Sestra Amateur:
New season, new opening, new name in the credits. Robert Patrick has joined the main cast as Special Agent John Doggett and you know what that means, right? Yep, less Mulder. There are pros and cons to this development. Viewers during the original run must have been livid to learn he knocked up Scully, and because of behind-the-scenes reasons, Fox would not be there when Dana needs him most. Of course, I would have liked for Scully to turn to Walter Skinner for solace, but clearly that wasn’t going to happen. My other preferred option would be seeing the show embrace the comedic aspect of Four Men and a Baby (Skinner and the Lone Gunmen, of course) but I don’t think that would be appreciated by fans tuning in to watch a sci-fi/mystery series.
Anyway, Scully wakes up abruptly after having a dream about Mulder being imprisoned by aliens. Or is Fox actually a prisoner and the Chris Carter/Kim Manners dynamic duo wrote/directed the scene that way to create ambiguity? Your call. Dana returns to work the day after Mulder’s abduction. She’s a wee bit more frustrated and angry than usual, and not just because she’s been abandoned by her baby daddy. Fox's office is being ransacked for clues to his location and Assistant Director Skinner has no control over it. Turns out, there’s a new sheriff – er, Deputy Director – in town. Actually, he’s a familiar face: Alvin Kersh is back in control at the FBI and wants Team Sculner to give their sworn statements to Agent Doggett, head of the Where’s Mulder Task Force, ASAP. Kersh also insists there should be no mention of alien involvement. Walter claims he’ll tell the truth, even though Dana tries to sway him for Fox's sake. Doggett’s a slick one; he interviews Scully without her realizing it, at first. Their meeting ends with Dana throwing a cup of water in his face.
Back at home, Scully learns more about her new enemy – I mean, future partner: former Marine, former NYPD detective, respectable resume. After a bout of morning sickness (at night), an emotional Dana realizes her phone is tapped and someone is watching her apartment. Uh oh, Scully is in full, Mulder-esque "trust no one" mode. She calls John and reams him out for spying on her, which he denies. Armed with her gun, Dana chases her landlord through the apartment building, not realizing it’s him. He claims Fox was outside her apartment.
Scully goes back upstairs and realizes someone stole her laptop. She then heads to Mulder’s apartment. Wow, his place is uncharacteristically dusty. I think we would have realized his computer was missing even without the clean spot. Dana curls up with one of Fox’s shirts and takes a nap. And now it appears Mulder is undergoing some horrifying torture at the hands of his unseen captors. His facial skin is stretched in a way that’s reminiscent of Katherine Helmond in Terry Gilliam’s Brazil and/or X-Files alum Andrew Robinson in Clive Barker’s Hellraiser. Let’s just say it would be the worst time for Fox to sneeze. And if you thought the dentist scene in John Schlesinger’s Marathon Man was hard to sit through then you’ll want to skip the 18:00- to 19:00-minute mark of this episode.
By the way, my Four Men and a Baby wish seems to be gaining traction. Walter is working with the Lone Gunmen to track Fox's location based on data our trio obtained through questionable means. Season 1 Skinner would never have allowed that. Meanwhile, because of Scully’s livid-but-paranoid phone call, Doggett touches base with Kersh and realizes there’s more going on than he’s been told. John’s a sharp one. He finds Dana at Mulder’s apartment and they briefly have it out before he confronts her with car rental receipts in Fox's name. She claims not to know where Mulder was going on his weekends.
But we’ll have to put a pin in this for now, because someone using Fox's ID card entered the FBI office and stole some relevant files. I thought that place had cameras. Back in the office, Walter gets ambushed by Kersh, John and an extra who all seem to think Skinner is either helping Mulder or involved with the theft. Scully reveals to Doggett that Fox was visiting his family’s gravesite on the weekends. For some reason, the Mulder family headstone has been brought to the task force headquarters and now includes Fox's death year.
John reveals to Dana and Walter that Mulder was terminally ill. Remember Fox's “extremely high brain function” diagnosis in "Biogenesis" (Season 6, Episode 22) and "The Sixth Extinction" (S7E1)? Apparently, Mulder did not make a full recovery after all. Doggett’s theory? A dying Fox staged his abduction to validate his obsession. Skinner is convinced he knows what he saw. Scully tries to support Walter while quietly begging John not to close his file with that conclusion.
