Things Are Getting Strange

Somehow, Nick forgot the gore-fest of Nothing Lasts Forever existed at all, but is now painfully aware of the strange choice of penultimate episode. Not least that the original intent was much more meaningful, touching and appropriate at this late stage. And not involve nailing back-street doctors to the floor with fence posts for reasons the episode never bothers to even try to justify.

And My Struggle 4 suffers greatly thanks to My Struggle 2. We struggle to talk about the finale and how much is left unresolved, how many answers unanswered and how only now do we know...

It's man vs machine in Rm9sbG93ZXJz, though the robot wait-staff are also determined to make Scully pay. One way or another. We discuss the motive of the antagonist and how Scully could be plausibly tracked through her personal massager...

Familiar feels very old-school The X-Files but we get hung up on plot weirdness and suspect character design. Also why Mulder and Scully got involved in the first place.

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We get really hung up on the implications of Jackson Van De Kampf's life in Ghouli and how people just ignore the less than great series of events that would have lead to this episode's events. Not really helpful that Jackson clearly used to have a quite different and significant name. We get heavily into how what was clearly a monster of the week episode morphed into something else...

Kitten feels a bit Wetwire, a bit Blood and a lot another Skinner episode about his time in Vietnam. Despite an interesting reason for the episode existing, it...

*if you want to end the series in the best possible way...

Plus One is a fun episode, possibly a little overshadowed by the sterling guest-star turn and the efforts of the make-up department. Also suspect the entire point of the episode was less doppleganger hangman game and more getting Mulder and Scully into bed together...

The Lost Art of Forehead Sweat is not actually the final episode of the series, but like Sunshine Days, the perfect note to go out on. An episode that at last uncovers the true villain of the series, that...

We reach Season 11 and find that the chosen way to resolve the massive, massive cliffhanger season 10 left on is.... lacking.

My Struggle III spends a lot of time undoing some of Season 10 but not all of it and as a result leaves some weird debris behind. We talk retcons and wave goodbye to the nominal replacement Mulder and Scully...

This is one of Kim's most hated episodes, and its hard to ignore that being written and directed, the thoroughly nihilistic episode is being inflicted on Langely as seemingly creator really out to hurt his own...

Don't promise us the Lone Gunmen being back and then do... that.

Babylon was quite notorious on first broadcast and the intervening years have done little to aid the fact it feels the wrong fit for The X-Files in general and specific for Mulder and Scully. We also get into what the whole point of Einstein and Miller probably was...

My Struggle II uses the phrase "alien DNA" way too many times (we counted) and made Kim quite angry with its rather flippant - if typical - attitude to how medicines work and what certain...

We struggle to say much about Mulder and Scully Meet the Were-Monster, broadly because the episode is an absolute delight and revisiting it has not diminished how starkly it contrasts with the rest of season 10. It is still a fantastic episode.

Home, Again on the other hand is part fantastically acted Scully drama, part serious Arcadia remake and part mystifying Candyman-a-like. One of these things feels distinctly out of place and we struggle to make sense of why the episode is formed like this...

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Welcome to season 10! And plots we could swear we saw in Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space'. And Gethesmane...

Still! The X-Files is back. Skinner is back! Cancer man... is somehow back! And now we're trying to retcon seemingly 9 seasons of plot out of the backstory. We discuss how strange the apparent project to discredit Mulder is and how odd some of the choices with the revival are.

Founder's Mutation is at least a better episode. Though all these mentions of William are concerning. They're not going to do anything with him, right?

...right?<...

We reach the second The X-Files film and are beset by questions. Many of them "Why this?" and "Really?"

While the acting is fine, we are not so taken with the plot or the any of the new characters. We also learned a fair amount from the synopsis we are not sure we even got hinted at in the film itself...

Somehow we can even pick fault with the end credits...

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So here we are. What once was the end of The X-Files is a bit too much like how Seinfeld ended for its own good...

We end up talking about Franz Kafka for hopefully good reasons as well as continuing to observe that Mulder should never be allowed in any kind of court-room.

We also get to our best and worst episodes of the season.

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Release wraps Doggett's running backstory up perhaps a little too fast and a little too without warning (and that's not getting into Reyes' questionable decision re: seeing people taking bribes). But. There is an answer - its bleak and awful and does not involve whatever happened to Samantha. We are however obliged to point out that supernatural force continues to drag its feet in these kinds of episodes...

We disagree on just how supernatural the episode is and discuss the implausibility of walling fresh murder victims with clay.

