X-Files S9E18: Second-to-last week tonight with Oliver

Sestra Amateur: 

I really hope I enjoy this episode because it’s the last one I’ll get to watch without Fox Mulder’s presence. In Van Nuys, California, a couple of righteous dudes, Blake McCormick and Michael Daley, are drinking beer across the street from the Brady Bunch house. They enter the house as groovy burglars and play with the bric-a-brac, which includes Carol’s vase and Greg’s football. One jive turkey panics and decides to go wait in the car. Blake goes upstairs and encounters Bobby and Cindy Brady in the hallway. Somehow the space cadet gets thrown through the roof … and across the street. To paraphrase Bobby, Mom always says don’t break into our house.

FBI Special Agents John Doggett and Monica Reyes are called in to investigate. John initially thinks the victim fell from a helicopter. Local coppers bring Michael Daley -- played by Married with Children alum David Faustino -- back to the scene of the crime. He tries to convince Team Johnica it’s the Brady Bunch house. Luckily – or unfortunately – Monica knows the true house and claims this ain’t it. And judging by Doggett’s reaction, he is not impressed with Reyes’ pop-culture knowledge. 

John and Monica make contact with the current homeowner, Oliver Martin (Cousin Oliver!?), who is played by Lost and Person of Interest star Michael Emerson. Daley enters the house with Team Johnica, but it is nothing like the 1970s museum he observed the previous night. Doggett does some old fashioned police work and finds a recently patched hole on the roof of the house. Sure, his explanation of what happened sounds far-fetched, but it’s nice to see him embrace the impossible, even as Reyes surprisingly doubts it. To paraphrase Jan Brady, "Monica, Monica, Monica!"

Of course, FBI Special Agent/Doctor Dana Scully does the autopsy on poor Blake but before she can begin, she gets supernaturally shocked by her scalpel. Team Johnica talk to Scully via Zoom (OK, OK, 2002’s version of Zoom) at the FBI field office located in Los Angeles’ version of Los Angeles. (They finally got the geography right!) Dr. Dana supports Doggett’s theory and mentions McCormick’s current electrical state. Meanwhile, Michael Daley is back at the house, watching Alice feed the Brady family dinner through the window. The spaz breaks in, but the Bradys are nowhere to be found. Daley confronts Oliver, who tries to get Michael to leave. Too bad something gets a hold of the trespasser and sends him through the ceiling – and to his death in the yard. That’s what happens to snitchers, Michael! Ask Cindy.

Team Johnica go to the fresh crime scene, but Oliver Martin isn’t cooperating this time. Scully arrives in L.A. with someone who can help: Dr. John Rietz, who knew Oliver as a young telekinetic boy named Anthony Fogelman. Meanwhile, Oliver is patching up the new hole and imagining Greg, Marcia, Peter, Jan, Bobby and Cindy running down the stairs when Dr. Rietz calls. Martin reacts to him but doesn’t answer the phone. Back at the FBI field office, Monica realizes Oliver Martin took Cousin Oliver’s name. Dana adds to the revelation by pointing out how Cousin Oliver considered himself a jinx. 

Doggett takes Dr. Rietz to Oliver’s and sees the house in all its Brady Bunch glory. John confronts Martin but he wants Doggett to exit the normal way. Since John won't oblige, Oliver’s temper gets the better of him and Martin sends Doggett through the ceiling and into the attic! Luckily, John goes feet first, which probably saves his life. Unfortunately, now he’s upside down. Dr. Rietz helps Oliver release his hold on Doggett, so he painfully crashes to the floor. Luckily he doesn’t end up with Marcia’s football-to-the-face nose.

Scully and Reyes arrive to assist John. Monica is enthralled by accuracy of the Brady Bunch house. Martin displays his powers by changing the interior to a beautiful landscape. Of course, this looks computer-generated, unlike the house interior. Doggett wants to leash Oliver’s power, but Dana wants to study it. Too bad Oliver still doesn’t have complete control over it. The group takes Martin to meet Assistant Director Walter Skinner and Dr. Jacocks at FBI headquarters in Washington, DC. 

Oliver manages to put a smile on Walter’s face (and creepy ones on almost everyone else’s) by levitating and spinning Skinner. Just when things look alarmingly positive for our intrepid heroes, Oliver suffers a seizure because the power is causing his organs to shut down. The Brady clan visits Martin’s bedside to say goodbye. Doggett realizes Dr. Rietz has a choice to make: Oliver’s ability or Oliver. The good doc picks Oliver, I mean Anthony. And Team Johnica move one step closer to each other. At least, I think they’re getting closer. Or maybe like Jan, I just need glasses.

Sestra Professional: 

While Sestra Am set out to enjoy the last Mulder-less episode, my focus was squarely upon the fact that "Sunshine Days" was the final Vince Gilligan effort for the series. (Is it my imagination or was Fox mentioned more here than he was for large parts of this season?) Gilligan wound up too busy breaking great with Breaking Bad to be involved with the revival seasons. I always surmised that he had the idea of using The Brady Bunch in his back pocket for a while (I thought that about his directorial debut on Season 7, Episode 21's "Je Souhaite" too), and in his last hurrah -- or because he was out of other ideas -- he made it happen in his swan song.

On the surface, it seems like the lightest episode we've had in some time, but in true Gilligan fashion, there's much more going on. Still, we've been dealing with some heavy stuff, dudes, between the departure of William and the resolution of the Doggett's son murder mystery. So it's kind of nice to transport the show lock, stock and horse sculpture to a place that reminds us of a simpler time, sitting in front of the TV after school and watching reruns. Except for Oliver, no one needs to be reminded of Oliver. It's like being reminded of Diana Fowley.

Who's on crack now, huh? We know we're in an X-Files episode, though, when we see the youngest Bradys Bobby and Cindy in the hallway during the opening teaser and they seem more like the twins at the Overlook Hotel in The Shining. Ultimately, the ep winds up being more in the Stephen King milieu of Carrie with the "Mozart of psychokinesis."

Robert Patrick and Annabeth Gish seem very relaxed for the penultimate effort of the season. Now unburdened by Doggett's past, John and Monica get to quip and he admits he's finally getting the hang of the job. On top of that, we learn that Scully was one of us -- she watched The Brady Bunch regularly too. Pretty good for someone who would never partake in bar trivia (although we could surely use her for science questions).

