REVIEW: Fringe: “Do Shapeshifters Dream of Electric Sheep?”

So far the third season of Fringe is turning out to be the best so far. JJ Abrams has woven a complicated web of high-stakes drama that is totally engrossing, and this week things got even more complicated for our Olivia clone when a shape shifter posing as a US Senator is killed in a car accident which threatens her cover.

To make things worse, Newton, the handler of all the shape shifters on this side of the dimensional wall, breaks into the hospital and shoots the dead senator in the head.

Fringe Director Candyman and Pacey realize that one shape shifter embedded in the government is just the tip of the iceberg and they set out to get any info they can from the still twitching android about his mission and who was helping him. They interrupt Walter during his first day as the head of Massive Dynamic as he rants to his frightened employees about God, and then begins to remove his pants. Pacey explains that Walter has been self-medicating again and sends him to his fancy new lab at Massive Dynamic to see if he can reboot the dead senator.

Not-Olivia and Pacey head off to search the “dead” senator’s office for clues about his mission. She tries to send Pacey away so she can destroy the evidence but he will have none of it, and eventually turns up a box with files on all the Fringe team members and their missions. This makes Pacey suspicious and when Pacey gets suspicious he paces a lot and furrows his brow in a very sexy way, and we like that.

Astrid show up at Massive Dynamic with a framed photo of George W Bush and an issue of Hump magazine that Walter thinks will help “stimulate” the brain activity of the android senator. Neither works very well so they haul in the senator’s widow instead, which makes Not-Olivia’s head explode when she realizes that if they reboot the android he might tell on her. She calls Newton and demands that he deal with the problem, and he promises he will.

The senator’s widow comes and the experiment almost works, but the only thing they manage to get out of the android was a date and series of random words that turns out to be a list of hotels he and his wife had planned to stay in on their anniversary trip next month. He didn’t mention electric sheep at all, so I guess the answer to the big question is NO. Not-Olivia uses this set-back as an excuse to get everyone out of the lab so the assassin that Newton is sending over can come in and retrieve the data chip from the android. They hit the Massive Dynamic cafeteria and Pacey talks to Not-Olivia about how the senator’s wife could live with him for so long and not know it was a robot. He guesses she made excuses for the differences, just like he does with Not-Olivia because she is, well, NOT Olivia. He ignores the mild panic in her eyes and goes on to say that her experience on the other side changed her, but that the change is good and he is so dopey in love he doesn’t see the obvious.

Meanwhile Walter and Astrid talk about dinosaurs, of course. They wax poetic about the Stegosaurus and Water suddenly remembers that the Stegosaurus had two brains, one in its head and one in its ass. Inspired, he abandons his pudding and heads back upstairs just as the assassin arrives. It’s so obvious that the Tyrannosaurus Rex is the king of dinosaurs and far more awesome than the stegosaurus in every way, well except maybe for its tiny baby doll arms but that’s ok. Neither Astrid or Walter realize this though and I am forced to endure more talk about the stegosaurus’ ass. Whatever.

Just as Walter is about to examine the senators ass the assassin comes in and knocks him down. Walter watches as the man removes the second brain chip from the base of the senator’s spine and leaves with it, passing Pacey and Not-Olivia on the way out. They see his greasy silver fingerprints and give chase, but lose him in the massively dynamic lobby. (see what I did there?). Pacey checks the security camera and gets the name and address of the assassin. They show up in a fancy new Ford Taurus just as Newton kills him and drives off in an old Ford Taurus. Was that on purpose? Was Ford trying to tell us something there? Like “look how ugly the old Taurus was. Don’t you want a shiny new one?” They are pretty cool actually, for a Ford I guess. Oh yeah, the chase.

Pacey shows off the mad driving skills he learned on the mean streets of Capeside and stays on Newton’s ass until the ugly old Taurus crashes in a tunnel. Not-Olivia rushes in and takes the disc from him while Pacey calls for backup.

Newton ends up in jail, and Not-Olivia pays him one final visit so she can deliver a Listerine Breath Strip laced with Super Xtreme Android Killer. Newton offs himself and Not-Olivia calls Pacey for a booty call, knowing that men are easier to deceive when you confuse them with sex. Well duh!

Fringe is on hiatus for two weeks so the networks can show us lots of baseball and Halloween oriented programming but the previews indicate that all kinds of hell is going to break loose just in time for November sweeps. Funny how it always happens that way. Fringe returns on Thursday November 4th.

Photo Cred: Liane Hentscher/FOX

follow me on Twitter @omgneal

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