Team Sculner meet with the Lone Gunmen (Four Men and a Little Lady?) to review current data to locate Mulder. Dana realizes the information is leading them to chess-playing savant/psychic Gibson Praise, who we first met two years earlier in "The End" (S520). John is almost on the same page because an unknown person slipped Gibson’s file under his door. He thinks Fox wants to hurt the boy, assuming Mulder considers him “evidence” of alien existence. And now everyone is converging on Arizona, looking for Gibson.
Meanwhile, Mulder is back in the alien dentist’s chair. Now he’s naked and bolted to it through his arms and legs. Have you noticed Fox’s “alien abduction” situation keeps getting worse and worse? Now there’s a bone saw cutting through his chest! Luckily, Scully wakes up, which supports the theory that Mulder’s torture scenario exists only in her nightmares. Dana and Walter are driving through Arizona while Doggett and his task force head directly to Gibson’s school. John has the advantage; he’s in a helicopter. You gotta love those government resources. Scully sees a mirage but shrugs it off, she and Skinner are too close. Doggett arrives first but Gibson bails through the window when he sees John. Team Sculner arrive in solid second place while Doggett’s lackeys take third. A white male who dresses like casual Mulder finds Gibson and walks away with him. Doggett tracks them up one of the hills and points his gun at … Mulder! How did my Four Men and a Little Lady turn into Clint Eastwood’s A Perfect World??
Sestra Professional:
In seven seasons, The X-Files understandably became "The Mulder and Scully Show," but I always thought the concept could be more malleable than that. And the introduction of Robert Patrick as John Doggett backs that up nicely.
Nice to meet you, Agent Doggett: Series creator Chris Carter started the attack on Doggett's person before the fan base could even get a real crack at it, but shippers probably would have preferred a vat of acid to a mere Dixie cup of water. Still, it gives John -- and us -- a starting point for the new beginning. This is actually rejuvenating for Gillian Anderson, although the pregnancy will surely slow Scully down. This soapy development ranks as one of my least favorite, maybe because it comes complete with the obtrusive "Scully's Theme" which Mark Snow meant to convey Dana's inner turmoil. To be truthful, it gives me morning sickness too ... at night as well. Oh well, at least Scully's hair looks better.
Moving the pieces around on the proverbial board also gives Skinner much more than he's had to do in recent seasons. Thank goodness. Walter seems to have dropped a rung in status with AD Kersh back in the fold, but he did see what he saw at the end of last season. And his reaction to that puts him in as much of a different place as it did Mulder. Well, almost, anyway, he's not naked with tubes coming out of different orifices.
Even with an open mind, it took me a while to come to terms with David Duchovny's reduced role in Season 8. But looking at "Within" from a distance, it's a splendid introduction to the new co-lead. And for proof, look at Kersh. Through no fault of portrayer James Pickens Jr., Alvin's as two-dimensional as they come. Luckily he chose his underling wisely, because from the get-go, John's got much more going for him (although surely neither of Kersh's dimensions will appreciate that). As we repilot, it's easy to get psyched up about taking the trip with Doggett. And coming off a lackluster season, that is most welcome indeed.
I'm probably not supposed to be giggling at Fox's fate ... or Dana's depiction of it. It makes me think about what that must have been like filming this on the set. After all, David did put the show behind the proverbial 8-ball by bowing out of the series. It feels like some kind of on-screen retribution. Is it revenge when Duchovny gets to utilize the completely dead-pan look that made him famous as "casual Mulder" at the end of the episode?
Give a little, get a little: Doggett does show us all that he's an ace. Maybe Kersh shouldn't have made the head of his task force someone smart enough to wade through the bull. He probably needed someone more like Jeffrey Spender who sits around waiting for his superiors to tell him what to look for and what to avoid. What John wants to do is find Fox, he's laser focused on that task. He's dogged in that pursuit, so his name might be a wee bit on the nose.
The Mulder sightings in and around his usual haunts are quite intriguing. They're disorienting, we don't know what to think about any of it. We know what we saw, the same as what Skinner saw. But that doesn't explain the VISA receipts nor the grave marker in the slightest. Even Dana doesn't know what to think, and we know she's the one who knows him best. But his partner in and out of the office didn't know that he was suffering from a recurrence of that Season 7 opener brain thingy. That makes for the most interesting development on the show in years.
Doggett's supposition doesn't seem too far off base, logically speaking. If we didn't know Fox as well as Dana does, we could buy that Mulder staged his disappearance. On a regular procedural, we might presume a character backed into a corner would be doing something like this to create doubt. That a man whose life had been threatened, whose work had been denigrated to the point that his premise no longer held water had just one play left to make. John's a smart man, it didn't take me too long to join his team.
