Dawson's Eek! Pacey’s Back, Flesh Melts in J.J. Abrams' Latest

When it comes to casting leading women, J. J. Abrams may be the smartest person working in television. For his first show, Felicity, he plucked an unknown Keri Russell from the land of extras and made her an instant star, with her signature mass of kinky hair and antique visage. For Alias, he cast a barely known Jennifer Garner—she’d appeared on Felicity, and had also briefly played second-string to Jennifer Love Hewitt on a Party of Five spinoff—and launched the career of a major Hollywood actress. And where to begin with Lost? Evangeline Lilly, the earthy Canadian who’d barely done more than a commercial; Yunjin Kim, a Korean starlet little seen in America; Elizabeth Mitchell, blond and blue-eyed, faintly recognizable but never before terribly memorable … they’re just a handful of the irreplaceable women on Mr. Abrams’ sprawling drama. Apparently, he likes them tough, smart, and believably attractive. From there, he gives them a personality, usually with a generous dose of bad.

So the leading character of Mr. Abrams’ new show, Fringe (Fox, Tuesdays, 9 p.m.), as in fringe science, is sort of a mystery. Anna Torv (an Australian actress who is, big surprise, new to American television) plays F.B.I. agent Olivia Dunham, a former military investigator who lives by the letter of the law, except when it comes to sleeping with one of her colleagues (Mark Valley). Like Ms. Mitchell, who arrived on Lost three seasons in and promptly became one of the show’s most mysterious, reviled, and beloved characters, Ms. Torv has a face so wide and open it’s almost blank. But unlike Ms. Mitchell—and Mr. Abrams’ other collection of angels—Ms. Torv’s lack of expression isn’t offset by something innate—maternal or feral. Even after a two-hour pilot, Ms. Dunham is an enigma, and not in a good way.

None of this, however, should sink Fringe, which stands out in a fairly pathetic fall network schedule as one of the few promising new shows. Its pilot episode is admirably ambitious, featuring enough plot twists and detail for a feature film. It opens with an airplane disaster in which every person on board is infected with a virus that eats away their flesh and bone. (Fringe features some truly spectacular visual effects.) We see the guy responsible; on a suicide mission, he injects himself with the virus with the help of an insulin pen, then barfs and sweats and coughs his way through the cabin to spread it. (Airborne won’t help you now, my friends!) The plane, however, is still able to land, despite its dead passengers and crew, thanks to a new autopilot program at Boston’s Logan Airport.

This whole first scene, which echoes Lost’s first episode, is a bold move for Mr. Abrams. Outside of programs about 9/11, 9/11 has rarely been so directly referenced. This is the next stage of terrorism, possibly more terrifying than the first: High-end, designer chemical warfare.

Agent Dunham is assigned to the case, which leads her fairly quickly to a mad (literally) scientist named Walter Bishop (John Noble), who’s been hospitalized for 17 years in a facility outside Boston. At the height of his career, he’d worked with another scientist on fringe possibilities: memory transference, reanimation, and the like, all of which required dangerous chemical experiments and life-risking trials. To spring him from his confinement, Agent Dunham needs the help of his sole surviving family member, Joshua Jackson, of Dawson’s Creek a genius screw-up who’s living in Baghdad cutting contracting deals with anyone he can. She blackmails him into coming home, they get the dad, and here you have the threesome that will comprise the hot core of this show: traveling the world, solving bizarre mysteries that are all part of what becomes known as The Pattern.

But how hot is it? It’s a delight to see Mr. Jackson back on television after a few lost years in pretty bad movies. He’s still great-looking, charismatic, and quick with one-liners. But it remains to be seen if he can be anyone besides the lovable Pacey Witter of Dawson’s Creek. Fringe’s Peter Bishop has to be angry, a lot. When Mr. Jackson goes there, however, his eyes go completely flat. Meanwhile, Mr. Noble’s Walter Bishop is so far a not very likable combination of eccentric egghead and irritant. Of course, he’s fresh from a mental hospital, so it might be unreasonable to ask him not to be annoying. But, still. He’s alienating!

We expect a lot from J. J. Abrams at this point, and Fringe doesn’t quite deliver. But given the cast—which also includes brilliantly creepy Lance Reddick (Lt. Daniels from The Wire), a chilling Blair Brown, and (in later episodes) the eternally stunning and talented Charlotte Rampling—we’ll keep trying. Let’s just cross our fingers that Ms. Torv manages to ascend to the rank of Abrams’s angels. She just needs to find her inner bad girl, even if she has been charged with saving the world.

hfrey@observer.com