Fringe has passed the sophomore test. News broke Friday that J.J. Abrams series has extricated itself from the bubble and is floating free into a third season - this following rampant speculation that Fringe was on the verge of cancellation.
News of renewal or cancellation hadn't been
expected until after the series wrapped up its second season, so the early
renewal is not only an unexpected surprise for Fringe fans but also a
tremendous vote of confidence from FOX.
The best news here is that Fringe could single handedly
return credibility to the genre on the big nets. After the phenomenon that was LOST season one,
the networks scrambled to bring pulp-era sci-fi/mystery back to the mainstream
and practically all of those experiments failed. With the exception of TheCW - which, for the
most part doesn't even qualify - the nets have had no luck hooking genre fans. Then was Fringe.
By weathering some harsh criticism and even harsher ratings
numbers, Fringe has emerged as evidence that science fiction can work on the
networks and is completely worth pursuing.
Far from perfect, Fringe takes itself seriously enough to appeal to an
audience that can be pretty uncompromising and notoriously fussy. In short, it works because it is genuine. Fringe succeeds where that procession of LOST knock-offs failed by being the real deal, created by folks who aren't merely
giving this sci-fi thing a whirl.
If we're lucky, the renewal of Fringe will make the
other networks rethink their strategies where primetime sci-fi is concerned
- with less of an emphasis on knock-offs
and cross pollination and more on honest and real sci-fi story telling.
