History Headscratchers / Fringe

* why does everyone in-universe seems to blame Peter for not realizing Fauxlivia was not Olivia? How do you think HE feels? The woman he's been sleeping with for weeks is NOT who he thought she was. But I guess {{Rape Is OK When It Is Sci Fi}}?

** The only explanation I could think of, that made me accept those discrepancies, was that maybe back then Olivia was not crossing over to the red universe, but to another one, one closer to the blue universe and that was just branching from it. The red universe, when fully introduced, makes it clear that things have been this bad for a long time and one gets the feeling that Fringe Division has existed for quite a while. Also, in the universe Olivia was crossing over to those first times, there was no Lincoln Lee to be seen. There are just too many discrepancies for that universe to be the same as the red one. And besides, there is no reason why there can only be two universes and not an infinite number, it just so happens that the red and the blue became entangled because of Walter's actions. The red universe is shown has having branched off some time in the past, since by the time Walter and Bell discover it, it is already a different place, with more advanced tech, presumably the branching could have occurred some some time in the early XX century. On the other hand, the universe Olivia crossed over in that early episode looked like it was at the same technological level as the blue one, and that the same events where happening, with the exception, maybe, of either ZFT being much more aggressive there, or their own red couple -another red universe branched from the main red universe-, launching the main attack much earlier.

***** The Cortexiphan trials most certainly did not take place for over six years. Originally, Olivia was supposed to be 3 when the experiments took place. The vision she had during the Season 2 episode when she was injected with Cortexiphan again had her 3-year old self in it. It correlates with her not remembering any of it. I find it very hard to believe a 9-year old Olivia would forget being injected with drugs or traveling to another universe, unless Walter somehow removed her memories. I see this as a clumsy retcon tying Peter and Olivia together in their childhoods. Don't get me wrong, it's a great episode, but continuity-wise, it doesn't mesh with what we knew before.

** The second part of this problem is: what caused the twins (Susan Pratt and Nancy Lewis) to ignite on the Redverse side? The cortexiphan trials never took place, and there is no ZFT trying to activate cortexiphan kids to protect their side. While I'll accept that the twins had dormant pyrokinetic abilities from birth, it was cortexiphan that let them use their powers. What caused their powers to be triggered on the Redverse side?

* In the Prime timeline, there are many inconsistencies from the first appearance of the Redverse in "The Road Not Taken (1x19)" and subsequent information revealed about that side in seasons 2 and 3. Olivia briefly crosses over from Fringe Division headquarters-- located, as we all know from the frequent title-ins, in the Federal Building in Boston-- to the Fringe Division of the parallel universe. She goes to Alt!Broyles' office which has a different layout, and talks to Alt!Charlie who mentions the charred victims are twins. Later it is revealed that Redverse!Boston is barely inhabited because it is the site of many soft spots (continued, edit lock's about to go.)

*** I meant the red universe. Peter is Walternate's(who is in the red universe) son, and Walternate uses DNA from Peter's child to activate the machine in the red universe. Why couldn't he use his own DNA

** Do you mean in the original timeline or in the amber one? Because in the original timeline, remember there was at least one piece of the machine the blue universe didn't had, the one Fauxlivia took to the red universe. So maybe that particular piece could allow them to operate the machine without the actual Peter, only using his DNA as a sort of key. But in the blue universe, without that piece, the whole Peter was necessary. On the other hand, it could just be that using his own DNA never occurred to Peter since he was there, and it only occurred to Walternate because he didn't had Peter. In the new amber timeline though, it seems the machine is not at all tuned to Peter's DNA, because he's not supposed to be there, and in fact Walter mentions the possibility of tuning the machine to Peter's DNA so he can try to use the machine to go back to his timeline.

* If Walternate could use Peter's son's DNA to activate the machine, why couldn't he use his own DNA?

* The Nazi guy in The Bishop Revival. They never explain how he is over a hundred, or why he waited so long to start killing people if he was working in the same lab with Walter's father from the start...

* The Observers are always shown eating extremely hot things in every appearance---except 2x16 "Peter", where they're drinking Slushos, which are cold.

* Since the discovery of another universe (or multiverses) would be the greatest discovery in human history, I'm always surprised that people on the show don't express more amazement w/ the possibilities.

* Im on the second disc of season 2 dvd to catch up on the show (So no spoilers please) and I have 3 questions;
** 1) Why does the sow need a recap at the start of every episode? Thats one of the things I liked about season 1!
** 2) How did Mina just go to see Olivia in the hospital in either the first or second ep? I mean, she's there for no reason or intro, and Im sure you have to get permission from the doctor to see a patient!
** 3) In the second ep, why did no one bring up the fact that the suspect killed himself in custody? Why were there no guards? Were they constipated?

