The X-Files Mini-series Episode Recaps

The X-Files (1993-2002; 2016)

Mini-series - 6 episodes (2016)
Rent The X-Files on Amazon Video (paid link)
Created by: Chris Carter
Starring: David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, Mitch Pileggi
Rated: TV-14
Watch the trailer 

Episode 1 Introduction
The X-Files is back! Just a few yeas ago, I didn't think I'd ever be able to say such a thing. I'm beyond excited for the first episode, though not without reservation.

The X-files is back!

The X-Files original run made you wonder about conspiracy theories. Could the government be involved in widespread cover up? Could the government spy on us? Yes, they can spy on us.  If that is true, what else could be true?
Fox Mulder was always quick to believe the worst of the government, and we believed him because he worked for the government. The characters more than anything set the show apart. Mulder (David Duchovny) was spooky, willing to believe in the supernatural and paranormal. He wanted to believe. If aliens didn't take his sister, the truth was too terrible to bear. Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) was his foil, the skeptic and a medical doctor, though religious, who turned to science for explanations. These characters are X-files. When they were replaced by Robert Patrick and Annabeth Gish in later seasons, the show just wasn't The X-files anymore.
The episodes set a mood unlike any show or movie could. It made you look over your shoulder as you were watching at night, wondering if something were creeping behind you. It provided iconic characters like Flukeman, Eugene Victor Tooms, and many more.

Can the mini-series live up to the pedigree of The X-files? It's a insurmountable task. It has to tackle the conspiracy which became rather convoluted in later seasons, provide solid monster of the week episodes, and integrate current technology. That's a lot to do in just six episodes. The 2008 movie couldn't revive The X-files, can the 2016 mini-series do it? Let's find out. It's time for the episode one recap.

Mulder and Scully are back in the driver's seat, ahem, the passenger seat.

Recap: Episode 1 My Struggle
The episode opens with Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) recapping the history of his involvement with aliens and the X-files division of the FBI before launching into the history of the government's role in aliens and UFO's. Mulder wonders if it was all a hoax as we see the Roswell ship crash.

The show cuts to the theme song which has remained largely intact, though abbreviated. Duchovny, Anderson, and Pileggi get top billing.
After a quick clip with a G.I. fellow on a bus going to the Roswell crash, Scully (Gillian Anderson), looking like a medical doctor, gets a call from Assistant Director Walter Skinner (Mitch Pileggi) who is looking for Mulder. Television personality Tad O'Malley (Joel McHale) has contacted the FBI looking for Mulder, but Mulder is off the grid.

Mulder agrees to meet Tad and Scully tags along. We get a few veiled references to a failed relationship between Mulder and Scully. In a nod to technology, Mulder uses Uber to arrive at the designated spot. The show was always big on technology, it's nice to see it employ the updated technology throughout this episode.

Mulder and Scully meet television personality Tad O'Malley.

While Mulder tests Tad on UFO history and is satisfied, Joel McHale makes this seem a bit too comedic. He's a bad parody of right wing pundits. The show always did a great job at being creepy, making the viewer feel paranoia. I didn't feel that this episode.
Tad has someone Mulder needs to meet, a former alien abductee, who Mulder has interviewed before, Sveta.

Joel McHale is Tad O'Malley.

Scully tests Sveta while Sveta uses her extra sensory powers to remind us that Scully and Mulder had a child together and that Scully has been abducted herself. I'm surprised this episode didn't try to ignore the Scully-Mulder baby. It wasn't the show's best moment.

Sveta is an alien abductee.

Tad shows Mulder a ship developed with alien technology. Sveta reveals to Mulder that it wasn't aliens, but men who abducted her.

Mulder and Scully still use their cell phones, though they aren't the bricks from the first run.

Skinner appears to show us the old office, empty and in disrepair. The iconic 'the truth is out there' poster is on the floor. Skinner urges Mulder to do something about the government lies. Mulder wants access to the files. Will they be digitized now? Would it matter? Mulder had a picture perfect memory of every case file anyway.

