The X-Files review: Season 11, episode 2 This
After a pretty average mythology heavy premiere (trust me, average is high praise for post season 6 mythology episodes), The X-Files comes back down to something a bit more familiar. Written and directed by Glen Morgan, This is a very strong episode that ties in a lot of what we know of The X-Files and brings it into the modern-day.
***SPOILERS AHEAD***
Having written some of the best episodes of The X-Files, “Squeeze,” “One Breath,” “Ice,” “Home” and “Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man,” Glen Morgan returns to The X-Files. His writing of Mulder and Scully in the early seasons of the show, helped shape the characters into what we now recognize.
Glen Morgan in the first shots of the episode, picks up on the sunflower seeds, the poster, the actual physical X-Files, with Mulder and Scully asleep together on the sofa. A crackled sound, a faded, shattered image from the past. A call from a face that shouldn’t be seen wakes them up, the past is coming back.
Langly (Dean Haglund) died, as Mulder and Scully both said, 16 years ago back in the season 9 episode “Jump the Shark.” However Langly it turns out had gotten involved in a secret government plan to bring all the minds of the Earth together into a computer simulation after their deaths. Then it turns out that said simulation is being used as a farm for information, to solve problems and be there when the Earth is destroyed and mankind has to take to the stars (linked to the events of last week).
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And it’s up to Mulder and Scully to stop the simulation, and rescue the mind of their long dead friend. Which they then do, and then don’t. As there is a backup.
Glen Morgan it seems isn’t really interested in telling this story. It comes across as though, with select choices of dialogue, he is more interested in placing The X-Files (both the show and the actual department) in today’s world, finding out where it fits.
Skinner returns (Do we trust him? Yes? No?) with some exposition, stating that the X-Files had now been digitized in the absence of Mulder and Scully. Everyone can access them. But, the world is different now than it was back in 1994. There are security agencies attempting to undermine each other from all corners of the globe, with this weeks particular physical force coming from Russia. These agencies now have access to the files, and if need be scrub them of incriminating data.
That is a worrying development for Fox. He spent his career putting them together, and getting to the truth. Now they can be viewed by anyone (Skinner states that that was the point of the X-Files to begin with), even at the cost of being censored? Glen Morgan also subtly hints at the state of affairs between current modern-day USA and Russia, and the White House with its relationship with the “spooky” FBI (I did like that little dig from Fox).
Next: The X-Files S11 E01: My Struggle III – Review
The line at the start of the credits sometimes reads ‘The Truth Is Out There’, ‘I Want To Believe’ or ‘Trust No One’. This week it read, ‘Accuse your enemies of that which you are guilty’. After doing a little bit of digging, it seems as though this is a paraphrasing of something Joseph Goebbels once said. He was a master of propaganda, of manipulating the word into something which is to believed and then lived.
Maybe there is something that Glen Morgan wants the viewer to think about and act upon.
Where does The X-Files stand these days? It is now known that this will probably be the last ever season of the show. So where does it stand today? Is it merely a nostalgic look back into a simpler time, or is it a warning to what could happen? It’ll be interesting to see if this particular theme is picked up again this season. I hope so.
The X-Files airs new episodes every Wednesday nights on Fox. Be sure to tune in!