At least, that is the version of BOTF you would have seen in the alt-verse where Peter Bishop lived up until the age of 7, when he was brought over to our world by the version of his father who lives here. Young Peter would never have seen the movie, as he was too sick to do anything -- go to a regular school, make friends, even play outside.
"Peter" is a critical mythology episode for Fringe, which refers back to "Jacksonville," the most recent episode from February, and "There's More than One of Everything," the Season 1 finale, that had Walter Bishop in tears before his son's grave. That simple, tense scene let all know that somehow he had pulled the alt-verse version of his son to this side.
In 1985, Walter, sporting big fluffy Rick Springfield hair, makes a presentation to three generals in the U.S. Army Research Center in New York City. He shows them a Motorola Razr phone with PROTOTYPE on its screen, telling them it's a smaller, leaner mobile phone because it is digital, not analog. One of the generals wants to know if it's Russian technology, and Walter says no, it is from an alternative universe that in some ways is more technologically advanced than ours.
The phone was reverse engineered and copied in our world by watching people in the alt-verse with a special Magic Window that Walter and William Bell created. It allows people in our universe to watch those in the other world.
Walter and his associate, Dr. Carla Warren, a physicist, are on the rooftop of the Army center with more generals. With some science talk of "errant photons" and "stretching the membrane between our world and theirs," Walter presents the Empire State Building through the Magic Window, noting that originally the observation deck was also to be used as a docking point for dirigibles. As the generals look into the mirror, they see just that activity in the alt-verse -- a zeppelin approaching the skyscraper, bathed in searchlights. (Blimp travel still in 1985? I am guessing there was no Hindenburg disaster in the alt-verse, or any other big dirigible accident there?)
The Fringe opening credits were'80s style. The credits and titles for scenes set in 1985 used a mod computer font, along with wire-frame/TRON style graphics and synth pop remake of the theme song. (I should note, though, that the computer font used was even older than the '80s -- as a kid I saw ones like it in articles, TV shows, etc. about computers and technology in the late 1960s and early '70s.)
In 2010, Walter comes to Olivia's house in the night, toting the Magic Window that he created after he realized there were doubles of most people in the alt-verse. He begins to tell Olivia how Peter ended up over here.
In 1985 at Walter's Harvard lab, he and Carla watch on the Magic Window as his alt-verse double, whom he's dubbed
"Walternate," is laboring over his equipment to find a cure for Peter's illness. As Walter watches Walternate, he marks atoms on a chemical chart of the compound that could cure Peter. He gets a call from his wife, Elizabeth, who says Peter is worse and wants to see his dad. She adds that she can't bear being alone all the time. Walter says that she knows where he is -- 24-7, he's in the lab, trying to find that cure.Walter comes home to see wife and son. He shows Peter how to do a trick his adult version has done earlier in the show, of flipping a silver dollar over and over the fingers in succession. Peter says he is not scared of dying. He wants to leave the silver dollar to his dad if he does die. Walter tells him not to worry, and that the boy will be fine...
...And the next scene is the cemetery at young Peter's funeral. Besides his parents and a minister, Nina Sharp and Carla are present. Nina tells Walter that William Bell offers his sympathies, that he is tied up with meetings in Berlin.
Later at home, Walter and Elizabeth think back about how Peter never had much of a normal life because of his illness. "We did did the best we could ... he knew he was loved. Didn't he?" Walter says.
Even later Walter asks Elizabeth to come to Peter's room, where he has set up the Magic Window. Elizabeth is shocked to see Peter sitting in his bed, reading, and demands to know why Walter is subjecting her to this. He explains the alt-verse technology to her and says that somewhere else Peter will grow and have a full life. He tells her that in their world that they must now move on.
At Walter's lab the next day, he and Carla are again watching Walternate in the Magic Window. Walter is sure that his double is close to completing the chemical compound that holds the cure for Peter's ailment. However, Walternate is startled when September the Observer walks into his lab. He does not see the compound change color. But Walter does see the chemical reaction and realizes Walternate missed the completion of the cure!
"All you have to do is stabilize the compound, and you can save him!" Walter yells, and he throws an object at the Magic Window, shattering it. (That is a Hollywood cliche -- an outburst of temper that leads to smashing of machinery or small device, as a cell phone, without regard to how much it cost to replace the stuff.)
In the alt-verse in 1985, September, who distracted Walternate, comes out of a movie theater with an associate and the senior Observer. They've just seen the Stoltz version of Back to the Future. Another one of those zeppelins flies lazily overhead.
September says he couldn't help when Walternate noticed him in the lab. The Chief Observer tells him that he changed the future, and the boy is important to the Grand Scheme of Things, and action must be taken to restore balance.
Back at Walter's lab, he tells Carla he is working on the cure for Peter -- not his son but Alt Peter. He references the Casimir Effect, which could produce a thinness in space and time. He cannot let the other Peter die.
Carla, furious, tells him that if Walter tries to cross over to the alt-verse, and speaking through her three degrees in theoretical physics, declares that the energy expended in a crossover would seriously damage both universes. That is why they deliberately lied to the Army about the ability to travel back and forth. This is much like the conflict of man of science/man of faith in Lost, with Carla more like John Locke when he was alive, with her belief in God, and Walter as Jack Shephard, deeply rooted in the science.
"Now I become Death, destroyer of worlds," Carla says, quoting J. Robert Oppeheimer, physicist who headed the Manhattan Project, in turn quoting the Bhagavad Gita, a famous Hindu scripture.