A to B to C: To me, this episode has always felt reminiscent of "Field Trip" (S6E21), the teleplay for which was co-written by Gilligan and John Shiban. It's got that end-of-season looseness. It's a melting pot of "we've been thinking about these things for a long time, so let's get them into a show while everyone is too tired to rationalize them." And I think it's a little too loosey goosey. Sure, it's fun, well, except for the victims who flew through the air like they were in a cartoon, but obviously weren't.

It's strange for Scully to want to hang nine years of searching for incontrovertible proof on this case. But it's nice to see her smile again (particularly when Skinner goes pate over tea kettle). And it's definitely nice to see Walter at all. But after Vince was involved in jumping the shark with the demise of the Lone Gunmen three episodes ago, we're now on the other side of that pop-culture phenomenon. There are aspects of his vision to be enjoyed, but on the whole, his episode isn't quite up to Gilligan snuff. I loved "Sunshine Days" when it first aired, but like The Brady Bunch itself, I've let it go as the years have gone by.

I don't particularly want to rain all over Vince's exit parade, he gave so much to the series over many years. And he imbues his final X-Files creation with the most important reminder -- family isn't just blood. (Fox Mulder will be happy to hear that since his biological pop is C.G.B. Spender.) You truly become family when you invest in other people emotionally. For that reason, Vince will always be X-Files blood (good and "Bad.")

Guest star of the week: Michael Emerson reminds me so much of Mike White (School of Rock) that, for years, I thought the latter was the star of this episode. But I hereby cast aside my incorrect impression of Anthony/Oliver. We need to have empathy for a character who kills a couple of people, including Bud from The Brady Bunch antithesis Married with Children. And we do, thanks to Emerson.

X-Files S9E17: Releasing them from their obligations

Sestra Amateur: 

As we approach the end of the original X-Files run, we finally get some long overdue backstory and closure for Special Agent John Doggett, who joined the party in "Within" (Season 8, Episode 1). We first learned about his murdered son in "This is Not Happening" (S8E14), the episode that also introduced us to Special Agent Monica Reyes.

Doggett gets a tip and breaks into an abandoned building. He’s knocked down by an unknown assailant who, surprisingly, doesn’t stop running just because someone yells, “Hey!” Inside a room, John finds a newly plastered wall, which starts dripping red liquid when Doggett claws at it. Sounds like a nightmare, doesn’t it? Nope, it’s real, and it’s a female stabbing victim behind that wall. 

Special Agent Dana Scully gets to conduct the autopsy. Using it as a training experience for FBI cadets, she happens upon a savant named Rudolph Hayes who can profile with the best of them. Team Johnica later meets with Dana, who has identified the body-in-the-wall as Ellen Persich. Scully learns a similar murder happened two weeks earlier because it involved the same knife. John and Monica meet Cadet Hayes and learn he can “see things.” Rudolph easily corrects Doggett’s inaccurate profile of their suspected killer. Reyes seems dually annoyed and impressed by his abilities.

Later that night, Hayes, who clearly experiences some level of social awkwardness, returns to the comfort of his room, which he has wallpapered with gruesome crime scene photos. Some are from the unsolved murder of John’s son, Luke. Team Johnica locates suspect Nicholas Regali, who fits Rudolph’s profile description to a T. Their “interview” seems designed to poke the bear, but Nicky doesn’t take the bait, so our intrepid heroes leave the bar empty-handed. Doggett’s son is clearly on his mind while investigating this case. Back at home, John is thinking of Luke while staring at his box of cremated remains. (Luke was murdered back in 1993 when he was only 7 years old.) 

The following day in the X-files office, Doggett asks Hayes to look at his son’s case file and describes his son’s last day: Luke was bicycling around the block while his mom, Barbara, counted the laps. (In an interesting juxtaposition, the iPhone commercial which aired before this scene showed a boy running his smart phone’s video camera as he rode his bicycle around the block over and over again to demonstrate the phone battery’s long life.) When Luke doesn’t return, Mom goes looking and finds just the bicycle. After an extensive three-day search, Luke’s body is found in a field. With a devastated and desperate look in his eyes, John asks Rudolph for help finding his son’s killer. Regarding the previous day’s case, Hayes claims, “That is your son’s.”

Rudolph shows Doggett his wallpapered room of unsolved mystery photographs. Hayes claims the pictures tell him things and Luke, in particular, calls to him. (I’d love to know who at the FBI did Rudolph’s background and psychiatric evaluations during the application process. Maybe he’s a legacy.) John thinks Cadet Hayes might be nuts, but he’ll suspend that analysis for now. Rudolph reveals the original suspect, Bob Harvey, was Luke’s kidnapper but not his killer. Hayes says Harvey died in a car crash, which Doggett didn’t seem to know. Rudolph doesn’t answer with words when John asks if Regali killed Luke, but his body language is very telling. Doggett takes this new lead to Assistant Director Brad Follmer, who used to work organized crime cases in New York, the same FBI office that investigated Luke’s murder. Follmer denies hearing Bob Harvey’s name back then but agrees to “ask around” for information. John updates Monica, who doesn’t think Regali is a lead, just a desperate father’s hope for closure.

Doggett spontaneously visits his ex-wife in Woodbury, Long Island, but she’s also too emotionally destroyed to even hope John is right. Somehow he convinces Barbara to attend a lineup containing Regali, but she doesn’t recognize him from the neighborhood nine years earlier. Dana meets Barbara for the first time and learns the ex-Mrs. Doggett thinks John and Monica could have a relationship if he would let her in. Doggett, who had asked Scully to compare the physical evidence from the two recent stabbings to his son’s case, thinks the similarities are enough but Dana doesn’t agree; there are too many inconsistencies between the cases.

Cadet Hayes is back in his bedroom, listening to the voices of murdered victims. And John realizes Regali never got convicted for serious crimes because he probably bribed his way to freedom. Team Johnica confronts Follmer, who Monica witnessed take money from a mobster three years earlier. That was her main reason for breaking off their relationship but she didn’t report him to the bureau because she cared about him. Brad claims he was paying a confidential informant. Reyes doesn’t believe him but she also doesn’t have any proof. (That’s an annoying pattern with Team Johnica in this episode.) 

