Fixing up declining shows seems to be J.J. Abrams' forte.

In 2004, Abrams returned to the world of international espionage after "Alias," the hit series he created, received an overwhelming fan backlash due to story decisions made by ABC. His creative input re-vamped the series and once again made it a ratings winner.

In the same year, he was asked to take a look at a struggling pilot ... a small show called "Lost." That show starts its final season Tuesday on ABC, after becoming a critical success.

Now, his talents are being called on once again. This time, it's his own pseudo-science series that needs him: "Fringe." And the way he plans to fix it is to determine an end point for the series and go from there.

Just as with 'Lost,' we didnt get to a place until the third season where we were saying, OK, we need to know where halfway is, Abrams told Slice of SciFi. And I feel like thats something that, if were lucky enough to continue going, I do think that at a certain point it would be a really smart thing to start to say, OK, lets figure out what the actual date is so we sort of know how far we should push things.

The series has moved into a strong place this year creatively, but its ratings are far below what they were in the first season, partially blamed on a move to the much busier Thursday nights. But what Abrams wants most is a timetable to tell the stories the series needs to tell.

There are other things that weve talked about doing her stepfather story -- that were putting off," he said. "So I feel theres a lot of opportunity for where were going beyond this season, and Im going to be bullish and optimistic about that. And I feel like we have a long way to go still, but I think that the show has sort of found a kind of rhythm that is nice to see, and Im really proud of what were doing with it.

And, one snippet that may excite everyone, Abrams has also hinted that Leonard Nimoy may be back.

"Fringe" airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. ET on Fox.