lisadoris

7.6 “The Goldberg Variation” this is such a fun episode. Willie Garson is back and this time he’s playing the luckiest man alive. He tries to raise money save his neighbor, a young, and not yet annoying Shia La Beouf and gets into all sorts of random shenanigans. Cause and Effect indeed.

7.7 “Orison” Donny Pfaster is back and Scully puts his ass in the ground where he belongs. It’s not a justified shoot by any stretch of the imagination but if anyone deserved to catch a bullet it was Pfaster and if anyone should get a pass on that killing it’s Scully. This episode is just as creepy as “Irresistible” and I love the use of music in this episode. I still won’t rank it high because it’s not an episode that I want to watch over and over again but it’s still a good episode.

7.8 “The Amazing Maleeni” Magicians, bank robberies, and double crosses, oh my. I don’t remember this episode being quite as much fun and it was this time around. It’s good that this and “The Goldberg Variation” bookend “Orison” because you need a levity before that episode and a palate cleanser afterward.

7.9 “Signs and Wonders” Why did it have to be snakes? A fundamentalist preacher/ snake rangler is taking out his enemies. If I had remembered how this episode ended, I would not have been eating dinner. There was puss, and dueling snake ranglers and an incest fake out. Ugh.

7.10 “Sein Und Zeit” A child abduction stirs up all sorts of issues for Mulder and the phrase “Nobody shoots at Santa Claus” is apparently a thing. Mrs. Mulder commits suicide which feels like it came out of nowhere and he asks Scully to perform an autopsy because he doesn’t believe it. We’re introduced to the concept of walk-ins: old souls who are looking for new hosts and that children are taken to spare them the pain they would have otherwise suffered. Mrs. Mulder had a fatal illness and did commit suicide and now Mulder believes that Samantha was not taken by aliens and is throwing the whole Syndicate conspiracy out the window. They find Santa’s village, tapes of children dating back to the 70s, and a bunch of graves. I’m going to chalk it up to the grief surrounding his mother’s death but after everything Mulder has seen over the past seven years, I find it difficult to believe that he’d backtrack on alien abduction so completely.

7.11 “Closure” So Samantha’s story now seems to be she was taken and per the alien agreement with The Syndicate, she is returned, lives with CSM and Jeffrey, is experimented on until she’s 14, runs away, and is taken from a locked room by the walk-ins so she’s dead. This is despite the fact that the bounty hunter, the clones, CSM, and Cassandra Spender have all told Mulder that Samantha is still alive. You’d also think that Spender Jr. or Cassandra would have mentioned Samantha at some point if this current story is true. There had to be a way for Mulder to come to terms with Samantha's disappearance without peeing on his entire journey.

BobO'Link

^Keep it up lisadoris! I, for one, am enjoying your regular updates on viewing this series.

FWIW - I've only fully seen S1 but own the entire series on disc. One day... of course I'll have totally forgotten your musings by then so I'm not at all worried about possible spoilers.

lisadoris

If you haven't seen the first 9 seasons of the series, please forget everything I write when you watch the series!

7.12 “X-Cops” so for many, many years, Cops has gone out of it way to present people of color and poor folks in the worst light possible. I don’t know if there was any way for X-Files to make a Cops-like episode that wasn’t derogatory but this wasn’t it. I really dislike this episode.

7.13 “First Person Shooter” Murder in a virtual reality world. This one was written by William Gibson and I think “Kill Switch” was the stronger episode. The objectification of women was a wee bit too much in this episode. It was nice to see The Lone Gunman here though it feels strange to have them in an episode that doesn’t involve a conspiracy of some kind.

alexkevin

What kind of person is me who haven't watched X-Files

BobO'Link

^No different than lots of others.

I've only seen random episodes and never got into the series during the original run. Most of what I've seen has been very hit and miss in syndication and I never made time to watch it - ever. It was more of a series I'd land of if channel hopping and nothing else jumped out. I usually enjoyed the episodes I saw. I purchased the DVDs during a FoxConnect 50% off sale, getting them for ~$6/season which I felt was reasonable. That was several years ago and I've only made time for S1. I'm considering putting S2 in rotation for SF/Fantasy month as one of the TV series I'll use for those times I don't have time for a movie or late nights when I'll likely fall asleep (much easier, and quicker, to start again to get back on track).

davidh777

There's a ton of TV out there. No shame in not having watched a particular series.