Follmer does have information on “Rudolph Hayes,” who died in a car accident in 1978. His real name is Stuart Mimms, a paranoid schizophrenic who checked himself out of a psychiatric facility. Follmer also claims Stuart was in New York the year Luke was murdered. The feds take Mimms into custody without incident, but all of the crime scene photographs are gone. Brad later meets with Nicky, who denies involvement with Luke’s murder. We also learn the leverage he has over Follmer; Regali has a videotape of him taking a bribe to lose an indictment. Team Johnica hit the nail on the head earlier, they just don’t know it.

Barbara Doggett attends another lineup, this time with Mimms, and she clearly recognizes him. During an interrogation, Agent Scully confronts Mimms with the fraud and stolen identity case. He denies killing Luke, claiming he studied the case obsessively. Stuart says he is still trying to help John and admits to sending the tip which led Doggett to Ellen Persich’s body (and to almost catching Regali). Mimms has nothing more to say and wants to return to the institute. In the bar, John confronts Nicky, who gives a hypothetical answer to the question Doggett has been asking for nine years: Sexual predator Bob Harvey grabbed Luke, who unfortunately saw "businessman" Regali’s face, so Regali had to do something about it. John (not Agent Doggett, if you get my meaning) unholsters his gun to go kill Nicky, but Follmer beats him to it, shooting Regali right in the eye! That’s one way out of your blackmail situation, Brad.

On a beautiful day, at a picturesque beach, John and Barbara Doggett finally scatter their son’s ashes. (When you go swimming in the ocean, do you ever think about the level of human remains floating around you? No wonder we need to shower so quickly afterward.) Barbara leaves and John seeks a comforting hug from Monica. If this was a movie, Team Johnica would live happily ever after. But nope, there are still a couple of episodes left, just enough for Chris Carter and company to deny them the happy ending they clearly deserve.

Sestra Professional: 

So much to unpack, so little time. As Sestra Am mentioned, finally a measure of resolution for John Doggett. Not to mention that they finally made some good use of Cary Elwes. They had a movie star with appeal to spare under contract the whole season, but not until this episode did we get to have any sense of what he could do for the long-standing show. And now it's too little, too late.

The tip: So we're introduced to a cadet who is sharper at sifting through evidence for clues that even our intrepid heroine Agent Scully doesn't pick up on. On top of that, he can shoot down FBI profiles provided by Team Johnica with the slightest of head shakes.

We've seen over the course of a couple of seasons that it takes a lot for Doggett to admit he doesn't have all the facts. And when he does, we know he doesn't just run around asking mediums what they see when it comes to Luke's disappearance and murder. We haven't even seen him take his limited information to the experts in the bureau.

Because of that, this winds up being a very powerful episode for Robert Patrick as an actor, perhaps his most dynamic performance over his run with the show. He shows us so much with his eyes. Through them, we see and feel John's most intense pain, and for the first time, his desire to believe in something that's not quantifiable. This time, for this case, he must believe.

Ashes: That emotion is amplified when Robert gets to play scenes with his real-life wife, Barbara Patrick. Every scene has that much more power. In a season when we didn't always connect to the past, Robert and Barbara bring their personal history to the screen. That kind of makes up for the fact that we didn't spend a lot of time with Luke's story in the past two years. We knew it was there, and the Patricks are able to tap into that well of emotion very quickly for us. It helps, it really adds an impassioned element that might not have otherwise been there for this crucial episode.

Jared Poe's the other key piece to this puzzle. Someone like Cadet Hayes/Stuart Mimms would usually get a season or at least an arc of several episodes to reveal himself. His portrayer's off-screen journey was equally interesting. Poe was a writing intern for the show. And even though he didn't have on-screen experience, he reportedly asked executive producer Frank Spotnitz if he could audition and beat out 30 other actors for the part.

Hayes/Mimms' story certainly wasn't wrapped up in a tidy bow. It was something of a misdirect when the FBI tagged and bagged him, blaming his history of paranoid schizophrenia. But does that really preclude him being able to tap into crimes the way he did or was he better at it because of his affliction? Like he said, that's what schizophrenics do, they obsess. It's an avenue Fox Mulder would have been interested in, were he on the canvas to do so.

A message: So things haven't improved too much at the FBI since the Mulder conspiracy days, have they? They have mentally challenged cadets running around. And we've certainly seen our fair share of compromised assistant directors before. 

The Patricks just break my heart with the denouement of the episode. We do feel for Luke and for them, even though the only one we really had any attachment to before the episode was John. It's a triumph that "Release" enables us to empathize to this degree. The hug between Doggett and Reyes winds up having more power and more substance as a result. Maybe in the future when they have those will-they-or-won't-they moments we've seen in episodes like "4-D" (S9E4) and "Audrey Pauley" (S9E11), neither of them will back away. 

"We never really got the chance to because we ended the show, but I think Monica would have definitely gone further with their relationship," Annabeth Gish said to back up that assertion in The Complete X-Files.

Guest star of the week: The truncated nature of wrapping up Doggett's backstory meant we didn't get more time with Jared Poe. That's a shame, because there was a wealth of potential in Cadet Hayes' intelligence and the questions about Mimms' intriguing abilities.

X-Files S9E16: Scarred for life

Sestra Amateur: 

Have you healed from last week’s brutal ending to the Lone Gunmen saga? Hope so, because there’s not a lot of downtime this week. Based on this episode’s title, the heartbreak continues, although “heartbreak” may depend on your perspective. A childless couple have adopted William. Yes, Special Agent Dana Scully’s baby boy. I hope the adoption agency was required to provide full disclosure, like when you buy a house. After all, can’t that kid move things with his mind?!

Flash back to one week earlier: Dana still has the best parking spot of anyone in her apartment building as she removes William from his car seat. And Special Agent John Doggett gets viciously attacked by a man who was searching the X-files office. Doggett catches up to him and learns the man’s face is severely burned. John and Special Agent Monica Reyes call in Agent Scully because the burglar claims he will only talk to her. The man –- played by Chris Owens, which is either inspired stunt casting or a major spoiler -- claims his name is Daniel Miller. Despite his disfigured face, he does look familiar to us. He says Fox Mulder gave him a card key to get into the FBI building. He also says his burns are part of a government conspiracy. Miller, who was stealing files related to Samantha Mulder, lets Scully inspect his scars. She confirms they aren’t chemical burns. He claims to have been injected with something that burned his body from the inside out.

