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Recapped by Daniel · Aired 04-01-2012

We get a blast from the past this week, as we revisit the case where a man freaked out on a plane and transformed into a porcupine man and perished along with everyone else in a fiery crash. Peter's familiarity with the case (as well as Olivia's memories, via old/new Olivia) both helps -- since he has some idea what's going on — and hinders, as some of the details have changed. In this case, Marshall (Porcupine Man) Bowman transforms back into human on the plane, but goes into beast mode and dies once he's down on the ground and being interrogated by TSA agents.

They're down a body in Fringe division, because Olivia's memory wipe means the FBI is concerned she's not the same agent they licensed. Example: she talks to an FBI shrink about how her sister went back to Chicago to be near her douchebag ex-husband. Except here, her sister is still married and she and her husband have two kids.

Of course, it's not like Olivia's going to let anything like a direct order keep her from working the case, and she shows up at the house of Marshall Bowman's partner, only to find he's a monster already; he attacks Olivia and escapes.

A tattoo of a cuneiform symbol on Bowman's corpse leads Peter to his bookseller friend, who doesn't know him or Olivia (although he can't help himself from hitting on Olivia), and with his help they track the symbol to a cult of whackjobs who are all about improving the human species; mutation by design. This is worrisome for everyone, perhaps most of all Lincoln, who may have been infected in the attack.

That monster has shown up at the home of some woman who, far from being freaked out, helps calm him down and give him an injection, while talking about how perfect they're going to be, like Adam and Eve.

Eventually, after a Massive Dynamic connection (naturally) is uncovered, and the discovery that it was an experiment overseen by David Robert Jones, the FBI finds the creature and kills it, after blinding it when they figure out that the nocturnal porcupine-bat creature would be sensitive to light. Lincoln is almost killed again twice, once by the creature and once by its human girlfriend.

The team's left with some burning questions, boiling down to what's Jones' deal, anyway? And rather than give Olivia shit for getting involved when she shouldn't have been, Broyles says they've decided she can be back on the team, since 60 percent of Olivia is better than 90 percent of everyone else.

We close out with Bowman's sister recruiting some other poor sap to the porcupine-man army, and a floating nightmare: a ship with some kind of collection of animal hybrids that we only get glimpses of. Huge spider legs here, a massive rattler's tail there. Night terrors tonight, folks.

Daniel is a writer in Newfoundland with a wife and a daughter. If we don't see the spider-creature again, he'll be really upset. Follow him on Twitter (@DanMacEachern) or email him at danieljdaniel@gmail.com.

How strange to kick off the "previously on Fringe" scenes tonight with clips from a mid-Season 1 episode that was largely a monster-of-the-week! You know, "The Transformation," where Mayor Carcetti's chief of staff turns into a snarling porcupine man. But it felt nice, almost nostalgic, didn't it? Like looking at the yearbook from your freshman year?

Stranger still, that when the episode actually starts, and we see the exact same scenes we saw back then: the same blissfully happy people in first class on Vertus Air, the same announcement about strong winds and turbulence, the same old lady sitting to the soon-to-be Porcupine Man. I suppose it would have been impractical to round up all the extras from this scene for continuity's sake. Besides, this old woman could be dead by this point.

Not Yet Porcupine Man is, as before, scribbling away in some sort of journal when his nose starts dripping dark crimson blood on the page. His seatmate again offers the same useless advice -- "put keys on your back" -- that she did originally. I remember being annoyed when she revealed that it's all bull, that she tried it herself and it didn't work. Well, thanks for sharing!

Same nervous trip to the lavatory, same shaky test of a tongue swab that turns a solution bright red, some agitated discussion with the flight attendants as Potential Porcupine tells them to round up all the sedatives and tranquilizers they can, dismissing their assumptions that this is some kind of panic attack. We don't see any discussion of weapons on board, like we did before; instead, we skip right to Buddy saying he's going back to the bathroom, and giving the flight attendant the same stark warning he did before: "When you get the drugs, you come back, you knock. If I don't answer or if I do and what you see isn't me anymore, you keep that door closed," he says.