Sunshine Days could easily be the last...

A strange description of Jimmy Bond, but accurate nonetheless.

After our hiatus, Nick is trying to be more positive about The X-Files. Each episode must have some positive points. Unfortunately, he is trying this on Jump the Shark and William of all things.

Jump the Shark does have a lot of sharks and Morris Fletcher. We get into why concluding a series in a different series feels like a terrible plan and how most of the regular X-Files lot seem to be largely absent. Still a shame to say goodbye to the Lone Gunmen, if...

At least, we're pretty sure guest star Burt Reynolds is God in Improbable at any rate. A rather stunning surprise from Chris Carter, this episode is tremendous fun, though unable to escape more questions about why Reyes isn't fired for this sequence of events.

We talk about our own life-path numbers and how relevant they are; also how Mulder crazy contrasts with Reyes crazy...

Scary Monsters sees the welcome return of Leyla Harrison to the series in a amusing if still grisly episode that can't quite hide how much it resembles a rather famous The...

One of them anyway...

Audrey Pauley feels more like a Twilight Zone episode, but is an interesting contrast to Steven Maeda's previous season 9 episode of 4D. And yet, somehow we end up talking about Dark Souls and Die Hard during the course of this episode. And how familiar the villain is.

Underneath is an episode we really did completely forget existed. And this despite it being the most The X-Files episode this season! A shame that Doggett is completely correct in this episode for a succession of completely wrong reasons.

Also not clear...

...mostly about the current state of the conspiracy here in Season 9...

Providence, wait, Provenance. No, Providence. Dammit, its Provenance!

Provenance has the Lone Gunmen for hilariously, almost futile inclusion and seems to want to hark back to one of the series more startling reveals - a half-buried ancient UFO off the coast of Africa. Except not we have one in Calgary, Canada.

We complain at length about what has been done to Scully's character and how weirdly certain people are that Mulder has died somewhere off-screen (made pointless given Carter's reported statement that D...

Vince Gilligan has failed us!

And apparently only us as the critical reception to John Doe is strikingly positive. We speculate how much of this is due to snobbishness around sci-fi/fantasy/horror and how much is because we're well acquainted with Gilligan's later productions.

Also a waste of a memory vampire...

Hellbound is not The X-Files take on Hellraiser, but that film inevitably comes up as a point of comparison given such focus on skinned corpses. And also ask high-brow philosophical questions such as when does the soul enter the body...

With Lord of the Flies, we wonder why The X-Files is now about a group of British school-children trapped on a desert island-

Wait...

We actually get curious as to whether the show's allusion to Jackass makes any sense anymore and the horror of body lice as a concept. At least we have an unscrupulous entomologist in the form of Rocky to provide entertainment in an episode reminiscent of Rain King but... Well, things are different now.

Trust No 1 demands the question of did Chris Carter actually want to still be involved in...

Daemonicus is Kim's most hated episode of the entire run of The X-Files. Fun times!

A good start leads into an increasingly dissatisfying experience and we once again discover how different intent was to how we wound up interpreting the episode on both watch and re-watch. Inevitably we also end up talking about Hannibal and also Hannibal.

Also; its clear the writers don't quite know what to do with Reyes...

4-D is better though bleaker and depressing and should probably have shown up in the series later. But the series struggles to know...

We're not entirely sure if Scully buys Jigsaw brand mobiles for her baby or the foley-artist made a strange choice for season 9's opener, but when baby William seems to use telekinesis to make his mobile move... It does sound like something out of Saw...

Welcome to Season 9! It all looks and sounds and feels a lot better than another series we've been struggling through. And in a possible bid to get more viewers both episodes involve Lucy Lawless not wearing anything.

We discuss how the tone of the series has changed dramatically after real...

...it won't attract the worm!

Weapon of Choice used (for no particular reason) in All About Yves is one of the high points. We get into why even with the writers throwing every trick in the bag to get a second series, even the revelatory answers were never going to be exactly great by way of Star Wars and Twin Peaks.

Plus, Kim has a far better plan to capture Yves than anything Morris Fletcher has dreamt up and its really hard to overlook how much simpler and effective and quick her suggestion would be.<...

We were told these two episodes were an improvement... and that was not wrong!

The Lying Game impressively avoids a gigantic pitfall that would have made the episode incredibly uncomfortable and lowered our impression of the characters still further. It also boasts a guest appearance from Mitch Pileggi who does a stellar job of impersonating Jimmy when events call for it.

