S10.E03: Mulder And Scully Meet The Were-Monster

[Bastet]

How did I miss the reference to Scully being immortal? Where was it?

 

She says it, when Mulder bursts in to the animal shelter and she has already kicked ass and taken names.  He tells her that's twice she's gone to confront a suspect without backup and she just cheekily responds that's she's immortal.  And then takes the dog.

 

Have I mentioned that I love Scully beyond all reason?

[sharinlilbit]

 

Very important question, though....when he was throwing the pencils at the I Want To Believe poster, did she say something along the lines of "hey, what are you doing to my poster?"

 

Yes, she rather pointedly said "MY poster."  Which I loved.  Guess she picked up a new one at a head shop.  ;) 

[Tardislass]

Hmm. Seemed I'm not the only one who didn't love it. My friend texted and said it made him sad to be an X-File fan and my dad just texted "what the hell was that?". I think this will be a very divisive episode. Certainly more campy than any story so far. But next week looks back to being dark and depressing since CC allowed that M&S can only have 0.5 hours of happiness in any season.:)

[HalcyonDays]

Very important question, though....when he was throwing the pencils at the I Want To Believe poster, did she say something along the lines of "hey, what are you doing to my poster?" I remember that he kicked and ripped one in the basement office while he was (ridiculously) accusing Skinner of not being on his side. So, could the current poster be Scully's?

 

Yeah, she said it was hers. When Mulder was throwing the pencils (sharp bloody things, eh? Nice aim, M). Anyway, when he was doing that, I was like "Wait, Mulder, you ripped that poster!!" But then Scully does say "What are you doing to my poster". Yup, it's hers!

 

"That's how I like my Mulder" gave me massive feels and smiles!

 

Loved the epitaph on Kim Manners' tombstone, "Let's kick it in the ass."

 

If I remember right, he died of cancer, so appropriate epitaph.

 

Darin Morgan eps are always about the human condition.

 

What can I say? He speaks to me. I read somewhere long ago, that when D. Morgan was writing during the original X-Files run, that he was struggling with depression and had a hard time writing at the time. It's one of the reasons he only wrote a few episodes. However, it's why he tends to focus on the introspective and the human condition, from what I remember reading.

 

Or he was smoking a bowl of the good shit from Van City. *grin*

[SparklesBitch]

RE: the transgender comment complaints.

Darin Morgan eps are always about the human condition. I believe that the transgender repartee herein was spot-on. The whole episode was about being something that you're not. As Rhys Darby's "were-man" character discovered, waking up one day to discover that you are not who you are *supposed* to be, and to want so badly to be what you are "supposed" to be, at all costs.

C'mon guys, give the writers *some* credit- they are smart and funny and revered for a reason.

"Also...token lesbian here"

What makes you think you're a token lesbian?

*I don't know how to capture comments and respond, sorry*

 

Agreed! One of the many reasons that Darin Morgan episodes are so great.

 

As for the token lesbian comment, I was just being silly. =)

 

And the capturing comments and responding, click the quote button in the lower left of the post you want to quote.

[Bastet]

If I remember right, he dies of cancer, so appropriate epitaph.

 

Yes, lung cancer.  And "let's kick it in the ass" was his catch phrase.  One of his cleaner ones, anyway; much of what he said couldn't have been shown on network television.  (Thus the Detective Manners character from Jose Chung's.  "You bet your blankety-blank bleep I am!")

Edited February 2, 2016 by Bastet

[cpierce]

I'm sorry, but I just can't with the comments from people who reveal that they never saw the series, or who cannot understand the relationships/mythologies/MOTW/canny stuff, etc., etc.... or that they only ever watched a few episodes. This show DEFINED AN ENTIRE GENERATION!!!!!!!

You don't have to be an "X-Phile" to understand, but you kinda hafta be a fan to at least "get" some of the more subtle- and not so subtle- references and nods.

Also, Mulder and Scully have never had any sense of happiness.

[Frozendiva]

Welcome back, Darin Morgan. Classic tale of the human condition and the inverted monster/the mirror's lens being from the *other* side.

 

Many of my thoughts are similar to those posted above.

 

The tombstones at the cemetery were a nice touch.

 

Poor Daggoo reminded me of houseplants I buy. Normally dead within a month.

