(no subject)
So I watched the Fringe finale, or I thought I did, but I clearly blinked at the wrong moment so completely missed what everyone else is exclaiming about. I'll have to find a way to rewatch the ending. That said! Let that not stop me from speculating the logic-structure.
Okay, so we knew all along that the Observer did something to alter the outcomes, and it was an accident or experiment but anyway it was a surprise. And we had the general sense that the intervention was when Walternate turned around in his lab and saw him, and thereby failed to notice that he'd discovered the cure to Peter's illness. And that most of the Observer's actions since then have been nudges to bring things back toward the original expected outcomes, or to account for the unexpected ramifications.
If Walternate had not turned around, he would have found the cure and saved Peter's life, right? We have no evidence at all that any Observer ever intervened in Walter's life around the time of Peter's illness, only in Walternate's. Walter's invention, to see the alt universe, Walter's impulse to seek out his other self, his intensive observation of Walternate finding the cure Walter had failed to find. None of that came from the Observer. If Walternate had not turned around, he would have found a cure and Peter would have grown up in his own world.
(Probably more like Tony Stark than like the hilarious love-child of Steve Jobs and Evel Knievel, but whatever.)
I don't understand why fixing the expected outcomes involves Peter's disappearance. He would have lived.
Whereas, the Observer's rescue at Reiden Lake makes total sense: having caused one alteration, he would see to it that Peter survived to play a role in the realignment of the timeline. No point in allowing the worlds to start crashing into each other to save Peter from kidney disease if he's just going to die of drowning, right?
I guess the only thing that makes sense is if we go back up the timeline to a time we haven't seen, before Peter is born and apparently preventing his birth. But that strikes me as narrative dirty pool, don't you think?
...Actually, exactly the sort of narrative dirty pool J. J. Abrams would pull. Never mind.
With that out of the way, I would like to report that between the age of 32 and 47 your looks and posture don't change at all, except for a bit of distinguished silver at your temples. Also, you can totally still be talking about having babies someday in the future if you're 46! I had to look him up to discover that John Noble is my parents' age (wow, I was off by like 15 years), but either way, I like to think that by the age of 75 his beard would grow in totally white.
Honestly, that future seemed awfully contrived, like a story hastily constructed rather than a textured world. For heaven's sake, Olivia "wicker headboard" Dunham lives in a sleek, squared-off modern apartment! AND WEARS HEELS. Surely this is a ringer universe meant to deceive Peter into doing something foolish!
Sadly, no. I felt the plot skitter away from the writers like a drop of water on a hot griddle, and I thought, Well, at least the summer will be full of fixit fanfic.
This entry was originally posted at http://vehemently.dreamwidth.org/23153.html. Comment wherever you like.
Okay, so we knew all along that the Observer did something to alter the outcomes, and it was an accident or experiment but anyway it was a surprise. And we had the general sense that the intervention was when Walternate turned around in his lab and saw him, and thereby failed to notice that he'd discovered the cure to Peter's illness. And that most of the Observer's actions since then have been nudges to bring things back toward the original expected outcomes, or to account for the unexpected ramifications.
If Walternate had not turned around, he would have found the cure and saved Peter's life, right? We have no evidence at all that any Observer ever intervened in Walter's life around the time of Peter's illness, only in Walternate's. Walter's invention, to see the alt universe, Walter's impulse to seek out his other self, his intensive observation of Walternate finding the cure Walter had failed to find. None of that came from the Observer. If Walternate had not turned around, he would have found a cure and Peter would have grown up in his own world.
(Probably more like Tony Stark than like the hilarious love-child of Steve Jobs and Evel Knievel, but whatever.)
I don't understand why fixing the expected outcomes involves Peter's disappearance. He would have lived.
Whereas, the Observer's rescue at Reiden Lake makes total sense: having caused one alteration, he would see to it that Peter survived to play a role in the realignment of the timeline. No point in allowing the worlds to start crashing into each other to save Peter from kidney disease if he's just going to die of drowning, right?
I guess the only thing that makes sense is if we go back up the timeline to a time we haven't seen, before Peter is born and apparently preventing his birth. But that strikes me as narrative dirty pool, don't you think?
...Actually, exactly the sort of narrative dirty pool J. J. Abrams would pull. Never mind.
With that out of the way, I would like to report that between the age of 32 and 47 your looks and posture don't change at all, except for a bit of distinguished silver at your temples. Also, you can totally still be talking about having babies someday in the future if you're 46! I had to look him up to discover that John Noble is my parents' age (wow, I was off by like 15 years), but either way, I like to think that by the age of 75 his beard would grow in totally white.
Honestly, that future seemed awfully contrived, like a story hastily constructed rather than a textured world. For heaven's sake, Olivia "wicker headboard" Dunham lives in a sleek, squared-off modern apartment! AND WEARS HEELS. Surely this is a ringer universe meant to deceive Peter into doing something foolish!
Sadly, no. I felt the plot skitter away from the writers like a drop of water on a hot griddle, and I thought, Well, at least the summer will be full of fixit fanfic.
This entry was originally posted at http://vehemently.dreamwidth.org/23153.html. Comment wherever you like.