No wonder Gillian Anderson got an Emmy for this episode. Years later still makes me cry.
Scully admits herself into the hospital for chemotherapy for her cancer. Skinner denies Mulder access to the Cigarette Smoking Man, but then approaches himself to protect Mulder. Mulder engages the Lone Gunmen and they break into a medical research facility and find answers to the cause of the cancer, but no cure. Mulder also discovers a group of adult clones, also searching for the cure. This has a very touching moment with Mulder and Scully embracing at the hospital. Duchovny and Anderson act their FBI butts off in this one.
Having been very close to someone who died from cancer, it's very difficult to watch this and other episodes related to Scully's battle with the disease. I have been dreading watching these episodes again and after seeing "Momento Mori", I feel like I want to skip forward in the series, past "Redux II".
Secondary characters in the episode: CSM, Lone Gunmen, Penny Northern
Oh I remember this episode. It breaks my heart seeing Dana in this situation.. :(
Purple prose intro - Check
Strange dialogue for women "I feel the seconds in my breasts" - Check
Yep, it's Chris Carter's writing alright.
Sigh.
I'm almost sorry to keep criticizing Chris and the alien storyline, but this was one of my favorite shows, and rewatching it has been a surprising experience. The alien storyline is just poor, and i have a right to criticize it both out of spite and out of genuine criticism.
Now, Chris's writing isn't exactly bad itself. When it comes to the characters he does a good job for the most part, and the ideas of the alien storyline are interesting, they just fail in execution. I think he's written a lot of standalone episodes too though, and those have been good.
They arrive just in time for someone to be remotely downloading files from the mufon computer?
Why is the guy running when she has a gun pointed on him, and he runs away down a narrow alley? She had a gun on you and she may shoot you if you do not stop. But no, he just runs back down a narrow alley, all in range of the gun.
Sigh.
Oh look, another episode based around Scully's vulnerability. We haven't seen one of those before!
It's Mulder who often gets most of the action and conspiracy parts.
One of the flaws in the show are the writers ideas for Scully and her personal storylines. Not even Vince Gilligan can escape that flaw, which is more apparent with his writing for female characters on Breaking Bad.
To be fair to this episode, the storyline has been built up, and it is a serious episode. But just because a character is in a serious situation doeesn't mean we disregard the quality of the buildup and the concept and execution of the current storyline, and the character's roles within.
To my surprise, this is quite a good episode, which is kind of part of the mythos arc. And it's surprisingly good! And there were some really good moments. This episode's writing is shared by 4 writers, though i read Vince Gilligan was the main writer. That's probably why there's less alien stuff in this and less convolution of the storyline. Vince took a part of the mythos arc and grounded it, helping with the straightening of the mythos narrative as a whole while expanding it logically.
Gillian Andersons acting is very good this episode.
HUG HER MULDER... YES THANK YOU. I bet the shippers were happy with that one.
Nice to see the lone gunmen again.
Edit: I just realized... Does this count as another Scully abduction? She was held in the hospital and the doctor is the bad guy. He convinced her/forced her to stay, and may have been giving her drugs to make her weaker. Hmm... it's not a full abduction, but it's crazy we have consider these things.
I'll give it a 0.5 on the abduction scale.
SCULLY ABDUCTION COUNTER... #6.5
was this episode real i can't believe
Shout by chloeBlockedParent2015-10-30T00:00:13Z
forehEAD KISSES WILL BE THE DEATH OF ME