We'll even overlook how the reasons the LGM get into the plot aren't exactly meant to be their thing, the plot does revolve around the kind of thing they would care about. It's doing...

It is hard to muster energy for The Lone Gunmen at this point...

Diagnosis Jimmy feels stitched together from discarded parts of other episodes and continues to call into question how Jimmy is able to exist in the real world. Meanwhile the other LGM-centric plot feels so poorly justified for its inclusion.

Unprofessional nurses and weirdly ineffective bear-traps abound...

Tango de los Pistoleros is a better episode but has so many question marks hanging over it that its still hard to enjoy. We wind up talking alot about how the characters don't appear...

We've reached episode 100 and so... are taking a break from The Lone Gunmen for this week.

Instead we have taken a trip to Springfield to witness the reasonably inexplicable crossover of The X-Files into The Simpsons. Which remains a lot of fun and is an extremely highly rated episode even now.

A lot of jokes and only a little threat of fear, famine and pestilence...

We also talk about the spec script, Flight 180, that went on to become Final Destination. We talk about the differences between the script and the eventual film, Charles...

...which was probably more baffling on release, but now we have to ask why the LGM don't actively use Linux for like paranoid reasons...

Back off hiatus! And despite the episode title being Planet of the Frohikes, the episode is more about Jimmy and chimpanzees and not really about Frohike at all. We get into the episode tipping its hand way too early, the The Murders in the Rue Morgue inferences and are somewhat floored by Yves actually being in-character.

Why does the series have a running gag about the LGM's newspaper being trash? How...

Stuff happened between watching Three Men and a Smoking Diaper and when we recorded this episode and made it somehow even less fun than the first time around when we were merely severely annoyed by every little thing in it.

Quite apart from the Lone Gunmen apparently getting into Gonzo Journalism rather than their normal style, the continued reliance on Jimmy as the "presentable" member of the gang (and not, say, Byers), the apparent lack of using Jimmy for his intended purpose (explain technical terms) and the juvenile humor, somehow the episode just casually tosses Frohike and...

Somehow the third episode of the series is Eine Kleine Frohike, an episode of The Lone Gunmen which feels like it should come from a hypothetical season 4 when the writers have well and truly run out of ideas. That it's also taking inspiration from The Ladykillers is just an additional bizarre twist to the whole mess.

We return to wondering if this series is just supposed to be an unauthorized Mission Impossible reboot or it just somehow has amazing rubber masks for some other reason. Jimmy's presence in the series continues to mystify and annoy given his...

We swap from the bureaucratic FBI to a low-circulation newspaper office run by three familiar characters. Welcome to The Lone Gunmen. The one series spin-off of the popular trio into their own show!

Second time we're discussing an episode titled Pilot...

For the most part the series starts strong with a plot more Lone Gunmen like than The X-Files provided for quite a time. There's some Mission: Impossible, some unfortunate correct guessing at events that occurred less than a year from broadcast, and a whole new character whose presence we can't help but be suspicious...

The X-Files could genuinely have ended with Existence. There's room for a future version of the series, but a lot of plot is resolved and the current alien threat is so nebulous. But Season 9 looms. But before that: The Lone Gunmen.

And before that: We get hung up on all the Biblical imagery in this episode, none of it subtle. Including the UFO/guiding star thing. We are increasingly unsure on how any of the conspiracy works or what this means, but the Sculder shippers are presumably very happy.

Still curious about who exactly William's...

Not to The Doors slightly sadly. That would be a bit too surreal. But certainly, closing and not even locking a door is enough to deter the new villainous version of that kid from the pilot episode of the series from attacking Doggett or killing Mulder. Useful stuff.

But before that Essence stuff, there's Alone:

Scully leaves the X-Files (the department) but remains in The X-Files (the show)! Doggett gets a new partner! Slightly inexplicably transferred from accountant to field agent. We like Layla in her first appearance here being the quintessential X-Files fan by...

Its never bad to have an episode where Reyes shows up. Though Empedocles does stress this attitude. For the main plot, Reyes herself prompts all kinds of questions about her existence within the FBI and her complete non-crossing paths with the X-Files. For the subplots, we do have to increasingly stress the question no one wants to ask: just who is Scully's baby-father?

But that gets side-lined in favour of Doggett's tragic backstory. Alluded to back in Invocation and then ignored. Until now!

Vienen should be a fun time. Another Thing-style episode for The X-Files...