Doggett is trying to confirm Miller’s identity and thinks Daniel is actually Fox. Scully knows he’s not Mulder (maybe she’s too embarrassed to admit she confirmed that during the physical inspection), but seems irked when this unknown stranger mentions her abduction. Miller claims people at the FBI would kill him –- and Mulder -– if they knew Miller was there. They let him continue to root through the X-files filing cabinet, but he isn’t finding what he wants. That’s because Dana hid a stash of files in her bedroom closet. Clearly, by “trusting” this lying stranger, she’s violating Mulder’s mantra: Trust No One. Maybe she’d rather prove she’s right to Doggett; after all, she and Fox agreed to conceal those files. But Dana changes her mind and her demeanor when Miller checks on a crying William. Now she’s a mother who is royally pissed at her baby’s absentee father. Miller claims Mulder is in pain and she cannot help. Scully actually lets this stranger hold William, who remains calm in this weepy man’s arms.

John meets with Assistant Director Walter Skinner, who plays the common-sense role by pointing out the physical discrepancies between Mulder and Miller. (Thank you, Walter!) Then the lab calls back with rushed PCR test results. (Boy, does that have a different meaning in this day and age.) When Dana confronts Miller, he claims Scully was used to create and raise William, who is part alien. Reyes interrupts the interrogation and kicks Miller out of the room. Doggett claims the DNA test confirms it is Fox Mulder. Dana still refuses to believe it. Miller chooses that time to leave, running away in a very non-Mulderesque fashion. (It reminded me of Phoebe running with Rachel through the park on Friends. Yep, that bad.)

John runs Miller down and claims they will protect him. Scully and Team Johnica give Miller medication and put him to sleep, then awkwardly wait for him to wake up. Miller creeps back into William’s bedroom, takes the kid’s pacifier and puts an unknown substance on the baby’s lips. He injects him with something, which causes William to cry. Dana and Monica rush the baby to the emergency room while John interrogates Miller. Doggett searches the bedroom and finds the syringe under the mattress. The doctor finishes examining William but finds nothing more than an elevated iron level. Scully realizes she’s been played yet again.

Back at FBI headquarters, everyone learns the truth: Miller is the presumed-dead Jeffrey Spender, who was shot by his own father, the Cigarette-Smoking Man, way back in "One Son" (Season 6, Episode 12.) I guess this confirms he and Mulder really were half-brothers, although in 2002, would their DNA have been considered that close a match? Dana learns he intentionally tried to win their trust so he could get close to William and inject him with something. Spender claims it’s a form of magnetite that makes William useless to the aliens for colonization.

Scully does a 180 and almost seems grateful to Jeffrey. Unfortunately, Spender claims she’ll never able to truly protect William, who may end up just like him someday. (In retrospect, the reboot reveal of William’s parentage really does make this seem like a revenge plan Jeffrey could appreciate even more if he knew the truth.) Why wouldn’t Dana consider witness protection for both of them so she could stay with her son? It’s not like she’s expecting Fox to show up at her door, nor would she be bound by contract since the series would end the following month.

Since Jeffrey wasn’t really in contact with Mulder, we still have no legit reason why Fox is still hiding from Dana and did not attend the Lone Gunmen’s funeral. I wrote a whole paragraph griping about how David Duchovny was available to not only co-write but direct this episode, yet didn't put in an appearance in the previous one in which Mulder’s presence should have been mandatory. And to show I’m not always about the negative when it comes to The X-Files, good for them putting Chris Owens’ name in the credits at the end of the show to protect that reveal. And William’s UFO onesie is just adorable too.

Sestra Professional: 

I'm deeming this the beginning of the "Be Careful What You Wish For" series. It doesn't see us just through the regular run of the show but everything up to the current point on The X-Files landscape.

This dubious distinction starts off with the aforementioned return of David Duchovny to the fold, not as Mulder, but co-writer of the story for "William" with creator Chris Carter and executive producer Frank Spotnitz. Since Duchovny hasn't been with us all season, he obviously can't do much to further the transformation of the show and the advancement of John Doggett and Monica Reyes' characters. So we're back to plot largely sidelined in Season 9 -- which, in my mind, was for the greater good. We've hardly mentioned Mulder this year. I wasn't bothered by that, and I knew Sestra Am 100 percent wasn't either.

After literally fading out on The Lone Gunmen last week, we open with Scully giving up the precious bundle of joy that we've spent a couple seasons toting around. It feels like the worst kind of fire sale. Even if you didn't read sci-fi publications or watch Entertainment Tonight, you could tell in the span of these two eps (and next week's "Release") that the proverbial house seemed to be being boarded up by snowbirds heading to Florida for the winter.

Following the opening teaser, we see -- or rather hear -- Scully reprising her fondness for singing "Joy to the World" for William. You might recall Dana first warbled that tune in "Detour" (S5E4). It's the kind of light moment we've come to expect from Duchovny since the non-fat tofutti rice dreamsicle scene in his directorial debut, "The Unnatural" (S619).

What is true and what we want to be true isn't always the same: So in Duchovny and company's hands, Doggett takes the kind of beating that used to be reserved for Alex Krycek. Not sure how John was able to recover enough to then apprehend the intruder, that's some super-soldier-like bounce-back ability he's got there. Then again, since Doggett so doggedly insists a shorter, lighter dude is Mulder, maybe he did suffer one blow too many.

Actually this part of the story does work, and even more importantly, it gives Gillian Anderson the meatiest material she's gotten all season. Unlike, say, "Trust No 1" (S9E6), in which Scully and the unseen Mulder were turned into revolting Hallmark movie versions of themselves. (That would have worked in the hands of Vince Gilligan, by the way.) So if we have to delve back into what was, I don't really mind the wee wedge put between our main characters by the mysterious scarred man -- who more closely resembles Chris Owens in his first X-Files incarnation as the Great Mutato in "The Post-Modern Prometheus" (S5E5).

You are as false as your face: In fact, Scully is written as strongly here as she has been in quite some time, and I'm not just talking about Season 9. Dana's complete confidence that the mystery man -- for all his similarities to Fox -- is not Mulder is heartening. The same holds true for Skinner. But at the same time, on some level, we can get behind Doggett's doubt. John's character isn't tarnished by a theory that we might have believed to be true if we did not have Scully and Skinner's leads to follow.

