Deconstruction Review of Fringe, Episode 3 Season 5 The Recordist
Posted by Karl Withakay on October 12, 2012
A Dreary Blue Episode
As always, an episode synopsis will be found over at Scott’s Polite Dissent
Where’s the Black Guardian?
In this episode of (original) Doctor Who, The Ribos Operation, the Doctor and Romana seek out the first segment of the Key to Time (needed to set the universe right), which is disguised as a lump of jethrik, a rare and powerful mineral, from the rural planet of Ribos where it supposedly came from a local mine.
Scratch that, wrong show. What I meant to say is:
In this episode of Fringe, The Recordist, the Fringe team seeks out the first component for Walter’s plan to defeat the Observers and set the world right, which is a rare and powerful mineral, from a mine in rural Pennsylvania.
Can You Hear Me Now?
I would think that the Observers are intercepting and monitoring all communications, including wireless communications, and that they have the processing power to analyze it all in real time, such that if someone were calling the Fringe team to warn them the observers were tracking them, the Observers would know about it. If the Fringe team is using some sort of advanced encryption tech that even the Observers can’t decipher, the Observers should at least be able to detect that signal, and any such encrypted signal should be a massive red flag for resistance activity, right? For plot convenience sake, we’ll have to assume some sort of special transmission technology/ technique that goes unnoticed by the Observers.
Old School/New School
What detected the Fringe team’s van on the roadside in rural Pennsylvania, and why couldn’t whatever it was be used to search for the van’s current location? Why did the Loyalists need to conduct a search using ground vehicles? Are there no air vehicles or spy satellites with infra-red imaging in the future?
In The Year 2036/ Oh My Aching Button Finger…
Apples are available in pill form, much like in The Jetsons. It seems like either those pills must have some sort of apatite suppressant in them, or they somehow expand to fill the stomach a bit, otherwise although they might be able to provide nutrition, they couldn’t satisfy hunger very well.
Time to Bug Out
“You’ve got what you came here for. Now leave before the Invaders find you here.”
The Recordists want the Fringe team to leave to prevent the Loyalists/Observers from finding their settlement, but regardless of whether or not the Fringe team leads the baddies away from the settlement, they already know that the team has been in the general area. It seems likely the hostiles would want to search the area to find out what the Fringe team was doing there. I think it’s not safe to stay in the settlement anymore; it’s going to be found.
In Two Weeks:
I can’t wait two weeks to cover the line spoken by Walter in the preview for the next episode. Walter says:
“There was a time when we solved Fringe cases. It’s time we created a few of our own.”
WTF? That’s nothing especially new. Weren’t nearly all of the Fringe cases at least indirectly caused by Walter?
Very Minor Trivia Note
The first three episodes of this season all feature words in the episode titles not found in my spell checker: Transilience, Absentia, and Recordist.
Cordial Deconstruction 
Rogelio Corte (@roger_cut) said
Hi! Thanks for the review. Just one thing: Walter says clearly in the video “forty NINE degrees”, and Olivia says “forty ONE”. However I couldn’t find any comment anywhere mentioning that. I’ve watched that part many times just to be sure. I kept expecting something to happen at the episode in connection with that, but it didn’t –it just went on and they seemed to have found what they were looking for, at the wrong location though. Cheers!
Marc Mielke said
Other than obvious sad dramatic reasons, why couldn’t the Recordist use the unfinished armour suit? Maybe it wouldn’t protect him fully, but it would seem a way better idea than just going down into the Rad Zone in your Vault-Tec skivvies!
Polite Dissent said
[…] have doubt, faith, and anger) A list of all previous Fringe reviews is available here. As always, Karl has more to […]
Francisco (FC) said
“Weren’t nearly all of the Fringe cases at least indirectly caused by Water?”
I’m telling you, H2O is a dangerous molecule…
Karl Withakay said
Yep, that stuff is absolutely lethal. http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html
Typo fixed, thanks. 🙂
Francisco (FC) said
Oh yeah, and don’t get me started on what that does to these guys: http://basementrejects.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/gremlins-stripe.jpg
You’re welcome 🙂
bros said
Anyone else notice Gene in the Amber behind Astrid in one of the scenes?
Don said
total lack of wow.
our comms phones are tracked and monitored now so are we to assume tech has gone backwards ?
It’s gotten boring fast. Is it to be one item per episode ??
Come on writers, amp it !!!
Don
loyal fan from s1e1
Karl Withakay said
Well, at least things like that give me something to write about and Deconstruct.
Don said
i was meaning the show not the review !
Karl Withakay said
Seriously, I agree with Polite Scott that this season seems likely to be thin on Fringe and more focused on the scavenger hunt/ quest for the golden fleece/sampo/etc. It’s a bit disappointing, since the Fringe stuff is the best fodder for scientific deconstruction. The upside is that it doesn’t take as long to write my blog posts.
thestonetape said
Respect to the classic Who knowledge. And for knowing it did it all first. And rememebring Jethryk – that’s serious fan-knoweldge. By the Master (no not that one) Robert Holmes