Case 04, File 14: Memento Mori

AKA: Scully's Embarrassing Livejournal

I am emotionally attached to Mulder and Scully, and based on my discussions with other fans, I don't think I'm alone in that. The X-Files is aware that we're all very attached to Mulder and Scully, but I feel like it doesn't totally know what to do with that information. It wants to craft emotionally complex engaging stories about Mulder, Scully and their relationship, but it also wants to make X-Files episodes.


Our episode opens with Scully officially getting her cancer diagnosis, an inoperable tumor in her nasal cavity. Mulder, having the emotional maturity of a 10 year old, is trying to handle it the best he can, by buying her flowers and insisting it's the result of her abduction in Season 2. To that end, they get Skinner's blessing to go and check out the MUFON network Scully visited in Season 3, but finds that almost all of the members are dead or dying.

They also find that someone is stealing info from the MUFON networks computer and track down a guy named Kurt who claims he was a member of the network tasked with protecting the information. Scully goes to see the last surviving member of the network who is getting treated at a local hospital. Mulder meanwhile goes over the info from the MUFON network and finds that all of the women who were abducted were also infertile and being treated for it at the same clinic. But the second Mulder turns his back, the Grey-Haired Man shows up and kills Kurt with an alien stiletto.

Back at the Scully plot, she decides to get treatment at the same hospital as the last surviving MUFON member while Mulder, being Mulder decides to break into the fertility clinic. There he finds...Kurt, miraculously not dead, and they break into the computer there and discover that Scully's name is there in a government database. Mulder wants to deal with the Cigarette Smoking Man but Skinner discourages him from it...mostly so he can meet with the Cigarette Smoking Man.

This opening shot is really really good and I don't really have anything more to say about it past that.

While Scully is getting chemo and giving more emotional monologues (that I can't recount because they make me too emotional myself) Mulder decides the logical thing to do is break into the government building where he found Scully's name with the Lone Gunmen. Once inside they find that the doctor who is treating Scully works there and a group of Kurt clones who show him their work making alien/human hybrids and that Scully's unfertilized eggs are there.

Mulder warns Scully to stop treatment as he thinks that the doctor is intentionally killing the women to cover up their experiments. Scully decides that, despite her illness, she still wants to work alongside Mulder for all the time she has left. But, back at the FBI, Skinner is meeting with the Cigarette Smoking Man to make a deal to save Scully's life. Dun dun dun.

Memento Mori is a bit of an odd episode, and it's one I have trouble approaching. It's at once an episode about Mulder and Scully trying to emotionally deal with Scully's illness and yet another entry in the "Mulder goes on a conspiracy uncovering adventure," subgenre of X-Files episodes. The marriage between these two concepts is not totally painless, but I'm not sure it needs to be. Having the attempt to tell an emotional story be slightly compromised by the trappings of an X-Files episode feels very much like Mulder's emotional state, so...maybe it works?

"I've got cancer and I'm angry and I'm going to solve both those problems the same way I solve all my problems, by SHOOTING PEOPLE!"

On that note, I would like to briefly talk about Mulder (I'll spend the rest of the review talking about Scully, don't worry). It may be an accident that he's written as immature, but I've always found it very believable that his emotional development seems to have arrested at 12 years old (no coincidentally when his sister disappeared). As such it always rang very true to me that he would handle Scully's illness by going searching for conspiracies in the shadows. Of course the fact that it's The X-Files and there actually is a conspiracy cheapens its value as a coping mechanism, but we can't have everything.

But honestly, Mulder is incidental to this episode, the main focus is Scully. I've always found the fact that Scully is more mature and reasonable person to be an engaging aspect of their relationship (the fact that Mulder actually respects her keeps it from wandering into "Reasonably woman babysits emotionally immature man," territory) so seeing her laid so low is pretty difficult to watch. The X-Files is leaning pretty hard on my affection for these characters and it turns out that it's a good thing to lean on.

Of course the episode is also leaning pretty heavily on its actors, and they're both doing great jobs. I obviously like Mulder's awkward, fumbling attempts to try and connect with Scully, but Gillian Anderson is doing the really heavy lifting. Her letters to Mulder always flirt with becoming overly maudlin but she sells them, and her scene with Penny dying is really intensely emotional in a way that I never seem to see coming, no matter how many times I see this episode. We even get some really good stuff out of Sheila Larken as Mom-Scully, who we haven't seen in a long time (I think our last appearance was Wetwired?)