 

Fox normally aimed the pencils at the ceiling. Why the poster - yes, being cynical and jaded will do that. As will being tired. The truth is out there still and maybe the were-monster was a way to get back in the game. The monster was Mulder's mirror.

 

I enjoyed the "mulderitsme" phone call, the X files theme ringtone, mention of Queequeg (cute Pomeranian from Clyde Bruckman's Repose). The red Speedos. Oh yes.

[SparklesBitch]

Have I mentioned that I love Scully beyond all reason?

 

Me too. Shouldn't everyone? ;)

[AntiBeeSpray]

RE: the transgender comment complaints.

Darin Morgan eps are always about the human condition. I believe that the transgender repartee herein was spot-on. The whole episode was about being something that you're not. As Rhys Darby's "were-man" character discovered, waking up one day to discover that you are not who you are *supposed* to be, and to want so badly to be what you are "supposed" to be, at all costs.

C'mon guys, give the writers *some* credit- they are smart and funny and revered for a reason.

"Also...token lesbian here"

What makes you think you're a token lesbian?

*I don't know how to capture comments and respond, sorry*

 

Fair point.

Hmm. Seemed I'm not the only one who didn't love it. My friend texted and said it made him sad to be an X-File fan and my dad just texted "what the hell was that?". I think this will be a very divisive episode. Certainly more campy than any story so far. But next week looks back to being dark and depressing since CC allowed that M&S can only have 0.5 hours of happiness in any season.:)

 

Ah.

 

Well I could say the same about My Struggle. Mulder going off on a tangent like he did towards the end of it had me going O_o.

 

Yep. But at least Glen seems to capture them well. So we have that.

 

I liked this ep better than I thought I would.

[festivus]

I loved every minute of Scully in this. Gillian looked like she was having so much fun.

[AntiBeeSpray]

I loved every minute of Scully in this. Gillian looked like she was having so much fun.

 

I did too! Same with Mulder. Darin got the pacing down pat. That's what I missed from them in part. Ep 2 seemed to be missing something to me. This was what I needed to see M & S again. I missed them so much.

[Tardislass]

My bet-We will never see Daggoo again. Although I rather think a farm or house in the country(Mulder) would be a better place.

[Frozendiva]

I still remember the scene in "Fight the Future" where Mulder *finally* sees the-then key to the X Files - the flying saucer/the alien ship - do you see it Scully? He gets to see a real 'monster', a real 'X File' and the monster has the 'humanity' and 'dignity' to accept Mulder.

 

I did also get a kick out of were-lizard not wanting to get up and go to work.

 

The ep made me miss the days of non-telegraphed shows where I can predict what will happen. The fantastical, the human, the make me think and make me smile type shows.

[janestclair]

Yes, lung cancer. And "let's kick it in the ass" was his catch phrase. One of his cleaner ones, anyway; much of what he said couldn't have been shown on network television. (Thus the Detective Manners character from Jose Chung's. "You bet your blankety-blank bleep I am!")

I am familiar with Detective Manners'...colorful phraseology.

I have no idea how I missed that immortal line.

[revbfc]

Forgot to mention that I loved all the Mulder and Scully interaction in this one. It was playful and light and fun, like a breath of fresh air. The "bat crap crazy", and the "this is how I like my Mulder" were so perfectly affectionate and lovely. It cracked me up that Mulder was all skeptical.

Very important question, though....when he was throwing the pencils at the I Want To Believe poster, did she say something along the lines of "hey, what are you doing to my poster?" I remember that he kicked and ripped one in the basement office while he was (ridiculously) accusing Skinner of not being on his side. So, could the current poster be Scully's?

Also...token lesbian here to weigh in on the whole gay and/or trans jokes thing. Maybe it's just me, but as long as I can tell that the jokes aren't being made from a nasty place, they make me laugh. Within the LGBT community (or at least my experience in it) there's a lot of poking fun at stereotypes and using them to describe ourselves. Humor pretty much reigns about that sort of thing. I'm not trans, but I have friends who are, and I know none of them would have been bothered by the content of X-Files tonight. They'd crack up. But then, I think that's because the intent obviously wasn't nasty. But to each their own! =)

On the bit of Scully porn....I can't help it, I ate it up. I think that's the shameless fangirl in me, though.

