The Dockers had no answers against a Bombers side smarting over last week's loss to Geelong and welcoming back its inspirational skipper James Hird.
As a contest for the four points, the game was over nine minutes into the second term, by which stage the home side was 54 points clear.
After kicking three goals without reply to end the first quarter, which gave the Dons an 18-point advantage at the opening break, they followed that up with five straight to begin the second term.
Matthew Lloyd booted three of those, dominating his individual battle with the previously in-form Luke McPharlin.
The Bombers spearhead ended the night with five first-half goals in the 17.13 (115) to 12.13 (85) result.
But one had to feel a degree of sympathy for McPharlin, who to this stage of the season has been one of Fremantle's best. On this occasion however, no one would have stopped the wave upon wave of attacking sorties from the home side, each one precise and with a clear intention.
It took the Dockers eight minutes to get beyond the centre line and 16 minutes to register their first - and only - goal of the term.
Lloyd, Adam McPhee and Scott Lucas headlined a long list of Bombers who put in excellent performances.
McPhee, a former Docker who arrived at Windy Hill at the start of 2003, was superb in the backline, often pushing well inside defensive 50 to block space for the likes of Paul Medhurst to lead into.
Scott Lucas provided a threatening target at centre-half forward, leading hard up the ground and giving Lloyd space to do what he does best - take marks and kicks goals. He finished a good night's work with 22 touches and six marks.
For Fremantle, determined to prove to itself and the competition that it can perform away from its home ground of Subiaco Oval, the night only further entrenches the popularly-held belief that it can't.
The half-time statistics were damning. The Bombers had seven players with 10 possessions or more, Fremantle had one. Moreover, the home side led the kicks 104-77, the handballs 68-49 and the marks 58-38.
The only category in which the visitors held sway was the tackling, where it held a 23-16 advantage.
To the Dockers' credit, they didn't throw in the towel, performing with greater cohesion and purpose in the second half. As a result, it booted four on the trot during the third term and reduced the margin to 32 points late in the quarter.
However, it entered the last quarter down by 45 and despite adding a further five majors and getting to within 24 points midway through the term, Essendon was never seriously threatened.
The Dockers have now lost their last three fixtures against the red-and-black, with all of those matches crunch games - last year's round-21 blockbuster, the Subiaco Oval Elimination final and now this Friday night affair.
The Bombers move to 7-3 and jump ahead of their opponents, who fall to 6-4 after tonight's loss.
Essendon coach Kevin Sheedy said after the match that his side played better football in last week’s loss to Geelong.
“I thought they got lazy. It was a very, very disappointing performance to be honest.”
“I thought we probably flirted with our footy tonight and in the last half in particular. And we shouldn’t do that.”
“If you want to be a good team we’ve still got a lot of work to do to make sure that players adhere to the way we want to play instead of the way that we did play in that second half,” he said.
“I just thought some of our experienced players played a little bit ahead of themselves.”
Dockers coach Chris Connolly was disappointed with his team's first half.
"Essendon at full-strength, Fremantle at full-strength, the first quarter just showed that we've got to grow up, we've got to mature as a team," Connolly said.
"We've got to get in first in a tough environment, we've got to use it well and we learnt a lot out of today."
"We need to keep up the positivity (of the second half) but in terms of our coaching of the individual, our coaching of the team, the major focus will be on the first quarter, in particular, the first 10 minutes."
In the next round, Essendon takes on Hawthorn while Fremantle is at home to Melbourne.
Essendon: 4.8 11.11 14.12 17.13 (115)
Fremantle: 2.2 3.5 7.9 12.13 (85)
Goals: Essendon: Lloyd 5, Lovett-Murray 3, Lucas, Murphy, Hird 2, Ramanauskas, Solomon, Misiti 1
Fremantle: Waterhouse, Simmonds, Longmuir, Walker 2, Pavlich, Hayden, Polak, Headland 1
Best: Essendon: McPhee, Hird, Solomon, Lucas, Lloyd, Rioli, Welsh
Fremantle: Pavlich, Longmuir, Cook, Hayden
Injuries: Fremantle: Schammer (bruised shoulder)
Changes: Essendon Watson (hamstring) replaced in the selected side by Lovett-Murray
Fremantle: None
Reports: Lucas (Essendon) for rough play against Schammer (Fremantle) in the first quarter.
Umpires: Rowe, Vosso, Woodcock
Crowd: 38,411 at Telstra Dome