I watched the original broadcast and was completely hooked, watching episodes multiple times, buying VHS cassettes and books, etc. I think my last re-watch was for those Mythology sets that came out many years ago, and those were cherry-picked episodes. Maybe I'll do a full re-watch someday, but I've never upgraded from the original DVDs, not even for digital.

BobO'Link

^Didn't the BR release change the AR to "fake" WS? I seem to recall lots of talk about it at the time. People loved it or hated it - no in between.

lisadoris

This post has a spoiler for an episode in season 11

7.14 “Theef” looks like I was wrong about the last of the Space:AAB cameos as James Morrison is one our guests this week. I am confused about whether we’re supposed to sympathize with Peattie. Yes, the doctor gave her an overdose of morphine basically committing euthanasia. I can understand why the father was upset. But then he kills two innocent people to get vengeance. Nope, that’s not the way to go. You wanna kill the doc, I can see it. You kill the doc’s father-in-law and his wife, I call bs. It’s not like either of those people were complicit in what the doc did and as Scully said at the end, what doc did was the right call.

7.15 “En Ami” Chris Carter has ruined this episode for me. Not that I loved it all that much to begin with but thanks to the events in S11 Ep 1, I just can’t deal with this episode. CSM sends Scully a story about a boy whose cancer was cured via miracle (parents declined medical treatment for religious reasons). She visits the boy and he has the familiar scar on the back of his neck. CSM promises Scully the cure for cancer if she’ll just take a road trip with him. She goes and it turns out the whole thing was a mole hunt for a DARPA leaker. Or so this episode had a believe. Fast forward to season 11 and it turns out that CSM had other motives as well: he rapes Scully and impregnates her. Carter made everything worse when he was asked about this after the episode aired and his response was no no, it wasn’t rape, it was science. I didn’t watch any more episodes after that. Dude, unless CSM injected the sperm into Scully’s arm, which is not how babies are made, he had to put that syringe or turkey baster into her vagina and that my friends fits the federal definition of rape. I read some of the episode synopsis of later episodes and Scully does eventually find out that she was violated but ugh. Hindsight makes this episode unwatchable.

lisadoris

7.16 “Chimera” A Dr. Jeckle and Mr. Hyde situation when a man steps out on his wife with her best friend and a woman from the wrong side of town. There were ravens present as well so everyone can recite their best Edgar Allen Poe piece.

7.17 “all things” I love this episode. An meditation on Scully’s life and her faith when a man she had an affair with, who was also her instructor in med school, turns out to have a heart condition. Anderson wrote and directed the episode and her use of Moby’s “the sky is broken” was well done. Most people remember this episode as the one where Mulder and Scully consummate their relationship. I also remember Stacy Haiduk from SeaQuest. The wikia comments are split between folks who think the episode was boring and those who think it was beautiful.

7.18 “Brand X” Cigarettes will kill you but not in the ways we see in this episode. Morley is testing super tobacco and it contains a bug that’s killing folks. I don’t think the FDA will approve this especially since the only thing that will save everyone is resistance to nicotine. Of course the company is covering everything up.

7.19 “Hollywood AD” A 40-minute long in-joke about the show moving to LA. Duchovny wrote and directed this one and while he has a good handle on Mulder and Scully as characters, he doesn’t have a handle on Skinner. Everything about Skinner was completely out of character and the case didn’t even turn out to be an X-File. I will admit that the three-way bubble bath scene was fun but everything else missed the mark. I really liked this episode when it originally aired but each time I’ve watched it after that, I’ve like it less.

7.20 “Fight Club” while the humor in “Hollywood AD” fell short, the humor in this episode was spot on. Kathy Griffin played two very similar but very different characters and the calamities that occurred around the two women were just a hoot. I love how Scully thought she was going to solve the problem with the wrestler doppelganger but it just made everything even worse. The Mulder and Scully twins at the beginning were crazy too. I haven’t seen Art Evans in anything since Die Hard 2 so it was nice to see him as well.

