Case 04, File 05: The Field Where I Died

AKA: Ripped From Last Centuries Headlines

One of the side effects of being a concept heavy show is that its very rarely on the actors to carry the episode. Oh there have been some really great individual performances such as Brad Dourif in Beyond the Sea or Tony Todd in Sleepless, but that's the actor carrying the concept rather than the actor carrying the episode. So it's pretty interesting to see an episode with a pretty light concept being held up by the acting, especially when the heavy acting is coming from one of our two leads.

Our episode kicks off with Mulder and Scully tagging along on an ATF raid on a suspiciously Waco like compound (the episode barely bothers to hand wave why they're there, but whatever). Our Cult leader and his wives are missing, as are the weapons they're there looking for, but 10 seconds outside and Mulder discovers a bunker with all the missing people about to Jonestown out. No weapons though. Wait, can I use Jonestown as a verb? Whatever, I'm gonna.

Anyway, they need proof that the tip they got from a guy named Sydney (that the cult was stockpiling weapons and that the cult leader, Vernon Ephesian, is abusing children on the compound) is accurate and they only have 30-ish hours before Vernon's lawyers get them out. So they set out to interview the people they captured, initially Vernon who rants about some Biblical shit I don't know enough to criticize properly but sounds pretty batshit, and then one of his wives, Melissa. Which is where shit gets weird.

See, Melissa immediately descends into a new personality, who turns out to be Sydney. Scully thinks it's split personality but Mulder intuits that it's actually past lives, which he confirms when Sydney think Truman is President. Mulder successfully argues that they should take her back to the compound to see if Sydney comes out and tells them what they need to know. Turns out he doesn't, but another personality, a southern woman who talks about seeing Mulder die in a Civil War battle on that property.

This goes basically nowhere, but it's a neat shot.

So at a dead end, Mulder takes Melissa in for hypnosis, where Sydney and the Civil War lady come out, but can't tell them where the bunkers where the weapons are hidden are, but recognizes Mulder. So Mulder, that bastion of sensible ideas, decides he's going to have himself hypnotized, and has memories of himself and Scully (and also Melissa I guess) being together throughout history. He can't identify where the bunkers are either, so what good are the memories?

Anywho, after some more faffing about and Scully finding some corroborating evidence, Melissa and Vernon (along with the rest of the cult) are let go and returned to their compound, but the FBI keeps searching the nearby field for the bunkers. So being a sensible insane cult leader, Vernon decides he's gonna Jonestown the entire cult. Mulder and the FBI try to stop them, but they fail, and the episode ends with Mulder standing in a field voice-overing poetry.

The Field Where I Died is an odd episode, maybe not in TV overall but definitely in the context of The X-Files as a show. It has more than a little in common with One Breath, but where that episode had a constantly moving plot, whereas this one is mostly a series of conversations. I dunno if that's a complaint, it's well acted and well directed, and it's always nice to see the series move out of its particular comfort zone.

"Alright now, Mulder and Scully are here to investigate Ephesian's paranormal abilities. That's a cheap way of getting them in the episode, but they're the main characters, they gotta get here somehow."

The central elements of an episode built around dialogue are always going to be the acting and the script. The acting is where the episode gets its biggest boost. Duchovny is known for his deadpan in the series as a whole, but when he needs to, he can dial it up and he really goes all in here, showing off some of the most naked emotionality he's put into an episode. His monologue towards the middle is pretty excellent, one of the stronger acting moments Duchovny's had in the series.

Melissa is also great, although she's trying for more out there stuff and therefore her approval comes with more caveats. Apparently the part was written for her, and her ability to do other voices, and while the Sydney voice is solid and the "This is the field where I watched you die" speech still gives me chills to this day, the child-like Lily character is pretty eh and comes and goes so quickly that it feels like an afterthought. The one complaint I have with her is that whenever she goes Sydney, she starts doing these weird forehead tapping hand moves which are just distracting.

The script is where the issues come in. Not the dialogue, which is well written and engaging, but the story. Simply put the episode fails to get a solid pace. Our stakes are purely emotional (yes, there's the suicide threat in the end, but that barely gets a mention until the third act) but that doesn't mean we can't get some ebb and flow to how the episode reveals information and parcels out our emotional beats. Instead the episode just keeps throwing them out at a steady rhythm, which makes the episode seem slower than it is.