Back to the lavatory, where he starts convulsing. He checks his eyes -- which change color to an inhuman yellow. Out in the cabin, the other passengers seem a little concerned about the agonizing grunting coming from the bathroom.

Unlike last time, the bathroom gets a visit from the air marshal, who knocks on the door, ordering the man to come out.

Which he does, looking fine. Normal eyes. Teeth still in place. Nose no longer bloody, and, most important, not an unholy beast more porcupine than man running rampage through the cabin. Marshall? Meet the air marshal. Marshal? Marshall.

By Daniel

On the ground now, and Non-Porcupine Man, also known as Marshall Bowman, is being interrogated by a TSA agent and chalking the whole thing up to a panic attack. "I hate flying. I always have, ever since I was a kid. But I was doing pretty well until they said that we weren't going to be able to land for a while," he says. The agent looks skeptical.

Another agent comes in with Bowman's luggage, and Bowman gets agitated when the agent unzips it. "Don't you have to ask permission before you do that?" says Bowman, which surely won't arouse suspicion. But the searching agent just says, "Not since Bush II." Oh, right. The whole suspension of civil liberties thing.

Bowman asks if they can make it quick, prompting the stink-eye from the agents, even more so when he makes a joke that all they're going to find is underwear, but "don't worry, it's clean."

Then he starts convulsing again, and his nose is bleeding again, and he asks for a bathroom. One of the agents points him toward a door and gets to rummaging as Bowman staggers to the john.

So while Bowman's teeth fall out and his eyes turn yellow, the agents find a secret compartment in his luggage with a little case that contains a couple of a syringes and little vials of variously colored solutions. "Panic attack, as in 'withdrawal,'" mutters one of the agents.

Man, either the bathroom is soundproof or the agents are studiously ignoring Bowman's screams, because he's crouching on the floor, and we see the spines erupt from his back (looks like the same footage from the original episode, which is a little unfortunate, because that happened in the airplane bathroom, which was a different color from this one). And just as Agent Knolls gets on the phone to tell someone that they've got drugs again, albeit nothing he's ever seen before, Porcupine Man breaks open the bathroom door. And just like the original episode, we're given only the briefest of glances before we jump to the credits, leaving our grisly imaginations to run wild.

After the opening credits, we're with Olivia visiting the FBI psychiatrist, and few things make me nod off faster whilst watching television than the ol' psychiatrist visit (except for maybe the ol' symbolic dream sequence). There's going to be a few plot points that arise because of it. The shrink is focusing on the fact that Olivia's not too concerned about forgetting all the details of her life, while Olivia classifies that as a problem she can handle. "The real problem, the one that we should all be worried about, is Jones." That would be David Robert Jones. "The one who kidnapped me," explains Olivia. The shrink looks a little surprised that Olivia remembers that -- and Olivia is a little less than convincing -- because she's already starting to become her former self from another timeline.

Olivia looks less than comfortable discussing it, but the way she sees it, Jones is still out there... and instead of pursuing him, she's had to take every psych evaluation out there, as well as CAT scans, MRIs, etc. "My sitting here now, trying to convince an FBI shrink -- no offense -- that I am fit to return to active duty is pointless," she says. When said shrink points out, not unreasonably, that what's happened to her is a little weird, Olivia's reaction is essentially, "Bitch, please. I work in Fringe Division."

The psychiatrist asks if Olivia told her sister, and Olivia says no. They're close, but they don't talk that often, what with Olivia having a life and a job and all that. Plus Rachel moved back to Chicago with Ella so Ella could be closer to Rachel's ex. "Who, in my opinion, is a liar and a bastard," says Olivia. Man, I'd really love to see Olivia's Facebook status updates. The shrink puts on her glasses, so you know thinks are about to get really serious.

Broyles' office. Olivia comes in and he invites her to sit down. She doesn't though, because she can tell from his demeanor what Broyles is about to tell her. "They said no," she guesses. Broyles says the truth is that they don't actually know what to say: "Nothing like this has ever happened before. The Bureau has protocols for dealing with mental trauma, depression, post-traumatic stress, amnesia," he says, and an irritated Olivia says she doesn't have mental trauma. Yeah, that's the POINT, Olivia. The Bureau HAS A PROTOCOL FOR THAT. NOT THIS. But she's off on a rant about how it doesn't matter if she can't remember every detail of every case she's ever investigated. She's in high dudgeon when Broyles interrupts to tell her that her sister is still married.