I didn't think the trans jokes were horrible either. Considering that the werehuman was struggling with what humanity is all about, why wouldn't he wonder about such things? Also, it was appropriate since "the monster" was trapped in a body that he didn't identify with. The irony that he was in a vaguely similar situation as trans humans was lost on him.

[Tardislass]

I still remember the scene in "Fight the Future" where Mulder *finally* sees the-then key to the X Files - the flying saucer/the alien ship - do you see it Scully? He gets to see a real 'monster', a real 'X File' and the monster has the 'humanity' and 'dignity' to accept Mulder.

 

I did also get a kick out of were-lizard not wanting to get up and go to work.

 

The ep made me miss the days of non-telegraphed shows where I can predict what will happen. The fantastical, the human, the make me think and make me smile type shows.

I loved that the were-lizard evolved from finding himself nude and wanting clothes-Adam in the Garden of Eden, to having the overwhelming urge to get a job and money, then the next day hating his job. LOL. I didn't like half of the episode but the whole hotel scene and the were-lizard's story were highlights.

 

But was I the only one who wanted to hear the animal control officers story?!:)

Edited February 2, 2016 by Tardislass

[Bastet]

I didn't think the trans jokes were horrible either. Considering that the werehuman was struggling with what humanity is all about, why wouldn't he wonder about such things?

 

The only thing I didn't like was the adolescent cringing at discussion of MTF surgery, but it was definitely in character for Mulder at least and nowhere near as insensitive as I'd feared.  He really was trying to explain in an understanding manner.

 

Yay, it's starting!  I'm positively giddy to watch this again.  See y'all again in an hour.

Edited February 2, 2016 by Bastet

[Starchild]

Did no one else notice the attire of the guest star, right down to the hat: Kolchak, The Night Stalker. The actor even looked like Darrin McGavin (who guest starred on the X Files).

I did! Best part of the episode, followed closely by every scene with Scully in it. Especially the autopsy.

[festivus]

For me I felt this episode was a love letter to the fans. So much I loved; Mulder and the camera phone, Scully saying men don't send her pictures of their junk, Scully's poster, her stealing that dog, her immortality line,  the lizard monster just running around everywhere in his tighty whities and that lady hitting him with her bag. I need to stop because I just loved everything about it and it was very sweet at the end. 

[Pjxf99]

Loved it like a tween girl loves her emoji. Not only do I want to watch that episode again, this made me want to hop on Netflix and watch some of the original shows again. And I haven't wanted to do that in ages, since about the time the movies sucked.

Does anyone think the dog's name has some weird meaning? there was lots of subtext in this show and in-jokes, so I was just wondering.

 

ETA: I have total faith in Scully's ability to kick ass (all hail Scully) but maaaaybe if she didn't turn her back on the suspected killer, she wouldn't have had to? just a thought, Dana.

Edited February 2, 2016 by Pjxf99

[Frozendiva]

I wondered how the animal control officer was going to explain his eaten 'net'.

 

Scully's reference to Mulder and the Inter-"net".

 

The were-lizard woke up after 10,000 years to find himself anywhere but in the Garden of Eden. More like a world of illusion/delusion.  He learned real fast that the world was not hollow and he didn't touch the sky.

 

It was nice to revisit an old-school X Files ep - the opening of the case file in Act 1, the visit to the crime scene. Just lovely old times. Mulder's protracted defense of himself without Scully getting in a word edge-wise - only that she was happy to see the old Mulder again. Mulder not being hugely tech-savvy having problems with his App and modern times. No more newspaper clippings when things are on Google.

[cpierce]

I didn't think the trans jokes were horrible either. Considering that the werehuman was struggling with what humanity is all about, why wouldn't he wonder about such things? Also, it was appropriate since "the monster" was trapped in a body that he didn't identify with. The irony that he was in a vaguely similar situation as trans humans was lost on him.

Yeah I already said that:

 

"Darin Morgan eps are always about the human condition. I believe that the transgender repartee herein was spot-on. The whole episode was about being something that you're not. As Rhys Darby's "were-man" character discovered, waking up one day to discover that you are not who you are *supposed* to be, and to want so badly to be what you are "supposed" to be, at all costs."

