Created by: J. J. Abrams

These days, I’m all for trying out any show that isn’t about the law or medicine. I caught a few episodes of Fringe in the Fall season, but I wasn’t terribly impressed. It is different and visually interesting though… and they sucked me in on the first episode of January, so I’m back for the time being.

Fringe airs on Fox Tuesdays at 9:00 PM. If you still desperately miss the X-Files – I was a huge junkie – this helps fill the void. The show tells the stories of a small sub-department of the FBI that investigates Supernatural or ‘Fringe’ Phenomena (sound familiar?). FBI Agent Olivia Dunham leads a wacky team consisting of mad-scientist Dr. Walter Bishop, fresh out of the loony bin; his son Peter Bishop, played by Joshua Jackson (who has grown up nicely since Dawson’s Creek); and Astrid, her omnipresent and rather nebulously employed assistant.

The show is significantly different than the X-files, in both structure and quality. The most significant diversion surrounds the team’s makeup and mission. In addition to investigating all kinds of interesting phenomena, the team is often called upon to try out one or another of Dr. Bishops’ experiments, many of which defy the laws of both nature and morality. For example, if you’re dead (but not too dead), Dr. Bishop can revive your body enough to get your last memory and sensory experiences out of your corpse.

I haven’t mentioned yet, though I clearly should, that to watch Fringe (like many things on the Fox network) requires a complete suspension of your disbelief. You thought J. J. Abrams went off the deep end with ‘Lost’? These are the ideas that were too crazy for abc.

The ‘bad guys’ are the folks over at Massive Dynamic, the company mysteriously tied to a variety of strange phenomena, happening worldwide. These events are similar only in that they are strange and inexplicable, and we are told there is a ‘Pattern’. In another unfavorable comparison, there is no ‘Scully’ in Fringe. No character offers us the skeptical point-of-view, so the writers clearly expect us to be all-in. In good conscience, I cannot recommend Fringe, although it is a great guilty pleasure to watch with the lights off. Oh, and don’t try to eat while watching this. Waaaaay worse than CSI.

Fringe will return in 60 seconds

One of the show’s unique features is the advertising. Fox is experimenting with a longer-drama format, so there are fewer commercial breaks, and none are longer than 90 seconds. Barely enough time to pee, in other words. At the top of each commercial break, there is a title screen, and a creepy voice tells you that ‘Fringe will return in’ say, 60 seconds.* I kind of like it, even though I usually fast forward through commercials. Maybe it’s the title screens. They all have really cool images. What can I say – I like pretty things.

The stand out quality of Fringe is certainly the portrayal of Special Agent Olivia Dunham by Australian actress Anna Torv. She is quite simply one of the most striking looking women I have ever seen, and effective the first episode of January, (Bound – watch episode here), she is my new hero. We have known since the pilot that Olivia had great moral fortitude and strength of character. In that episode, Olivia almost dies a couple of different times, and in very ugly ways, to save the life of her partner and lover. Turns out he was working for the bad guys, and he dies at the end of the episode, in her arms, after a high speed chase. I know single life is tough on the professional girl, but even I haven’t had a date like that.

In the first 20 minutes of ‘Bound’, she is abducted twice. In the first abduction, she convinced her captor to give her a  sip of water, and he stupidly let her sit up and placed the glass in her hand. She took out several large men with brutal efficiency, shockingly fast. Rather than pausing a moment for a mini-meltdown, she immediately shifts gears to find the person responsible for her kidnapping. When asked by her boss ‘are you OK?’ she replies ‘not yet’. Tough chick! Sadly, she is almost immediately drugged, restrained and abducted – this time, by a group of company agents. OK, hang on for this twisted tale: It seems that Olivia was once a prosecutor. She convicted a man, named Mr. Harris, for sexual assault. The conviction was overturned, and somehow Mr Harris ends up working for the Department of Homeland Security (huh?). He has been ordered to review the Fringe Science Division, which has brought him back to Olivia’s orbit. He decides to abduct and interrogate her as a part of his investigation (seriously, huh?). Don’t forget I warned you that this show requires a complete and willing suspension of disbelief.

Even still, after watching Olivia last week, I’m going to have to tune in, at least on occasion. I’ve discovered the joy of physical fitness in the last year or so and when I train at the gym, I fantasize about being a total kick-butt Superhero Girl. Hey, an active imagination informs this column. Surely you aren’t surprised. Agent Dunham may just be my new motivational force.

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Fringe on iTunes:

*The network will also be utilizing this format with the Premiere of Joss Whedon’s ‘Dollhouse’, in February. I can’t tell you how excited I am to have Joss Whedon coming back to television!