The X-Files - Plus One
*** / ****
I've always enjoyed horror stories on dopplegangers going way back to Mirror Image, a fabulous episode of The Twilight Zone starting a fantastic Vera Miles. The spin of the third episode of the eleventh season of The X Files is that a brother and sister team separated by an asylum cell use the Hangman game and psychic transference against victims considered misfits in society deserved of strangulation, sword decapitation, belt lynching, etc. When Mulder and Scully investigate, they become eventual targets...of course. Scully getting feces tossed her direction by "evil Judy" and told she's old, with no hope for kids or a future relationship with Mulder, starts to cause her to examine herself while Mulder interviews Judith's brother, Chucky, a snotty, grouchy malcontent, living a packrat existence. That the Hangman game eventually turns the siblings against each other when Mulder is fending off his violent double and Scully successfully shoos hers away ends the case with quite a sense of cosmic irony...in their abilities to kill others through the game, communicating to each other psychically, their disdain for one another is their own undoing. I guess ultimately this satisfied me because of a key romantic scene between Mulder and Scully in a hotel adjoining rooms where they discuss age, family, and their jobs, which eventually leads to sex. Holding each other, their bond is quite strong despite setbacks, ups and downs. Debating the existence of evil, ghosts, and mental influence that can bring about killer doubles once again puts our beloved FBI agents in a conversation about what is real or fiction. While this season wasn't any great shakes overall and had its main alien colonization/apocalyptic arc derail tragically, there are still gems and good moments that remind us of what still remains...our duo never fail to charm and enchant. The final scene, where they clearly want to repeat a previous encounter in the hotel bed, is communicated in not so many words as facial recognition. That is a delight.
I've always enjoyed horror stories on dopplegangers going way back to Mirror Image, a fabulous episode of The Twilight Zone starting a fantastic Vera Miles. The spin of the third episode of the eleventh season of The X Files is that a brother and sister team separated by an asylum cell use the Hangman game and psychic transference against victims considered misfits in society deserved of strangulation, sword decapitation, belt lynching, etc. When Mulder and Scully investigate, they become eventual targets...of course. Scully getting feces tossed her direction by "evil Judy" and told she's old, with no hope for kids or a future relationship with Mulder, starts to cause her to examine herself while Mulder interviews Judith's brother, Chucky, a snotty, grouchy malcontent, living a packrat existence. That the Hangman game eventually turns the siblings against each other when Mulder is fending off his violent double and Scully successfully shoos hers away ends the case with quite a sense of cosmic irony...in their abilities to kill others through the game, communicating to each other psychically, their disdain for one another is their own undoing. I guess ultimately this satisfied me because of a key romantic scene between Mulder and Scully in a hotel adjoining rooms where they discuss age, family, and their jobs, which eventually leads to sex. Holding each other, their bond is quite strong despite setbacks, ups and downs. Debating the existence of evil, ghosts, and mental influence that can bring about killer doubles once again puts our beloved FBI agents in a conversation about what is real or fiction. While this season wasn't any great shakes overall and had its main alien colonization/apocalyptic arc derail tragically, there are still gems and good moments that remind us of what still remains...our duo never fail to charm and enchant. The final scene, where they clearly want to repeat a previous encounter in the hotel bed, is communicated in not so many words as facial recognition. That is a delight.
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