 

I don't think it was ironic in the least, it was very much on-the-nose. In fact, it was sort of the whole point. As someone else mentioned upthread, the person in the mirror, etc.... It's why this show's writers are so brilliant.

[Tardislass]

Loved it like a tween girl loves her emoji. Not only do I want to watch that episode again, this made me want to hop on Netflix and watch some of the original shows again. And I haven't wanted to do that in ages, since about the time the movies sucked.

Does anyone think the dog's name has some weird meaning? there was lots of subtext in this show and in-jokes, so I was just wondering.

It's a play on Scully's other dog's name Queequeg, who was a character in Moby Dick-I believe one of the crew. Daggoo was an African slave on board the whaling ship. Thank you internet!

 

Daggoo is enormous, physically very powerful, and barely acculturated to the customs of the white Americans around him. Ironically, on board the Pequod, he is the harpooneer on Flask’s whale boat. The immense, strong, calm black harpooneer and the tiny, hotheaded white officer are not only a strange pairing—sometimes they seem positively allegorical.

 

Edited February 2, 2016 by Tardislass

[madam magpie]

Have I mentioned that I love Scully beyond all reason?

Me too!!!

I thought this episode was fantastic! Lots of fun!

[tpel]

Up until tonight I was at peace with the fact that we would only get 6 episodes. Now I want more. I want bat-crap crazy Mulder and affectionately smirking Scully on my TV every week forever!

 

Mulder trying to get pictures, yet messing up with his phone, was a nice reference to the passage of time. Now that practically everyone has a camera on them at all times, the lack of photographic evidence for the various beasties witnesses claim to have seen challenges their credibility. Mulder intends to rectify this lack, yet he is, as he said last week, "old school", not necessarily up on tech stuff.

 

Maybe he should ask his buddies, the Lone Gunmen, for help! I'm spoilering this, as I know they do appear in the revival in some capacity. I don't want to know any more than that until I see them.

 

Maybe a stupid question, given the fact that the writers admitted that the story had no logic, but if the animal control guy was strangling his victims, what was with all the torn out throats? Was he biting them too?

[Tardislass]

Maybe a stupid question, given the fact that the writers admitted that the story had no logic, but if the animal control guy was strangling his victims, what was with all the torn out throats? Was he biting them too?

 

I got the idea that he strangled them and then bit at their necks.

[ottoDbusdriver]

That was an awesome episode -- it was fun.  Loved the play on the opposite of the traditional monster biting man scenario.

 

And I really loved the were-lizard's comments on all of his new urges after being bitten.  To get a job in order to pay his bills and how he hated his job, and the meaningless of it all. The urge to get a pet, and then the pain of losing that pet.

 

Rhys Darby did a really good job as the were-lizard.

 

Was the hotel clerk drinking rubbing alcohol?!

 

It certainly looked like it. Yikes !

[Bastet]

I got the idea that he strangled them and then bit at their necks.

 

Yes, we saw him gnawing on their necks.  (It was sort of ... gnawed on.  Sorry, Bad Blood moment.)

 

Okay, love it even more after second viewing, which I wouldn’t have thought possible.

 

The interaction between Mulder & Scully is pitch perfect.  I love that she pulls her gun and he pulls his camera. (And instead of dropping his gun, he doesn't know how to use the new camera app.)  And the way he shoves it in her face while she’s trying to do the autopsy.  Digital version of the Big Blue photos.  ("Could that be a tooth?”)

 

The episode is just one shout out to prior episodes after another, and I love them all.  Some are more blatant than others, but I don’t think there’s a single scene that doesn’t at least remind me of something that has come before.  Classic XF.  Just brilliant, really – right up there with Jose Chung's, Clyde Bruckman, Bad Blood, and Small Potatoes.

 

I love every minute of Scully in this, from her uncontrolled amusement at the beginning to their role reversal in the field, to declaring she’s emptying her clip into whatever it is, to “Mulder, the internet is not good for you,” to every frame of Autopsy!Scully enjoying the hell out of herself, to her facial expressions during the fantastic hotel scene when she can’t get a word in edgewise (and, of course, “Yeah, this is how I like my Mulder” and “No, you’re bat crap crazy” when she can), to her sighing when Mulder keeps hanging up or running off when she tries to tell him about the lab results, to her solving the case, saving herself, apprehending the killer (“Hey, you missed all the fun”), and stealing a dog.