It may seem like a tried-and-true X-Files scenario now with Scully in Fox's believer role and Doggett in Scullyville. And it is, to some extent, but John's giving us a new wrinkle on that old chestnut. He can't come around via autopsies and science, like Dana once did, but his brain absorbs police reports like nobody's business. He doesn't need Lone Gunmen and a bunch of UFO reports to point him toward Gibson Praise, especially when a well-timed folder is slipped under a door. Doggett may just be an asset to Dana, to the X-files as a department and to The X-Files, the show, after all.
Major props to Carter and Kim Manners for getting all this accomplished over the course of the first episode of Season 8. The literal cliffhanger is -- again -- the best one in quite a while. Everything, especially Gillian, looks great. Seemingly on fumes for large portions of the previous season, the tank is full once again.
Meta-morphosis: Want to know who some of the other names under consideration for the role of Doggett were? According to The Complete X-Files, that list included Christian Slater, Patrick Dempsey, Lou Diamond Phillips, D.B. Sweeney, Dominic Purcell, Bruce Campbell, Hart Bochner, Esai Morales and Craig Sheffer. ... "When Robert walked in the door, I think we all just said, 'This is him. This is John Doggett," co-executive producer John Shiban said in the book. ... "The character was me, and there was just no way I wasn't going to do it," Patrick added. I say, thank goodness. ... Oh, and we all know Dana was named after legendary Dodgers broadcaster Vin Scully. Well, Vinman's partner just happened to be named Jerry Doggett.
Sestra Amateur:
To prepare for this episode, I thought it would be a good idea to reread the blog from the very first X-Files episode because I have seem to have near-zero retention. A few things I’ve learned -- my writing style and font preference have changed since 2016 and I’ve broken that habit of double-spacing in between sentences. If your brain is leaky like mine, then I suggest rereading the blog for "Pilot" (Season 1, Episode 1) before starting this one.
In present day Bellefleur, Oregon, Detective Miles is rushing to back up a deputy when his car experiences electronic interference. The vehicle loses power and digital clock goes wonky (I’m plagiarizing myself again). Miles crashes into Ray’s car but the poor deputy appears to have injuries unrelated to a traffic crash. Then Miles really steps in it, literally. It’s that green ooze we’ve seen before. Ray is no longer Ray, he’s an alien bounty hunter! (No, not a bounty hunter that hunts aliens, he is alien!)
The scariest thing in the world is happening to Sculder right now: The X-Files Division is being audited! They sent a “Scully” to examine the FBI’s most costly unit. Dana tries to make an impression by explaining to the auditor how one of the related investigations left her unable to have children and nearly killed her. (Maybe that’s why she and Mulder didn’t use a condom all those weeks ago.) The evaluator is convinced Fox could be more cost-effective if he conducted more investigations from the office computer.
Meanwhile, in a Tunisian prison, Marita Covarrubias is arranging Alex Krycek’s release. Even he is stunned to see she’s still alive. Apparently, the Cigarette Smoking Man is in need of his services. And back in Oregon, two young men, Gary and Richie, head toward the woods to check out reports of a crashed UFO. Det. Miles runs interference and sends the boys away. The detective's son, Billy, calls Mulder who confirms -- once again, “It’s happening again.”
Krycek and Marita meet with a terminally ill and wheelchair-bound Cancer Man and he reveals an alien ship collided with a military aircraft in Oregon. He sends Alex to the scene for damage control. Probably a good idea because those two young men weren’t deterred by Det. Miles and are creeping around the woods after dark. Gary walks over an area that lifts him in the air and thrashes him about. Meanwhile, Richie’s flashlight becomes too hot to handle. He drops it and leaves.
By the way, Billy is now Deputy Bill Miles, divorcee. Sculder meet with him at his father’s home in Oregon and he reveals a Navy pilot hit an unidentified aircraft that has not yet been recovered. And Deputy Ray is still missing, as far as Bill knows. His father returns home and gets reacquainted with our heroes. They head to the scene from the agents' first investigation together, which still bears the orange X that Fox spray-painted on the road to mark the location of their electrical disturbance. (That’s some industrial-strength spray paint to not get weathered or washed away after seven years. Florida DOT sure needs it on all of their road construction sites.) By the way, it’s the same location where Det. Miles’ car died. Scully finds evidence that Deputy Ray shot his gun three times, but at whom was he shooting? That’s almost unimportant once we realize Det. Miles is hiding the missing deputy’s dead body in the trunk of his patrol vehicle. And to make it worse, he upsets the chain of custody with Dana's shell casings.
