ext_61669: (Fringe: Olivia and Walter)
ext_61669 ([identity profile] emmiere.livejournal.com) wrote in [personal profile] beccatoria 2010-04-19 01:18 am (UTC)

I don't want the dangerous parts of Walter's arrogance to be explicitly tied to his atheism and I feel that's partly what's happening here.

No, I thought that too, especially since we did see arrogant Walter in all his eighties glory just recently. Juxtaposed with Dr. Warren, it's not hard to make that association (even though I'd be more interested how her faith affected the decision to continue in what was likely morally dubious work). I do think Walter has mentioned God in more vague, but similar ways a couple of times before this and it caught my eye because I thought it was potentially a weird character thing for him. And I'll admit that my own perspective on things means I missed some of the implications you saw, but your worries are completely legitimate.

That end scene though is just...a completely beautiful moment, for exactly the reasons you say. And while I don't think the show is necessarily staking a place on the matter, I thought that Other Scientist Dude(?) was a good counterpoint, talking about science as God. The parallels of grace and choice just worked really well for me.

(And I as a side note, I totally sympathize trying to define a more complex argument from the perspective of just having done this from the opposite way, as a non-atheist talking about the secular humanistic view of religion on B5. As you might know. ;) It made me laugh watching this the next day.)

Also, based on Private Eye Olivia Dunham and [livejournal.com profile] chaila43's suggestion on my post that there's a crazy palm tree Olivia/Broyles AU just waiting to happen in that pic, I move that the proper use of all screencaps (or clips!) from this episode is to create insanely awesome new narratives, never mind what actually happens. :D

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