 

Random note: It sounds like Gillian's accent slipped through on "investigative."

 

I also love every minute of Mulder.  And Guy.  And everyone else.  The modern-day Bates motel with the taxidermy and the creepy proprietor spying on guests.  “Mulder, it’s me.”  The social commentary, which is just fantastic, line for line (especially “The only way to be happy as a human is to spend all your time in the company of non-humans”).  I hope everyone involved had as much fun making this – and they looked like they did – as I did watching it.

Edited February 2, 2016 by Bastet

[Ghost of TWOP Past]

Oh my god so much fun. I can't even list all the things that were good because it would be basically the whole script. So, some personal favorites: 

 

Mulder chasing the monster with a camera instead of a gun because he's sick of never having evidence. 

 

3 repeat guest-stars from the OS. The one not mentioned yet was the hotel manager, who was in several old eps. 

 

"Mulder, it's me." I almost cried.

 

Scully is immortal. Almost cried. Again. 

 

And just my characters having fun. 

 

The one thing that bothered me is that Mulder's ringtone is the show's theme, since that music shouldn't exist in this world. But who cares? So much fun. I was laughing out loud through most of the episode.

[green]

 Mulder's ringtone is the X-Files theme? Ha!

 

 

Absolutely totally completely loved the episode.  Clever, witty and laugh aloud moments like that ring tone going off.  One of the best and funniest hours of TV I've see in forever.  Total 100% classic.  Never delete it from your hard drive!

[Charlesman]

I liked the bit about the desert racetrack rock mystery being solved in the intervening years since they went off the air. Nice thing to place in there.

[turnitwayup]

I loved this ep. So many callbacks. The s3 stoners are still stoners 20 yrs later, the red speedo makes another appearance, the tombstones (awww), Scully's immortality, Queequeg shoutout and her taking the dog with her. Rhys Darby is such a good comedic actor and it would've been hilarious if Darin had written a line about Guy having the urge to be a band manager, but since he couldn't find a band to manage he ended up at the cell phone store. Lulz at Shangela as the truck stop hooker (her words), tho I wonder why they didn't go for an actual trans actress. Loled at Mulder's ringtone and his inability to figure out his new camera app. He was probably so excited to have technology advance so much and can easily get proof using his phone, yet it still doesn't go as planned. Can Fox give us a s11 so that Darin can write more eps?

[VCRTracking]

Loved that they used the same two stoners from 20 years ago. Now they're huffing paint!

 

I love the silly episodes. They're as just as much a part of the show as the serious monster ones and the mythology episodes. Anybody who gets upset about an episode because it's absurd hasn't been watching the series.

 

Guy's porn fantasy about Scully. I'd be lying if I said I didn't have those thoughts about her!

 

Happy Scully's keeping Daggoo.

 

I thought Mulder was being very enlightened about transgendered people and explaining it to someone who didn't really understand the concept(that someone being new to the whole human thing)

 

Okay if Scully is immortal I hope Mulder is going to die by auto erotic asphyxiation I hope he's in his 90s.

[minamurray78]

"Alas, I was human again."

 

"And I quickly realized that the only way to be happy as a human, was to spend all of your time in the company of non-humans."

 

I loved everything about this.

 

And the puppy kept playing with Guy in lizard form and licking his lizard face lol. I hope he lasts longer than Queequeg.

Edited February 2, 2016 by minamurray78

[Richness]

While I liked some parts of this episode, it was way to campy for my tastes. I watched earlier seasons when the show first aired, but eventually gave up on it toward the end and haven't rewatched it since. Therefore, I didn't recognize most of the callbacks and appreciate everyone explaining them in more detail. I remember Jose Chung was more my style of humor.

 

However, there were two meta pieces of comedy that I really enjoyed: The show's theme song as Mulder's ring tone, and the were-monster's accent. Did anyone else think they were playing off on the talking Geico gecko by making it a were lizard come human? Loved the were-monster trope reversal, even if his urges to get a job and so forth were too outlandish.

 

And for purely bad reasons, I loved the red speedo shot, though I don't remember it from way back when. Google is your friend.

[BK1978]

Rhys Darby is great in pretty much everything I have had a chance to see him in and I thought he was great last night.

