Is he telling her to shut up? Astrid comes up with a new idea to use a shipping lane. Walter kisses her head and Donald looks nervous.
Now they need another thing, Donald says, an influx something-or-other (sorry — there are way too many gadgets in this finale). The crew, getting word that Broyles is taken in, start on the new plan.
Anti-gravity osmio bullets is the newest thing Walter has to put in play and Peter is in charge of them. They are “cool” according to Walter.
Gene, Gene, The Mooing Machine and Astrid Gets a Shout Out
Astrid takes Walter aside and shows him something as Donald tells Peter something important. Astrid takes Walter through the amber tunnel and they have found Gene, his old cow, frozen in there. Astrid wanted Walter to see her, although to let her out would be too distracting. “You always know how to soothe me,” Walter tells Astrid. “Walter, this is not the end,” she says. “We’re gonna win this and when we do we’ll be drinking strawberry milkshakes in the lab…” Walter says, “It’s a beautiful name.” When she asks what is, he tells her, “Astrid,” finally using her actual name. Astrid smiles, touched.
Broyles is being interrogated by Windmark and told that “your kind infected them,” meaning the 12 emotional former Observers. Windmark admits that he feels something. “I believe you call it . . . hate.” That Windmark — never one to follow the crowd. Broyles agrees the feeling is mutual. Distorted voices make Broyles’ face twitch.
Peter and Olivia talk about getting Etta back. “Nothing else matters,” Peter tells her. More kissing ensues. ‘He’s here,” Olivia says. Back to work, picking up the piece they need. Gas masks in place, they load the stuff into bags and take off.
A guard drinks a glass of water and there are tiny little things floating around in it. What the…
Donald announces that he took the last innoculation, which means that Walter is now not going to take the boy forward. Since Donald has these human feelings now, his attachment to the boy is too important. Walter and Peter’s love helped him to understand his feelings for Michael. He claims that when they go forward together, Michael will understand how Donald loves him. “That’s being a father,” Walter tells him. “It’s not about fate, Walter, it’s about changing fate,” Donald says. “About hope and protecting our children.”
Fathers of the world, unite! Man hugs all around… while Broyles is being asked to give everyone up to Windmark. “It is acceptable,” Windmark says, “I am your ally.”
Broyles allows this thought to be transmitted: “They are in the lab.” The big showdown is coming, while the guard with the floating thingies explodes Alien-style, his entire abdomen scattered over the walls..
Things are coming out of Observers’ throats like huge eels as Olivia and Peter in gas masks walk through the foggy halls, stepping over Observer debris, marching into an elevator while another Observer battles butterflies.
The Final Battle
At the guard station, Olivia finds Broyles on the security cameras. Peter packs up what they need and they go in to save Broyles.
The rest of the crew waits for Peter and Olivia. But roadblocks abound. How are they going to get around this? Observers are opening important-looking cases on the ground and Peter, Olivia and Broyles make their way back to the van.
Anil is in charge of team two and the magnet is on the way. Gunshots ring out as they near a checkpoint and the magnet and the van both storm through in a blaze of bullets.
The good guys get to the magnet and start putting together the machine. Olivia is all motherly with Michael, keeping him as safe as she can, as the gunfight continues.
Peter shoots and Walter scores, putting pieces of the magnet together. Donald gets the wormhole going and Michael is summoned. However, Windmark is at the other side of the magnet, reaching for him.
Peter and Windmark duke it out and Windmark’s Observer buddies seem pretty set on taking Peter down. Windmark has Olivia around the throat and tosses her to the floor. Michael watches as Windmark moves toward him but Olivia picks something up off the ground and starts to get up. Alarms are going off, bedlam is ensuing and suddenly a car slams into Windmark and kills him.
The wormhole is open behind Walter. The boy sits on the ground and Donald is down. The boy pulls out the Greensleeves music box and Donald’s eyes close, as Walter watches sadly. He extends his hand to the boy just as Peter shows up. So it was Walter’s fate all along to sacrifice himself. Peter and Walter exchange longing looks and Peter mouths “I love you, Dad.” Walter takes Michael’s hand and marches resolutely into the wormhole. Astrid is crying, Olivia is tearing up. Peter is stoic. And then…
“I think I would be happy to stay here the rest of my life,” Peter is saying. Olivia and Peter are back in the park watching Etta play, that favorite memory a reality.
Etta runs to Peter and he turns to look at Olivia as Etta jumps into his arms. As they laugh together, all is finally right with their world. And ours. Home from the park, Peter opens the mail, finding a letter addressed to him. It is a white tulip, the drawing of Walter’s that meant so much to him.
Watch the complete series of Fringe anytime. Sign up for your 30 day free trial of Amazon Prime.
(Image courtesy of FOX)
Contributing Writer, BuddyTV