* "Bloodline." A genetically inheritable virus. [[FlatWhat What.]] Did I miss something crucial in my Biomed lectures? Then again... maybe it was some kind of weird, modified virus that was accidentally unleashed on the unsuspecting public. [[MST3KMantra Never mind... I'll just go with it.]]

* There's only one thing that bugs me about this show. It's pointless to complain about the soft science, because it's so routinely over-the-top and absurd as to become almost prosaic within the context of the show when a woman doing a Leonard Nimoy impression discusses the possibility of transplanting one of her two personalities into the body of a cow and communicating through brain waves on an EEG monitor. There's a certain RefugeInAudacity here, as if they listened to all the complaints about the science used in ''TheXFiles'' and said "You think ''that's'' ridiculous? Put ''this'' in your pipe and smoke it!" Most of the rest of it that would bug me if I were in a nitpicky mood I can chalk up to RuleOfFunny. What ''does'' bug me is the "find the shapeshifter" plot at the beginning of season 2. ''Everyone'' picks up the IdiotBall and runs as far as they can with it. It was obvious who it was in the first place, but after they discover the orderly's body, it becomes ''impossible'' to miss. That, and the utterly cheap manner in which they wrote Kirk Acevedo off the show. It's nice having him back in season 3, but still...not quite the same.
* The fact that everyone in-universe seems to blame Peter for not realizing Fauxlivia was not Olivia. How do you think HE feels? The woman he's been sleeping with for weeks is NOT who he thought she was. But I guess {{Rape Is OK When It Is Sci Fi}}?

* Hold on while I try to walk myself through this. Spoilers for very recent events, this being about the ending of episode 3x22. So, after the events at the end, it seems that [[spoiler: no one has any memories of Peter once he vanishes after leaving the machine and making the bridge between worlds.]] The observers imply [[spoiler: that he never existed//was wiped from the time stream because he has now served his purpose.]] Um, what? [[spoiler: If Peter is the focal point for basically everything that goes on or has gone on in the series all because our Walter's Peter died as a child, which caused him to go to the other side and steal their Peter which caused the universe to start breaking down which caused basically everything else, then wouldn't it follow that if you [[CosmicRetcon retcon]] Peter out of existence, don't you undo everything? Doesn't it then follow that by taking him out of things you make it so that none of this ever happened?]] I am so freaking confused right now.
** Also, what does this mean for [[spoiler:Fauxlivia's baby? Does he still exist?]]
** So, did the Observers [[spoiler: delete Peter, or did he do himself in by mucking with the timestream somehow?]]
*** As it stands now, he seems to have [[spoiler: "fulfilled his purpose," whatever the heck that means, but it implies that he wiped himself from the timestream by some sort of paradox]], but that just raises ''more'' questions.
** This isn't so much a plot hole as something made intentionally vague as part of the season finale cliffhanger. The mystery of what the hell just happened there is presumably going to play a major part in season four, or at least the first few episodes of it.

* ''Novation''. Shapeshifters. They fell for it '''AGAIN.'''

* Not so much JustBugsMe as FridgeLogic, but the speed-growing fetus that featured in the second episode should've basically [[{{ImAHumanitarian}} devoured the woman]] from the inside, through the umbilicus, in a quest for protein and carbohydrate to power its rapid growth. That little biological factoid just pushes an already high {{squick}} factor right through the ''roof''.

* While it doesn't ruin the show for me, I have to wonder about Walter Bishop's naivete in re modern technology. In the second episode, he's captivated by the seatwarmer in Dunham's car, even though Cadillac introduced seatwarmers in 1966. And in the next episode, he's frightened by the buzzing of Peter's cell phone. True, cell phones have gotten smaller and acquired more features since 1991--when Bishop was apparently committed--but not in ways that a super-scientist wouldn't be able to predict.

* In the intro with all the fringe science terms floating around, psychokinesis shows up twice.
** so does Dark Matter, but I havent seen either yet. Maybe the Observer is made of dark matter, as he said that he can't touch the tunnely cylinder thing, indicating he may be made of a different kind of matter. Or that the cylinder is made of dark matter, and the Observer is allergic to it.
*** Of course you haven't seen it. It's ''dark.''
**** And now psychokinesis is part of the greater mytharc, so you were right. I wonder what role dark matter will play...

* We're at the beginning of the second season now, and yet all of the JBM entries but one are from the first eight episodes. That bugs me.

* Is it unnatural for me to think Olivia has the IdiotBall for no deducing that Sam Weiss is behind everything in Dream Logic even though there wasn't any indication until the ''audience'' sees that?