Determined to do the crossover, he bitterly tells Carla, "There's only room for one god in this lab, and it's not yours."
Walter realizes a lake would absorb the high energy output of a crossover, so he sets up his equipment at Reiden Lake in eastern New York State, which in succeeding years is to be used for other crossovers. Carla has ratted him out, and she arrives with Nina (and in that scene, you see her cell phone, one of those brick-like gray things with a keypad).
Nina tells Walter not to do the crossover. He reminds her that if William were present, he would be applauding at the chance he is taking -- why peek into the alt-verse, when you can actually go there? Nina refuses to believe Bell would support Walter's recklessness. He responds: "You don't understand him! All William cares about is increasing the power and the legend of William Bell!"
Just as Walter starts to cross over, Nina grabs him and tries to prevent his entry into the alt-verse, but Walter goes to the other side -- along with Nina's forearm and hand. As Walter vanishes, Nina pulls back her arm, stunned as it seems to blur and flicker before her and Carla. And this is why in the present she has a bionic arm.
In the alt-verse, Walter discovers that the bottle containing the cure has broken and soaked his shirt and coat. Determined, he still continues toward his double's home, hoping to get Alt Peter, cure him in our world, and then sneak him back to the alt-verse.
At the Alt Bishop house, Elizabeth shows Peter how to do the silver dollar trick. He finally learns the trick and tells his mother that if he dies, he wants her to have the coin. As Walter told his Peter, nothing will happen to him, and he'll be fine.
Walter comes to the house and convinces Alt Elizabeth that he has the cure, and Peter should come with him to the lab. He tells her that it could take days, and that she should stay home and rest so that she can care for a recovering Peter later. Elizabeth gives him the silver dollar and tells Walter to bring Peter back, and he promises to return home. But it was a big promise Walter did not keep.
Walter takes Alt Peter to Reiden Lake. Peter wants to know why they are not taking a car, to which Walter says, "You can't get to where we're going in a car." (Professor Brown in Back to the Future said a similar line to Marty and his girlfriend at the end of the movie: "Where we're going, we don't need roads.")
"You aren't my father, are you?" Alt Peter says.
"Of course I am, and I'm going to make you all better."
Walter takes Alt Peter back to our side, only for the two of them to fall into the icy lake, but September is there to rescue them. When Walter asks September why they were saved, he repeats what his boss said to him: "The boy is important. He has to live."
Elizabeth comes to Walter's lab and is shocked to see a living Peter. Walter tells her that this Peter was dying too, and he could not let him suffer the same fate as their son. He tries to get Elizabeth to stop hugging him, that Alt Peter must be sent back once he is cured.
In 2010, Walter says he could not take Alt Peter back, because he saw in Elizabeth what he feared most in himself: he could not lose the boy again. That was the first crack between the universes, that has led to a series of others, and it is all his fault. "You can't imagine what it's like to lose a child," he tells Olivia.
Thoughts and footnotes:
-- Once Peter was brought home, how did he forget his passage into our universe and the dip into that icy Lake Reiden? All he can remember is he fell into a lake, and a strange man rescued him. Are these suppressed memories, or did Walter do something to make him forget?
--What happened to Elizabeth in succeeding years -- did she die herself, or leave Walter after he was put in the mental institution?
--What has happened to Alt Water and Elizabeth in the years that have passed since their son was abducted? Will there eventually be a showdown between the two different Walters?
--Peter eventually will learn the truth about himself. How will he react, and what will be the impact on the conflict of the two universes?
--Peter is important to the Observers and the balance of the universes (like Anakin?) -- in what way?
--One odd moment for me was in the second establishing shot of the opening scene at the Army Research Center, which showed a corridor and Walter's voice heard off-camera. I saw a picture of George Bush Sr. on the wall, but no Ronald Reagan. At first it made me wonder if the world in Fringe is not ours after all, until I rewound and found that Reagan's portrait was to the left of Bush and mostly in shadow. But that brings up an interesting premise, or possible plot twist. What if the world shown on Fringe is really not ours, but yet another that is virtually identical, and we're seeing a battle between two alt-verses?
--As fans have discovered, the little images of butterflies, frogs, hands, etc. that appear before each commercial break are actually glyphs or code symbols that spell out a word relevant to each episode. This week the word was, appropriately, "PETERS." As we now know from the show, there is more than one of everything!
--Michael J. Fox had always been the producers' and Robert Zemeckis' first choice for the Marty role, but his schedule was filled with work on the sitcom Family Ties. Stoltz and C. Thomas Howell also were considered for Marty. Stoltz had impressed them with his role in Mask as Rocky Dennis, a real-life boy with a highly deformed face but who was extremely intelligent and artistic. Stoltz finally was cast as Marty, but a month into filming, the producers just did not feel he was right for the role, because he was too much a dramatic actor, and he had trouble with the skateboarding. Zemeckis and company decided to start over, this time with Fox. Even Stoltz did not feel right as Marty and confessed this to his Mask director, Peter Bogdanovich. Funny to see his name again, as he loomed large in the sci-fi genre recently as "father of the Cylons," Daniel Graystone, in Caprica.
--In our world, Back to the Future was a 1985 summer season blockbuster, while it was on screens in the alt-verse in winter. It might have been a late 1985 release for the holiday season. A poster for Clue, which was a late '85 release, suggests this was quite possible. I like when the producers do these subtle things, such as the contrast between the slim Razr phone Walter showed the generals, and then the shot of Nina's monstrous Motorola DynaTAC later in the program.
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