7.21 “Je Souhaite” She isn’t Robin Williams in Aladdin but this genie tries so hard. I have to admit that I like Kevin Weisman better in Alias but he was several fries short of a happy meal in this episode (and so was his brother). If your sibling cannot walk, why isn’t your first wish to undo whatever accident caused the disability? She tried to point this out on multiple occasions but they didn’t listen. Mulder wishing for peace on earth and ending up as the only person on earth was priceless.

7.22 “Requiem” We’re back to the very first case Mulder & Scully worked: Billy Miles in Oregon. FOX waited until the very last minute to renew the show so this episode was designed to work as a series finale and a series finale. In the end Mulder gets abducted, which seems like where the series has been headed since day one, and Scully is pregnant. Mitch Pileggi played the hell out of the apology scene.

davidh777

That sounds familiar but I don't know for sure. I prefer OAR myself but don't throw a fit about it.

BobO'Link

I did some reading up on that... Yes, they did for S1-S4, which were produced in 4:3 AR. Starting in S5 it's "native" WS. So... they modified those early seasons to be WS to prevent "them black bar" people from complaining. It's generally thought to be a pretty good conversion. Personally, I'd prefer OAR *and* WS so I can choose the one I prefer. It absolutely negatively affects my interest in upgrading.

lisadoris

I'm watching the blu's and to be honest, all of the episodes look amazing. It may not be OAR in the first couple seasons but to be honest, I didn't even notice.

8.1 “Within” Scully welcomes Doggett to the team by throwing water in his face. To be fair, he totally deserved it. The hunt is on to find Mulder and Doggett’s not getting anywhere. Skinner and The Lone Gunmen track the UFO and figure out that they’re cleaning house which means, they’re looking for Gibson Praise. Doggett finds Praise and an out of it Mulder in the desert. Dondre Whitfield, who I adore on Queen Sugar as a brief scene in this episode.

8.2 “Without” After Mulder does a Peter pan off of a very high cliff and apparently walks away, Doggett starts to listen to Scully and Skinner just a bit. Of course we know that the Peter Pan from the previous episode was actually our friend Brian Thompson. Here’s what I don’t understand, the bounty hunter impersonated Billy Miles’ father perfectly in the last season finale, why doesn’t he do the same thing with everyone else instead of standing their silently raising all sorts of suspicion? Scully takes out Brian Thompson and gets thrown across the room for her trouble, Mulder is being tortured by aliens for who knows what reason (the project is finished so what’s the point), and Doggett is now assigned to The X-Files.

8.3 “Patience” Scully does her best Mulder impersonation as they search for a giant vampire bat person. Apparently he’s pissed at being captured over 40 years ago and is taking out everyone who has the scent of the hunter who found him. Scully and Doggett get attacked but they’ll be okay. Scully orders Doggett a desk; something Mulder should have done for Scully eight years ago . This episode also sees the return of the local law enforcement behavior like jerks troupe. He gets eaten for his trouble.

lisadoris

8.4 “Roadrunnsers” a cult of folks who worship a giant slug who they implant in people’s bodies against their will. Kinda gross. Part of me thinks this episode probably wouldn’t happen this way today given the proliferation of cell towers even in remote areas. Another part of me is pissed that we’re back to putting Scully in peril but then how bad ass was she to make Doggett cut the slug out of her neck without so much as a rag to bite on. Me thinks Scully should follow Mulder’s lead and have a second gun on her person: she gave away her gun to a stranger way too easily.

8.5 “Invocation” a kid who disappeared ten years prior shows up unchanged and really creepy. The episode never tells us exactly what the kid is: he’s clearly not a ghost since they took blood from him but he’s not real since the kid has been dead for quite some time. The writers give us our first hint at Doggett’s backstory. Did I mention how creepy the kid was?

I get to watch one of my favorite episodes later today.

shadokitty

Keep it up lisadoris. I’m enjoying your write ups. I might watch some X-Files next month because of them.

BobO'Link

That sways me towards them - should I decide to upgrade. As it's not a series I have history with I'll only know once I make my way through. Even then, with most stuff, I have a DVD is "good enough" mentality and only upgrade if there's an excellent price on the BR release.

shadokitty

That is how I was with the remake of Battlestar Galactica and the original Knight Rider. I had BSG on Digital, but found the UK Release of the Blu Ray set for $30. Knight Rider is available on Blu Ray, but I already had all 4 seasons anyways.

