Review of The X-Files, Season 10 Episode 3, by Dan Bullock – February 2016.
Just finished the episode? Haven’t we missed such brilliant tongue-in-cheek gloriousness? It was superb. Darin Morgan’s script has given us one of the finest The X-Files episodes in a long, long time as ‘Mulder and Scully meet the Were-Monster’ took us back to everything that was truly great and then some more.
Opening with a couple (NB: The same stoners from two 1996 episodes – Ty Lebine and Nicole Parker-Smith) sniffing gold spray paint to get high, they think they witness a supposed 3-eyed monster who’s attacked people in the woods but is everything as it seems and, more importantly, is everyone who we think they are..? We’re about to be in for one hell of an exciting journey.
Post title-sequence, we see Mulder sitting in his office throwing pencils at his (or Scully’s!) ‘I Want to Believe’ poster. Although we’re happy to see him back there, he reveals to Scully that he has been reviewing old case files and he’s practically embarrassed about things he used to trust. After going on a rant about having to grow up and move with life, Scully tells him she’s got a new case but it’s exactly the type of thing Fox is trying to ignore: Monsters.
As they set off to investigate, it’s clear that this episode is going to be different and not specifically connected to what we’ve seen so far. ‘Were-Monster’ isn’t a small world and there’s so much to cover, let’s recap this one that I ridiculously enjoyed. We got paint-sniffing stoners; Mulder and co running around a truck-stop with Fox trying to use his camera app; the chasing of the spikey-green monster with the animal welfare guy and his net breaking (a classic comedy trick); Rhys Darby’s character sat on a toilet after a brief change in appearance; Mulder actually screaming when blood hits him in the face; a creepy motel owner (another past X-Files actor cameo role); poorly taken photos; a dog named Dagoo and even more. The result was eventually drunken Graveyard conversions (which included a nice dedication to Kim Manners – producer) and confessions, real life monster stories and one of the best episodes that’s right up there with the classics.
I found it difficult to be excessively constructive because it was one of those moments you’ve just got to enjoy for the surrealism and right reasons. Although I was initially apprehensive about comedian Rhys Darby’s involvement as, with anything, it can difficult to find that line between comedy and parody but I was utterly won over and he effortlessly fitted in.
This story also reminded us of how great David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson are at being both deadly serious and extremely funny and, furthermore, the faith we have in their characters without undermining any The X-Files history. Even with a man-sized human lizard narrative involved, it was a smart story bringing up questions about our relationship with nature and gave it a fresh twist. These episodes were always the ones that gave us wonderful, refreshing escapism outside of the more serious storylines we were involved in but they are loved just as much. The team have undoubtedly done it again with some fantastic, hilarious work.
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