The X Files: Blood **

 This will be a brief companion piece to a write-up made in the past on this second season third episode of The X Files,  Blood 

Because I wrote about the episode a few years ago, I could focus on some other aspects of it I might have been less centered on last time. Developing a profile as he once did on the Behavioral Science Unit, an unusual amount of spree killings in Franklin, PA leave Mulder bewildered as to how they might be connected. An insecticide that produces a chemical reaction causing "electronic hallucinations" where folks see readout on monitors of different types encouraging grabbing guns, knife slashing, or bare hands bashing. Trying to discourage the use of insecticide (killing crop-destroying flies) because of digital readouts that encourage folks of severe phobias (rape, claustrophobia, and in Sanderson's case, blood) to go berserk is quite an outlandish premise that Mulder must seriously offer in a manner that Scully and Franklin's sheriff (John Cygan) can swallow...credit to the show, it works because Sanderson was already stressed about the lack of available work, so Mulder needed to stop the potential for a Charles Whitman like shooting spree near a blood drive. Sanderson in this episode is so pitiful; during the economic catastrophe of this most recent pandemic in 2020 and 2021 his plight is so understandable. Sanderson is even in a clocktower, sweating, coming apart, shouting, just overcome by his mania. Mulder even being attacked by a woman with a knife when he tries to calm her down helps him gain some understanding of what he is dealing with, so when he does confront Sanderson, he is better equipped to deal with him. That ending where Mulder actually has his own experience is quite chilling...luckily, he's able to ride it out. 3.5/5

***I like how the sheriff in Franklin is so different than law enforcement typically treats FBI agents who arrive at crime scenes. He's level-headed, cooperative, even open to whatever Mulder might have. He just wants the murders to stop.***

***When Mulder visits The Lone Gunmen, they talk of how insecticides were just blown into the faces of women and children to prove how safe they were decades ago. Seeing the B&W footage of volunteers being sprayed is horrifying to me. That kind of behavior...the cancer and such that was spawned out of that, just left me shaken.***

***Once again The Lone Gunmen gave Mulder plenty of conspiracy theories, but this also provided a fun exchange between Mulder and Frohike about Scully. And Mulder had access to Frohike's night vision goggles. Mulder's apology about choosing his interest in Celebrity Skin as opposed to their magazine cracked me up. I immediately had an alarming thought, though: The Lone Gunmen, espcially today, would probably be viewed as Domestic Terrorists***