 

To me Scully felt off in this episode..She didn't seem like Scully.  The best comedy episodes were ones that felt like an X-File but had humor. Sadly, this seemed like Benny Hill with a bit of Tao.

 

And someone please tell the writers that gay and transgender jokes are not edgy anymore. I feel like I'm back in 2012 when I hear that.

 

I found parts of it great but a lot was way too camp. Wish I loved it as much as most of you did.

 

Yeah Scully seemed very un-Scully like in this episode.

 

 

Did no one else notice the attire of the guest star, right down to the hat: Kolchak, The Night Stalker. The actor even looked like Darrin McGavin (who guest starred on the X Files).

 

I am glad that I was not the only one to pick up on that.  I thought it was a great inside joke they did there.  The minute I saw him dressed like Kolchak I started to whistle the Kolchak, The Night Stalker theme song.

[MrWhyt]

I am glad that I was not the only one to pick up on that.  I thought it was a great inside joke they did there.  The minute I saw him dressed like Kolchak I started to whistle the Kolchak, The Night Stalker theme song.

 

Allegedly this is a reworking of an unproduced script that Darin Morgan wrote for the Kolchak remake.

[baileythedog]

I loved every single thing about this episode. 

 

I loved that a long-desired contact and conversation with an actual monster is precisely what Mulder needed to assuage his mid-life crisis.  Scully recognizing the enthusiasm in this Mulder ("my Mulder" who is "bat crap crazy") is just the punch in the arm their relationship needs.  Mulder, who's undoubtedly been adrift and purposeless for far too long, was probably a challenging person for Scully to live with.  

 

I loved Mulder knowing immediately that Guy's version of events that included a gratuitous Scully sex scene absolutely did not happen.  

I loved the incredibly long and detailed flashback all essentially commenting on the human condition and how the were-monster had the uncontrollable human urge to get a job he hated and prepare for a mortgage all while learning that the happiest human is one who has relationships with non-humans.

 

I loved the animal control guy never even able to get his story out, even though it started with all the trappings of his eventually becoming a serial killer. ("I started out wanting to hurt small animals...")  But since Mulder had jettisoned profiling even before he stopped believing in the paranormal, he cared not one whit. 

 

Despite all his fumbling around with a camera trying to capture an image of the monster, at the end he gets his own confirmation but no actual evidence. Again.

 

I never thought I'd see Mulder's little red speedo / bikini briefs again, so that was a nice bonus!  

 

Just too much to love about this episode.

[Pippin]

Once again, Darin Morgan hits it out of the park.  Loved it; looking forward to watching it again on "Space" this Friday.

 

His episodes are always terrific.  (I wish I could write like this guy!)  They're funny but the characters are always true to form. 

 

The "X-Files" has always been like the little girl with the curl.  In this case, it was very, very good.

 

 

[Happy Harpy]

The scene with Mulder impersonating Mulder/Scully at the motel is probably one of the best of the whole show, at least for me. The X-files in a nutshell.

I loved the believer/skeptic inversion/subversion/played straight again.

I loved all the references and Easter eggs and the tribute to Kim Manners.

 

Because of all this, I find myself wanting to like this episode more than I actually did. Disclaimer: I'm one of those weirdos who are meh about Jose Chung.

I loved Clyde Bruckman because it was funny and emotional, I loved Humbug because it was funny and scary. And here, as others said upthread, I didn't find much beyond campy fun.

I know that emotion was supposed to be found in the were-monster's condition, but the tone was too light and placed it on the backseat imo, plus the Buffy season 1-style lizzard costume killed it for me. The cases have always worked better for me when they evoke fear more than when they show its source (unless it's a worm like in Ice, for example).

 

OTOH, I do think it was a great idea to solve Mulder's crisis of faith/midlife crisis during an episode with a lighter tone.

 

But it doesn't matter anyway, because I agree with @Bastet, the Mulder/Scully interactions are pitch perfect. Scully was awesome, Mulder was awesome and I loved every minute they interacted, even when just talking on the phone. This is why I love and watch the X-files.

Edited February 2, 2016 by Happy Harpy

[GaT]

I laughed a lot during this episode, definitely took me back to original X-Files.

[Cirien]

Loved it! But now I know what it would be like if Dr. Seuss had written an episode of The X-Files.

