'Fringe' Has Always Been About Playing God
This Saturday, one of my favourite TV shows of the past few years comes to an end: Fringe (FX channel, now known as Fox in the UK). What initially attracted me to it was the similarity with an old favourite of mine, The X-Files. Though there are 2 major differences between the 2 series: 1 - throughout it's 5 seasons Fringe has become more and more serialised and less about standalone episodes, with the result that it has generally got more interesting as it has progressed, whereas the later seasons of The X-Files lost my interest altogether and lacked a compelling larger scale storyline. 2 - the character of Walter Bishop, played by the truly wonderful Australian actor John Noble (Denethor in "Lord Of The Rings"). He adds a whole other dimension to the series, playing (as most of the main cast do at different times) multiple incarnations of the same character that range from comical (yet grieving) mad scientist to frightening, God-complex dominated scientist hell...