Case 06, File 16: Alpha

AKA: MRAs Ruined The Title Of This Episode

In case episodes like 3 and Shapes didn't prove it to you, The X-Files does want to do episodes about classic monsters but, as episodes like 3 and Shapes prove, they don't just want to do classic versions of those monsters. The X-Files is a weird, creative show with a lot of weird, off the wall ideas, and it doesn't ever really like to be constrained by existing boxes. So even when your idea can be theoretically summed up by the word "Dude changes into wolf" you can bet it's gonna take that idea in an odd direction.

Our story opens with a pair of Chinese shipping workers checking out a crate with a dangerous animal in it. After they decide to open it, for reasons that are transparently dumb, they disappear and when the crate is found upon arriving in America, by its owner Mr. Detweiler, a cryptozoologist (yes, that's a real thing) and animal control, both of their bodies are in the crate and the animal is missing. Which is not ideal frankly.

Mulder learns of the deaths and decides that he wants to go check it out, but while he does, a mysterious dog like animal with glowing red eyes kills a customs official and his dog. Mulder and Scully check out both crime scenes, noting that the crate was locked from the outside and the doors to the customs officials' house were also closed, which leads Mulder to start to suspect that there's something weird about the dog they're looking for.

To prove it, they go see a Karin Berquist, a canine behavioral specialist who it turns out is internet friends with Mulder and is the one who turned him on to this case. He is also her only friend, as she turns out to be a reclusive weirdo, who tells Mulder that his theory (that a mysterious feral dog, called a Wanshang Dhole, is responsible) is silly, as the Wanshang Dhole is extinct and that also dogs don't hunt for fun as this animal seems to be.

"I'm not getting close to it man, I remember the opening scene from Jurassic Park."

But that night, an animal control worker is killed by a man that transforms into a dog, at which point everyone starts realizing shit is getting real. Another animal control officer, who's been hanging around, vows to kill the animal since it killed his friend, but Detweiler threatens him to not harm the animal. Meanwhile Berquist (who sort of invites herself onto the team) finds evidence that the dog has a fifth pad on its foot, making Mulder start to believe it can transform between human and animal.

We then spend an inordinate amount of time on a few things: Detweiler goes to a vet to get some tranqs, but then the dog shows up there and nearly kills a vet, but then a DIFFERENT dog gets shot by animal control, only it turns out that that's the Wanshang Dhole transformed. There's a very long subplot where Scully thinks that Berquist is the killer cause she's into Mulder, and she is into Mulder, but then it turns out she has lupus (this goes nowhere). The next major plot movement is when the dog turns up to attack the animal control guy from earlier.

When Mulder goes to see him in the hospital, he finds Detweiler there and realizes Detweiler is the Wangshang Dhole (he got possessed looking for it in China), as does Berquist who...knows him? Mulder goes to the hospital to protect the animal control guy on Berquist's advice, but realizes eventually that she lied and Detweiler is going for her. Detweiler in fact, does go for her, but she manages to lure him into attacking her in front of a window and they both get impaled on the fence outside her window and die, and thus the episode ends with Mulder back in his office, getting her I Want to Believe poster to replace his burned one.

Alpha is an episode I enjoy, but I don't think is very good, which is an odd stance to take, I admit. It has so many flaws they're basically leaking out at every turn, but it's still an oddly amusing good time to me, maybe cause I like werewolf stories (and feel they're underrepresented in horror media) or maybe it's cause I can see parts of a much stronger, more focused episode peeking in around the edges. Whatever though, I'm here as a critic and I'm here to bury Alpha not to praise it.

Berquist can't be that sad or lonely, look at how many pups she has.

Like Arcadia before it, a big element that drags this episode down is the secondary cast, who get really lopsided attention by the episode. Detweiler is probably the most under-served, as he only gets like, 2 or 3 scenes, none of them very in depth, before its turning out he's the dog. We know basically nothing about him as a person, and he barely interacts with our protagonists, or indeed anyone. And the only interesting thing about him, him acting like a psycho to the animal control guy, is just an extension of him being, you know, the dog. It's a good scene, but it adds little.

One the way other end of the scale, we have doctor Berquist, who gets a lot of characterization if nothing else. The actress is doing a good job, but a lot of it feels like leftovers from other drafts of the script, which gives her character a weird, disjointed feeling. We learn around the start of the third act that she has lupus which is why she's not out in the field but if someone can tell me why that mattered, I'd be glad to hear it. And all of this is at the expense of the other characters; Yeah we can't focus too heavily on Detweiler without giving away the Twist, but none of the other characters feel like much more than bodies for the dog to maul.

And there we wander into the big issue: The dog is not scary. They do what they can, with the glowing red eyes and transforming, and when we see it in silhouette it looks okay, but they keep having to show it head on and it just doesn't work. I keep wanting to pet his little head and tell him to calm down. I don't know how you work around this, except maybe get a dog that's a little bigger or more intimidating. The dog they got looks like a coyote and while I know, conceptually, that coyotes are dangerous, I don't fear them in the way I would say, a good sized angry Husky or Malamute.