It takes Dana the requisite amount of time to put all the pieces together -- and by pieces, yes, I mean all the scaly bits of Jeffrey's visage. Welcome back, Scully! It's so good to see you again. I didn't know how much I missed you until the moment when you confronted Spender in the interrogation room.

And yet it's come to this. After following Dana through her pregnancy ... and all its various scares ... the birth ... and its inherent danger ... and avenging angels masking as nannies and right thinkers, now Scully gives him up. Can I just add that the use of "Michael, Row Your Boat Ashore" seems overly aggrandizing? Perhaps the same singers voicing "Joy to the World" might have put a better bow on the William story.

As Sestra Am alluded to, if you're scoring at home, that's two major exits Mulder missed out on. We can feel his return nearing -- this show has given us all supernatural powers!! -- and it feels like a supreme letdown that these moments were lost to pivotal characters, and us by extension.

Guest star of the week: I would say Chris Owens qualifies for these kudos, since he wasn't part of the cast for a few years. And because I do feel bad for being one of those who did Jeffrey Spender dirty since he started mucking up the works in Season 5. In addition to the mythology refresher course Owens provides, he gets to do a lot of Mulderesque quipping in this one, guess it's just in the jeans.

X-Files S9E15: A strange brand of Lone justice indeed

Sestra Amateur: 

Are there any pop-culture enthusiasts who do not know the origin of the phrase “Jump the Shark?” It always amuses me how it evolved from a literal act into a figurative one. I’m interested to know where most X-Philes think the show passed that infamous milestone.

There are familiar faces in this amusing episode, which feels more like one from The Lone Gunmen’s spinoff series than The OG X-Files. I’m sure we can all use a break after seeing Monica Reyes in excruciating pain while she imagined monsters crawling around inside her stomach in the last episode. Now we get a return appearance from Michael McKean as Morris Fletcher, the man who briefly swapped bodies with Fox Mulder back in the "Dreamland" two-parter (Season 6, Episodes 4-5). I guess he didn’t get his marriage back on track because he’s in the middle of the Bahamian ocean with a beautiful blonde who is not his wife. Thugs in a speedboat threaten Morris, kidnap the woman and blow up the boat. Luckily, he and his UFO blueprints seem to survive the explosion. 

Fletcher requests a meeting with FBI Special Agents John Doggett and Monica Reyes, but they are unimpressed with him at the outset. Monica reveals his female companion is fine and his UFO blueprints are bogus. Team Johnica are leaving when Morris admits he knows about super soldiers. Doggett and Reyes ask Frohike, Byers and Langly to help them track down a female super soldier named Yves Adele Harlow, played by Zuleikha Robinson. (Wow, this really is a Lone Gunmen ep!) They take umbrage to Fletcher’s presence and involvement. Meanwhile, Yves kills college professor Douglas Houghton by shooting him in the chest. Sort of.

Langly unsuccessfully searches for Yves in an airline database. Morris claims her real name is Lois Runce, but the guys don’t believe him. They get a surprise visit from former intern Jimmy Bond, who promptly loses consciousness. When he wakes up, Jimbo confirms Yves’ true name and is upset because she may have committed murder. Meanwhile, Yves burns her victim’s heart in a furnace. (OK, this isn’t as light-hearted as I expected it to be. No pun intended.)

Team Johnica learns Yves’ victim was an immunologist who studied sharks and other marine life. Langly, Frohike and Byers seek assistance with tracking Yves from Kimmy the Geek while Doggett and Reyes meet with the coroner who performed Houghton’s autopsy. They learn the chest wound contains bioluminescence and cartilage. Kimbo reveals to Team Johnica and Fletcher that the Lone Gunmen are broke and no longer publishing their newspaper. Fortunately, the boys have located Yves in a D.C. hotel and prevent her from murdering another person. Unfortunately, they apparently screwed things up for her because they don’t understand. (None of us do yet, sweetie.)

John and Monica arrive at the hotel room. They learn Morris lied about Yves being a super soldier and set everything up since the boat incident in the Bahamas. His plan for the Lone Gunmen to locate Yves worked. It turns out, the man Fletcher works for is a billionaire terrorist … and Yves’ father. Harlow killed Douglas Houghton because he was also a terrorist. In doing so, she destroyed the virus located inside Houghton’s chest. The second man she tried to stop has the same virus inside his chest.

Back at Lone Gunmen HQ, Kimbo and Langly are trying to locate the human timebomb while Morris continues to verbally abuse Frohike and Byers. Team Johnica locate and secure the man but he’s clean. Guess he was the decoy, but now Doggett isn’t too trusting of Yves. The true human timebomb has entered a conference hall filled with people and easily passed through security. Our non-FBI heroes find the terrorist and try to talk their way into the conference, but a security guard refuses to let them enter the conference hall. 

Jimbo spooks the virus bomber, John Gillnitz, by calling out his name, just like Riggs tricks villain Jack Travis into leaving a packed hockey arena in Lethal Weapon 3. Gillnitz bolts while Jimbo head butts the security guard to chase after him. They corner him with only one minute and 40 seconds left before detonation. Then our heroes do something amazing: They trap themselves with Gillnitz by pulling the fire alarm. Jimbo and Yves find them but can’t save them. They have a bittersweet farewell as Gillnitz starts leaking bioluminescence, infecting everyone in the room. At least we don’t have to watch them suffer.

It’s a beautiful day at Arlington National Cemetery, not a cloud in the sky. Byers, Langly and Frohike are laid to rest side by side by side. So much for being a light-hearted amusing episode. They didn’t even get to take Dana Scully along on their last adventure. A 60-second cameo appearance isn’t enough. And no Mulder at the funeral? Unless he was in Morris Fletcher’s body again, I’m pretty sure that’s where they jumped the shark.

Sestra Professional: 

In spite of -- or maybe even because of -- the funerals at Arlington, it was an unceremonious end for the Lone Gunmen. Let's face it, they had been trending downward for a while, possibly since the Vancouver years. When the trio came on the scene, its members were distinctively quirky but intelligent naysayers. Somewhere along the line, they turned into bumbling do-gooders. Even on their largely overlooked spinoff series, they were shadows of their former selves, and resolution tended to come in spite of their actions. This episode's opening montage bears that out. Yet they still deserved better than this.

Some might maintain that three men who railed against the government for years might not want to be buried on hallowed grounds. I'm not sure I agree with that hypothesis. By this time, they might have been proud to rest in the same vicinity as John F. Kennedy, Jr., and brother Robert, or at the very least, Abner Doubleday.

