I nearly gave up on Fringe about halfway through the first season. It was clearly The Walter Show, and he's too insane to carry a show as more than comic relief. I did not care about Peter and Olivia enough to remember their names at the time. It was monster-of-the-week, and the formula of the show was to have Peter and Olivia have an ultimately pointless chase scene for ten minutes before Walter had a convenient flash of mad scientist insight to incrementally advance the plot in time for the act break. It was a little dull.
I relate all this only so you know where I'm coming from when I say they've fixed that.