AKA: America Has A Blind Spot For Veterans, Oh Yeah, Send Tweet
When I think about The X-Files and political issues, I tend to think of silly things like the belief that the government is hiding aliens or things that make me wince in hindsight, like when I see stuff similar to what inspired the anti-vaxxer movement. But The X-Files is political, and not just because all media is political. Its a show about government coverups and conspiracies attempts to cover political issues are going to worm their way into the show.
Unrequited opens with a rare, in media res opening involving Mulder, Scully, Skinner and some other guys trying to protect a general from an assassin who disappears in plain sight. 12 hours earlier the same assassin somehow sneaks into a general's limo and shoots him without being seen. Skinner is assigned with figuring out how the general got assassinated and he naturally brings on Mulder and Scully, hoping to protect some other generals who are giving speeches at a Vietnam remembrance.
After investigating the driver, they discover he's on the mailing list of a lunatic right wing group, and head out to arrest the leader of the group. He claims that he snuck back to Nam and rescued a soldier named Teager still being held as a POW and that a card they found left behind was a sign from his unit. Teager meanwhile is stopping by the Vietnam memorial and telling a widow there that her husband is still alive before disappearing again.
After Mulder and Scully go to meet the widow and her eye starts bleeding randomly, Mulder starts working on his theory and goes to see Teager's remains, who is supposed to be dead. But when they find that his remains are ambiguous as to whether he's dead, Mulder decides that the general who signed his death certificate is in danger. So he assigns a pair of agents to protect him in the Pentagon, but Teager still sneaks in in plain sight and shoots him.
After Teager is seen on the security tapes walking straight past people without them seeing, Mulder gets his theory down: Teager is able to manipulate the blind spots in people's eyes to disappear in plain sight. After a quick visit from Marita confirms the name of the third general Teager is after, Scully and Skinner protect him and we get back to our in media res opening with Mulder, Scully and Skinner trying to stop Teager. After some brief action, Teager is taken out by Mulder and the episode ends with the military covering up Teager's death and actions and Mulder powerless to stop it.
Unrequited is an episode that is in the shadow of a better episode from the get go (namely Sleepless) and while other episodes can manage to find a way to shine from that situation, Unrequited never figures out a real identity of its own. Its not a terrible episode and it has some really excellent editing, but I can never escape the sense that most of its ideas have been done better elsewhere.
I think the big weak point is, unfortunately, Teager. The actor isn't doing a bad job and his ability set is kind of neat, but Sleepless (sorry, they're both episodes about super powered veterans using their powers to avenge the ghosts of Vietnam, the comparison is going to come up) was anchored by a mammoth performance from Tony Todd, and Teager can't compare with that level of screen presence.
Of course it doesn't help that Teager isn't a very well fleshed out character. He only gets two scenes where he's not silently killing someone and one of those isn't till the very end. We have very little sense of him as a person outside of his mission and even that isn't all it could be. We know he's killing generals, but is it because he wants to punish them? Does he think it will help the men still back in Vietnam? Teager is such a non-entity that the episode lacks an emotional hook.
So it just has to fall back on the actual events of the episode, which are well realized, but kind of limited. Easily the best section of the episode is when Teager is sneaking into the Pentagon. It's mostly just realized through editing together some shots with Teager and shots without him, but doing a lot with very little is what The X-Files does best, and anyway, as the finale proves, the effect they used to show him disappearing from plain sight looks very silly, so trick editing is probably the way to go.
And of course there's the central element of the question of how veterans are treated. That's obviously an interesting theme to run with, but tying it back into the conspiracy theory that there are still men being held captive Vietnam makes it harder to take seriously. Of course since The X-Files is reflexively distrustful of the government, they reject the finding that there aren't any POWs in Vietnam, but at least they acknowledge they're not in line with reality.
Honestly, this is an episode I'm feeling a little torn on. It's well made and got some good scenes, but I just don't feel any connection to it. Most of Season 4 is tattooed on my brain, but I always forget this episode until I watch it and it always fades from my brain pretty fast so I guess it just doesn't make that much of an impression. But maybe I'm wrong. It's got some good ideas but I feel like they're underdeveloped. Another few passes on the script, or just a tighter focus on the villain, and this could be a really great episode. As is, it's just okay.
Case Notes:After investigating the driver, they discover he's on the mailing list of a lunatic right wing group, and head out to arrest the leader of the group. He claims that he snuck back to Nam and rescued a soldier named Teager still being held as a POW and that a card they found left behind was a sign from his unit. Teager meanwhile is stopping by the Vietnam memorial and telling a widow there that her husband is still alive before disappearing again.
After Mulder and Scully go to meet the widow and her eye starts bleeding randomly, Mulder starts working on his theory and goes to see Teager's remains, who is supposed to be dead. But when they find that his remains are ambiguous as to whether he's dead, Mulder decides that the general who signed his death certificate is in danger. So he assigns a pair of agents to protect him in the Pentagon, but Teager still sneaks in in plain sight and shoots him.
