Concentrate and Ask Again (S03E12)
Airdate: 4 February 2011
Written by: Matthew Pitts & Graham Roland Directed by: Dennis Smith
Running Time: 44 minutes
By the middle of its third season, Fringe found itself walking something of a tightrope. The show needed to keep delivering those standalone "mystery of the week" episodes that brought in casual viewers, yet it also had to push the overarching mythology forward with genuine urgency. Plenty of series have stumbled at this particular hurdle, either retreating into repetitive procedural comfort or becoming so consumed by their own mythology that newcomers feel hopelessly lost. Concentrate and Ask Again—the twelfth episode of Season 3—manages to strike that delicate balance with impressive confidence. It's an instalment that respects the intelligence of its audience while still delivering the genre thrills that made the show compelling in the first place.
The procedural thread opens with Dr. Warren Blake (Paul Jarrett), a senior researcher at IntREPUS, celebrating his birthday in the office. One of his presents—a seemingly innocent ragdoll—turns out to be a booby trap. The thing releases a blue powder that essentially liquefies his skeleton, leaving behind a gruesome corpse that brings the Fringe Division rushing to the scene. The team quickly pieces together what happened, tracing the package back to Aaron Downey (Todd Scott), a former US Marine with a serious grudge. When the team moves to arrest him, Downey attempts a desperate escape only to be struck by a car. He's left in a semi-vegetative state, unable to communicate and certainly unable to reveal where he's stashed the remaining containers of that deadly compound. With the clock ticking and the toxin unaccounted for, the investigation hits a wall—until Walter Bishop suggests a rather unorthodox solution.
Walter's plan draws directly from his morally questionable past. During his Cortexiphan experiments on children, one of his test subjects—a boy named Simon Phillips—developed telepathic abilities that proved uncontrollable. Walter had no choice but to expel him from the programme. Years later, the Fringe Division tracks Simon down to find a grown man (Omid Abtahi). Simon's gift has become his prison; reading others' thoughts makes him physically ill, forcing him into a reclusive existence deep in the woods. Olivia, having undergone Cortexiphan treatments herself, proves immune to his telepathy, which allows them to form a genuine connection. She persuades him to return to Boston to read Downey's thoughts, though subjecting himself to the mental noise of a million strangers represents genuine torture for the poor man. Meanwhile, three more business executives with US military connections die in identical fashion to Dr. Blake, confirming that Downey either had accomplices or someone else has gotten their hands on his compound.
What Simon extracts from Downey's fractured mind, combined with intelligence from Nina Sharp, reveals "Project Jellyfish"—a classified bioweapons programme designed to destroy human skeletons. Downey was among the test subjects inoculated against the blue powder, but the protection passed genetically to his unborn daughter, who died when her bones simply dissolved. The Fringe Division concludes that Downey conspired with two fellow test subjects to eliminate everyone connected to the project, including its architect: former US Army General Jim Thorn, now running for Congress. Thorn is scheduled to attend a fundraiser at the Museum of Fine Art, and Olivia brings Simon along to deploy his abilities in the field. He successfully identifies both would-be assassins, allowing Olivia to neutralise one of them in a genuinely tense last-minute intervention. When Olivia drives Simon back to his woodland sanctuary, he hands her an envelope containing what he glimpsed in Peter's thoughts—a revelation that lands like a gut punch.
Running parallel to this, Nina Sharp investigates William Bell's safe and uncovers something peculiar: multiple language editions of books about the First People, each attributed to a different author. Sharp's sharp mind quickly spots the pattern—these names are anagrams, all pointing to a single true author. That author turns out to be Sam Weiss, the unassuming bowling alley proprietor who previously served as therapist to both Nina and Olivia. When Nina confronts him, Weiss admits to writing the texts. He describes the doomsday device as something capable of both creation and destruction, explaining that its ultimate function depends entirely on Peter—and specifically, which Olivia he feels drawn toward. The episode closes with Olivia reading Simon's note, learning that Peter remains in love with Fauxlivia despite his protestations to the contrary.
Concentrate and Ask Again succeeds largely because its procedural elements never overstay their welcome. The opening death scene, while undeniably grim, shows admirable restraint compared to some of the more excessive gross-out moments from earlier in the series. Graham Roland and Matt Pitts's script handles the revenge conspiracy with admirable economy, deploying tropes about the Military Industrial Complex effectively rather than lazily. This works partly thanks to the return of CIA Agent Edwards, whose sinister presence adds genuine menace, and partly due to Jody Thompson's brief but devastating turn as Downey's wife, forced to relive her family's trauma.
The episode also delivers its obligatory action set-piece with style. By staging the climax at a fundraising gala, the production gives Anna Torv the opportunity to appear in what might be her most glamorous costume of the entire series—Olivia working undercover in evening wear provides a welcome visual shift from her usual FBI tactical gear.
Yet the real heart of the episode belongs to Omid Abtahi. He portrays Simon not as some superheroic telepath but as a man genuinely tortured by his abilities—both physically and psychologically. There's something profoundly moving about watching him do the right thing despite the genuine pain it causes him. The script perhaps pushes the tragedy a bit too far with the subplot involving a bar waitress Simon fancies from afar; he cannot approach her because proximity would make him ill, but more crushingly, he fears learning what she truly thinks of him would shatter his already fragile heart.
This personal tragedy dovetails beautifully with the mythology arc. Peter may claim otherwise, but Simon's revelation confirms he feels more drawn to the confident, playful "Fauxlivia" than to the genuine Olivia—an attraction that carries potentially apocalyptic consequences given what Weiss reveals about the doomsday device.
That said, the sudden elevation of Sam Weiss—who had all but vanished from Season 3—into a figure of cosmic significance does feel somewhat like a soap opera twist. The bowling alley philosopher turned ancient text author strains credibility even by Fringe's generous standards.
Nevertheless, Concentrate and Ask Again is one of the strongest episodes the series produced up to this point. It demonstrates how a procedural framework, when executed with care and anchored by genuine emotional stakes, can enhance rather than distract from a complex mythology. The episode respects its characters' pain while never losing sight of the wonder and terror that made viewers invest in this universe in the first place.
RATING: 7/10 (+++)
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