Bound is a payoff episode in many ways for the first season of Fringe. Having been abducted by the mysterious forces led by the enigmatic Mr. Jones, the opening scene that shows Olivia’s nerve-jangling escape from her captors stands by itself as a marvel of suspense filmmaking. Although she manages to fight her way out of captivity, the scene is still deftly told strictly from Olivia’s paranoid point of view, emphasizing the fear she feels underneath her calm and collected exterior by expertly using jumbled camerawork and frantic editing. And, as if that wasn’t enough, as Olivia waits in the SUV she stole from her captors, the Calvary--fellow FBI agents whom she called on her cell phone--finally arrive, only to treat her like a perp as they dart Olivia into unconsciousness.

She awakes in a hospital room in Boston, face to face with Sanford Harris, a man whom she had put away years ago on sexual assault charges back in her Marine days. Not only have all charges against him been dropped, but he’s now leading a formal review of the Fringe Division, and, although he has her released, Harris still intends to keep a very close eye on Olivia, whom he alleges is mentally unstable and unfit to do her job. While this is going on, the Fringe team is called to Boston College, where a prominent professor dies when a giant slug comes out of his mouth. Talk about on the job pressure! But then Olivia’s personal life gets complicated when her sister and niece come for a visit. As jumbled as all of these story elements sound, the writers and director do a great job of juggling them into one coherent storyline.

Yet the first ten minutes of Bound doesn’t contain all of the suspense that this episode has to offer--later on, there’s a gripping showdown between Olivia and a double agent in a seemingly tranquil suburban house that easily surpasses the opening in how it’s filled with taunt tension that leads to an edge of your seat moment. And if all of this wasn’t enough proof that Fringe is finally hitting all cylinders, the ending drops a major plot bomb in how it hints that everything the Fringe group has seen is a build up of two sides in a coming war. The final scene, with Olivia enjoying a serenely peaceful moment with her niece, may have a double meaning in that--after the day she's had--this gentle respite is one that's well-deserved for the poor woman, and that it could also well be the last such peaceful moment that Olivia might enjoy for a while. A great ending for a nerve-wracking nail-biter of an episode.