Olivia stares at him, and he elaborates: "Rachel is still married. She and her husband have two children, Ella and a younger brother, Eddie."

Dr. Anderson's already sent over her report, Broyles tells Olivia, and he says that 40 percent of all the information she provided about her life is incorrect. (I'm a little curious about how they'd quantify that, actually.) "Which, as far as the tenth floor is concerned, means you are not the agent they licensed."

Olivia, floored, sits down. "Our grandfather's name was Eddie," she says, almost absent-mindedly, if you'll excuse the expression.

She arrives home, where Peter calls out, "Is that you?" -- which really any person can truthfully answer "yes" to -- and he asks what took her so long and jokes that he was about to send out a search party, which for Peter involves dogs and men in trench coats, and thank god Olivia finally steps to where he can see her face and realize now's not a good time for his alleged charm.

By Daniel

Olivia, floored, sits down. "Our grandfather's name was Eddie," she says, almost absent-mindedly, if you'll excuse the expression.

"That good, huh?" he says. Olivia says they don't want her even consulting on cases. Peter cheerfully says that's surely only temporary, which Olivia seems to confirm by telling him Broyles suggested she think of it as an overdue vacation. All things considered, she actually seems to be taking it pretty well, mainly because she's got Peter's love again? Ugh, I know, that's ridiculous. Peter says Vermont's beautiful this time of year, like it's possible to come up with a time of year when Vermont isn't beautiful. "I know you don't like skiing, but as long as we got a rug and a fireplace, I think we'll be fine," says Peter.

Fortunately, his phone rings, so we don't have to hear any more about how he wants to rub his body all over Olivia's. "You should answer that. I think the '70s are calling," says Olivia. Score one for Dunham!

We don't hear the other end of the phone call, just Peter's surprise at being called. After he gets off, Olivia guesses it was Lincoln. It was. "Well, one of us is still on the team," she says. Peter starts to try to comfort her or something, and she tells him to go, that she'll be fine. "I'll be back as soon as I can," he says. Yeah, maybe it'll be one of those twenty-minute Fringe cases! He leaves, and Olivia sits forlornly at the table. Come on, Olivia! Do you even have a television?

At Harvard, Lincoln's telling Astrid -- who looks different somehow this week. Severely plucked eyebrows or something? -- to see if she can get access to the surveillance footage. Peter strolls up and Lincoln asks how Olivia's doing. She's frustrated, but OK, Peter says. Lincoln's all, NBD, but Broyles asked me to take lead until she's back. "I hope that you're OK with that," says Lincoln. Even if you're not, Peter!

As for what happened, they're not sure yet but details are still coming in: there was an incident on a Vertus Air flight from Paris to New York. Peter, recognizing it, asks if it was Flight 718, and Lincoln says it was. Peter figures that if this is like the timeline he's from, then it stands to reason that some of the exact same cases would take place. Except wouldn't it have already happened here too? Never mind, not important.

Peter starts to protest, but Walter interrupts: "I know you're not him, my Peter, but you're as close as I'm going to get."

Walter pulls a bottle of beer from the box. "For when you turned 21," he says, adding that he probably wouldn't drink it now. No, but I can imagine Walter experimenting with it. Happy, Peter gives Walter a big hug and thanks him, and Walter, a little choked up, says he's welcome, and they stare at each other for a moment. Astrid smiles while Lincoln's all, "Um, we have a CASE here."

Peter remembers that the guy on the plane was Marshall Bowman, an undercover cop who was given a designer virus that was programmed to rewrite his DNA and turn him into some kind of a giant porcupine. But the plane crashed, and he was burnt to a crisp. Walter interjects to say that he likes porcupines because it shows God has a sense of humor. No, male pattern baldness shows God has a sense of humor. Kind of a cruel one.

But Astrid has some news for Peter: the guy's name was Bowman, but the flight didn't crash -- it landed a few hours ago. Walter, not paying attention at all, has produced a copy of Hump magazine that was evidently for Peter's 16th birthday, since Walter figured Peter'd be "all about girls" by then. Now I'm trying to envision my own father buying pornography for me, and I can't do it. And now I have to go throw up.

