THE X FILES season one: episodes 17: EBE to 24: THE ERLENMEYER FLASK
THE X FILES season one: episodes 17: EBE to 24: THE ERLENMEYER FLASK
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17 17 "E.B.E."‡ William Graham Glen Morgan & James Wong February 18, 1994 1X16 9.2[58]
Mulder and Scully receive information from Deep Throat about a UFO that was shot down over Iraq and has been secretly transported to the US. However, Deep Throat then intentionally misleads the agents to prevent them from discovering the truth. The Lone Gunmen are introduced.
It’s been a very long time since I watched one of the conspiracy arc episodes and this gave me the same downbeat, open ended, “I’ve been cheated” feeling those gave me. The build up is terrific but confusing a lot of the time. They’re tracking a UFO in a truck driven by one man but he’s fooled them? The Lone Gunmen are mildly funny but not sure ANY continuing comedy characters should, well, continue. KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER had such characters here and there but they always helped out because Carl was paying them AND they never appeared again to the best of my knowledge. There was at least Gordy the morgue attendant who DID appear again but he’s far funnier and less seen then the Lone Gunmen. I’m sure I liked the Lone Gunman. I’m not sure I ever liked them or thought them funny which is why when later it was announced that they would get their own show…I could care less. I mean how dare they cancel MILLENNIUM and come back with the POS LONE GUNMEN show?
In any case, we get relatively few answers here and we/I/all of us are frustrated. Still, it’s a clever idea but it just doesn’t work for me in a way that the arc episodes almost never did. Sometimes, if they gave us SOMETHING they worked. A lot of the time, the writers were trying to drum up excitement for the arc in us and sometimes, I jumped on the band wagon such as later when Scully catches her sister’s killer. Still, I think the monster episodes and serial killer episodes are superior to the arc ones. This almost worked and wasn’t boring.
18 18 "Miracle Man" Michael Lange Chris Carter & Howard Gordon March 18, 1994 1X17 11.6[59]
Mulder and Scully travel to Tennessee to investigate the "Miracle Ministry" and its star attraction—a young man with the ability to heal people with his touch—when a person dies shortly after being healed.
Whatever happened to Scott Bairstow, that brilliant young actor who plays the young man? He’s great in this. Some criticize the ending but I think it works when he rises from the dead. The jokes work too. Mulder and Scully are the show and their banter is downright funny and sometimes frustrating: he’s sometimes a jerk regarding religion, she’s a straight forward science girl who also is Catholic. What is Mulder? Was Mulder? Jewish? Not sure. This works on every level but I can’t help but think of the earlier and similar but superior FAITH HEALER from FRIDAY THE 13TH: THE SERIES (you know the first show with a skeptical redhead and a distant--?---male cousin who wanted to and did believe?). THAT was gross and scarier but had the same themes and was more hard hitting.
This is entertaining, though and why would a man who was brought back wait ten years to take revenge? Even so, this works and far from being an evil like TOOMS, the Miracle Man is a fully fledged human being with regrets. It’s also scary that someone who heals…and thinks he can and will…has a touch that will kill someone who comes to him for life and healing.
19 19 "Shapes" David Nutter Marilyn Osborn April 1, 1994 1X18 11.5[60]
Mulder and Scully head to an Indian reservation in northwestern Montana to investigate a manslaughter case which Mulder believes may relate to the very first X-File ever created at the FBI, and its main subject: lycanthropy.
A lot of people do not like this one or rather authors who write books about the show. The tribe is made up not to offend. Yet, it seems that, too, offends. Gosh, the show can’t win, can it? I like it. It’s not apparent who the killer or killers are but this time it IS a real life monster and there seems to be evidence, though it gets burned? I thought for sure the YOUNG RIDER character actor (Ty Miller) was playing someone who was in love with one of the female Native Americans but that didn’t happen. I found a lot of this visually well done, too. The setting also works for me.