BobO'Link

I essentially did that with both versions of Battlestar.... My DVDs for each were "good enough" with the those for the new one looking quite good. I purchased that UK BR set for under $25 and snagged a super deal on the original, picking up the BR "Definitive Collection" edition (both WS and FS versions) for $30. I felt those were upgrade worthy prices.

shadokitty

I was looking at things to watch that weren’t related to this month’s challenge, so decided to watch some things for my make your own challenge again. Watching UFC Fight Night, on FS2 right now.

lisadoris

I'll usually stick with the DVDs of TV shows unless the blu's are a serious upgrade but in this case, my DVDs drowned and by the time I saved enough to re-buy the series, the blu's were available and there was a sale. I will say that the episode "Triangle" looked horrible on DVD but looked fine on blu. That's the only episode where I really noticed a difference.

8.6 “Redrum” A Terminator 2 reunion and a Scandal preview but the main point is: Joe Morton makes everything better. Morton plays a prosecutor who is moving backward in time trying to figure out who framed him for the murder of his wife. It’s not an original idea but the episode is made better by really good acting. Morton’s character is sympathetic in terms of what is happening to him but he behaves like a bit of a dick to people accused of crimes and that turns out to be why he’s having the worst week ever. Danny Trejo is our bad guy and Anne-Marie Johnson is the wife so we get a good supporting cast. This is one of the few episodes from this season that I really like.

8.7 “Via Negativa” So this one is like a supernatural Nightmare on Elm Street as Keith Szarabajka can enter people’s dreams and kill them in real life. He goes on quite the murder spree including a couple FBI agents. Kinda like “Redrum,” the story isn’t original but the acting is superb. Robert Patrick plays the hell out of Doggett figuring out what’s going on and being really freaked out about it. Whereas Mulder would have been screaming to the rooftops, Doggett is quietly scared out of his mind. The scene where he talks to Skinner about not knowing if he’s awake is well done. He knows what’s happening but he can’t believe it but he believes it enough to know that he’s in serious danger.

8.8 “Surekill” A twin who is a couple fries short of a happy meal can see through walls which makes him a very ballsy assassin (to use Doggett’s term). He shoots someone in a locked jail cell much to the dismay of the cop who watches the murder happen. The other twin is the brains of the operation and he’s just mean. None of the guest characters are sympathetic which you care what happens to them one way or the other and that’s where the episode falls down a bit.

lisadoris

8.9 “Salvage” Some poor door working at a salvage yard gets poisoned and turns into the terminator. Did I mention that he’s supposed to be dead too? He wants vengeance against the people who killed him/turned him into a machine person and you’re kinda with him until he drops an innocent woman who was trying to help him. Not cool dude.

8.10 “Badlaa” This episode was bad and confusing. So an Indian mystic can bend perception and inhabit people’s bodies. He’s apparently seeking vengeance for a chemical spill that killed over 100 people in India. Unfortunately, the episode doesn’t tell us how the people who are killed are related to the incident. That’s important information to convey. One of the kids in the episode is played by Michael Welch who I remember form Star Trek Insurrection and Stargate SG1. Unfortunately, he recently played a horrible character on Scandal and now I can’t watch him in anything without seeing the racist rant his character spat out on Scandal. The episode is bad regardless of my issues with that actor whose only in the episode for like 10 minutes.

8.11 “The Gift” So Doggett goes back and researches a case Mulder hid from Scully and Skinner. The episode reminds us that Mulder was dying which is why he was seeking out a man who could heal people. Unfortunately, the healer literally ingests whatever is wrong with the person and he feels it. Mulder couldn’t go through with the healing and even tried to kill the healer (he was suffering and wanted to die). The people in the town are selfish dicks who want to keep torturing this man and treat him like property. Doggett tries to save the healer and gets shot and killed for his trouble but the healer takes his death and finally dies. It’s an interesting episode.