That's really a moot point because the fact they had to be laid to rest at all is the true problem. When this show jumps the shark, it realllly jumps the shark. (Although, harkening back to Sestra Am's original inquiry, I know I can come up with jump-the-shark spotters for every single season since the production moved to Hollywood.)

Three more unlikely heroes there never were: But I digress, because with the series coming to an end, this episode -- first and foremost -- is an attempt to wrap up Byers, Frohike and Langly's story with recurring Morris Fletcher and sexy-villain-turned-ally Yves St. Laurent. (Yeah, I know that last one's not right. But the show's apathy is wearing off on me.)

I still think there was something to the concept of a Gunmen series. The chemistry between the trio was always strong, and there were enough differences between the characters to be able to delve into different stories. I wasn't watching the spinoff at the time, but years later, I did binge it. And ... it's not bad. 

Both shows got mileage out of Michael McKean's presence as former Man in Black Morris Fletcher. So bringing Morris into Doggett and Reyes' orbit isn't a bad first step. But when John and Monica walk into the empty Lone Gunmen bunker, we start down the irrevocable road to ruin. Kind of reminds of another bad move, attempting to wrap up the Millennium story within the confines of one X-Files episode in the fourth episode of the seventh season. Should we feel grateful that we didn't have a Harsh Realm terminus as well? (I still say that show might have worked with Nicholas Lea (Krycek) in the lead. Chris Carter, you couldn't have bent to fan pressure on that one, like you folded like a house of cards on the Sculder personal relationship front?)

Guys like that, they live forever: I really used to enjoy the Gunmen doing their thing. But over time that concept got worn down to the nub, and their penchant for snappy dialogue apparently went along with it. Morris provides the cringeworthy image of watching those guys trying to find their butts with both hands, which hasn't been much fun for us either. As with the aforementioned "Millennium" episode, The Lone Gunmen square peg doesn't quite fit in The X-Files' round hole. 

Morris crying "super soldier" is the most thin of threads to knit the two together and it's all down hill from there. It did look promising when John and Monica used all due diligence but ultimately boxed in the wrong dude. The Lone Gunmen don't have those kind of resources at their disposal upon smoking out the real one. They can't even talk their way into a conference room with the end of the world at stake. And so they wind up where they do, conveniently spawning what Byers had talked about just minutes earlier. They went out on their own terms.

As Sestra Am said, this dismal turn of events is made worse by the fact that neither Scully nor Mulder are involved in the denouement. Kimmy's bilingual gravesite reaction doesn't really register. Still not sure what to make of Walter Skinner's deed, but it was an attempt at some kind of amends. And as far as Scully wondering whether the Gunmen knew how much they meant to her, I'm not sure they did. I didn't get that read and I've been watching closely the whole time. Fox's absence for the trio's series wrap didn't help in the slightest. So this ep winds up at the bottom of most X-Philes' lists, whether or not we believe this is where the series actually jumped the shark.

Although Bruce Harwood (Byers) said in The Complete X-Files that he was glad the Gunmen were killed off in the end, it remained a thorn in co-writer Vince Gilligan's paw. "To this day, I still think we made the wrong choice on that one," he said in the show's comprehensive guide.

Guest star of the week: While Zuleikha Robinson (Yves) and Stephen Snedden (Jimmy) slip seamlessly back into their spinoff characters, Michael McKean once again gives an ep any life it has. He's gotten kudos in this spot twice, but the veteran actor easily could be a four-time winner. Maybe Morris Fletcher should have been the focus for a sister show. 

X-Files S9E14: They did the monster mash

Sestra Amateur: 

In Fairhope, Pennsylvania, a young boy named Tommy Conlon is scared of something in his bedroom. His father, Jeffrey, played by Scott Paulin, just wants Tommy to go to sleep. Tommy can still hear the creature and tries to escape the room but dear old dad is holding the door closed. That’s called tough love, right? Fun fact: When you type “Fairhope Penn” into Google, the second suggested result is "Hillbilly Haven Fairhope Pennsylvania."

Dr. Dana Scully is trying to eat her lunch in between classes at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, when she gets a surprise visit from accountant Leyla Harrison, whom we first met in "Alone" (Season 8, Episode 19). Harrison manages to ruin Scully’s appetite with photographs from a graphic X-files case involving Tommy’s now-dead mother. Even though Tommy insisted a monster killed his mommy, the coroner’s autopsy determined the victim stabbed herself. Sixteen times. Harrison also claims the monster killed Tommy’s cat, Spanky. 

Dana dismisses Leyla and goes about her day until she gets a call from Special Agent Monica Reyes, who is heading to Pennsylvania with Special Agent John Doggett … and Harrison. She manages to convince Team Johnica to continue with the investigation. I wonder whether Leyla is as fascinated with Reyes and Doggett's expenses as she was with Sculder’s.

The trio meets with Jeffrey Conlon, but he sends the feds away. Luckily, John notices some physical evidence that convinces him to get a warrant to search the place. Too bad their car gets disabled in a very disgusting manner. Meanwhile, Dana gets woken up in the middle of the night by Harrison's friend Gabe Rotter, who hand-delivers Tommy’s dead cat. (Wow, the things a guy will do for a date.) 

Back in Fairhope, no one has a working car or phone, so it’s sleepover time. They hear Tommy scream for help upstairs and observe Jeffrey preventing his son – and the monsters – from leaving the bedroom. Doggett shoots the creature but that splits it into two monsters. Jeffrey tries to defend his actions but Leyla doesn’t buy it.

During the necropsy, Scully determines the cat did not commit suicide like Mrs. Conlon. She then speaks with Sheriff Jack Coogan (Jackie Coogan? Sounds like some kind of in-joke), who is familiar with the Conlon family. Too bad the worsening weather may make it difficult for him to get to the agents. Outside the Conlon home, the feds unearth a broken piece of mirror, not a monster. They’re preparing to leave the house with Tommy and Jeffrey when the sheriff arrives. Too bad it’s not actually him, just a meaty shell John is able to impale with his fist.