Mulder and Scully visit Ray’s wife, Theresa Nemman Hoese, and learn she’s the same Theresa from their original investigation. She reveals Ray was also an abductee and claims to have proof in his medical history documents. Theresa hands her baby to Dana while she retrieves the documents and Fox is transfixed by her maternal side. Later that night, a sick Scully goes to Mulder’s room. She’s chilly so Fox tries to warm her up. He decides this case is too much for her to handle emotionally and tells her to head home. Mulder’s right about a few things; their personal costs are too high and there is more Dana needs to do with her life.
Meanwhile, the impossible has happened: Cancer Man doesn’t know everything. He’s genuinely shocked to hear Sculder are in Oregon looking for the missing deputy, who, according to CSM, will be with the missing spaceship. Good news: Ray returns home. Bad news: it’s not Ray. Theresa stabs her “husband,” who oozes green acidic liquid before dragging the poor woman away from her screaming baby. If only she had one of those silver ice-pick-like weapons handy. The next morning, the agents inspect the baby’s room and find the same scorch marks on the carpet they saw on the road. Scully experiences another dizzy spell. Looks like she’s ignoring Fox's suggestion to go home.
Cancer Man and Marita have a discussion about how much they do (or don’t) trust Krycek. Very Sick Man is convinced the person who possesses the crashed alien ship will “possess the answer to all things” blah, blah, blah. He even has a psychotic look in his eye as he denounces God and worships the alien race’s knowledge. He’s so far from being the puppet master of Season 7, Episode 15 (En Ami) only two months earlier that it feels truly unbelievable. But we’ll suspend our disbelief – once again -- for the sake of the story.
Outside the Hoese residence, Mulder confronts a suspicious-looking Richie who claims Gary was taken and Det. Miles is a part of it. While looking for Gary in the woods, Dana finds the same pocket and gets thrashed. At the same time, Richie and Fox locate Richie’s burned-out flashlight. Mulder finds Scully but assumes she just had another fainting spell, not an alien spacecraft-induced epileptic fit. Billy confronts his father at gunpoint, but the detective gently disarms his son before morphing into the most familiar alien bounty hunter form, Brian Thompson. Of course, Sculder pick that exact moment to arrive at the Miles residence. But when they enter the house, it’s empty.
Two days later, Fox is back in his FBI office and Assistant Director Walter Skinner has a frank discussion with him before letting Krycek and Covarrubias into the room. Alex claims the ship is still cloaked in the woods while the alien bounty hunter cleans up the evidence. Marita insists Cancer Man is really dying, but Krycek is willing to assist the FBI because he wants payback against his former handler. A perplexed Dana arrives late to the party. And now it’s time for the Lone Gunmen to work their magic and find the ship. During the powwow, Scully gets frustrated and leaves the room. Fox tells her she’s not going back to Oregon because the bounty hunter’s mission is to take care of abductees like Dana. He won’t risk losing her, but she won’t let him go alone. Skinner goes on the Oregon snipe hunt in her place (snipe, snipe).
Back in D.C., Scully is reviewing the Miles and Hoese medical files when she realizes Mulder is the one in danger, not her. She then has another ill-timed fainting spell. And in Oregon, Team Skinder (Mulner?) use laser light beams to locate the cloaked ship. It obscures Fox, who has found all of the recent abductees. Mulder walks among them and stares at the alien ship hovering above the group. The alien bounty hunter joins them and the ship leaves with its precious cargo while poor Walter watches helplessly.
Team Krybias (Covacek?) return to Cancer Man, who is understandably disappointed. Krycek responds by throwing CSM down the stairs. It would have been more definitive to just break his neck with your bare hands, Alex. Snipeless Skinner visits Scully in a D.C. hospital, but she already knows Mulder is gone. Walter claims he can’t – and won’t – deny what he saw in Oregon. Dana resolves they’ll find Fox together (Team Sculner! No, Team Skinly!), then breaks the stunning secret news that she’s pregnant. OK, now that I’ve patiently watched “The Duchovny Show” for four years and six months, may I please have some Robert Patrick?
Sestra Professional:
The takeaway from last week's episode, "Je Souhaite," was to be careful what you wish for because it just might come true. For seven seasons, Fox Mulder wanted to unlock the mysteries of the X-files. Well, that idea had sort of been tamped down this year, especially after the mystery of Samantha was resolved, but it still rang true. Now he knows.