8.12 “Medusa” So there’s a contagion chillin’ in the Boston subway system. Doggett gets to hang out with Penny Johnson, who I love from DS9 and 24. Scully stays in the control center because she’s pregnant and she still hasn’t told Doggett. Shouldn’t she be showing by now? Aside from local officials behaving like jerks again, there’s nothing too memorable about this episode.

lisadoris

8.13 “Per Manum” Scully and Doggett get played by Stargate’s Jay Acovone and by Adam Baldwin. I liked the latter a lot better before I knew he doxed women online. He’ll be back and his story arc will get really confusing if I remember correctly. The case involves pregnant women being murdered after giving birth to aliens so of course, Scully gets involved. As we’ve seen all season, the writers have made Scully very weepy and it’s getting annoying. It also doesn’t make sense at this point that she won’t tell Doggett that she’s pregnant, he finds out at the end anyway. A few episodes she trusted this dude to cut her neck open, he can handle it.

8.14 “This is Not Happening” Monica Reyes makes her first appearance and I can hear other X-Files fans groaning. I don’t blame Gish: it took the writers years to figure out how to write Scully so there was no way they were going to do Reyes justice in two years – they can’t write female characters. I like that Scully completely misreads Reyes and they all turn out to be right after a fashion. Abductees are being returned in really bad shape and a cult housing our old friend Jeremiah Smith is trying to help them. Teresa Hoese from our original Oregon case comes back first and gets snatched by the cult so Jeremiah can heal her. I recognize the doc treating Teresa from The Matrix (Bernard White) and his accent is completely different here. The feds overreact and raid the place, Jeremiah begs Scully to protect him, they find Mulder’s body so instead of listening to Jeremiah, she runs away, the aliens snatch Jeremiah, and Mulder is dead and Jeremiah can’t help him. Scully was way too emotional in this episode and never should have let Jeremiah out of her sight. Did she think Skinner and Doggett couldn’t ID Mulder and bring him to Jeremiah?

8.15 “DeadAlive” Mulder is buried, three months have passed, Scully is finally showing. Billy Miles’ body is recovered out of the water and it turns out he’s still alive, just barely though. Skinner exhumes Mulder’s body and it turns out, he too is a wee bit alive. Miles’ wakes up and all his skin falls off in the shower (really gross) and he’s not quite himself afterwards. According to Krycek, that bastion of honesty, it’s an alien virus. This actually makes sense as the alien plan B after the rebels took out the Syndicate. They can infest the population with a virus that will allow us to become hosts for their consciousness. Gotta hand it to the aliens, they’re a persistent bunch. Krycek will give Skinner an antidote if he kills Scully’s baby (a request that makes way more sense in hindsight than it did at the time). Doggett gets his butt kicked by Krycek and a car and Skinner tries to kill Mulder which ends up saving him in the end. Kersh makes it clear that Doggett’s career is sunk. I have two nitpicks: first, why weren’t The Lone Gunman at Mulder’s funeral? Second, if Mulder was buried, wouldn’t he have been embalmed and all of his organs removed? Did the virus also regrow the organs?

ororama

My last set of challenge comments:

Uciliste na Otvoren Prostor, Peracki and Panagur are brief looks at school, doing laundry and street activity in early 20th century Macedonia.
Weekly Review No. 232: Maori Battalion Returns is a newsreel about preparations for welcoming soldiers returning from World War II that is an interesting look at Maori culture at that point in time.
In The Bread and Alley, a boy has to overcome his fear of a dog in order to get home.
In Lost in Paris, Canadian librarian Fiona Gordon reluctantly becomes romantically involved with homeless man Dominique Abel while travelling to Paris to assist her aunt, while The Tent details the further adventures of Dom's tent.
In A Man Called Ove a recent widower decides that he has nothing left to live for after being pushed out of his job, but reconnects with life after he becomes involved with his new Swedish-Iranian neighbors.
Trans-Canada Express is a documentary about the importance of rail in the war effort in World War II and in the growth of Canada.
In No Bikini, a young girl deals with an ill-fitting bathing suit in her swim class.
In Two Cars, One Night, two brothers waiting in their parent's car in the parking lot of a pub interact with a girl in the same situation.
Arab Labor: Kindergarten and Arab Labor: Kidnapping are two more humorous looks at relationships and misunderstandings between Jews and Arabs in Israel.
In Tulpan, a recently discharged sailor pursues one of the few potential brides on the Kazakh steppe.
La Collectionneuse is another of Rohmer's Moral Tales, in which two men spending the summer at an absent friend's mansion on the Côte d'Azur decide that they are not interested in pursuing their younger fellow guest because they decide that she is a slut and it would be too easy, and by the time one realizes that he may have made a mistake it is too late.
Wonderful Town is a slow moving romance set in southern Thailand after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.
In City of Men: Parents and Kids Laranjira and Acerola deal with their father issues.
In Little Terrorist,a boy playing cricket on the India-Pakistan border enters a mine field to retrieve the ball and needs help from the other side to get home.
In The Fire Within an alcoholic leaving the sanitorium where he was successfully treated visits old friends but finds he cannot connect with anyone or anything.
Quem Faz Correr Quim is the story of an Angolan Air Force pilot whose wife bears a deformed child, who goes from his sorceress mother to his former mistress, who seems tired of him, to his wife, who demands that he take responsibility, seeking a solution.