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| "Hm. A mysterious card with a skull on it...it's probably fine." |
Unrequited is an episode that is in the shadow of a better episode from the get go (namely Sleepless) and while other episodes can manage to find a way to shine from that situation, Unrequited never figures out a real identity of its own. Its not a terrible episode and it has some really excellent editing, but I can never escape the sense that most of its ideas have been done better elsewhere.
I think the big weak point is, unfortunately, Teager. The actor isn't doing a bad job and his ability set is kind of neat, but Sleepless (sorry, they're both episodes about super powered veterans using their powers to avenge the ghosts of Vietnam, the comparison is going to come up) was anchored by a mammoth performance from Tony Todd, and Teager can't compare with that level of screen presence.
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| He disappears in the next shot, but I'd love it if we cut to him crouching behind a trash can or something. |
So it just has to fall back on the actual events of the episode, which are well realized, but kind of limited. Easily the best section of the episode is when Teager is sneaking into the Pentagon. It's mostly just realized through editing together some shots with Teager and shots without him, but doing a lot with very little is what The X-Files does best, and anyway, as the finale proves, the effect they used to show him disappearing from plain sight looks very silly, so trick editing is probably the way to go.
And of course there's the central element of the question of how veterans are treated. That's obviously an interesting theme to run with, but tying it back into the conspiracy theory that there are still men being held captive Vietnam makes it harder to take seriously. Of course since The X-Files is reflexively distrustful of the government, they reject the finding that there aren't any POWs in Vietnam, but at least they acknowledge they're not in line with reality.
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| WEEMP |
- The general's speech in the cold open makes me deeply uncomfortable for reasons I'm not interested in going into here.
- The X-Files doesn't usually go for in media res openings, so this one is kind of interesting. It kind of reveals the episode's hand a little early though, since we usually like finding out what's going on.
- 12 hours earlier? This whole episode takes place over 12 hours? That's a hell of timetable, usually episodes take place over the course of days.
- The general is pretty calm about seeing a dude just appear in his limo. You'd think he'd at least have a small reaction, come on.
- The episode has to establish stakes pretty fast, so it does it with a mountain of exposition dropped by Skinner, which is a little on the lame side.
- I get that Berkhold is a complete nut, but I feel like siccing dogs on FBI Agents after inviting them in is a good way to end up in a jail cell.
- This episode throws out another guy who was a one man army in Vietnam. Between this and the group from Sleepless, how did the US lose the war with so many One Man Armies running around?
- Berkhold talks about liberating Teager from a POW camp in Vietnam. Pro-tip buddy, don't confess to your international crimes in front of the FBI.
- The episode kinda flounders once we know we're after Teager, but I do like the scene where Teager talks to the widow and her subsequent scene with Mulder and Scully. Even if her eye bleeding is really random.
- Do kids really get a tour of the Pentagon when they're too young to know that a pentagon is a 5 sided shape?
- Skinner is officially more open to Mulder's crazy ideas than Scully. I guess when you have a guy showing up on camera with no one seeing him, it's hard to argue that shit has gotten weird.
- The scene between the general and Berkhold is conceptually interesting, but I don't know either of these people and it doesn't accomplish anything, so who cares?
- Marita's cameo is pretty pointless, but I love the fact that Mulder and Scully explicitly got this assignment because the people higher up assume they'd blow it. It's always amusing to see how Mulder and Scully are perceived by the rest of the FBI.
- The POW/MIA issue is a real thing, but I haven't done enough research on it to comment on how it's portrayed.
- The climax is mostly just a repeat of the cold open with more context, but it makes me wonder why they're not using video cameras or something to see Teager.
- Seeing Teager out of the corner of your eye is a nifty solution I suppose, but it feels anti-climactic.
- Teager dying will reciting his name and number is fine, but then panning across to the American flag is overly on the nose.
- The final scene is mostly just about expositing how they're doing the cover up, but it does bring up a point: I would have liked more perspective from Skinner. He's the only main character who was in Vietnam, how does he feel about it?
- As always, these reviews are supported by my Patreon. Check it out so you too can get some bonuses like...well I'll think of something.
Current Celebrity Watch:
Scott Hylands, who plays the general who Teager is trying to assassinate in the climax, is an incredibly veteran actor with a career going back to the 60s and continuing to this day, at least in Canada, he's not nearly as famous in the US. But, he did just play Ewan McGregor's father in Season 3 of Fargo, so he's got that going for him.
Sidebar, but both Teager and Markham looked really familiar to me, but I couldn't place them. It turns out their actors (Peter LaCroix and Larry Musser respectively) had appeared in previous episodes of The X-Files. Larry Musser even got to say "That's a bleeping dead alien body."
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