The X Files - Leonard Betts

 

So the episode "Leonard Betts" is absolutely outrageous and a lot of fun because of how absurd it is. Leonard loses his head when his fellow paramedic driver accidentally has her attention distracted by his ability to "see Cancer", running a red light, resulting in a truck driving right into the side of the van. And yet, Betts walks right out of the morgue...without his head! And there are conversations about "radical evolution" and "great leaps" that perhaps had been unknown the agents are now discovering. Betts is a product of evolution, actually walking with Cancer all throughout his cells, needing Cancer to survive, even "eating" it (from waste in hospitals) as Mulder puts it "snack food". But Mulder also posits to Scully that he couldn't be "too advanced" if he still drives a Dodge Dart.

What makes this episode so substantial, just beyond a Monster of the Week, is that Betts can tell when others have Cancer, sort of like a Spidey sense available to him since he is basically Walking Cancer. And when he can't get it from hospitals, he takes it from people with Cancer. And he confronts Scully with a scalpel -- after taking Cancer from a barfly with a bad cough -- telling her sorry but he needs something she has...Scully has Cancer. And this becomes a big deal on the show going forward. It is quite a journey for Scully, obviously, but also for Mulder because he, obviously, loves her. As we all do.

In this episode, at the very least, Scully gets to show off her fighting skills by fending off Betts when he is still in "developmental stage" after another "version" of himself is killed in a car explosion after the agents fire their guns into the vehicle. Using shock pedals, Scully is able to bolt Betts' brain, throwing him back and killing him. But that is but a conclusion to the episode with him. Through a lone episode, where Betts is but a one week character, Scully's emotional roller coaster continues. It is a big arc for Gillian Anderson, allowing us to see her really get more time to develop Scully through a really difficult ride. Mulder is oblivious to what Scully is really going through because she doesn't tell him of the experience in the van with Betts. 

Included in the episode is one version of Betts "exiting" another version of Betts inside a storage locker, as well as, his mother "giving up Cancer" so he can continue to build this next version to full capacity. I just like that Scully didn't need rescue, that she was able to defend herself and come out of it victorious...and having learned an uncomfortable and devastating truth. 4.5/5