The X-Files - Shapes

I am not as hard as others towards Shapes, a werewolf story set in Montana near Native American territory where a land dispute between Natives and American father and son has escalated into a case to be settled in court. Gwen Goodensnake (Renae Morriseau)  claims that the Parkers'' cattle is grazing on Native American land. Outside while checking on their cattle due to recent mutilations to several of their cows, the Parkers encounter a creature. It claws and tosses son Lyle (Ty Miller) while papa Jim (Donnelly Rhodes) shoots the animal, soon pointing his flashlight to it, finding a dead Native American boy instead. So already tense relations further worsen with the FBI soon involved. Scully and Mulder arrive to investigate.

Any episode that has Michael Horse and Jimmy Herman can’t be all bad as far as I’m concerned. It made sense to include the Wounded Knee incident and bitterness towards the government…Scully and Mulder, despite being sympathetic to them and not difficult, aren’t just going to arrive and get the red carpet treatment. And why should they, really? Despite that having to be addressed, the episode does eventually see Mulder and Scully finding common ground with the sheriff, Tskany (Horse; of Twin Peaks) and a respected, wise elder, Ish (Herman). Ish especially grows fond of Mulder because he seems open to their beliefs and not as skeptical as Scully who tries to use logic to explain the first victim’s scar down his chest, skin found on the premises, canine teeth, and human and animal footprints following each other, found on the ground. Then Jim Parker is ripped apart by what appeared to be a similar “manimal” and the investigation turns suspicion on Gwen in a possible retaliatory strike of retribution.

I do agree with the criticism that the episode tells a basic werewolf story and the plot goes where the viewer expects. Even when I watched it as a teenager during its original run, I knew what the results would be. And I knew Scully would be alone [natch] with the monster as Mulder and Tskany would try to rush to her rescue. The ultimate tragedy of it all is that the feuding parties—the Goodensnakes and Parkers—would all be gone, settling the dispute in a different, unexpected fashion.

Horse on The X-Files, I admit as being a Twin Peaks fan, is just too cool so I have a hard time not enjoying Shapes if just for his being in it. He has a quite presence in the episode, too. He’s in a fix, as well. He is trying to do his job as a law enforcement officer, keep the respect of his people, and manage a very testy adversarial conflict between the Goodensnakes and Parkers. Scully and Mulder arrive trying to perform an autopsy on the kid and Tskany simply refuses to allow them to touch the body. Just getting to exam the body has its significance as two posted warriors of the tribe stand guard over the doorway of the sheriff’s office to protest the FBI being involved. So Mulder and Scully must navigate the waters carefully and respectfully, which they do. 

I like how Lyle was a respectable, honorable young man who even attended the funeral of the boy as he was about to be burned to ash on the bonfire. He could have stayed away but didn’t. He wanted to show that he was deeply sorry and affected by what happened on the Parker land. When he speaks about his mom to Scully, you can see this young man who sorely missed her. And to lose his father (blood of his father was found in his system) and be unknowingly responsible…it is just an accumulation of bad ju-ju on this young man. All of that and being marked by the lycan curse, certain to transform soon himself, Lyle is a tragic character in the Lawrence Talbot tradition. Gwen is enraged with her brother being dead and having no family. That accompanied with the land situation with the Parkers and later seeing Lyle attacking his dad in werewolf form just further Gwen’s misery. By the end she’s just ready to anywhere but this area of Montana. There is a scene where Scully approaches Gwen and offers condolences, telling her she lost her father recently as well…it is a reminder of her own loss and how she can understand what Gwen is going through. Not only Gwen, but Lyle as well; Scully can empathize with both.

Mulder’s ties to the Native Americans won’t end here. Ish just sees something in him (“Your name is Fox…”), and tells him he’ll see him in 80 years. I don’t know necessarily if this will be ever followed up on (the episode did feel like the very example of stand-alone) but it’d be cool if the show ever really ended, with an elderly Mulder returning to Montana, with Ish inexplicably waiting for him. When he is rescued by Navajo and recovers from near death thanks to them later at the end of the second season and start of third, it is like connective tissue. He seemed destined to encounter them again, and the show incorporated the Navajo culture within the recuperation and recovery of Mulder, considered dead by the Cigarette-Smoking Man. It is a big three-episode arc, too. So even if Shapes is classified as insignificant, I like to look at it as the show’s opportunity for presenting the FBI and Native Americans in a setting where they actually somehow co-exist, with some werewolvery thrown in for good measure. Except the agents of the FBI this go-around are careful and cautious, investigating within the anxious, tense environs as best they can, hoping to solve the case and do so with little incident if possible. Because Mulder is observant and willing to listen to Ish, always nudging Tskany to open up to him, he learns of the Manitou and is informed of what they might be up against. Ish shares back story of seeing the Manitou himself, and this gives shape to the monster of the episode.