So that leaves our plot, which is another thing being pulled in multiple directions. It's not necessarily obvious that Detweiler is the dog, but he hangs around just a little too much without any exploration for him to stand out, so you know he's up to no good before the episode telegraphs it. Berquist is conceptually interesting, and her actress is selling her part hard, but the Mulder romance angle is so weird and out of place that it feels forced, and they have no chemistry. Honestly, I thought the lady installing the fence was her girlfriend the first time I saw this episode.

"I'm not going to shoot you, because uh...honestly, cause the ending won't work otherwise."

So what do I like about this episode? Well as a major Mulder/Scully shipper, I really enjoy watching Scully seething with jealousy over Berquist in this episode, even if like a lot of stuff involving Berquist it ultimately doesn't come to much of anything. I do actually like the central mystery. As I said, I'm a sucker for werewolf narratives, and trying to figure out if the mystery dog is a werewolf and then who it is, is close enough to scratch that particular itch. And while the dog playing the villain isn't scary, he sure is a good boy. Yes he is.

I suppose that my descriptor (It's not very good, but I still like it) could apply to most bad episodes of this series. While there are a handful of exceptions, I find that no matter how bad an episode is, I can usually find something to like in it, so long as Mulder and Scully are there. So maybe I'm judging Alpha a little too harshly, since it still makes me happy, but on the other hand, you could say the same of literally any episode that has Mulder and Scully in it. Gotta have a baseline somewhere.

Case Notes:

• I get that it's something like hazing, but if I was transporting a dangerous animal for whatever those poor shipping workers are making, I would fuck with it as little as possible.
• After the thing in the cargo crate has been banging around and stops, the workers think they killed it and open the crate, while I would be legging it for the other side of the ship. I think I'd last pretty long in a horror flick.
• Detweiler already being on the ship at the end of the cold open is one of those narrative conveniences you ignore, but in retrospect, it helps set up the twist.
• Mulder's info drop has him working very hard to be funny. I forget if that's a plot point or if it's just Mulder being Mulder.
• This episode killed a teenager like 3 episodes ago, so I guess it makes sense they would cross the "Killing the dog" line too.
• The scene with the cop getting killed by the wolf is okay I guess, but I like the effect with the dogs eyes.
• Mulder hears Detweiler is a cryptozoologist and immediately goes off. I like Scully's "Don't mind him, he'll go on forever."
• Scully hears Mulder's theory and just rolls with it. She's worked with him for six years, she can just deal with his craziness.
• Mulder turns out to be internet friends with the canine behavior specialist. Scully seems a little jealous but honestly, I'd just be happy Mulder has a friend. Mulder doesn't have a lot of friends.
• Berquist has an I Want to Believe poster, which reminds us that Mulder doesn't have one anymore and immediately tells us why they connected.
• Berquist is supposed to be a shut in but she has a couple friends and lots of dogs, so she seems to be doing okay.
• A dhole is an actual kind of animal, found in Asia, so I don't know why Berquist would jump straight to the extinct one if she doesn't know the deal.
• You'd think they'd mention to the animal control people in the city there's a type of wild dog loose that is believed to have killed 3 people. It's uh, good information to have.
• The fish and wildlife guy doesn't react too much to a guy transforming into a dog in front of him.
• I like Berquist a lot, she is really believably anti-social and awkward, without it feeling forced.
• Scully thinks Berquist killed four people to get Mulder out there. Look Scully, just cause you'd kill for him...
• Dude just walks straight into a vet and asks for dog tranquilizers, and he just gets them. You'd think they would be better controlled.
• The vet has a signed picture of Berquist up. Is this a Da Vinci Code world where experts in obscure fields of study are suddenly rock stars?
• Attacking the vet that did surgery on him seems pretty ungrateful, although him being able to change into other dogs is convenient.
• Berquist talking shit about Detweiler is really amusing to me for some reason.
• Fake out of the animal control guy not answering the radio and then being fine is followed by the double fake out of the dog being in his back seat.
• Mulder just figures out that Detweiler is the dog, that it possessed him when he found it in China and suddenly Berquist knows too. Guess we're heading into the third act.
• There's an easy joke about Berquist liking Mulder cause his first name is Fox.
• Oh man, I forgot that this episode included the first ever example of Chekov's coyote fence.
• I like the symmetry of the first and last scene in Mulder's office opening with "You going home?" from Scully.
• Mulder getting the new I Want to Believe poster is such a good way to end the episode. My DVD has an alternate ending where they do the usual X-Files thing where it's suggested that Cahn has the dog thing, but that feels like less of a proper ending to this episode. It's okay to have some closure.
• As always, these reviews are supported by my Patreon. Check it out, as I'm planning a Rifftrax style audio commentary of an episode and my Patrons can vote on which episode I do.

Current Celebrity Watch:

Detweiler is played by Andrew Robinson, who played Garak on Deep Space Nine. He's had lot of other roles (like the villain in Dirty Harry) but really, that's the only one most audiences for this column are gonna care about. On a more minor note, Berquist is played by Melinda Culea who played someone named Amy Allen on The A-Team. I've never watched a full episode of The A-Team so I have no idea if she's a big role, but she was in 20+ episodes, so I guess? She's also married to the director of this episode.