My Fringe theory: main characters are an "imperfect Trinity"

Here's my Fringe theory of the moment:

The three main characters—Dr. Walter Bishop, Peter Bishop and Olivia Dunham—are an imperfect trinity with parallels to the Holy Trinity. It's, in essence, "the same old story," told a little differently. Here's my basic analysis:

The Father: Dr. Walter Bishop
Walter himself admitted at the end of Epis. 1.02 that he was trying to play God when he tampered with Peter's history. From Epis. 1.09 and onward, Walter is seen sporadically holding a Bible in his hand or quoting scripture. Keep this in mind: Walter is a creator, though much of his creations led to misinterpretations (perhaps William Bell's ZFT "bible," which in itself has a cultic variant with the formerly missing chapter on ethics) and mis-use by scientists who had their own agenda.

The Son: Peter Bishop
Peter died in 1985. Then he was resurrected in 1985 by his father (or rather, taken from an alternate Earth). He enters into service as an FBI correspondent at age 30, the same age Jesus began his earthly ministry; although, Peter's ministry comes after his alternate's death, not before. Peter apparently has ability to read people's minds, and other powers he apparently has yet to tap into. Peter spent years in Iraq, whose territory plays a huge role in history as told in Bible.

The Spirit: Olivia Dunham
Note her childhood name, Olive, which has religious connotations to begin with. She is an interceder between the FBI and the Bishops, a liaison in every sense of the word, on multiple dimensions (and now in multiple dimensions it seems). As an FBI agent, she enforces, and paves the way for the conviction of evil-doers. If water signifies the Holy Spirit's presence in baptism, then Olivia's oneness with the water in the tank is representive of this concept.

In closing: this imperfect Fringe "trinity" works in concert with each other to save the world. And is there a "Judas" in their midst?

Behind the Fringemunks

So what exactly do I make of The Fringemunks project?

It's definitely helped broaden my audience, which is something I've wanted to do - hence, the creation of my website http://DavidWuMusic.com, and the various methods of tracking who visits. As with any start-up site, it's a matter of attracting visitors and motivating them to visit and re-visit.

For most of my life, my music has had some appeal, whether it be to extended family, or a church, or an ethnic community. But there was always a glass ceiling, and any peak above the ceiling always yielded a sense of frustration and disappointment: it was like pulling teeth sometimes to encourage people to listen to my music.

So how does one transition from struggling to attract the masses, to struggling to keep up with the masses who want to hear more from you?

Enter the Fringemunks, a serialized 2-song joke that is turning into a 20-song hit for a portion of Fringe fans around the globe. Despite the tongue-in-cheek nature of the songs and its accompanying irreverent humor, it is still my music underneath the sped-up voices and, I feel, there is redemptive quality to the lyrics that I write for the parodies. It allows the audience to experience a Fringe episode in a different light, and also allows one to hear a song in a slightly different light as well. For me, it's also one experiment after another, creating music and presenting them to an audience in mind--it's simply great practice.

The appeal for the listener is exemplified in a series of anticipations for each new song. Once an episode airs, I want the Fringemunks fan to automatically wonder how the 'munks will recap that episode. If a listener memorizes the song, it can be a great tool to remember a particular episode's plot and details when the episodes and seasons start piling up.

Not only that, I try to infuse an emotional quality into each and every song - it's not all fun and games. It's a funny kind of serious, a detour from the usual humor. Not exactly Weird Al, not nearly Chipmunks (I don't speed it up as fast as they did).

Something is working. Glancing at the results of the visitor tracker, there are lots of visitors in the Seattle area, a plethora in New York... and a whole bunch in Europe... especially Hungary. That's right, there's a website in Hungary that is marketing the Fringemunks. How flattering is that! Makes me want to brag a little, but not too much.

Plus, the name "Fringemunks" is catchy, I think.

Fringe: My Prediction about Peter's Medical History

Warning: potential spoilers below, for those who haven't read the Fringe comics.

Time for me to share with you which Kool-Aid I'm drinking in regards to Peter Bishop's ambiguous medical history on Fringe:

I believe that Peter may actually be Walter's father. There are clues that point to this.

Dr. Nicholas Boone, in Epis. 1.18 "Midnight" asks Walter, "How far would you go for someone you love?" Walter pauses on this, and reflects. And we reflect as well, as there is somehow an interesting bond between Walter and his "son" Peter - Walter would rather go back to the mental institution than to be without Peter, for one thing. And we know that a teleportation device can not only drag people from any point on Earth, but from any time.

Then there's what's in the Fringe comics. In the final "Bell & Bishop" scene in the 4th of 6 comics, we find out that Walter's father was either a Nazi or worked for the Nazis... or somehow had a connection to the Nazis. What if somehow Walter whisked his father away from that lifestyle and path, causing an anomaly in time and family history.

The fugitive John Mosley from Epis. 1.04 "The Arrival" said to this to Peter about his "relative" under the tombstone: "shame you never met him." Perhaps there are different layers to this statement, but think of the logic that would stand if Peter WAS the relative supposedly buried.

(OK, we'll see how far off I am in the final two episodes of the season.)