* In Power Hungry, we are shown a rather nice aerial shot of Hartford, capital city of Connecticut, and told by the giant floating caption that it is Worcester, Massachusetts. This troper is a proud resident of the Hartford suburbs, one who knows his own city's skyline better than any other in the world, and just doesn't understand why they had to use it in place of the real Worcester. Surely, anyone who's been to either city just once would know the difference upon viewing the episode, not to mention the countless viewers in the Greater Hartford and Greater Worcester areas...so why hasn't anyone else commented on it. On that note, if I you ''did'' notice it at the time, please let me know here...
** TV series and movies do things like this all the time. That's why there is an [[CaliforniaDoubling own trope]] for this.

* Peter and Olivia's Almost Kiss. In fact Almost Kisses in general! It's like a TV version of the Lucy/Football thing from Peanuts. I always see it coming but I always fall for it too.

* Rewatching the first season, the episode The Arrival bothered me. The Rogue is equipped with a massively powerful energy pistol. Now, most of the ultratech in the show is not used by the main characters or otherwise buried because it is A) Too dangerous, B) only understood by the people who built/use it, C) PoweredByAForsakenChild, or D) So flagrantly evil it is impossible to think of practical applications. However, the gun is just that: A gun. A powerful, deadly tool that destroys what you point it at and nothing else, doesn't seem to require anything exotic to use, and is as easy as point and click. What happened to the gun?

* In 2x16 ("Peter"), why didn't Walter use a metal flask.. or something that wouldn't break...

* Here's something that bugs me - John Scott. The handwave that John was a Black Ops NSA agent and that's why he knew so much about the Pattern felt like so much bull. Why, then, did he kill that guy (name escapes me - the villain of the pilot, the guy with the twin brother) after recovering? To keep his cover? Why did he threaten the guy at the beginning of the episode? Was he in on the testing of the toxin on the plane? If so, then I honestly don't think being undercover justifies knowing about an experiment that will kill 147 people in a most horrific manner and keeping quiet about it. What, he couldn't slip a note to his handler?

* If Walternate could use Peter's son's DNA to activate the machine, why couldn't he use his own DNA?
* If the GreenLantern is red in Red-verse, how was ''Blackest Night / Brightest Day'' handled?

* The 3D location captions. It looks good the first time, afterwards it seems a little show-offy and unnecessary. I will only be happy when a character walks into one of the words and/or the Fringe gang investigate why the world is being affected by random floating letters.
** [[YourMileageMayVary YMMV]] I guess. This troper doesn't mind them. Far better than just some boring caption.
** It's not the use that bugs this troper, it's the overuse. I'm pretty sure we know what "FBI Headquarters" and "Harvard University" and "Massive Dynamic" look like by now.
** It would be impressively weird as well as an admirable example of LeaningOnTheFourthWall / PaintingTheFourthWall if they ''did'' a filler episode with that as its plot. I doubt it'll happen, but then again, ''Fringe'' is the only show I've ever seen that might actually do such a thing.

** The whole overuse of the EvilCorporation trope on TV in general JustBugsMe, too.

* This troper was insulted by the five minute mark of the second episode (the first episode that I had seen): During a scene of expository grapeshot, we are told that Peter "Has an IQ of 180". The writers are showing all the ambition of a sloth here, opting for an arbitrary number instead of letting the characterization speak for itself, and letting us make our own conclusions. This is as much of a wallbanger as power levels or midiclorians.
** Notable difference; an IQ score is a real, tangible scale, not a made up one. I'm not sure how this will affect your deliberations.
*** I think he's complaining about how Peter's intelligence is a borderline InformedAbility.
**** Though to be fair as well, while IQ is a scale, as our own trope page points out, it's not entirely something meaningful in and of itself.
*** Doesn't he come up with facts all the time? It's just that the brightest star in that part of the sky, so to speak, is ''Walter Bishop''. Imagine pointing a flashlight and a spotlight on someone and see which they notice.
*** Peters IQ was said to be 190.

** It bugs you that there's been little to nothing to complain about throughout most of the series? Wha?

* If Walternate could use Peter's son's DNA to activate the machine, why couldn't he use his own DNA?

** While I agree Peter's presence being a paradox doesn't make much sense given what we know, I think the reason the Observe can't go back in time to warn his past-self, because he does not have a past self. As "The Firefly" showed, the Observers can move through time without any repercussions. Walter postulates that they exist outside of time, simultaneously at all points in it. Hence, he is one self and cannot interact with his past self. Just an idea.

* Here's something that bugs me - John Scott. The handwave that John was a Black Ops NSA agent and that's why he knew so much about the Pattern felt like so much bull. Why, then, did he kill that guy (name escapes me - the villain of the pilot, the guy with the twin brother) after recovering? To keep his cover? Why did he threaten the guy at the beginning of the episode? Was he in on the testing of the toxin on the plane? If so, then I honestly don't think being undercover justifies knowing about an experiment that will kill 147 people in a most horrific manner and keeping quiet about it. What, he couldn't slip a note to his handler?