Fringe producers confirm somebody 'we all love deeply will die'
Rumors have been flying about what's going to happen on Fox's
Fringe, and executive producers Jeff Pinkner and J.H. Wyman have set the record straight about what we can expect as the sci-fi series heads into its final episodes of the season.
[Spoiler alert!]
Fringe returns tonight with the first of four final episodes of the season, and you can expect big developments. However, rumors that someone will die on the series and that there might be a third alternate universe thrown into the mix are only half right.
"Somebody who we all love deeply will die," confirmed Pinkner. "We're not introducing a third world. There's our world, and then there's the world that Peter was taken from as a baby. ... And we still have plenty of story to tell just in those two worlds. And
maybe at some point in the future there will be a third world, but not yet."
As far as who's going to die and the possible fan reaction to killing off "somebody who we all love deeply," Wyman said: "At some point you have to say, 'All right, they're driving.' And you know, you've got to go with it. There's been so many things that people have assumed or thought from various sources that weren't true. I mean,
Fringe always does things the way you don't expect. At least we try to. So it's going to be effective, and I think it will be self-explanatory."
However, the producer isn't going to spoil the story any further, he said. "In the last three episodes we're always trying to finish the season off with opening a brand-new chapter for next season, and put the show in a new context for our viewers. So we can tell you that we've tried to achieve that this year as well."
"Hopefully it will be wholly unexpected and also re-contextualize the story of season three in a really cool way, and be fun and entertaining and mind-blowing," Pinkner added.
What the producers will tell us is that whatever happens during the final episodes, it won't mean an end to the alternate Over There universe.
"It's not going to end. That's our plan to go forward," said Pinkner. Traveling back and forth between the universes is the language of the series now."
That makes the news that Fox gave
Fringe an early renewal for a fourth season even better. "Our goal was to try and make two shows about one show and have a very compelling mythology on the other side. And hope that our viewers and fans would be as engaged as we are with those people on the other side," said Wyman.
"We can promise that it's going to be even more compelling and we're going to develop those characters even more" in next year's fourth season, he continued. "And we're going to see more of our characters through their eyes, and their characters through our eyes. And it'll definitely dimensionalize further."
As for alt-Olivia and Peter's baby, "The baby will be part of it. But how it's handled, it's definitely ... remember, this is
Fringe," Wyman said with a laugh. "It won't be normal."
Fringe airs on Fox at 9 p.m. ET tonight with an episode called "Lysergic Acid Diethylamide," which addresses the problem of William Bell's consciousness threatening to displace Olivia from her body permanently if Walter and Peter don't figure out a way to save her. And yes, you can expect some Leonard Nimoy action, which Pinkner promised will involve "something that you've never seen on
Fringe before."
In other
Fringe news, if you'd like to own a little bit of the freaky Friday sci-fi series, Fox is giving away replicas of
Fringe props beginning today and continuing for the next four weeks. You can find out more at
www.fox.com/fringe.
Who do you think will die?
They're goodies! 
