The X Files - Born Again

 I do admit that this particular episode of the first season isn't one I watched all that much in the past. It isn't that the episode, "Born Again", is lousy or not quality enough. Watching it this afternoon, "Born Again" has a fun enough premise if not exactly spectacular or memorable. I think that is why it felt like such a fresh viewing. I might have watched it once in the 90s and once in the 2000s. It concerns a little girl who seems to be the vessel for a reincarnated spirit of a cop who died under grisly circumstances. What seemed like retaliation from a Chinatown crime syndicate, with the cop having an arm cleaved off and eye gouged out, as Mulder and Scully investigate the mysterious death of a detective in Brooklyn, left alone with a little girl by another cop who can't seem to get her to talk, Sharon Lazard (Maggie Wheeler), they realize there is more to this than meets the eye. The little girl tells the police that the description of the man who pushed the cop talking to her out of a window is Charlie Morris. Further investigation proves that Charlie was actually drowned before the mutilations to his corpse, with saltwater a component later tied to a fishtank and this brief blurred out image of the very last thing the cop saw before his death...a deep sea diver figurine.

Origami was a hobby of Charlie's and a cop close to him is married to Charlie's ex-wife, so it is inevitable that the little girl will eventually show up at their house. Money in a safety deposit box and four cops tied to it with Charlie seeking revenge against the three unless someone -- perhaps his ex-wife -- can get him to stop. Scully arguing with Mulder about putting a case together based on a theory a majority of people consider outrageous, especially in a court of law, remains a sticking point that frustrates Mulder...his theory very well could be correct, but Scully is the practical one who must remind him that unless it makes sense to folks, the case just won't pass mustard. The blur on a monitor when the little girl is under hypnosis and fights against the trained psychiatrist (Charlie fighting the psychiatrist) results in the fishtank figure on screen once a specialist gets a hold of the tape is far-fetched to the nth degree, but as an X-Files fan, these sort of plot development gimmicks are expected so Mulder can get to the girl before Charlie murders the final cop involved in his death. I think what deducts points from this episode is that it feels so middle-of-the-road, as some of the first season episodes like "Space", "Shapes", and "Shadows". When you journey through the series, an episode like this doesn't have that memorable sticking point that remains on the mind after its over. 2.5/5