20 20 "Darkness Falls" Joe Napolitano Chris Carter April 15, 1994 1X19 12.5[61]
Mulder and Scully travel to a remote area of Washington State National Forest after an entire group of thirty loggers goes missing. They soon discover that an unseen force that was lying dormant has been awakened.
Bugs. Ewl. At least when swarming they just looked like little light dots. Close up they’re scarier. Yet, the whole idea is scary. At one point, I wondered how Mulder and Scully were going to get out of this one…turns out they weren’t going to. They had to be rescued which is a brave choice to make. This one works in a very unnerving way. The webbed up bodies are also creepy as is the whole episode. Being trapped as the sun does down and darkness spells a growing death in darkness from small creepy crawlies is probably one of the scariest notions ever. And this brings that to life.
The scene Scully sees as the green things are coming through the floor boards and then realizes they are already ON her is marvelously played, acted, and ...is really unnerving.
21 21 "Tooms" David Nutter Glen Morgan & James Wong April 22, 1994 1X20 13.4[62]
Tooms is released from the psychiatric sanitarium in which he was incarcerated for assaulting Scully—and he needs to kill once more to get the final liver which will allow him to hibernate for another thirty years. Mulder and Scully race against time to find evidence of his involvement in the past string of murders before Tooms disappears again. Assistant Director Walter Skinner appears for the first time.
Not sure the scenes where Mulder spouts a speech about the unnatural Tooms in court works. It’s absurd and weird. He’s telling over three dozen people about an X FILE when no one is actively going to listen to what they must assume is a crazy man. And against all grain, the courts, which in real life probably would do this, let Tooms OUT! WTF?
The actor who plays Tooms, does a great job here, even better than when he was in Squeeze. He looks human but nothing about him under the look conveys human. He speaks very little, his eyes are filled with raw “things” such as hate, determination and the actor is up for giving us those emotions with his look, his stares, his body language, and it works. Most praise the toilet bowl sequence but it just grosses me out…glad he didn’t get in that way. That would have been to gross out disgusting. I do salute the show for trying something edgy and pushing the envelope.
TOOMS is a great episode but I’m still not sure why he would try to get through an escalator? And how Mulder managed to turn it on from where he did? It makes a great climax though. Is he really dead? Did they recover the body?
22 22 "Born Again" Jerrold Freedman Howard Gordon & Alex Gansa April 29, 1994 1X21 13.7[63]
After a detective and his former partner die in unexplained circumstances, the accidents are linked to a little girl who witnessed both deaths and Mulder believes that she may be the reincarnation of a policeman murdered by his colleagues.
Another creepy little girl and it works just as much as last time. Some criticize this as slow and as having too much into the mix: reincarnation (which to me is real) and telekinesis. I don’t. I like that mix and I like that they gave it that idea. The origami is a nice touch and I seem to remember a major villain in MILLENNIUM using that.
By the way through all of season one, Mulder’s quips ALL work and sometimes Scully is funny, too. I like in one episode where Mulder, having found out Scully went to a wedding asks her how it was and then asks if she caught the bouquet and she replies, “Maybe.”
And there’s dozens more.
Scully references the forgotten movie THE REINCARNATION OF PETER PROUD. These kind of references happen a lot, too.
23 23 "Roland" David Nutter Chris Ruppenthal May 6, 1994 1X22 12.5[64]
Agents Mulder and Scully investigate a series of murders in Mahan Propulsion Laboratory as a team of scientists die one by one and the only suspect is a mentally handicapped cleaner named Roland.
So soon after the last episode about a killer inhabiting a body ---this is not reincarnation but the twin factor, one twin making the other do stuff. It works because, as most X FILES episodes are, it’s visually stunning and visually upsetting at the same time especially via the deaths that happen and how they filmed (the teaser of the janitor Roland just going about his business while a scientist victim flies into the propulsion fan is well thought out, filmed, acted, and staged).
