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Saturday, October 24, 2009

FF: 1.6- Gimme Some Truth

*Editor's Note: My grandma is in the hospital again. I just got back from visiting her. Please excuse my lateness. Because Fringe wasn't on Thursday, there will be no Fringe column this week or next week. (It won't be on next week due to the World Series- Go Yankees!!).

The show started off with a confusing bang. And it ended with a less confusing bang. In between, it was really, really good. So, let's recap!

There was a large meeting in Washington to discuss the Blackout. Our favorite FBI agents went under polygraph tests to make sure they were telling the truth about what they saw in their flashforwards. After this occurs, there is a press conference, and when asked, the President of the United States states he will not reveal his flashforward. Lucky for us, we see his vision. And someone is telling him something terrible has occured. So what could it be?

This week, a rivalry and a debt were introuduced to us involving FBI Agent Wedeck. Wedeck helped cover up an affair the President had, so he is indebted to Wedeck. Wedeck and Senator Joyce Clemente are not so tight. This is evident throughout the entire conference. She seems determined to stop the Mosiac, which we all know is collecting data from all around the world about things people saw in their flashforwards.

But she makes a good point. Right now all the FBI divison is doing is being led by a man who had a hazy vision. Is it truly reliable, especially from someone who was drinking? But then again, if these visions do come true, then this could be an important thing they're doing.

To solve the rivalry problem, Mr. President makes Clemente Vice President (of the US) so she won't bother Wedeck anymore.

Meanwhile, Janis, the now-revealed lesbian, looks for satelite imagery from around the time of the mass crow die-off in '91. They find a series of 100 foot tall pylons standing in the middle of nowhere. But where did they come from?

And now the explosion is revisted. After Mark, Demitri, Vreede, and Wedeck go to thier car, they are attacked. They manage to escape and kill some of the assasins. A few escape, unfortunately. Though they are not harmed, we can't say the same for Janis, who at this time, is attacked. She disarms one gunman, but the other gunman shot her in the stomache. Hmm, this seems ofly close to the uterus. How can she be pregnant in the future? Especially if she's a lesbian. That doesn't mean she gets pregnant by accident, ya know!

Around this time, Olivia recieves an annonymus text from someone saying "Mark was drinking in his flashforward"/ But who could it be from? Wedeck? They did have a large fight about the visions. Or was it someone else, someone who knows more?

FlashForward keeps getting better. At the same time, more questions are being aked. And none seemed to be answered...

Sunday, October 18, 2009

"Happy Birthday, Mr. Monk"

It's Mr. Monk's birthday, but he has no time to celebrate. He has to solve a murder. Plus, he doesn't like to celebrate his birthdays after a tragic episode in his childhood.

First, let's get to the murder: a matenance man is killed one night as he is is compacted by a garbage disposal. Ouch!

The day after, Natalie tries to bring Monk to a surprise 50th Birthday Party. He suspects the party, and tells her he doesn't celebrate birthdays. He later reveals to her why: one birthday, he invited all these people over for a party. They came, and so did Cowboy Hank, who entertained everyone. After he left, the kids left. They didn't even stay for cake. Though amusing, it's not a horrible story, and Natilie knows this. She decided to throw him a party anyway, one that he won't suspect.

But back to the case... Monk sees the lights off in the warehouse, and comes to the conclusion that someone must have turned the lights off. The only other person in the building at that time was Richard Meckler, who is an attorney selling the automatic vacuum cleaner made by Kurt Pressman. Monk is amazed by the contraption. During a reception, Meckler and a few others take a sip of Diet Coke. Then Meckler dies.

At each place they go during the investigation, Monk suspects he's at a surprise party, amuzingly looking for people in the oddest spots. It was also revealed at the morgue where Monk was looking under the sheets for people that Meckler was poisoned with a fast acting toxin. But who did it and why?

The do a renactment. But Meckler didn't eat any food. The only thing he could have been poisoned with was a drink, but he shared his drink with others. The plot thickens...

Later, Monk cleans the vacuum's filter when you weren't supposed to, and breaks it. He takes it to Pressman to fix, though when Natalie tells him he can't because he has to see Dr. Bell, he suspects that his party would be at Dr. Bells and Natalie gives up. Pressman says he can't until after his friend's funeral. On their way home, someone opens fire on the two of them, and they run into a Port-a-John for cover. The assasin hauls them to... Monk's surprise party!!! And Monk admits he was surprised!

Pressman is also at the party, but takes his drink and slips it away. Unfortunately for him, Monk is very observant and notices his ice cubes are different from everyone elses. He peices this together, and solves the case.

Here's what happened: Bradley Foster invented the vacuum cleaner and took his idea to Meckler. Meckler killed Foster and had Pressman pretend to be the inventor. But Pressman got greedy and killed Meckler so he could have all the money. When Pressman points out he drank from the same glass, Monk looks at his own drinks and realizes that his ice cubes are square but everyone else's are round. The poison was in the ice cubes, and Pressman drank from the glass before the ice cubes with the poison melted. Cowboy Hank arrives to lasso Pressman and the police take the killer away.

After the incident, Cowboy Hank puts on a show, and no one leaves. He admit's it's a great birthday, and tells her not to do it again. Oh, and that TK Stollemeyer likes- her first name is Trudy.

A great funny episode this week, I quite enjoyed it. Next week's also loooks interesting. Sharona is back! Though I prefer Natalie, it'll be interesting to see what conspires.

The Fringe Files: 2.5- "Dream Logic"

Case: Dream Logic- A man attacks his boss, believing him to be a demon-like creature.

History of Events: After a man attacks his boss thinking he his a demon, The Fringe Devision flies out to Seattle to investigate the srange occurance. After speaking with him, the man dies from such extreme exhaustion that his hair turns white. Walter decides to bring the body back to his lab with the help of another FBI agent while Olivia and Peter stay in Seattle. Back at the lab, he finds a microchip in the person's brain, and believes mind control was used. There's another death similar to what happened to the man, and Olivia finds the exact same findings. The chips lead the FBI to a doctor who was performing sleep studies on people with sleeping disorders. This chip, however, came with a sideffect. It made people dream while they were awake, and people had horrible nightmares, resulting in death. Walter performs a similar experiment on the FBI agent, but with a contraption that goes over the head instead of a microchip tin the brain. It turns out that the nice doctor is actually a dream addict with two personalities. He is the one causing these things to happen. He makes a plan to capture his alternate persona

Non-case Related Events: Walter and Peter have now moved into a bigger apartment. Olvia is still upset over losing Charlie. She tells a story to that bowling guy Sam about her first case. She wanted to run, but Charlie came over and said "You're gonna be fine". Throughout the entire episode, she was collecting busniess cards from everyone she met. At the end of the episode, it was revealed that the names on the cars was an anagram for "You're gonna be fine". Was it Charlie talking from beyond the grave? Finally, the last scene of the show was Peter having a nightmare about Walter when he was a kid. Could this be about his kidnapping from the alternate universe? Well, this much is certain: there was a poster in the room about a Challenger Space Shuttle mission that never occured.

IMO: I do love the monster mysteries on Fringe, but as the show progressed, I found out it wasn't about monsters at all. But I still enjoyed it. The new revelations about the Alternate Universe are always fun to get. And the whole business cards thing was cool and wierd at the same time.

Next Week's Case: Earthling