What exactly is left to investigate? So we go back to the very beginning to wrap up this season. It's kind of nice to return to garden-variety X-Files, the stuff that got us hooked with shape shifters and green goo. Cigarette Smoking Man's in ... Skinner's in ... Alex's in ... the Lone Gunmen are in ... it's even great to see Marita again. I didn't really how much they were missed until this exact moment. Well, except for maybe the Krycek part.
Since we're at that point ... and the script is by series creator Chris Carter ... we get a bit of a clunky recap of our seven years with Sculder by virtue of an auditor who has just realized they're spending more than the FBI's other agents. (That's government efficiency for ya.) Scully counters with the standard line about not being able to measure their work in regular terms. She reminds us that she blames her Season 2 abduction not on aliens, but on a conspiracy of men who subjected her to medical tests that left her barren. But ultimately it gives the non-believer a reason to say she has seen things she can't deny.
Cancer Man, still smoking despite having a trachea tube, sets the stage for what's to come -- "I'm hoping we can all move forward, put the past behind us." But there's a lot of water under that bridge. It makes logical sense in terms of our canvas for CGB Spender to depend on Krycek and Covarrubias to get him back in the middle of this. After all, how reasonable was it to think the alien takeover just ended after The Syndicate was taken down? So CSM turns to the people who understand -- as much as they can -- what it all means.
Seeing Billy Miles again is strange, not because of what's come before, but because of what I know comes after. Like Mulder quoting the legendary Yogi Berra, it's déjà vu all over again. Being crack law enforcement professionals, I wonder if Billy and his pops noticed how much better Dana dresses now. Scully's clothing choices when they first met were downright dowdy, now she's all sleek and tailored.
There's so much more than this: A certain parallel is evident between the former Teresa Nemman and her missing husband, Ray Hoese, and our leads. Particularly when Teresa points out that his experiences were even worse than her own. They had a connection that was deeper and different than with everyone else they knew too. So after our heroes see her again, it's rather effective to see Dana and Fox snuggling in bed, even if it's because she's feeling under the weather. Then the return of fake Ray provides some sharp shadowing of what we're in store for in the future.
The shippers finally have something to cheer about. They're past having to cling to looks or brief touches between Mulder and Scully. There's genuine caring, Fox won't let her go back out in the field after a couple of spells -- the jostling of Dana by the magnetic field is literally one of the more jarring things we've seen in some time. Particularly after the big reveal at the end, something that the fans were so ecstatic about at the time that revival history really put a damper on.
Luckily, we get Skinner back soon after to point out that if Fox brought an alien to shake hands with the president the bureau's impression of him wouldn't change. That point might have seemed more valid if he didn't follow that up by bringing Alex and Marita into Fox's office. Does it feel a little like they're throwing everything into a pot and hoping for a savory stew when the Gunmen are called in too? Maybe, but again, having these cornerstones of the franchise make for at least a more absorbing episode than we've had for great stretches of Season 7.
Sending the old devil back to hell: The Smoking Man allegedly may be dying, but as we know well, true evil doesn't seem to ever die. So throwing him down the stairs -- while kinda cool -- doesn't seem like it would get the job done. I enjoy Krycek and think the canvas is more interesting when he's on it, but his job success rate is even lower than the one Mulder and Scully got raked over the coals for by the auditor.
Speaking of people who aren't up to the tasks they're given, you just knew sending Walter back to Oregon with Fox wouldn't pan out as planned. Having Mulder see things in the magnetic field that Skinner couldn't was a fine touch, though. All credit here to Kim Manners stepping in for Carter to direct the season finale. And it's not like Skinner could have done anything to save him under those conditions, even a completely healthy Dana would have had a problem doing that.
For a large portion of Season 7, the powers-that-be at The X-Files thought it might mark the end of the series. David Duchovny wanted out, but Gillian Anderson was still under contract for another year. The final decision on an eighth season hadn't been made at the time "Requiem" was written and filmed. That's when the creative team decided to go back to the pilot to bring everything full circle, according to the official episode guide. Shortly before it aired, FOX announced the renewal, with David agreeing to be in about half the episodes. The series could have easily ended here and continued on just in movies, but as we'll see, there is more left in the tank.
Guest star of the week: Apologies to Zachary Ansley as Billy Miles, but ... he'll be back. Anyway, I was more touched by Sarah Koskoff as Theresa Nemman Hoese, who retained so much of her character's appeal from the pilot, with glimmers of hope amid much confusion. It's that dimension and glow that later sets her apart when Mulder ultimately gets pulled into the group taken by the UFO.
