The bonds of family, the ecstasy of romance, the exhilaration of intellectual inquiry, and a secret government agency working to protect you from all kinds Read the full post.
Mar 11
2011
10:07 AM ET
'Fringe': Save this show! A guide (and a plea) for new fans.
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I’ve watched Fringe from the beginning and have loved it since day one! Some people don’t like sci-fi and think if you do then you are a nerd. They couldn’t be more wrong or closed-minded. Fringe is an awesome show, as was Lost, and I really hope Fox renews it.
Oh one more thing about Walter – apparently people who don’t watch the show think he’s a raving crazy loon. He’s actually playing a man slowly recovering from mental illness. Also, the scenes between Walter and Peter are such a joy. (Especially if you are a grown child having to deal with a sometimes childlike parent.)
Walter has his moments of taking care of Peter too. Their father-son dynamic is one of the MANY reasons I love this show!
I absolutely love this show! Every episode is like a mini-movie I wish could last 2 hours! I wasn’t sure about the love story between Peter and Olivia at first-but I am so hooked now!! Please FOX-don’t make a mistake and end this intelligent, entertaining show! Viva la Fringe!
This show is pure gold since season 1! I don’t get why the ratings are so low, i mean, Fringe is EPIC & the actors are excellent.
Thanks Ken for making a case for Fringe. It needs all the love it can get! I LOVE this show. It’s frustrating that I don’t have a nielson box and my watching of the show doesn’t count. The funny thing is I don’t have cable so I’ve never watched it live. Instead, I watch all my shows on Hulu or the network websites. I think that’s what a lot of people are doing and it’s really a shame that there is no way to track how many people are watching in nontraditional ways. I swear, if I knew that I could get a nielson box, I would GET cable just so I could help my favorite show!
For all US viewers that want to provide feedback to FOX execs directly, please consider signing up for PROJECT FOX (google it). This is your venue to give feedback on all FOX shows including the FOX primetime scheduler.
Uh, I googled. Got a lot of stuff about saving actual foxes. Nothing about the network?
This is absolutely the most intelligent, best written / acted show on tv right now.
I’m another ‘late to the party’ viewer – started watching this season and IMMEDIATELY purchased S1 & S2 dvds. Caught up while watching current season – and now it’s my ONLY ‘appointment tv’.
Certainly knowing the history and mythology of the show adds to one’s enjoyment & understanding, but I think most episodes are accessible to the new or casual viewer, especially with Ken Tucker’s recap. Casual users be warned, though – you’ll get hooked!
I make it a point never to miss a Fringe episode (if only I had a Nielsen box…). It is the best show on TV right now BY FAR!!!!!!!!!!!
I know people see the words “best show on TV” and instinctively don’t want to try it. But this show is so damn entertaining on so many levels, from the sheerly disgusting, to thought-provoking, to romantic, to sci-fi nifty, and it is also lovable as well. It kills me to think that people might be discovering this show on a rental next year at this time and then wondering “Why did it get cancelled?”
I fell in love with Firefly… after it was canceled… I don’t want Fringe fall victim to “canceled in its prime, but later greatly loved…”
OMG, thanks Ken, you said everything that I do think about Fringe, I just wanna thank you so much, I’m speechless
Fringe in THE show you have to watch. The actors are so great and all the show is great. I can’t imagine my life without Fringe. I can’t watch Fringe live because I don’t live in the USA and it’s really killing me. With the season 1 I really liked the show and I’m not a Sci-Fi girl, but at the end of the season 1 and with the season 2 !! OMG I’m completely a die-hard fan of the show and Fringe deserves more viewers !!
I keep thinking back to the season one finale, when the camera pulled back from Olivia looking out an office window and the shot reveals that she’s in one of the World Trade Center tower’s….the chill that went up my spine in that moment when we all realized that this show was going to take us to another dimension, an alternate world. It was just mind-blowing. This really is the coolest show on TV and people who aren’t watching are really cheating themselves from seeing one of the best sci-fi show’s in TV history. What the networks need to realize is that, just as in Fringe, our world has changed and network TV audiences will never be at the same level they were 30, 20, even 10 years ago, especially on Friday and Saturday nights. The ratings for Fringe on Friday are comparable to many cable programs (like Mad Men, etc.) that are considered a hit in the cable universe. Cable understands that niche programs, even if they don’t appeal to a wide audience, still have value to a smaller group of loyal fans who watch them. What Fox needs is a programming executive who is a visionary, with the cajones to stand up to the expectations of the traditional industry standard of programming and make a statement that quality programming has a place within the network landscape. Maybe then the networks will once again be able to be competitive with the cable networks and receive the positive buzz and award accolades that cable has so dominated over the last decade! Fringe Friday’s (and Human Target as a lead in at 8:00)deliver that niche, loyal audience. When you think about it, what’s the alternative, really? Keep blowing through other quality programs (Firefly, Dollhouse, Terminator)in the hopes of finding a hit that will bring audience levels back to what they were in the 90′s? It’s not gonna happen guys. It’s time to get realistic and embrace the quality programming you already have. It’s almost like a Fringe storyline – in the alternate universe, there’s a network who supports it’s program’s and appreciates/rewards their loyal fan base by keeping their show on the air!
ITA, Wiz! That final scene showing the WTC guaranteed that I’d watch every FRINGE episode that will ever be made!
The difference between network TV and cable is that cable can afford to have critically acclaimed shows with smaller audiences. There will always be a struggle with the free networks because they just need to bring in more viewers because viewers = ad money. So it’s less that cable understands the niche programs better, the cable channels can just afford to cater to niches.
My questions are, why is a show with a somewhat small but very loyal audience not bankable for a network like Fox? And if the numbers just don’t work, why can’t Fringe move to FX, where it would have killer ratings (for that network)?
I suspect the answer to my first question is related to the expense of producing a show with lots of special effects and a crew of well-respected actors and writers.
As for the second, I keep asking, no one is answering…
PS, one of my suspicions regarding the move to Fridays was that Fox *does* want to keep Fringe, and they figured if they could run it in the death-slot and keep the audience, it would then appear to be a pretty bankable. I really want to believe that as long as Fringe maintains it’s numbers on Fridays, Fox will keep it, if only because that’s howevermanymillion more viewers than they were getting on Friday night before!
We definitely need a save this show campaign. Fans of other shows have sent things to the network. So…apples (a la the apple image at the end with the babies in it) ?? Or maybe just a bunch of fringe from the fabric store??
LOVE this show!
Or a white tulip !!
Sending items to the network won’t help at this point. There has also been a fan effort to get people to watch the show, but it’s very hard to do on Fridays. One can hope that EW readers will listen to what Ken Tucker says about this show… because he’s spot on…
The fan effort to save the show has mostly been Internet based. Or via
word-of-mouth to anyone that would listen. However, there are people that enjoy the show, that aren’t online much. They may not know it is danger. Entertainment Weekly has earned my admiration for their article supporting Fringe this week.
Best show now on television. Beyond a doubt.
Viva la Fringe!