Gabe complains to Dana about Leyla’s fascination with Mulder and Scully. She decides to head to Pennsylvania with Mr. Rotter. After Team Johnica examines the “sheriff” and realizes he’s not a typical human being, Doggett proposes an interesting theory: Maybe they’re experiencing something similar to what happened to Team Sculder during an exposure to mushroom spores in "Field Trip" (S6E21). Tommy and Reyes head upstairs to his bedroom while Team Harriett tries to get more information from Jeffrey. Dear daddy claims he locked Tommy in the room with the monsters because he knew the creatures would not hurt his boy like they hurt everyone else. While they’re upstairs, Tommy shows Monica his latest drawing -- it depicts a creature inside her stomach.

Scully and Rotter (Scotter? Rully?) arrive at the Sheriff’s office but the big man doesn’t think they can get to the house safely. And Reyes, who now has a creature inside of her, realizes Tommy is the scary monster! (Of course, most parents of 8-year-old boys probably figured this out much earlier.) Too bad John chases the kid into the bedroom and falls into an abyss, where he gets attacked by hundreds of these things. Tommy then makes Leyla bleed from her eyes by drawing that very scene. 

Doggett, who managed to convince himself the creatures aren’t real, escapes from the room and confronts Jeffrey with the truth. And Mrs. Conlon truly did stab herself but only because of what Tommy caused her to believe. John and Jeffrey get the women out of the house while Doggett prepares to burn it to the ground with Tommy inside. The little boy thinks he’s bluffing until everything starts to burn. Somehow, his fear enables Leyla and Monica to heal. Team Scotter swoops in to save the day. Inside the house, Dana and Gabe find an alert John and an unconscious Tommy. Luckily, Doggett was bluffing and never set the fire. He didn’t even use actual gasoline. What a letdown.

Leyla and Gabe later visit Scully, Doggett and Reyes in the X-files office. Harrison’s backhanded compliment to Doggett shows she’s still a little in awe of the X-files agents. And Tommy’s treatment to stifle his imagination and prevent the return of the monsters? Television, lots of television. Interesting message from a TV show that aired for nine years and needed viewers to continue. I wonder whether they already knew The X-Files was being canceled by this point.

Sestra Professional: 

I'm sure it's been fairly evident that, on the whole, I'm a fan of Season 9. There are a couple main reasons for that. First and foremost, I've always thought the Doggett and Reyes characters show how malleable The X-Files formula could have been. I know legions of shippers will disagree with me on that front. But I think I could have the Star Trek universe in my corner in that regard. Second, it's because of the breadth of stories coming from a lot of different directions. I've mentioned The Twilight Zone cross-pollination on a number of occasions. Last week, Chris Carter gave us arguably his best stand-alone ep, and this week, well, lookie lookie, it's a throwback to the early X-Files (aka The Vancouver Years) complete with a textbook "creepy kid." 

That juxtaposition between the show creator's flight of fancy last time out and the return of Leyla Harrison makes the season's pendulum swings all the more apparent. So after jumping off the high board, we revisit the character who winds up speaking for the fandom simply because she herself is a fan of the Mulder and Scully dynamic and their work on X-files cases. Looks like a little temporary blindness in "Alone" did not permanently close her eyes to the cause.

How could someone stab themselves 16 times? This particular episode also reminds me of an episode of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer spinoff Angel -- "I've Got You Under My Skin" -- that had originally aired a couple of years earlier. The scenario feels sort of Millennium-istic to me as well with some misdirect over the behavior of a dad who seems to be extraordinarily tough on his young son.

Scully's still working hard at Quantico, so hard that she apparently doesn't have time to eat. She's gotta be used to that, right? It's not like we saw her and Mulder chowing down very often when they were working in the FBI basement. Gillian Anderson gets the bulk of this ep's light-hearted moments, if having to do a late-night autopsy on a dead cat can be categorized as light-hearted. It is fun to watch her unencumbered by the overbaked mythology for a while.

Mulder and Scully, Scully and Mulder, blah blah blah: So the actual monsters come off as cartoony, but I appreciate that since they're supposed to have been thought up by a young boy. It fits the profile. So does Gabe Rotter, when he voices sentiments he's had to have heard from Leyla a lot more than we have in the two episodes she's been a part of. I mean, we have gotten Sculder discussion to the point of distraction, right? It would have been worse on a guy trying to get with Harrison. And Rotter, named after the show's writers' assistant, must have heard such talk even more than the viewers. Symmetry!

Leyla's apparently having as much of an effect on John as the FBI investigators have on her. For Pete's sake, the man cited a previous X-file as a possible explanation for what's going on with the monsters. His guess of "Field Trip" was about as unsubstantiated as Harrison's reference to the boy fueled by lightning in "D.P.O." (S3E3). But at long last, Doggett's disbelief that things are really happening as they appear to be finally comes in handy for the ultimate resolution.

I made this: Once I stopped being tickled by the fact that eerie Tommy voices the words we hear every week for the show's production company Ten Thirteen, I focused on how great Annabeth Gish vocalized Monica's screaming. For some reason, I didn't doubt for a second that Reyes was in major pain from having a monster with pincers trying to claw its way out of her stomach. And poor Leyla. Two cases, twice victimized in the eyes.

As Sestra Am pointed out, that was a dispiriting way to end the episode, though, with the idea that inundating a young boy with even more television would be the only way to squelch his overactive imagination. But The Complete X-Files backs up Sestra's assertion, it was during production of this episode that the cast and crew found out the show was going to end its regular run.

It wasn't a complete bummer behind the scenes, though. I got some extra insight into Jolie Jenkins' return as Leyla via Cameo last year. "I wished for it so hard. I feel like I manifested it ... the opportunity to go back," Jolie told me. "Particularly working with Robert Patrick and Annabeth Gish ... I had such a great time with the two of them. I just remember having so much fun. Everyone was so warm and friendly, and it was such a wonderful work environment in that way. And at the same time, everyone had such respect for the show and what Chris Carter was doing."

Guest star of the week: Apologies to Scott Paulin, but I'm giving it to Jenkins again. How thankless a task is representing The X-Files base at large? You got your shippers, your no-romos, your Vancouverians -- and a large chunk of that base was pretty disillusioned with the show by now. But for the second time in as many chances, Jenkins provided a breath of fresh air as the FBI's resident fan girl and she lived up to some lofty standards once again.

X-Files S9E13: Playing the numbers

Sestra Amateur: 

How bad can an episode be when the opening scene features Burt Reynolds? He’s in a casino, imparting wisdom to a pathetic gambler named Wayne. Both of their heads are turned by a lovely female loser who also always lets the house win. And her luck goes from bad to worse when she gets murdered in the bathroom by our pathetic gambler. Did Burt know that would happen? That seems … improbable.