lisadoris

8.16 “Three Words” Mulder behaves like an ungrateful dick in this episode. He comes back to work behind Kersh’s back and blames Doggett for everything. Some dude gets shot while trying to charge the White House. He wanted to tell the president that the alien invasion has started and obviously doesn’t get far. The cult leader from a few episodes ago gets wind of this, breaks out of jail and takes Doggett hostage to retrieve the proof of the invasion. Cult dude gets killed and Mulder’s pissed because Doggett survived the encounter. Doggett gets info from Baldwin’s character and that info turns out to be a setup. It also turns out that Baldwin ain’t human.

8.17 “Empedocies” Some dude gets fired from his job, gets possessed by fire, and goes on a killing spree. Reyes is brought on to the case and sees a connection to the death of Doggett’s son. She brings Mulder onto the case and Doggett is really, really not pleased about that. Ron Canada has a brief role at the beginning of the episode and Denise Crosby has a brief role toward the end. Scully’s in the hospital and she tells Mulder to stop being a jerk and help Doggett. The idea that there are specific strands of evil that can infect people made for a very unsatisfying explanation.

8.18 “Vienen” Black oil makes its final appearance and now we have glowy eyes too. Mulder cock blocks Doggett on a case on an oil rig and for their trouble, they’re stuck on the rig with the oil, and no communication. The whole crew, including Casey Biggs from DS9 is infected except for one Latino gentleman who doesn’t make it to the end of the episode. Mulder and Doggett do a Peter Pan off the rig right before it explodes and there was so not graceful. Mulder, rightfully, takes the blame for what went down and is fired from the Bureau.

lisadoris

8.18 “Alone” a mutant who is part reptile blinds his victims with venom, lets their insides liquify, and then drinks out of their harden husks. Yuck. Scully takes maternity leave and Doggett is paired with a woman who is greener than green. This is her first case but she followed the x-files from her perch in accounting. Though this is both her first, and last case, she does ask Mulder and Scully how they got out of Antarctica at the end of the movie. There was no answer to that. The two bickered like a married couple trying to explain it though and that was adorable.

8.19 “Essence” Billy Miles is back and he’s killing the OBs Scully was running from a few episodes ago. Scully’s mom sends her a nurse, played by Francis Fisher, who is working with Jay Acovone from “Per Manum.” Now everyone has decided to start asking questions about Scully’s pregnancy. Billy takes out Acovone and it appears he’s alien replicant: same strength as the bounty hunter, more talkative, and red blood. When Fisher gets busted and starts talking, she talks to Doggett, Mulder, and Skinner. Um, shouldn’t Scully hear this information? Mulder’s not even in the Bureau anymore so his butt shouldn’t be anywhere near this. This is what you end up with when there are no women in the writer’s room. Apparently, Scully’s kid is a perfect human child with no human frailties. Billy comes for Scully and Krycek of all people helps. He tells the group, which includes Scully this time, that the aliens want to wipe out any hope of humanity surviving the alien apocalypse. The end of the episode sees everyone trying to get Scully out of the FBI building in a game of hot potato. We also find out that one of the FBI agents is a replicant.

8.20 “Existence” They shove Billy Miles into a trash compactor at the end of the episode and this episode begins with him reconstituting himself in the morgue. Reyes drives her and Scully to Georgia, a drive that’s supposed to take 11 hours according to Google Maps. Adam Baldwin tells Doggett that Scully’s baby is a military prototype super soldier. Even though they’re in the middle of nowhere, Billy still finds them. Turns out Krycek and Adam Baldwin know each other, which isn’t that surprising. Shady folks tend to stick together. Baldwin inadvertently outs the FBI replicant. Skinner shoots Krycek right in the forehead. Actually, Skinner shoots him twice in the arm before going for the kill shot. Can’t say Krycek didn’t deserve to catch those bullets but it’s a little bittersweet. As Scully goes into labor, Reyes realizes the forestry agent with them is a replicant. The whole thing gets biblical as everyone and their momma watches Scully give birth.