Sestra Amateur:
Let’s break out the Google Translate for the last time this season. Sestra Pro doesn’t need such a device because she speaks French. Je Souhaite means "I Wish" which is pretty much how I feel about this episode. I wish this bottle ep will be better than last week’s bottle ep. Luckily, the bar is set low, Vince Gilligan is in control and Mark Snow’s opening score sounds whimsical.
In a Creve Coeur, Missouri self-storage facility (I feel like I should be translating that city name too), slacker employee Anson Stokes -- played by familiar face Kevin Weisman -- is dreaming of a better life. Hounded by his boss Jay Gilmore, Anson is cleaning out a storage locker when he finds a woman wearing a black leather jacket wrapped up in a rug. (Where’s Storage Wars when you need it?) Anson’s boss won’t shut up, but it’s no longer a problem; poor Jay no longer has a mouth.
One month later, after seeking medical attention (at least I hope he didn’t “fix” the problem himself), Gilmore ends up in Sculder’s office, accusing Stokes of making him “shut up.” Scully has medical explanations for Gilmore’s affliction, but Mulder doesn’t buy them. They travel to Anson’s trailer in Missouri to interview him and find a yacht in the adjacent lot. Anson’s wheelchair-bound brother and roommate Leslie Stokes – played by the suddenly everywhere Will Sasso – claims they’re just holding it for a friend. Fox spots the woman in black but a panicky Leslie abruptly ends the interview.
The agents check out the storage unit, which still hasn’t been emptied. Are Jay and Anson the only two employees in the place? Mulder finds a photograph inside which implies the woman in black is a lot older than she looks. Back in the Stokes trailer, Anson is debating how to use his last wish. How about wishing your brother doesn’t have to be in a wheelchair, you selfish jerk? Apparently, the woman in black is a genie who thinks like I do. Anson goes with invisibility instead. Her job complete, the genie has vanished. And stupid Anson gets flattened by a truck that couldn’t see him.
Dana inherits the challenge of autopsying an invisible man. He should probably smell horribly, based on the number of flies that were swarming his unseen carcass. But Scully gets creative and giddy as she brushes powder on Anson’s face. I wonder how many jars it took to cover his whole body. Finally, Dana is a believer. By the way, Anson’s body should have been way more mangled since he was hit by a semi. Meanwhile, Fox reinterviews Leslie to ask about the “jinniyah” – a female genie – but Leslie outsmarts Mulder and retrieves the genie from the storage unit, where she is wrapped in her rug again.
Thanks to facial recognition software, Fox finds the genie in archival footage with Benito Mussolini and Richard Nixon. Jinniyah gets around. Leslie now has three wishes but, surprisingly, it doesn’t cross his mind either to wish for his body to be healed. He thinks he has a better plan for his first wish; to get his brother back. Too bad it makes Scully look like a crackpot to the medical community she was hoping to impress. But Leslie wasn’t specific enough because this is post-hit-by-a-truck Anson, animated but rotting and smelly. (I wonder if Gilligan was influenced by The Monkey’s Paw, one of the creepiest short stories I’ve ever read, but chose to give it a humorous spin.)
Leslie wastes another wish to get his brother to talk again and a suffering Anson blows up the trailer before Leslie could make his third wish. Hopefully the yacht’s OK. Mulder finally gets to talk to Jenn (his nickname for Jinniyah) who relays her origin story to Sculder. Because Fox “unrolled” her, he’s earned three wishes, so he takes Jenn home with him. His first wish -- peace on Earth. Too bad the only way to achieve that (at least with this particular genie) is to erase all humans from the world. Mulder wastes his second wish by undoing his first wish at a very inopportune moment, during an FBI staff meeting led by Assistant Director Walter Skinner. Fox starts treating his third wish like a legal document until Dana arrives and talks some sense into him.
Mulder wishes for Jenn’s freedom, then enjoys movie night with Scully. Maybe his post-genie thought was for a sense of normalcy because Sculder seem to have it for one night. But it won’t last long. Next week is the season finale and we all know how those affect our intrepid heroes. As the French say, “je veux croire.”
Sestra Professional:
Thank goodness Vince Gilligan is here to remind us how a comedy episode of The X-Files should be done. It might have otherwise been wiped from our minds with a flashy thing that the Tobacco Dragging Guy always uses to make Jackal Muldoon forget what he's seen. Wait, what? That object is from Men in Black? Not that "Je Souhaite" ranks among my favorites, just that it feels much more righter. Last week's dud, "Fight Club" apparently really took a toll on my recall ... and my grammar.