"Should we trust the audience to know the Cool-Aid is poisoned?"
"Nah. Let's just end this shot on a big bottle labeled 'Poison'."

Outside that, there's not too much to talk about. The direction is very nice, although I don't think they ever tell us what was up with that shot of the glass they do a couple times.  I wish the cult leader was a little more memorable or nuanced, cause I like my fictional cult leaders like I like my Nicholas Cage performances: Either completely unhinged or quietly nuanced, anything in the middle is boring (that was a long way to go for that punchline). I also wish the episode found more for Scully to do. She brings up, briefly, that Mulder is more interested in seeking his own brand of truth than helping anyone, and that's something I wish got more play.

Still, it's hard to be down on this episode. It's uneven at points and kind of rough around the edges, but it works because it's a unique episode of the series that shows off strengths that the series always has but doesn't usually get to display. The series is, as I've said before, enjoying a level of risk free experimentation most series would kill for and that includes episodes that aren't brutal and gory, but are just outside what the show normally goes for.

But Scully is Mulder's eternal soulmate X-Files, make sure you remember it.

Case Notes:

• David Duchovny reading poetry is actually a really solid way to open an episode, especially when combined with him staring at the photos. It's both mysterious and oddly touching.
• Mulder and Scully look super out of place in the raid. Put on some body armor, god.
• The shot of the stained glass window, and Mulder staring at it, are both pretty solid.
• Quick piece of advice for our cult leaders: Don't pray aloud when you're hiding.
• This episode is pretty intensely Ripped From the Headlines (both Waco and Jonestown are name dropped) but I am amused by how much exposition Skinner has to drop on why they're there.
• The guy playing Ephesiasian is okay, not great, which is a shame, but he's not absolutely vital to the episode. The woman playing Melissa is fantastic though, she's the key to this episode's success. I wish she wouldn't do the hand thing when she's doing Sidney, it's...distracting.
• They say they're holding Vernon and his wives BS charges, but why not charge him with bigamy?
• I love how Mulder goes straight for past lives, it's amusing to me. It's because he's got his own past life stuff going on, but it's still very Mulder.
• I suppose the scene with Mulder, Scully and Skinner discussing split personalities is also exposition, but by making it bounce back and forth between Mulder and Scully, it feels more engaging.
• I also like Scully calling out Mulder for being more interested in his own weird investigation than in helping Melissa or the other members of the Church.
• \"The field where I watched you die" speech is so very very good, it still gives me chills.
• Mulder is talking on the phone while driving. Bad Mulder.
• The scene with the hypnotherapist is good stuff, but I really wish the actress would stop doing the Sydney hand movements.
• This episode is one of the few episodes that has some genuine ambiguity to it, since we're not 100 percent sure that the past life is real.
• Duchovny is acting his heart out in basically every scene where he has to do a monologue. Seriously, for a deadpan snarker, he is killing it this episode.
• "Even if I knew for certain [we'd been friends in past lives], I wouldn't change a day," is a absolutely perfect line.
• Made even more perfect by Scully's follow up "Well, maybe that Flukeman thing."
• Melissa dropping "I want to believe" right towards the end, when it's clear she's contemplating suicide is a perfect twist of the knife.
• Melissa tears the Civil War photograph. Um, I know you're going for a big, symbolic action, but those are rare historical documents, you can't do that.
• The climax is extremely intense and well realized, but the pan to the big bottle labeled "Poison" is something it doesn't need.
• I don't get the bit where Ephesian stands over Melissa and hands her a second cup. The wiki tells me Sydney faked drinking it, but the episode is bad at communicating that.
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Current Celebrity Watch:

Melissa is played by Kristen Cloke, who was at the time, a main character on Space: Above and Beyond (I told you, like 80 percent of that show's cast was on The X-Files). She also had a recurring role on season 2 of Chris Carter's other show Millennium and she was apparently a main character in Final Destination. She's also in Lady Bird, which is really good and you should see it.