 

I choose to believe that Tyler Labine was playing the very same stoner as in "The War of the Coprophages" (an episode directed by Kim Manners, as it happens).

 

I also laughed at the return of another well-known guest star: the red Speedo.

 

Was the motel manager really drinking rubbing alcohol? Yikes.

 

 

It may be a reference to the episode "Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose," written by Carter and Darin Morgan, wherein Mulder and Scully encounter a man claiming a psychic gift for foretelling others' deaths. One of his predictions appears to be that Mulder will die as a result of autoerotic asphyxiation; at another point in the story, when Scully asks him to tell her how she will die, he only answers "You don't."

Also remember in that episode "Tinthonus" where that crime scene photographer - Alfred Felig was basically immortal because he cheated death, because when death came it missed ( because he turned away) . At the end of that episode Scully was shot by her temporary partner and Fellig asked her to look away when she could see death coming for her . Scully recovered fully but Fellig died. Mulder suggested that it was because Fellig had taken her death upon himself, and because she turned away, she is now immortal, until a time that she wishes to die

[Mama No Life]

I think one thing that I keep coming back to is just how much the actors have honed their craft since the original.  There were times that  DD's line delivery made me cringe even though he is my fav and my adulthood crush.  I don't see any of that this time around. Sure, some of the lines are still awkward but they both deliver them with so much more depth and nuance.  Maybe I just feel that way after watching them in other things, but I definitely see range we didn't see in the original eps, esp with DD, both comedically and dramatically.

[Jac]

I. Loved. This. Episode.

I loved all the callbacks and meta, red speedos, Scully's immortalality, Queequeg, Mulder's ringtone, Kim Manners shoutout

Rhys Darby and Kumail Nanjiani were both great and I am so happy.

Edited February 3, 2016 by JacquelineLHope

[Chaos Theory]

What I like most is that the show has acknowledged that time has moved on And a number of Mulders theories were outright disproved by science. It would have been easy for the show to drop the characters back in yo exactly the place the series ended but instead they are in logical places where they might be twenty years later.

[joelene]

Loved it. LOVED. IT. Close to perfection. Regarding the trans issue I did an involuntary groan when Rhys exclaimed "That's nuts!", but thinking about it and the whole context, I don't think it was that bad. "Are you on crack?" "Of course!" had me howling. I did ache for Scully when she disappeared there for a while, but they saved it by her saving herself and catch the killer. I would've loved seeing more of it. I'd have loved to see the part where Rhys went berserk and thrashed the store with Scully standing there, too.

But, yeah, loved the episode. I hope the final serious MOTW will be close to as good.

[Prevailing Wind]

In addition to all the above mentioned things to love, I loved the Jackalope head on the wall in the Motor Lodge.

[CrashTextDummie]

I wasn't really in love with all the callbacks because I don't think relentless fanservice is particularly clever. But there were more than enough other things in this episode that were very clever for me to love it overall still.

 

The magic of Darin Morgan episodes for me is that they are the good kind of silly. They always tread the line between dumb and endearing, and almost never step on the wrong side of it. His scripts are also exceptionally good at taking a joke and then building on it. Best example here being Mulder trying to take pictures with his smart phone. It's mildly amusing at first but then you get to M&S watching his recording of himself screaming and him getting ID on the monster via the picture of Guy in the Pora-potty and I'm just cackling like a maniac.

 

And then there's the trademark absurdity that just makes you marvel at the inventiveness of the guy. There's two shots in particular I loved above all others. The first was the monster hiding in the porta-potty: a) because it was just a hilarious visual and b) because when has a chase scene ever ended in a porta-potty? The second was the monster lying on his back in the forest, peacefully gazing at the moon (and then being attacked by the killer). The basic conceit of this episode (what you saw in the first half of the episode isn't what really happened) isn't new, but when the flashback started in this manner, I just knew I was going to be content with whatever else they were gonna throw at me.

 

It has to be said though that this kind of episode works first and foremost because DD and GA have exceptional comedic timing. I think you'd have a hard time finding actors on an ostensibly serious drama being able to basically lampoon themselves this effortlessly while staying entirely true to their characters.

[FurryFury]

I can't believe there are people here who call this a bad episode. Sorry, but the whole revival thing was worth it just for this. Instant classic. Darin Morgan is the best.