Multiple Worlds of Fringe

Tanya R. Cochran is an associate professor of English at Union College in Lincoln, Nebraska. Among other works, she has coedited collections on Firefly and Serenity as well as Reading Joss Whedon. Sherry Ginn is a retired educator currently living in North Carolina. She has authored books examining female characters on science fiction television series as well as the multiple television worlds of Joss Whedon. Edited collections have examined sex in science fiction, time travel, the apocalypse, and the award-winning series Farscape, Doctor Who, and Fringe. Paul Zinder is a senior lecturer of film production at the University of Gloucestershire. He has published essays on various cult and genre television series, including Alias, Deadwood, Justified and Veronica Mars.

“valuable work of television criticism...worth the attention of media scholars and the show’s fans alike”—Psycho Drive In.

• Table of ContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroductionPart I: Humanity“The Whole World Is Their Lab”: The Scientist as Villain, the Scientist as Hero (Val Nolan)Nothing but Tech: Cyborgs and the Human Question (Paul Zinder)Women with the Agency: Dana Scully, Temperance Brennan and Olivia Dunham (Rhonda V. Wilcox)“We Were Trying to Make You More Than You Were”: The Singularity, Transhumanism and Shapeshifting (Zak Bronson)Part II: DualitySame … Yet Other: Interpersonal Communication Across Alternate Worlds (Eleanor Sandry)“You’re a Smart Boy. But There Is Much You Don’t Know”: A Quantitative Examination of Intelligence, Wisdom and Family Relationships (Heather M. Porter)Myth(re)making and Border Crossings: Exploring the Classical Predecessors (Scott Daley)Nature vs. Nurture: The Psychology of the Twins at the Apple’s Core (Sherry Ginn)Part III: Genre“You Don’t Even Need the Island to Be Weird”: J. J. Abrams and the Weirding of the Small Screen (Stan Hunter Kranc)Asking the Biopunk Questions: Opposition and Interrogation in Olivia Dunham and Walter Bishop (Jennifer McStotts)The Television Musical: An Alternate Universe of Storytelling (Christopher M. Culp)“This Means Bodies”: Body Horror and the Influence of David Cronenberg (Bronwen Calvert)Part IV: ViewershipObservation on the Fringe: September’s Observation and Narrative Participation as a Template for Viewer Agency (Julie L. Hawk)Teasing the Audience: Construction of Meaning Through the Opening Title Sequence (Víctor Hernández-Santaolalla and Javier Lozano Delmar)Paratextual Mediation: Fox, Fandom and ­Death-Slot Fridays (Tanya R. Cochran)Appendix: Fringe Episode ListAbout the ContributorsIndex