The teaser was concerning, though, the characters seemed cardboardy (still working on getting my words back from the brain degradation) and that mouth gag seemed a little much. But then again, we're talking about a writer who has crafted tails on babies and a teen vampire to start off previously highly regarded episodes.
Scully's reaction to seeing the state of the "mouth thing" provides the first clue that everything is going to be OK in The X-Files universe for them and us. Gilligan writes with a lighter touch, one that leaves room for Gillian Anderson to react in a way that's natural for Dana. Sufficeth to say, Vince really knows how to write for Gillian, and in his first directorial effort, he shows he can shoot her in the best light as well.
How many centuries now has disco been dead? But Mulder isn't left out in the cold. This season had a lot of light-hearted offerings early on that allowed Fox to quip, then it got rather serious until the 19th ep, Duchovny's "Hollywood A.D." Here, Fox gets to investigate "Mr. Saturday Night Fever" and he realizes the mystery woman is the spiritual link. He's on to the fact that the previous wishers got all the power they ever wanted and lost it, including Mussolini and Nixon. OK, it's not the most subtle thing Gilligan's ever penned.
The non-centuries-old bottle-ep characters are pretty one-dimensional. Even the most narrow-minded individuals should have realized the genie was gesturing to Leslie's wheelchair. But if they had, that would have left us without the singular death of Anson and the ensuing autopsy scene -- the funniest one this side of the second tourist one in "Bad Blood" (Season 5, Episode 12), also written by Gilligan. Unless you count the elephant in "Fearful Symmetry" (S2E18), decidly not penned by Vince.
This takes the cake: In my favorite scene of Season 7, Scully gets a sense of how gaga all the conspiracy stuff used to make her partner, bringing Anson into view brush stroke by brush stroke. She doesn't want to leave the late Stokes alone for fear of him disappearing like so many their leads have before, even saying a quick "bye" to him when closing the door on him in the morgue. It's almost heartbreaking when she opens it again and Anson's no longer there.
So we watch the travails of the two worst wishers in the history of wishing. Did Leslie take a mailbox to the head while hitting the postal objects with a bat? Considering a solid gold wheelchair over asking her to fix his legs seems rather misguided. Then again, if he hadn't gotten all blowed up (residual, I can't just been instantly cured), Leslie probably would have wound up with Secretariat's gams or something like that.
It's like giving a chimpanzee a revolver: Eventually Mulder has to get a hold of Jenn to show he's so much better at wishing than everyone else. There's a protracted sequence in which Fox realizes he can't just say "peace on Earth" without ramifications. We get hit over the head with the "people are cursed with stupidity" sentiment, lest we not have figured out that Jenn spent 500 years listening to people ask for the wrong things. The greed, the shallowness, the propensity for self-destruction. We get it, even without a prison tattoo.
The larger point is taken, though. Even without a jinniyah around, we should say what we mean and mean what we say. So wishing for more Gilligan-scripted episodes should be good, just stipulating that they are Vince Gilligan episodes and not ones featuring the first mate of the S.S. Minnow.
Guest star of the week: With respect to Will Sasso, effective in spite of Leslie, the nod goes to Paula Sorge. Gilligan wrote the part for Janeane Garofalo, who was unavailable. Sorge does a remarkable job in her stead. Initially, she gets to react comedically to the abject ridiculousness around her, but as we find out what Jenn's been through, Sorge gives a more resonant look at a thankless job. The genie, not the role. Specificity is indeed important.
New season, new opening, new name in the credits. Robert Patrick has joined the main cast as Special Agent John Doggett and you know what that means, right? Yep, less Mulder. There are pros and cons to this development. Viewers during the original run must have been livid to learn he knocked up Scully, and because of behind-the-scenes reasons, Fox would not be there when Dana needs him most. Of course, I would have liked for Scully to turn to Walter Skinner for solace, but clearly that wasn’t going to happen. My other preferred option would be seeing the show embrace the comedic aspect of Four Men and a Baby (Skinner and the Lone Gunmen, of course) but I don’t think that would be appreciated by fans tuning in to watch a sci-fi/mystery series.