The agents, however, are watching the footage of the rampaging beast at the TSA office. We only get snippets of glimpses of the carnage but what the agents see is apparently gruesome stuff. It's enough to make even Walter, still clutching Hump magazine, to say, "Fantastic."

Then it's over to the scene of destruction, where Porcupine Bowman is dead under a sheet. Astrid, who you'd think had seen enough of this kind of stuff by now, declares it disgusting and Walter tells her to learn to see past the obvious: "What a remarkable specimen," he marvels.

Meanwhile, Peter's interviewing Bowman's sister, who says the last time she saw him was a little over a week ago. She's upset that she's apparently not allowed to see her brother but Peter tells her that even if he had the authority to do that -- which he doesn't -- it's not a good idea.

She seems distraught, so Peter apologizes for putting her through this, but he's got one last question; he's got Bowman's notes and asks her about the part at the end where he has written, "Once we get started, there'll be no turning back." Peter wants to know if she has any idea what that might be about or who he was writing it to. She doesn't, but the last couple of times the two of them spoke, he didn't seem himself. Jesus, you should see him now. She just figured he was stressed from work.

By Daniel

Peter goes out to the crime scene to tell Lincoln that she doesn't know anything. Meanwhile, Lincoln's learned that Peter was right: Bowman working out of Credit Cotier in Marseille, managing their corporate accounts. But before that, he was a detective in the BPD crash unit, retired six years ago... at least officially. "Sounds to me like a cop working undercover," says Lincoln. Yeah, one of those undercover Boston cops in a six-year sting operation in France.

But no one knows what killed the thing; agents down the hall heard screams, and by the time they opened the door, it was on the floor writhing in pain and then it just died. Peter says that on the case they worked before, Bowman was working with a partner who was infected but didn't know it, and he almost transformed a couple of days later. Peter can't remember the guy's name, though. Olivia would, he says. Lincoln, looking a little conflicted about it, suggests he give her a call.

And then they're on the way to Daniel Hicks' place. And because we haven't cut right to Hicks' place, that means we're going to get a little heavy car conversation. After some awkward silence, Peter says, "You want to talk about it, or should we just pretend like we already did? Olivia."

Lincoln, studiously nonchalantly, is all, "She's your Olivia, I get it. I mean, I don't really get it, how she can suddenly become this other version of herself." He says that under different circumstances, he might think Peter was drugging her. Then Lincoln talks about how when he met Olivia she'd just lost his own partner, Robert, who had an incredible relationship with his wife Julie. "The way she looked at him, Olivia looks at you that same way. So why don't we just leave it at that?" says Lincoln, looking a little bit more pissed off as he continues driving. Peter smiles at hearing how into him Olivia is, I guess, but it kinda looks like a little smirk. "You're a good guy," says Peter, like SHUT UP, PETER, Lincoln doesn't want to hear it! Lincoln, sardonic: "Yeah, I'm a good guy."

Peter heads to check the back, because splitting up is a GENIUS IDEA when you're looking for someone who may have changed into a vicious porcupine beast. Lincoln finds bags of medical waste in the kitchen and wonders what it's about. Olivia says she doesn't know because they didn't find these last time.

"Remember you said eventually all this would stop getting strange? In case you were wondering, it still hasn't," he says. Even in the darkness, he can tell she's looking at him blankly: she doesn't remember having the conversation. Maybe Lincoln should make stuff up! "Hey, remember I lent you a thousand bucks? When were you going to pay that back?" I mean, he might as well try to make the best of it.

Peter, meanwhile, is checking the back and finding nothing, but he is startled by a door swinging shut.

Even expecting an attack, though, I was genuinely startled by the beast jumps out at Lincoln (who is now on his own) and throws him against a wall. Olivia comes racing in and manages to fire off a shot or two at the creature, which skedaddles, and then Peter comes in. Safety in numbers, you IDIOTS.