All these years and the office still stands. I guess it's too 'spooky' for anyone else to use.

Mulder meets an older man, who we saw in the Roswell flashback. Roswell was a government cover up. Who would have thought? Mulder has been in contact with this man before. Mulder has never given up in his endeavor to uncover the truth. This man makes a reference to the alien-hybrids that Mulder brushes aside as manipulation.

Mulder has it all figured out, and Tad adds that the final takeover has been prepared. Americans have been forced into compliance, with wars and consumerism. Sveta is the key, but Scully reveals that she doesn't have alien DNA.

The government compromises Sveta. She throws Tad under the bus, the government blows up the alien spacecraft, and blows up Sveta and her car. They are dealing with a powerful force that will not stop at any length to protect the coverup.

Scully runs Sveta's DNA again and determines she actually does have alien DNA. How did she miss that before? It seems highly contrived to accentuate the story beats.

Scully runs the DNA again so the results better match up with the story beats.

 Scully and Mulder get a text message from Skinner. It's urgent!

In a highly contrived shot we see the Cigarette Smoking Man (William B. Davis). He states the X-files have been re-opened. I get why they used CSM, but he should be dead. It's a way to bridge the gap from the original series to this one without introducing a new character. I get the why, but I don't like it.

The episode felt light on plot. We're introduced to the major players of this mini-series and the X-files are re-opened.

It's cute to have Mulder backtrack on aliens and say he was mislead and manipulated by a government cover-up, but it's also disingenuous. After all he's seen and what we've seen on the show, the evidence leads to a little more than Roswell was aliens and everything else was the government. I get this contrivance. The show was never able to pin down the alien conspiracy, it spiraled out of control and a soft reboot is an easy way to compact that story and give it a fresh start. Whether it works depends on the next five episodes.

I was incredibly excited to revisit The X-files after a thirteen year hiatus. This episode has potential, but it doesn't quite live up to the original. The season one premiere did everything this one did and had a full story too. Sveta and O'Malley serve little purpose other than a front to change Mulder's mind in just a few minutes on a quest he's endured for decades. Hopefully the setup pays off. The X-files have been reopened and we only have five episodes left. I've previewed the titles and premise of the next two episodes and it looks like we're in for some monsters of the week and humor. I hope it delivers.

Episode 2 Introduction
The second episode of The X-Files overcomes the issues of the first. We get a complete story, something episode one lacked amid all the setup and introductions. Mulder's quest for alien proof has been rebooted to expose the corruption of the government. Episode 2 looks to be the first proper episode.

Could we have simplified the first episode and had Skinner call Mulder, asking him if he would accept a position with the FBI? We got an elaborate charade to bring Mulder back, but did we need the theatrics? I didn't need Joel McHale.

What has Mulder been doing in the last decade? He hasn't given up the search, but apparently he hasn't found anything notable either. I assume he isn't a alien chaser, listening to the scanner, typing on internet conspiracy chat rooms, and hoping to find that one piece of evidence

What is Mulder's motivation? Skinner just asking him to come back isn't enough. I don't buy a television host telling him to believe does the trick. Mulder needs a catalyst. Maybe Skinner opens the door with a baffling case that needs Mulder's investigative eye. Mulder was a superior profiler, he likes to solve puzzles. That's a hook I could buy.

Recap: Episode 2 Founder's Mutation
This episode felt like The X-files, it isn't a great episode but it's better than the first episode which is pretty much skippable.
 This episode kicks off with Dr. Sanjay doing a retinal scan to get into a Department of Defense facility. His eye is bruised, shining bright red.

He hears a piercing tone that halts him in mid stride. This tone cuts through his thoughts, driving him mad. No one else hears the sound and it causes him to access a secure terminal in a secure room as colleagues attempt access. Sanjay succumbs to his madness, ending the tone and his life in a graphic scene.

This introduction felt like X-files, and the theme song only accentuated that. I love hearing the theme song.