Anyway, Scully wakes up abruptly after having a dream about Mulder being imprisoned by aliens. Or is Fox actually a prisoner and the Chris Carter/Kim Manners dynamic duo wrote/directed the scene that way to create ambiguity? Your call. Dana returns to work the day after Mulder’s abduction. She’s a wee bit more frustrated and angry than usual, and not just because she’s been abandoned by her baby daddy. Fox's office is being ransacked for clues to his location and Assistant Director Skinner has no control over it. Turns out, there’s a new sheriff – er, Deputy Director – in town. Actually, he’s a familiar face: Alvin Kersh is back in control at the FBI and wants Team Sculner to give their sworn statements to Agent Doggett, head of the Where’s Mulder Task Force, ASAP. Kersh also insists there should be no mention of alien involvement. Walter claims he’ll tell the truth, even though Dana tries to sway him for Fox's sake. Doggett’s a slick one; he interviews Scully without her realizing it, at first. Their meeting ends with Dana throwing a cup of water in his face.
Scully goes back upstairs and realizes someone stole her laptop. She then heads to Mulder’s apartment. Wow, his place is uncharacteristically dusty. I think we would have realized his computer was missing even without the clean spot. Dana curls up with one of Fox’s shirts and takes a nap. And now it appears Mulder is undergoing some horrifying torture at the hands of his unseen captors. His facial skin is stretched in a way that’s reminiscent of Katherine Helmond in Terry Gilliam’s Brazil and/or X-Files alum Andrew Robinson in Clive Barker’s Hellraiser. Let’s just say it would be the worst time for Fox to sneeze. And if you thought the dentist scene in John Schlesinger’s Marathon Man was hard to sit through then you’ll want to skip the 18:00- to 19:00-minute mark of this episode.
But we’ll have to put a pin in this for now, because someone using Fox's ID card entered the FBI office and stole some relevant files. I thought that place had cameras. Back in the office, Walter gets ambushed by Kersh, John and an extra who all seem to think Skinner is either helping Mulder or involved with the theft. Scully reveals to Doggett that Fox was visiting his family’s gravesite on the weekends. For some reason, the Mulder family headstone has been brought to the task force headquarters and now includes Fox's death year.
Team Sculner meet with the Lone Gunmen (Four Men and a Little Lady?) to review current data to locate Mulder. Dana realizes the information is leading them to chess-playing savant/psychic Gibson Praise, who we first met two years earlier in "The End" (S520). John is almost on the same page because an unknown person slipped Gibson’s file under his door. He thinks Fox wants to hurt the boy, assuming Mulder considers him “evidence” of alien existence. And now everyone is converging on Arizona, looking for Gibson.
Nice to meet you, Agent Doggett: Series creator Chris Carter started the attack on Doggett's person before the fan base could even get a real crack at it, but shippers probably would have preferred a vat of acid to a mere Dixie cup of water. Still, it gives John -- and us -- a starting point for the new beginning. This is actually rejuvenating for Gillian Anderson, although the pregnancy will surely slow Scully down. This soapy development ranks as one of my least favorite, maybe because it comes complete with the obtrusive "Scully's Theme" which Mark Snow meant to convey Dana's inner turmoil. To be truthful, it gives me morning sickness too ... at night as well. Oh well, at least Scully's hair looks better.
Even with an open mind, it took me a while to come to terms with David Duchovny's reduced role in Season 8. But looking at "Within" from a distance, it's a splendid introduction to the new co-lead. And for proof, look at Kersh. Through no fault of portrayer James Pickens Jr., Alvin's as two-dimensional as they come. Luckily he chose his underling wisely, because from the get-go, John's got much more going for him (although surely neither of Kersh's dimensions will appreciate that). As we repilot, it's easy to get psyched up about taking the trip with Doggett. And coming off a lackluster season, that is most welcome indeed.
Give a little, get a little: Doggett does show us all that he's an ace. Maybe Kersh shouldn't have made the head of his task force someone smart enough to wade through the bull. He probably needed someone more like Jeffrey Spender who sits around waiting for his superiors to tell him what to look for and what to avoid. What John wants to do is find Fox, he's laser focused on that task. He's dogged in that pursuit, so his name might be a wee bit on the nose.
It may seem like a tried-and-true X-Files scenario now with Scully in Fox's believer role and Doggett in Scullyville. And it is, to some extent, but John's giving us a new wrinkle on that old chestnut. He can't come around via autopsies and science, like Dana once did, but his brain absorbs police reports like nobody's business. He doesn't need Lone Gunmen and a bunch of UFO reports to point him toward Gibson Praise, especially when a well-timed folder is slipped under a door. Doggett may just be an asset to Dana, to the X-files as a department and to The X-Files, the show, after all.
