Spoilers

“Synchrony”

The X-Files goes deep into the realm of science fiction, even further down that road than they normally go, as they tell a story involving time travel.

An old man (Michael Fairman) comes back from the future to attempt to stop the creation of a chemical compound that is used as a rapid freezing agent. In the future, this agent helped create the possibility of time travel.

I liked this episode, despite a few plot holes that appear in the episode. Michael Fairman would appear on General Hospital and it was cool seeing him in this episode (no pun intended).

There were a couple of disturbing scenes of people bursting into flames which were well done for the mid-nineties.

The secondary characters are not quite as interesting ad they should be. They are fine and that makes the show a fine watch, but perhaps not as awesome as it could have been.

Spoilers

“Max”

The second part of this story which began in last episode’s “Tempus Fugit” was a very solid conclusion to a decent start. “Max” takes some time to continue to determine what happened to the flight that the character of Max Fenig, who had some kind of object on the flight with him that was a direct reason why the plane crashed and killed the entire passengers.

The object was radioactive and the show hinted around with it being some kind of alien technology. The scenes where Mulder faced off with the man who shot Agent Pendrell were tense scenes, especially when the UFO arrived.

I am not sure that this story needed to be told in two episodes. I think if you took the best parts of this, you could have made one exceptional episode instead of two mildly decent ones.

I do like the fact that the show finally go back around to starting to deal with Scully’s cancer, as her nose did start to bleed during her attempt to save the shot Pendrell. I also appreciated Skinner’s direct reference to her health as he noticed the blood on the tissue that Scully held in her hand. There were several episodes since the diagnosis that did not deal with the cancer even in the slightest and they felt as if they could have been placed at any point in continuity. Bringing it back should help show us motives for all of the main characters involved moving forward, whether the episodes are mythological based or monster-of-the-weeks.

Spoilers

“Unrequited”

“Unrequited” was an episode of the X-Files dealing with the idea that there were POWs left behind in Vietnam by the US military and that one of the soldiers left behind was back to take vengeance on those who left him behind.

Oh, and that soldier is able to turn invisible.

The show uses the same shot at the beginning of the episode and then repeats it in the third act which feels fairly lazy. The story itself was lacking a bit. The middle part of the episode does not feel as tense as the ending.

How many times can you see someone and then not see them? It turned the episode fairly repetitive and the conclusion felt somewhat anticlimatic.

Overall, I liked the concept, but the story and the characters did not feel as flesh out as it could have been and was just another excuse to have Mulder and Scully wonder about the corruption of the government.

Spoilers

“Kaddish”

The X-Files have used plenty of mythological creatures from different religions and cultures over the years in their monster-of-the-week episodes. This episode featured the Jewish creature known as a golem.

I knew of the idea of a golem from Marvel Comics so I remember being intrigued by this episode when it was first released.

Mulder and Scully were investigating a murder of a man who was suspected to be involved in the death of a Jewish man. They expected this to be a revenge killing.

Of course, the murdered man had two other friends who were doomed as well. They were all Nazis, so I did not find much compassion for these victims.

However, the golem would go off on its own and become more of a danger to others as well.

This was a decent episode, but a bit of a step down over the last few episodes. There was no mention of Scully’s cancer at all, which felt out of place considering how important of a twist that storyline was.

Spoilers

“El Mundo Gira”

The X-Files goes into illegal aliens this episode, blending it with the legend of El Chupacabra and a strange, deadly fungus, that was killing people.

This episode took the idea of El Chupacabra and turned it into something different, something unexplained, and I have to say that I enjoyed the manipulation of the legend.

It was based on the Mexican Soap Operas too as a love requited story was at the center of it. Some of the acting felt like it was over the top like you might find in some of the soap operas/telenovela of the culture.

The ending was a lesson in POV as we saw what happened in the ending from two distinctly differing points of view. This is something that the show has done on several occasions, including in such classic episodes as Jose Chung’s From Outer Space.

This was a fun episode, but I still would wish that Mulder and Scully would be able to capture their prey once in a while.

Spoilers

“Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man”

“Life is like a box of chocolates. A cheap, thoughtless, perfunctory gift that nobody ever asks for. Unreturnable because all you get back is another box of chocolates. So you’re stuck with this undefinable whipped mint crap that you mindlessly wolf down when there’s nothing else left to eat. Sure, once in a while there’s a peanut butter cup or an English toffee. But they’re gone too fast and the taste is… fleeting. So, you end up with nothing but broken bits filled with hardened jelly and teeth-shattering nuts. And if you’re desperate enough to eat those, all you got left is an empty box filled with useless brown paper wrappers“

This monologue came from the season four, episode seven of the X-Files, out of the mouth of the Cigarette Smoking Man, and I loved it. It was not the kind of monologue one expected, taking a famous quote from Forest Gump and warping it into a view of life considerably more negative.

The episode featured a telling of the back story of CSM, played by William B. Davis (and a younger version played by Chris Owens). In the show, CSM is given credit (or blamed depending on how you look at it) for the assassination of JFK and Martin Luthor King Jr, as well as many other historical moments. However, it is implied that the story may or may not be accurate, as Lone Gunman Frohike stated that he found this story in an old magazine of his.

This article is a fictional tale written by CSM himself, though, as he said, the ending had been changed. Exactly what was changed was not included keeping us uncertain about the accuracy of the episode.

I liked the way they leave it uncertain as it felt sort of doubtful that one man could be behind all of the things CSM was given credit for.

The main purpose of the episode is to show just how dangerous Cigarette Smoking Man was and continue to set him up as the big bad for the series, while potentially humanizing the character a touch. Imagine the pain and death that could have been spared had the magazine just published the story he wrote as he had intended it.

The episode also gives the actual cigarettes as a symbol for the evil that CSM does, as he was preparing to resign, he crumpled up the cigarette pack and once he realized that his life was not changing, he purchased a new pack right away.

I had always wanted CSM to be killed by Mulder, multiple times over the series so far. This provides even more context to the villain.

Spoilers

“Sanguinarium”

The opening scene of this episode was so disturbing, it gave me literal chills. It has been a long time since a TV show had done that to me.

Combining plastic surgery with black witchcraft is a bizarre choice, but it makes sense throughout this episode. The story itself is not as strong as some others that we have seen during thee monster-of-the-week episodes, but the horrific visuals made up for that.

Plus, Twin Peaks’ own Benjamin Horne, actor Richard Beymer, appeared as Dr. Jack Franklin, the driving force behind the black magic at the hospital. In fact, Dr. Franklin was able to escape and set up shop in another hospital at the end, showing the failures of our protagonists.

The scene where Ben errrr Dr. Franklin, I mean, started peeling off his face, well, that was extremely disturbing as was most of the surgical scenes involving the patients and the doctors which are mesmerized.

There were some twists that did not make much sense.