Back at the lab, Walter is stitching up Lincoln's shoulder instead of that being done at a hospital, and humming while he does it, annoying Lincoln, as does Walter's explanation that auditory distraction dulls the peripheral senses and allows for optimal focus, which is why surgeons play classical music in the OR.

Olivia comes in to report there was no word of anyone seeing the beast that got away. As for the one they've got in the lab, Peter says they're still not sure why it died, but Walter's theory is that its cells broke down, that the rapid mutation caused all the internal organs to fail. And the injection kit with the rainbow of solutions? No idea yet either, says Peter, but they're running labs on it to try to break down the chemical composition. Peter shows her track marks on the creature's arm: "We think he was injecting himself with whatever that stuff is," says Peter, who must be some kind of forensic genius for making that leap.

Olivia finds some sort of tattoo that the Bishop boys apparently missed, and Peter calls Walter over ("Did you find his genitals, son?") to look at it. Lincoln's left to awkwardly man the tweezers holding the surgical thread, and he's defenseless in the onslaught of Olivia's apology, because she feels like if she hadn't been there, he would have called for backup. I'm not sure that's true; he didn't even mention it at the time and I can't imagine the thought process would have been, "There's a potentially murderous beast in there, maybe we should bring in some backup. Nah, we've got Olivia, we're good." Because she's worried that he didn't want to call Broyles with Olivia there, but for crying out loud, he could have said, "We're calling for backup, so Olivia, you'd better make yourself scarce." I mean, it's not like she would have listened then either, but he could have said that.

And it's not like she's STOPPED working the case now; Astrid comes up to say she ran the name that Olivia gave her: Conrad Etienne Moreau. "You're right, he was a scientist. But he died five years ago in a car crash." Olivia's stunned, and Peter says it doesn't make any sense, because on the case he worked, Moreau was the one trying to broker the deal for the mutating virus.

Lee points out that not all the details the two of them remember from the other timeline are tracking here, and Olivia wonders who's behind it if Moreau isn't.

Walter's got an idea: the Sumerians! Well, not really, but it turns out that Bowman's tattoo is cuneiform. He's not sure what the symbol means, but he thinks it's Sumerian, and then he goes off on a digression about how his favorite ancient language is actually Yiddish, taught to him by Bell's father, and blah blah blah.

Peter says he and Olivia know someone who might be able to interpret the tattoo: "An old friend, though he may take some convincing 'cause I'm pretty sure he has no idea who we are."

Lee -- still holding his own surgical thread -- sounds intrigued, but Walter won't let him go because he still needs to be stitched up. Rather than telling Walter to hurry up with the damn stitches, Lincoln just gives Olivia the go-ahead. It's a good thing he's learned his lesson!

And it's off to Eddie Markham's bookstore, and Peter's right: Ed doesn't appear to recognize them at all. Peter doesn't bother trying to tell him about alternate timelines or anything, he just asks on Olivia's behalf for a book called Lake of the Long Sun by Gene Wolfe -- does Ed know him? "Are you kidding me? I worship him. And a girl as beautiful as you who likes sci-fi is a girl after my own heart," says Ed, who introduces himself. Olivia does likewise but also announces she's taken, like maybe he was just being nice, Olivia. Conceited. Markham says all the best ones are. However! He's got the entire Solar Cycle, and asks if she wants it signed or unsigned.

While Markham searches through the stacks, Olivia and Peter have a loud, meant-to-be-overheard discussion over whether Markham could help them with the other thing before pretending to decide it would be too obscure for him.

He jumps at the bait and Olivia says they're trying to decipher a cuneiform symbol, and Markham's all, "Sumerian, Hittite or Arkadian?" and Olivia's all "very impressive" and Markham tries hitting on her again, just as futilely. But she shows him the symbol, and he's somewhat surprised: "Are you one of them?" he asks. Buddy, even if she were, she likely wouldn't remember.

By Daniel

Peter says he and Olivia know someone who might be able to interpret the tattoo: "An old friend, though he may take some convincing 'cause I'm pretty sure he has no idea who we are."

Back at the lab, Lincoln has been stitched up and he grabs his jacket and is headed out the door when he's stopped by Walter, who speaks Yiddish, admonishing him essentially for leaving the table without asking to be excused. And that's just rude, because Walter has made peanut butter and bacon sandwiches!