Still, one reviewer wrote: a man whose head is on ice (for a time) inhabits his twin’s body to kill the men who were carrying on his work. Isn’t that what science does? I guess Arthur was upset because they were presenting the work as their own? I also was unclear about Roland’s vision of strangling the girl in his group home. Was that what Arthur was thinking about? Why would he do that? And if Roland can stop himself from killing her, why couldn’t he stop himself from killing the others? With Arthur dead, Roland is free? Or is he not?
The equations thing reminded me of GOOD WILL HUNTING and some of this reminded me, more briefly, of RAINMAN.
24 24 "The Erlenmeyer Flask"‡ R. W. Goodwin Chris Carter May 13, 1994 1X23 14.0[65]
A seemingly unrelated car chase leads Mulder and Scully to a scientific lab encompassing a secret which could provide proof of a government conspiracy.
The shocking ending. I knew when I saw Deep Throat get shot that this series was going to go places no other series ever did before…and I was write. I always thought Deep Throat was an ally and a good guy. Books I’ve currently read suggested he was not. I’m still not sure and this what is so frustrating about THE X FILES. What happened?
How did Dana get into a huge facility and steal a baby alien fetus? I know Deep Throat got her in but the way the password scene is played, it’s almost as if she made up the password on the spot and got it right. He must have given that to her. In any case, how did she get it out IN A BOX? Or some other way? I don’t see security letting her just take it out without searching her, even if Deep Throat got her inside. It’s a huge fault in the script that we do not see that or was it edited out of the script.
Mulder sees cloned bodies in watery tanks and when he brings Scully to see, they’re gone. There’s also one who got away and has green blood that emits a gas that makes people sick and Mulder gets hit with it. Mulder also says he will protect this man just as the man is, seconds later after Mulder makes his claim, shot to death and dies in Mulder’s arms…while emitting gas that makes Mulder’s eyes bleed. Mulder still makes jokes when his captors have him.
This makes Mulder and Scully heroes who are unable to swoop in and save the day. Back when this first aired, I wasn’t appreciative of that. I wanted heroes and needed them on TV to save the day. Whatever powers their adversaries had, these two couldn’t do that. And today, it’s refreshing, in a way. To a point.
And what point do those enemies have of keeping Mulder and Scully alive? Not sure. Mulder is too well known? By who? The public at large? Is Scully a way to get to Mulder? Is the Cigarette Smoking Man, seen here in a huge INDIANA JONES like warehouse of X FILES files, protecting Mulder (and Scully) for some reasons of his own? Turns out, probably? He’s a great villain, too.
Yet, the arc episodes, and make no mistake, this is one of those…are still frustrating and often gimmicky. This is one of the best ones, though, and it works. It’s scary. I mean we know Mulder is not going to die but…he looks like he’s failed miserably AND is suffering a lot.
Scully’s wide eyed look when she learns the female doctor who was helping her look into the man’s blood and those strange bacteria in it (and they look a bit like COVID) is killed in a “car accident” is priceless. She just knows…as do we…that the woman was killed on purpose and not only that, her WHOLE family was killed in that accident which was probably staged. I don’t think we ever find out how. This brings back conspiracy movies like CHINA SYNDROME, THE PARALLAX VIEW, and even CAPRICORN ONE to mind. THAT’S SCARY.
You get the feeling that there is NOTHING Mulder and Scully can do against such powerful, shadowy enemies...the government?
This first season is truly imaginative, funny, scary, unnerving, and well shot and scored with two interesting leads who have an on screen rapport and with a dash of humor, science fiction and horror. I think the X FILES, this season anyway, has aged well and hasn’t dated at all, despite the 1990s being another universe.
Revisiting this season one can tell WHY it was so popular and so fast. It’s very entertaining, even when it’s not good and in this season there is only one episode that wasn’t (JERSEY DEVIL probably) and a maybe two others that were slow but all the rest are superior television and even the “bad” episode and the slow episodes are entertaining and have 10/10 moments, dialog, and visual stuns, and great ideas.
Looking forward to season two!
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