9.1 “Nothing Important Happened Today” Xena begins her recurring stint here and it turns out she’s a replicant too and Cary Elwes pops up too I seem to remember him just being a jerk. I liked him better on Psych. The opening credits have changed and Skinner’s finally in the main cast. Doggett ended last season starting an investigation of Kersh which has made things awkward. Mulder’s apt has been cleaned out and everyone is shutting Doggett out which makes no sense at all. We get our first indication that William is special as the toy above his crib moves all by its lonesome. We also learn that despite the fact that they’re both former military, neither Doggett nor Skinner have any stealth skills. I’m sure the answer to the question of why is Langley’s face blue was answered in an episode of The Long Gunman but since I didn’t watch the show, I don’t have an answer to that question.

lisadoris

9.2 “Nothing Important Happened Today II” Turns out Doggett served with Xena and she saves his butt. She cops to the super solider story but it turns out she’s trying to get Doggett to lead her to a whistleblower. Brad, Elwes’ character, is a straight-up brown-nosing jerk and it turns out he and Reyes were romantically involved. Adam Baldwin tries to crush Doggett’s skull and Xena saves him again before getting a fist through the chest by Baldwin’s headless body. Scully finds a room full of ova that has been manipulated but of course the ship has been wired to explode so the evidence goes boom before she can see if her name is listed. Turns out, Kersh actually tried to help Doggett.

9.3 “Daemonicus” Since Reyes has a background in ritualistic killings, it seems fitting to have a case dealing with satanic rituals. It’s a bit sad that the writers framed the story as the women flowing their intuition got played by the killer and if they had listened to Doggett, none of this would have happened. It’s also a bit strange that after framing Doggett as a restrained, thoughtful investigator that the first three episodes of the season have been him hot tempered and prone to violent outbursts. I don’t know why they’re changing the character now and they really need to go back to last season’s Doggett.

9.4 “4-D” A parallel dimension episode, cool. Another staple of sci-fi/fantasy TV and it’s done well here imho (though the wikia doesn’t seem to agree). Some serial killer commits his crimes in a parallel universe and in the process of trying to nab the killer, Reyes 2 gets sliced and Doggett 2 gets paralyzed and pushed into our universe. Reyes 1 is framed for the crime and Doggett 1 gets pushed to who knows where (can’t have two Doggetts running around in the same universe). Skinner enjoyed taunting the killer and you don’t really blame him for that. Despite the past relationship he had with Reyes, Brad seems to genuinely believe that she would try to kill Doggett even with the contradictory evidence. His character is a jerk; I would have preferred they just give Kersh more screen time instead of bringing this character onboard (though I do like Elwes as an actor) a show can only handle so many jerks at one time.

9.5 “Lord of the Flies” a young boy can control insects thanks to his mom played by Jane Lynch. Aaron Paul was in the episode too which tells me that Breaking Bad wouldn’t exist without The X-Files. The flies were gross and it’s very clear that Scully does not like entomologists. Erick Avari had a fun cameo in the episode as a very confused medical examiner.

9.6 “Trust No 1” Okay, so the writers never made it clear why it was so dangerous for Mulder that he had to leave. Why is he in more danger than Scully, William, or Doggett? If the super soldiers wanted any of them dead, why not kill Scully, Mulder, and William during child birth. They were there. In this episode, she’s trying to get Mulder home but instead of trusting Doggett, she trusts a random woman she’s met on the street? Allison Smith has an honest face but there is no way Scully invites a random person she’s never met to stay in her home. Terry O’Quinn makes his third series appearance and here, he’s pulling the strings and he’s also be a super solider. I love the fact that when this episode aired it was probably difficult for people to believe that the NSA knew all this information about Scully and today, no one would be even remotely shocked. Kathryn Joosten completes The West Wing guest trifecta. This is also the episode where we learn that iron kills the super soldiers.