Lincoln manages to turn down what sounds like a perfectly disgusting offer, but the other problem is, as Walter hesitatingly explains, Lincoln may be infected. Lincoln immediately starts to lose his mind, clutching his shoulder, as Walter explains that if it was a virus that killed the beast-man, then it stands to reason there's a possibility Lincoln got infected when he was scratched.

By Daniel

Lincoln, stammering, wants Walter to do something about it and Walter, laughing like this is self-evident, says, "I can't cure the intermediate stage!" They have to wait until the virus matures and then Walter is eighty percent sure he can counteract it. Lincoln wants to know what happens if he's part of the twenty percent. Well, then there will be a hundred percent whining around the lab, for one thing.

Meanwhile, Markham has found an explanation for the Sumerian tattoo: It means "renewal" or "rebirth" and it's the symbol of a whack job cult that's obsessed with guided evolution of man. "They want to create a new species, a better species. Mutation by design," he says. Peter looks at Olivia in alarm. Yes, apparently the symbol on mutated porcupine man's arm is related to a group that's interested in mutations!

Elsewhere, a woman arrives home doing that thing that people on television do where they walk through a huge dark home and turn on one tiny little lamp while looking at the mail, all the better to let the creature skulking about the shadows to continue to remain unseen.

But then she senses the movement, glimpses something ducking around a corner and nervously approaches. When she finally sees the beast, she gasps -- more out of surprise than fear, it turns out. "Oh, baby, you're hurting," she says, and turns out the one light that's on.

She walks up to Porcupine Man, and gently strokes him, then leans in for an embrace. Then she injects him with something, saying it should be the last one. The beast groans. "Just think how special you're going to be," she says. "How special we're both going to be. Like Adam and Eve." The beast blinks, like, "We're going to have to repopulate the Earth? I didn't say anything about having kids."

So back at the Harvard lab, Olivia, Peter and Astrid are enjoying making fun of Mayan prophecies of serpent ropes and celestial ships. Walter, watching from the other side of the lab whilst also looking into a microscope, takes in the good-natured tomfoolery and says, "It's perfect," and Lincoln thinks Walter's talking about his blood culture, and Walter confesses that he was talking about them: "I hadn't realized how much I longed for family." Lincoln crabbily says that they're great, and Walter hastens to include Lincoln because it's not every day that "a perfectly suited chess partner" comes along.

By Daniel

Anyway, Astrid's discovered more of what the cult believes: "Each generation of gods is overthrown by its children, who become new gods with new tools. Science delivers these tools, and mankind gains dominion over all he surveys." Tsk! Typical sexist religion.

Anyway, most of it's about encoding foreign genomes with retroviral DNA, but Walter, coming over to have a look, notes that the file number is "816tpt618" -- a palindromic code. And wouldn't you know it, years ago when he and Belly were "tripping," they created a way of organizing lab files using only palindromes. Olivia asks if he's saying this information comes from Massive Dynamic. You know, at some point, Fringe is going to realize that it's much more efficient to start the investigation at Massive Dynamic.

However, over at Massive Dynamic -- one of those trips that probably could have been replaced with a phone call -- Nina can't help them, because they haven't used that file system for years -- they converted to a more "user-friendly" system after Belly died. Olivia suggests it's from a terminated experiment, and Nina says she'll have to run a search since they have many projects dealing with the genetic engineering of hybrids.

As she gets to typing, she glances at Olivia and notes that "Phillip" said she'd been pulled off field duty. Olivia shrugs, all, "I know, but here I am," which is about as nice a way to say, "Mind your own damn business," as I can think of and Nina chalks it up to the possibility that every version of Olivia is stubborn.

But success! The file number corresponds to an old project, but the contents have been erased. Peter asks if it could have been hacked into from the outside. Nina doesn't see how because the system doesn't have eight redundant firewalls. Yeah, it sounds like it was as safe as your Cortexiphan supply that no one could have accessed, right?

Olivia asks who was overseeing the project. Turns out it was Lane Pryce. I mean, David Robert Jones.

