Case 07, File 15: En Ami

AKA: The Devil and Ms. Scully

Scully has been an important part of many of the Myth Arc episodes, but she's never really had any personal interactions with most of the conspiracy, so even though she's been victimized by them a lot (a lot a lot) she's never gained the personal enmity with them that Mulder has with say, the Cigarette Smoking Man or Krycek. But with Duchovny's exit coming down the line like a freight train, and with no idea of what the story of the series is going to be going forward, I think it's about time Scully got some personal antagonism with the Conspiracy.

Case 07, File 14: Theef

AKA: It's A Psychobilly Freakout

One of the things that can make horror age so quickly is that it can take shortcuts to be frightening, and those shortcuts can be insensitive, if not abhorrent, to more modern sensibilities. The X-Files, for the most part, avoids race and class based horror, so it does manage to avoid a lot of that stuff. But, one of the few things it has indulged in, is in indulging in horror based around lower income people from rural areas. And while that's not usually enough to sink an episode, it can be...awkward.

Case 07, File 13: First Person Shooter

AKA: Twitch Stream This

Once, while on a stream with YouTuber and generally excellent human Dan Olson, he said to me that, for any discussion of the worst episode of The X-Files to be interesting, Space has to be excluded. His reasoning was sound: Space is the episode with the least good in it, basically nothing worth talking about (and thus a very dull episode to review, honestly). But while there are no episodes with less good in them, there are some episodes with much, much, much more bad in them.

Case 07, File 12: X-Cops

AKA: The Only Thing To Fear Is Pro-Police Propaganda

The X-Files exists in an odd space, compared to other law enforcement centered media. Even when discussions of pro-cop media in the 90s media comes up, The X-Files is rarely part of the conversation. Part of that is that our heroes, despite being FBI Agents, are so often positioned as against the government (or at least the vast conspiracy within it) or maybe it's cause what Mulder and Scully do is so unlike what normal law enforcement does. Either way, when they actually do engage with real life law enforcement, it strikes an...odd tone.

Case 07, File 11: Closure

AKA: Oh Boy! Closure!

Let's be honest with ourselves: There was never a concrete plan for what happened to Samantha. And I don't mean that in the way that David Lynch never actually intended to resolve the question of who killed Laura Palmer, I mean they intended to resolve it at some point, but I don't think they ever knew what that way was. But with the future of the series in flux and Duchovny's exit coming like a freight train, I think they made the choice to just find an ending for it, and I'm determined to approach it as it's own thing. Even if it does contradict one of my favorite moments from Season Two.

Case 07, File 10: Sein Und Zeit

AKA: Law And Order: Ghost Victims Unit

Despite Mulder's motivation being (supposedly) the loss of his sister, The X-Files doesn't really do kidnappings. Oh it's done it once or twice but for the most part, not counting alien abductions, actual kidnappings are pretty rare. There's probably a complex psychological reason behind it, with kidnapping being just a little too real and dark, or maybe they just don't want to have to keep checking in on their victim in the script, who knows. Hence we all know that when they do kidnapping, it's cause Mulder wants to make it personal.

Case 07, File 09: Signs and Wonders

AKA: I Was Born A Snake Handler And I'll Die A Snake Handler

There is a moment in Garth Marenghi's Darkplace in which a character is dying and, randomly, decides to spout off some facts about Bermuda. It's funny, not just because of the non-sequitur but because, like much of Darkplace, it's reflective of a real thing writers do. Get too into researching an idea or concept and you can find yourself forcing that stuff in because it's just on your brain. You can even find yourself writing an entire episode about it.