X-Files S7E12: Nothing to fear except fear itself

Sestra Amateur: 

Do you like The X-Files? Do you like Cops? Do you like FOX TV circa 2000? If so, then "X-Cops" is the show for you! This week, FBI Special Agents Mulder and Scully are on location in Los Angeles with the men and women of law enforcement. All suspects, even supernatural ones, are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

Rookie Deputy Keith Wetzel tries to sound like a veteran while waxing nostalgic about the effect of full moons on night patrol shifts, but he likes to use the word "irregardless," so I’ve lost interest. He and the Cops camera crew respond to a monster call, but the deputy is thinking drug addict or burglar. He finds huge claw marks on the complainant’s front door, so it’s either a monster or Freddy Krueger. 

Deputy Wetzel searches the backyard, panics and bolts with the camera crew back to his patrol car. Unfortunately, the unseen monster attacks the car, preventing their getaway. His backup arrives, led by Sergeant Duthie, but the deputy claims it was “gangbangers.” The entire squad chases down armed subjects, but it’s just Sculder. Fox tries to interview Wetzel, but he’s now reluctant to talk on camera. Mulder makes it easier for him and mentions a werewolf-like creature seen during a previous full moon. And it turns out, poor Deputy Wetzel has a bite on his wrist. Do you know how much paperwork he and his sergeant have to do now?

Meanwhile, Scully tries to convince Fox not to be so open about their types of investigations with the camera running. He’s titillated by the possibility of catching a werewolf on camera to validate his beliefs. Mulder shows Duthie the werewolf sketch from the previous victim, but this victim describes Freddy. (I was right!) Dana tells Fox that Deputy Wetzel was not bitten by a werewolf, it’s just a bunch of bug bites. Deputies get another call and the agents follow the cops to a clawed dead body. It’s the sketch artist who had just left the victim’s house. 

Sculder and Duthie interview witnesses Steve and Edy, but the sketches from the previous attacks aren’t helpful. The fingernail Scully finds at the crime scene gets quickly identified as belonging to Chantara the streetwalker. The duo and a camera crew locate Chantara, who blames her pimp boyfriend Chuco for the murder and is terrified he will break her neck. The cops and the agents raid Chuco’s crackhouse, where they find his long dead body. Now that’s a great alibi. Everyone runs outside when Deputy Wetzel starts shooting at something. Too bad that something broke Chantara’s neck first.

One deputy finds evidence that Wetzel may have shot the creature. Keith finally admits he thought he saw “The Wasp Man.” (That explains his bug bites.) So this creature is able to become a person’s worst nightmare. Maybe they’re looking for the Batman villain Scarecrow, whose modus operandi is to feed on everyone’s fears. Sculder return to witnesses Steve and Edy, who are in the middle of a domestic dispute, not an attack. Our intrepid heroes split up to follow different leads. Surprisingly, Scully lets the cameraman tag along for Chantara’s autopsy, probably because Assistant Director Skinner told her the FBI has nothing to hide, off camera. The coroner’s assistant already heard way too much about the investigation and is concerned about contagion. She would fit in very well in today’s reality. Of course, her fear of the hantavirus causes her to die of the hantavirus. Dana was spared because she wasn’t afraid.

Deputy Wetzel is trying to be a brave little soldier, but he apparently doesn’t feel safe with just the camera crew and they get attacked again in the crackhouse. (How did law enforcement manage to clear, search, process, inventory and seal the crime scene in only couple of hours? I’ll believe in the fear contagion before I’ll believe that!) Sgt. Duthie -- who, by now, should have relinquished command to a higher ranking officer -- and her deputies try to enter through the locked front door. Mulder and Scully go around the back and gain entry. They find the camera crew alive and well. (I wonder what kind of hazard pay the Cops camera crew gets. This particular show, it doesn’t seem like enough.) Dana keeps them safe and hidden. Wetzel is alive but bleeding. Did he defeat the creature by being courageous? It sure didn’t sound like it. Regardless of his own beliefs, the sun began to rise, so he’ll have to revisit his fear during the next full moon. I’ll bet he switches to the day shift by then.

Sestra Professional: 

Bad claws, bad claws, whatcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do when they come for you? After the wrapup of the Samantha mythology 7 1/2 years in the making last week, we definitely could use something a little lighter. Enter Vince Gilligan with a concept he had been trying to turn into reality -- at least The X-Files' version of such -- for many years. Hence the mashup "X-Cops."

Creator Chris Carter's concern, according to The Complete X-Files, was that such an effort would be "too goofy." The show needed to play the episode exactly like an installment of the fellow FOX show. And so it did. With Cops co-creator John Langley consulting, Gilligan was invited on an actual shoot to get the rhythm of the show. It looked so much like the original that FOX decided a notification was needed at the beginning so viewers understood The X-Files wasn't being pre-empted.

Can I see your badge again? "X-Cops" also feels very reminiscent of The Blair Witch Project, the small-budget film that did big box office the previous summer. Not just in terms of the hand-held cameras either, the idea that the evil remains unseen and we never get a true look at what Mulder, Scully, the cops and the camera crew are after. Our protagonists even hear strange noises while stomping around an old house at the end.

With all that going on, we might have expected our leads to fall by the wayside in an episode that might have seemed gimmicky, particularly during a season in which the bottle shows haven't done much to advance our story. Luckily, it doesn't play out that way.

That's why they pay us the big bucks: Mulder really gets into the idea of having a camera crew trail his every move while documenting his ideas -- particularly since he's so far ahead of the curve than anyone else -- for an international audience. It's your basic feast for David Duchovny, he plays to the Cops camera with perfect precision. There's not a more perfect moment than when Fox tells Dana, "I don't think it's live television, she just said [bleeped out]." One would think Mulder had been on the actual Cops for years, the way he can conversationally lay out details of the case while driving or walking. Maybe Fox was a closet viewer, when not indulging his various other television predilections.

Contrast that with Scully, who probably doesn't want to be investigating the case anyway, let alone with cameramen following in her wake. Gillian Anderson matches Duchovny beat for beat with her comic timing. Early on, Dana just turns away from the camera in shame -- I'm not entirely sure whether that's because she's being filmed or because she's investigating a monster. But Anderson really excels as the episode rolls to its conclusion. Girlfriend can perform an autopsy and point out out that the FBI has nothing to hide at the same time. And her "I hate you guys" upon finding the Cops crew cowering in the closet is priceless.

Meta monsters: The crossover episode was filmed on videotape by director Michael Watkins, who even worked the camera at times. Having had an ongoing relationship with Los Angeles law enforcement, he called in a few favors -- including use of real sheriff's deputies as extras, according to the official episode guide. ... The average number of edits in an X-Files ep ranged from 800 to 1,200. The total in the first cut of this one was a mere 45, the episode guide stated. ... Cops cameraman Daniel Emmett and sound man John Michael Vaughn played themselves and an editor from the show was tapped to create the trademark blur over the faces of innocent bystanders, according to the guide. 

Guest star of the week: Dee Freeman was an arresting presence as Sgt. Duthie, pun intended. She sounds as disbelieving as Dana, and she's also got a vocabulary reminiscent of Detective Manners in "Jose Chung's From Outer Space" (Season 3, Episode 20). But most of all, she brings some grit to an episode besieged by such flamboyant characters as Steve and Edy and a hooker whose pink hair matches her fingernails.