Over at the Harvard lab, Lincoln is plowing through the sandwiches Walter made. Well, he's actually just picking off the bacon and eating that. Maybe one of the characteristics of the engineered mutation is that people with the virus eat their feelings! Lincoln wants more bacon. MORE BACON. Walter calls for "Aphid" to provide some, and then something dawns on him: He asks Lincoln what else he's hungry for -- pickled herrings, spinach? Lee says he doesn't know, but some onion rings would be nice, maybe some cheesecake. Sounds like the Betty Draper off-season diet! Lincoln trails off, staring at Walter's midsection. Walter grabs his own love handle, and then tells Lincoln to call Peter and Olivia, and tell them he understands.

At Harvard, Lincoln -- who could change into a porcupine-bat himself if he doesn't get help -- is nevertheless balking at the wheatgrass, penicillin and laxative blend that Walter's brewing up. Walter hands him a beaker full of the stuff, telling him that he added mint to kill the aftertaste. Lincoln takes a healthy swig and then chokingly reports that the mint maneuver didn't work.

Then Walter checks in with Peter, telling him he's figured out what the injections are for: to safely manage the transformation. "They're on a schedule to ensure that the mutation doesn't occur too quickly." That's why Bowman died, Peter figures; he was in the cabin, and the drugs were stuck down in his checked luggage. Yeah, thanks a lot, Osama bin Laden!

Anyway, you're never going to believe this, but Walter's got a computer model that is able to use Lincoln's infected blood to replicate the mutation sequence, which sounds utterly preposterous to me. Nevertheless, we're watching a rendering of the Porcupine Man spinning around on screen, and it doesn't have bat wings, because, according to Walter, it just needs to recreate the last few injections.

Then Olivia and Astrid check in with good news (well, at least for the purposes of their investigation): a surgical center just outside of Allston was robbed ten days ago, and a half-dozen bags of surgically removed fat were stolen. The bad news is that two of guards were killed during the robbery and the place has been under lockdown ever since, meaning that if they need more fat, they're gonna have to get it from someplace else. The problem is that there are over forty-five potential clinics in a ten-mile radius. Yeah, and besides, they're in Boston, so if they get really desperate for human fat, they're gonna have options.

Fortunately, this ridiculous computer program has managed to sketch in the wings, so Peter asks how many of the clinics were in high-rises. Well, surely LOTS of those forty-five clinics would be in -- oh, just one? Really? OK, well, that sure is lucky!

So the agents are off to LDP Institute, which is in Beacon Hill on the 12th floor. But this time, Lincoln stops them and tells Peter that he's got no choice: "I need to call for reinforcements. I have to inform Broyles."

Peter's all, if you call Broyles, he's gonna know that Olivia was working on the case, like HELLO, PETER, YOU ARE GOING AFTER A MURDEROUS PORCUPINE BAT, but fortunately Olivia's there to remind them that they are not in charge of her li'l ol' feminine self and announces that she just called Broyles, who will have backup meet them at the facility. "He said he'd deal with me later."

So the Fringe folk and the SWAT team enter the darkened lab, and maybe someone can explain to me why it's a good idea that the infected Lincoln go along, and why it's a good idea for them to go radio-silent just because the power has been shut off?

At least the lights-out gives us the chance to watch what's going on in night-vision, and the agents have those cool red pinpoint laser sights sweeping around all over the place, even if we can see the monster moving around before they can.

Back at the Harvard lab, Walter comes out of the bathroom, clutching his 20-year-old copy of Hump magazine, and the less said about that the better. He's suitably chagrined to see Olivia standing there, but she's probably too worried about the raid to appear outwardly grossed out.

Walter heads over to the chess game that he's got going on with Lincoln, hoping to ease the tension he's feeling. Shouldn't his bathroom time with Miss Hump 1992 have helped with that? He starts crowing when he recognizes that Lincoln is using the sleeping-Indian defense: "He saw my rook about to take his queen, and he countered with his knight."

Hearing "knight" makes Olivia think of "night" and she remembers Walter talking about how porcupines are nocturnal -- not to mention BATS, geez -- and she tells Astrid to get Lincoln on the radio. WHICH IS OF COURSE TURNED OFF. He -- having not learned his lesson -- is by himself, when he finds some ripped-up medical waste bags. And we can see the creature in the shadows in the room behind him, and maybe someone should tell Lincoln that the night-vision goggles aren't helpful if you're not going to LOOK AROUND THE ROOM.