So Krycek's back in Deadalive. What has he been doing? Did he tell anyone he killed CSM off last season? Why does he want Skinner to prevent Scully from giving birth? We get no answers.

But Mulder is definitely dead. Totally. 100%. Just pay no attention to him being first in the opening credits again.

We get very confused about why Theresa (the other abductee returned last episode) doesn't factor into events, also how this weirdo new alien scheme works and how Scully used to think Mulder had more friends.

The three words in...

It is hard not to question Scully's decision-making ability in Per Manum. Not least because she figures the best place to hide out while conspiratorial stuff is going on is with the army. Who have never, ever been involved with anything shady and conspiratorial.

We discuss how ultrasounds tend to look a tad on the alien-side of things no matter what one you look at, Scully's lack of questions at multiple points, our confusion over what the latest twist of the conspiracy even is, and why it is at the very least impolite to get Doggett out...

We're back! After injury and illness, we return to watch Doggett die in The Gift!

It is perhaps not as big a spoiler as you might imagine given he's perfectly fine and in the rest of this season despite this slight complication. This is a weird episode though and features an entity which we are repeatedly told is a soul eater despite not acting anything like one.

A shame the episode starts well and has a really good setup that fails to pay off come the ending.

Medusa continues a sporadic trend of...

We watched Tetsuo the Iron Man ahead of Salvage this week. Mostly because Salvage is an admitted version of the film. The experience was illuminating but did underscore how strange the idea of doing this idea as an X-Files episode and all the parts Salvage left out. At least we got to see all the things that inspired Tetsuo and all the things it seemingly influenced after...

We also talk a fair amount about new film Alien: Romulus, but also pick at the parts of Salvage that are confusing. Like whose ashes were Ray's widow given? Why...

The premise and intent behind Via Negativa is really neat and interesting! The actual episode starts really strongly and then loses its way somewhat spectacularly and is found exceptionally wanting. Very confusing and not in a fun what is reality kind of way the episode is probably going for.

We talk about Event Horizon a bit and how the episode seems to hand wave away the impossibility of the murder weapon, though at least we get a Doggett-Skinman team-up episode so that's fun.

We get high-brow literary with Surekill. Or at least note that Of...

That Doggett can go through the events of Invocation and come out the other side to dismiss anything happening in Redrum is nothing short of astonishing. Never did Scully get handed something so ardently impossible as the dark tale of child kidnap and apparent manifestation from beyond the grave. Fresh Bones was not this concrete with its impossible child.

We get into how Closure from last season does provoke a lot of awkward questions for how the dark, dark backstory for this episode is even able to occur - where are the damn fairies for this one...

A decidedly odd start to Doggett's time on the X-Files. And we can't ignore that it would be more effective if Patience and Roadrunners was swapped in the episode order. And also that Patience feels a lot like a re-do of Squeeze just without actually re-watching Squeeze and apparently just working off the vague memories of the classic.

We compare the monster to Buffy special effects, dwell on the nature of the show's Bible and wonder about man-bat breeding colonies. And also admire how no one mentions a certain DC comics character once.

Roadrunners is...

New season and new character! With Within we welcome John Doggett to The X-Files and indeed, the X-Files. Our new hardened skeptic to Scully's abruptly much more open-minded version of herself. Which does feel a little odd as it feels like seeing the UFO at the end of Requiem would be more of a trigger for this, but here we are.

Also Kersh is back!

We discuss how Scully remains difficult for many X-Files writers to cope with and the implausibility of various spaceships within Earth's (or Earth-like) atmosphere. Also how we are now awash...

Is it ever possible to have a story wherein a character is granted three wishes and for them to not screw up immediately? Je Souhaite certainly paints none of the would be wishees in especially good light.

Despite the inherent issues with humanity, the episode is a lot of fun. Scully gets to be giddy about autopsying an invisible man, while Mulder tries to rules-lawyer his way out of unwanted side-effects. As the penultimate episode of the season (and at one stage, possibly ever) its a fun time.

Requiem feels like an episode went missing...

Not sure if the first episode to receive the treatment, but it turns out Mythbusters specifically took down one of the central premises of this episode as being effectively impossible. So, no you can't listen to the Aramaic version of I am the Walrus on that pot your aunt made...

Hollywood AD is a weird episode. Part religious struggle and part Hollywood wrecking the premise of The X-Files itself and reducing a Cardinal who cracks joke into a bizarre version of Cigarette Smoking Man in the form of the Cigarette Smoking Pontiff. We talk about Borges and...