Special Agent Monica Reyes is reading about the death. She picks Special Agent Dana Scully’s brain about the universe and mathematical equations. Monica believes she’s found a serial killer link via numerology and karmic numbers. Scully thinks it’s bunk but she does notice physical similarities with the victims’ injuries.

Wayne spots Burt playing three-card monte outside his apartment. Apparently, three is a very important number here -- people show up in threes, do things in threes, etc. It’s quite a rhythmic scene; too bad, Sestra Pro can’t attach a gif instead of a jpg to the blog. Wayne confronts Burt and upsets the apple cart when he doesn’t like what Burt has to say.

Meanwhile, Reyes visits Vicki Burdick, a numerologist played by Ellen Greene, who doesn’t really believe in her own science. Special Agent John Doggett calls Monica with an update: He and Dana have found two more victims with the same M.O. Now called the Triple Zero Killer, the feds have formed a task force to catch him. Too bad he found his way to the numerologist and adds her to his murder list. Wow, that too seems … improbable. FBI supervisor Fordyce, played by John Kapelos, loves Reyes' initiative but cringes at the esoteric aspects of her investigation.

The Triple Zero Killer meets with Burt at an outdoor café. Doggett briefly stops at their table to watch some domino action. Too bad he doesn’t know how close he is to the killer. Meanwhile, Scully is about to autopsy the numerologist but the number six keeps distracting her. She identifies “666” markings made on the other victims’ bodies by the murderer’s ring. Fordyce provides John with a textbook serial killer profile description and is surprised when Doggett doesn’t consider it much of a lead. Team Scules also stumbles across the killer, this time in an elevator. Too bad the women don’t know it’s him until Dana sees the ring on his finger. He manages to get away because Scully won’t shoot a fleeing unarmed man, even if he is a serial killer.

In the parking garage, they find Burt “waiting for a friend.” Instead of finding a way out of the garage and continuing their investigation, they play checkers with Burt and lose badly. Monica determines from the game they will be the next victims because the Triple Zero Killer targets a blonde, a brunette and a redhead. Reyes and Dana's argument about the patterns in the case and God’s influence over all of it lead Monica to believe the killer is still in the garage with them. (Yes, that means Burt is God.) 

The lights go out and Wayne attacks Reyes. He’s about to shoot Monica with her own gun when John arrives and shoots the Triple Zero Killer. So, to summarize, Scully and Reyes stopped looking for the killer, played checkers and had to be rescued by their male partner. That is the most improbable part of this whole episode.

Sestra Professional: 

It's time for some name-dropping of the highest order. My favorite college professor, Watson B. Duncan III, is the man who got Burt Reynolds into acting. As the story goes, and no one -- not even Chris Carter -- told a story better than Watson B. Duncan III, when Reynolds suffered a career-ending injury in football at Florida State University, he was at the end of his proverbial tether. When he returned to Palm Beach County, the multihonored English prof was the one who told him to try out for a play (and believe you me, Burt was none too willing at first). The rest is history and I'm glad The X-Files got to be a part of his storied career.

As Sestra Am noted earlier, Reynolds certainly made for a refreshing change of pace around these parts. There aren't a lot of actors who we could buy slotting into the role as Mr. Burt, a concoction that seems part hustler, part celestial being and all heart and soul. I'll give all the credit in the world to Carter for this. He finally stopped trying to be Darin Morgan/Vince Gilligan and gave us a truly unique concoction of his own. With complex numerical factors giving way to supernatural results, I believe Chris finally dialed into his comedic stand-alone ep voice within his own creation. He's come a long way from "Syzygy" (Season 3, Episode 13), baby.

It's playing the hand you're dealt: Carter really gives voice to some intriguing concepts through Mr. Burt, continuously reinforced via ingratiating refrains of famed French writer Karl Zéro songs like "Ca Va Ca Va" in the background. We're certainly not in the usual X-Files milieu, but we are on firm Season 9 ground for sure. It only helped my case to have just rewatched Magnolia, in which Paul Thomas Anderson detailed random occurrences that wound up being anything but while also raining frogs down on Los Angeles.

Come to think of it, "Improbable" is a lot like that film. There are aspects we take note -- like Sestra Am mentioning the penchant for things happening in threes, the rhythm of sweeping matching another Zéro song, and the expansive dance number at the conclusion -- but we can't tap into Carter's motivation and meaning on every single level. We can cling to the obvious ones (our agents running into the baddie in offhanded ways) and marvel at a greater picture we can't see quite as well as that final expansive image of Mr. Burt.

Go, girl: This is a really fun episode for Reyes. She has still been making Mulder-esque leaps during investigations, but the bulk of her "whale song" impulses this year have been muted. Utilizing numerology to crack unsolved murders provided a refreshing look at the investigator we knew was in there somewhere. And yet it also brings her point of view in line with the Scully we've always known and loved. In this episode, it truly is all connected.

Ellen Greene, long a favorite of mine on stage and in the heaven-sent Pushing Daisies cast, gives possibly the finest brief appearance in the show's run. Totally prejudiced here, but how one-note would a couple of scenes of the numerologist talking about filling out forms have been without being Greene? And equal kudos to John Kapelos. In nine years on the show, no one has hit the FBI crew chief note quite like The Breakfast Club's insightful janitor.

Choose better: That leaves Ray McKinnon to bring Mad Wayne to his inevitable conclusion. A performance largely overlooked because it's as big and brash as the episode requires him to be, the Sons of Anarchy/Deadwood veteran moves the proceedings along with the necessary unsophisticated blend of cluelessness and psychosis.

The scenes with Mr. Burt, Monica and Dana in the garage rank among my favorites for the season. The checkers scene is playful, but there's a greater, more X-filey sentiment at work. Yet I have to admit I never thought of the denouement quite the way Sestra Am envisioned it -- with John having to save his two brilliant co-workers -- and now I feel I will see it no other way, particularly since it's fitting a very particular Carter profile.

Guest star of the week: Greene and Kapelos add dashes of flavor to the concoction. But it's beyond improbable and jumping ahead to inconceivable to not give this ep's kudos to Reynolds. He utilizes all the tools at his disposal to make the ep unforgettable. That surely would make Watson B. Duncan III proud.