*humming the Mission Impossible theme*

I'm less enthused about the plot outside of Scully dealing with her cancer. As I said, I like that Mulder goes diving into conspiracy hunting as a coping mechanism, but I don't like that he actually finds one, especially since as conspiracies go, this one is pretty weak. All we find out is that there are some clones (what is this, like our 5th or 6th set of clones?) and that Scully's eggs were stolen which...did we know that before? I feel like we knew that, or that at least eggs were stolen, and could have inferred from there. This won't become relevant until like season 5, so it's basically just a set up without a punchline. Also I guess the bit where Skinner owes Cancer Man a favor comes up again, but I forget when and how.

Whatever, tripping up on the necessities of being an X-Files episode is fine, even in the series' strangest, most experimental time period they still need to bring in the fans. I might have been cool with an episode just devoted to Mulder and Scully dealing with the fallout of Scully's diagnosis, but then I'm one of those weird people who thinks Fly is one of the best episodes of Breaking Bad. So maybe I should just stop complaining and end the review before I go on a rant about how much Mulder and Scully are in love.

Okay so in that final scene, that hug got-

Case Notes:

• Scully's opening monologue honestly gets me a little choked up, so I have no other notes about it.
• Mulder trying to be funny and looking so uncomfortable is great characterization, he would have trouble with something like this.
• Mulder was the first one Scully called. Not her parents or her boss, Mulder. I love them so much you guys.
• We've got some Season 3 continuity here, which is aided by a flashback to the Season 3 episode it's continuing on from. In fact, given that that episode was a continuation of Duane Barry trilogy, this is a pretty continuity heavy episode.
• I'm not totally clear on how they tracked down the hacker, but whatever.
• Gillian Anderson does a great job at subtly selling her anger and defensiveness about what's happening to her.
• I usually try to be glib and sarcastic in these case notes but this episode is really serious and is hitting me right in, as the kids say, the feels, so it's hard for me to write sarcastic jokes here.
• I had completely forgotten that the UFO guy Mulder runs into turned out to be a clone.
• Dr. Scanlon has a weird, super friendly and yet menacing energy. I forget, but I'm pretty sure he turns out to be villainous, but that could be just because he feels like a villain.
• I get why Scully's mom is mad at not being told, but that's a little unfair to Scully, she gets to choose how she deals with it lady.
• These Scully monologues are hitting me right where I live, goddamn.
• Mulder just straight up breaks into the center for reproductive medicine. No warrant, no official channels, just breaks in. I love you Mulder.
• I like how the episode doesn't stress that the Kurt who meets Mulder in the reproductive medicine place is a clone, just expects us to follow along.
• Man, people were much more lax about their password security in the 90s, I don't think I've ever written one down, and someone in The X-Files always has one written someplace.
• I am always happy to see a Lone Gunmen appearance, but their hacking talk is raw nonsense.
• I always love a Skinner/Cigarette Smoking Man scene. Skinner's seething contempt and CSM's arrogant dismissal make every scene with them a joy to watch.
• Mulder and the Lone Gunmen are breaking into a Research Center via sewer access and hacking the cameras. There is nothing I can write that is funnier than that.
• Scully "Feels Mulder near." I promise not to harp on the shipping stuff too much but godDAMN.
• This episode begins to lose me a little bit when it starts wandering into the stuff about alien hybrids and clones and stuff. I'm much more interested in Scully's emotional journey.
• I do like the scene where Mulder and Byers have to escape from the lab, it's nice and intense, and the dude firing his gun at the same spot in the bulletproof glass over and over to make a hole is clever.
• I like that the episode purposefully keeps Mulder and Scully separated from the end of the first third until the very end, it's good filmmaking.
• I like how embarrassed Scully is of those letters she wrote Mulder.
• I am such a Mulder/Scully sap, it's actually alarming.
• Mulder was planning on leaving Skinner a voicemail and was put out when he picked up. Very relateable.
• As always, these reviews are supported by Patreon. If I get enough donations, I might do a shipping manifesto of Mulder and Scully, so you should donate so I can continue to let them destroy my life.