So Olivia calls Peter on his cellphone. Hey, if they had to turn off the radios, shouldn't Peter at the very least have put his phone on airplane mode?

Anyway, she tells him that they should turn on all the lights, because the creature is likely sensitive to it.

The lights don't come on quick enough to prevent Porcupine Man from knocking Lincoln to the floor again, but they do come up just as it's about to finish Lincoln off. The creature is blinded and disoriented, and starts howling. Lincoln -- who has his night-vision goggles on -- is likewise discombobulated, but still manages to fire off a few rounds that hit the creature in the chest, and it staggers backwards and falls to the floor.

He's not safe yet, because an enraged Mrs. Porcupine Man attacks him with a knife, and she's getting the upper hand until Peter shoots her in the shoulder, like THANKS FOR EVERYTHING, SWAT TEAM. Lincoln, extremely freaked out, tells Peter, "Nice shot." Peter: "I was aiming for her leg." Really? Which leg? She was straddling Lincoln! Anyway, while she's writhing in pain on the floor, she looks over and sees her beastly boyfriend close his eyes and go still, and she starts wailing "No!" Seriously, a porcupine widow at her age. Tragedy.

By Daniel

So Olivia calls Peter on his cellphone. Hey, if they had to turn off the radios, shouldn't Peter at the very least have put his phone on airplane mode?

Anyway, she tells him that they should turn on all the lights, because the creature is likely sensitive to it.

By Daniel

Back at the Harvard lab, Walter is tearing into the presents that he'd wrapped up for Peter. In addition to the beer and the ever-present Hump magazine, we can see a skateboard (shit, I'm in my 30s and I still feel sometimes like getting on a board), and then he unwraps one of those things that's a magnetized wheel on a track? I had one of those. They're one of those toys that were invented before kids had videogames. Play with it for twenty seconds and it's, "OK. Now what? What do you mean, 'this is all it does'?"

Then Peter comes in, sees the thing and is thrilled and he starts playing with it. And while the Bishop boys play with their toys, Astrid and Olivia realize there is still WORK to be done, and Olivia tells Astrid that the woman's at the hospital and she'll be fine; the bullet didn't cause any permanent damage, and they're treating the virus with Walter's cure that he apparently came up with at some point off screen.

The bad news, Peter tells everyone, is that she has no idea who created the serum; Bowman was the one who obtained it for them. So there are lots more questions, like if David Robert Jones is behind this, what's he up to?

Walter floats the possibility that creating a flying human-porcupine hybrid was the end goal. Olivia wants to know where he is recruiting these people from, are there more out there, and SERIOUSLY WHO WOULD SIGN UP TO DO THIS, WHAT THE HELL. "'And mankind gains dominion over all he surveys,'" says Walter, launching into a ramble about humanity evolving from slugs in the ocean -- depending on who you talk to, he says -- and that it's either a miracle or an accident, and maybe Jones is trying to take control of the situation.

That's when Broyles comes in, Lt. Buzzkill himself, glowering at everyone and asking for a word with Olivia. The two of them go outside the office to talk, with Olivia babbling away about how she's sorry for disobeying her orders, and how she shouldn't have gotten involved because if she hadn't, then Lincoln wouldn't have been hurt, etc. "Are you done?" says Broyles when Olivia finally stops talking for two damn seconds. Obviously he's worked things out so that she can continue working because even sixty percent of the Olivia he knows is still better than ninety per cent of the agents he's ever worked with, which... kinda makes me sad for the FBI, actually. "And a Fringe Division with an Olivia Dunham is better than a Fringe Division without her," he adds, and done blowing smoke up her ass for the episode, he leaves, and Olivia allows herself a small smile as she goes back into the office.

Fringe TV Show - Animal Kingdom - Fringe Photos &amp; Videos, Fringe Reviews &amp; Fringe Recaps | TWoP

Fringe TV Show - Animal Kingdom - Fringe Photos & Videos, Fringe Reviews & Fringe Recaps | TWoP