Mulder steals Sanjay's phone as he investigates the crime scene. Mulder brags that he's old school and Scully retorts she's old school, pre-google. The mini-series loves it's technology jokes. Mulder wants access to Dr. Goldman, but is rebuked.

Scully plays medical examiner again, and discovers the words 'founder's mutation' scrawled on Sanjay's hand. Censors definitely allow more gore these days. We get to see Sanjay's cranium removed.

Sanjay had said his kids were dying. Are they test subjects? Mulder and Scully go to Sanjay's apartment to find clues.

A janitor we saw in the DoD building is seen again on the street outside of Sanjay's apartment. On Sanjay's wall are images of kids with various deformities. Is it genetic testing?

While searching the house, Mulder hears the same tone as Sanjay and is crippled with pain.

Skinner is hard nose, ordering the case to be closed and ruled as a suicde. Mulder makes a Snowden reference, which illustrates the difference with the original. What was avante gard twenty years ago is less so now.

Mulder's office is back with lots of banker boxes and files. Now he uses a television instead of a slide projector. Mulder theorizes that the birds Sanjay saw outside were driven to the surface by sounds inaudible to humans.
Scully takes a moment to remind Mulder that, "This is dangerous." The dialog isn't as sharp as it should be.

The agents meet Agnes, a young pregnant woman in the hospital with a sick baby. I bet it's just like the kids Sanjay was researching. Agnes is later found dead with her baby surgically removed.

We get another episode with a reference to baby William. It's crazy to think Scully has a fifteen year old kid. She has a vision of William growing up. It's a bit much, but the thoughts are a part of her and affect her.

Mulder and Scully gain access to the reclusive Dr. Goldman who is into genetics and strange children diseases. All of the kids are in sealed rooms and the DoD is funding his research. The agents see a woman with telekinetic powers before they are ushered out.
The right child with the right DNA could create a new species. Is this what Goldman is after? Is this what the DoD is after?

The agents interview Goldman's wife who killed her unborn child. Jackie Goldman doesn't speak for ten minutes before throwing an apple at a cat. She and Mulder bond over not liking cats and she reveals her daughter could breathe underwater due to her husband's experiments on the embryo. Are his patients mutated by his own hand?

Jackie had run away from her husband with her unborn son. She manages to hit a deer and flip her car which is a feat unto itself.

Jackie hears a piercing tone, knowing it's her son. She has to stop the sound and stabs her belly, but that doesn't stop her son. Jackie is institutionalized. Is this son the janitor we've been seeing? Yes it is.

The janitor was fifteen feet away when Sanjay killed himself. We also saw the janitor near Sanjay's apartment. Someone was inside. It must be him. The janitor's name is Kyle.

Mulder and Scully drive to Kyle's mother's house. When the birds gather, Mulder goes down.

I'm unclear why Kyle targeted Sanjay. The show tells us he can't control his power, but he seemed in control every time I saw him. He targeted specific people.

Kyle is looking for his sister Molly, who happens to be the telekinetic girl we saw earlier. Kyle breaks a window and causes Dr. Goldman to bleed from his orifices. Molly subdues Mulder and Scully with her powers. This kids escape and that's it. It felt a little anti-climactic. A scene with the kids in a diner or something would have had more closure and hearkened to the episodes of years past.

The episode concludes with Mulder's visions of his son. Mulder's old fears invade the vision, his son abducted by aliens.

This episode wasn't bad. It definitely felt like X-files, though an average to below-average episode. I hope the mini-series builds from here. We had flashback or visions from Mulder, Scully, and Jackie Goldman. It felt a bit intrusive, but for Mulder and Scully the child they gave up is something that haunts them.

Episode 3 Introduction
The premise of the third episode and the fact it's written by the acclaimed Darin Morgan indicates we're going to get some of the humor from the original run. This looks to be more parody and less clever, but Morgan only wrote four episodes from the original run and each one by all accounts is considered a classic.

The original description for this episode listed it as a loose Scooby Doo parody taking place in a mansion. At some point between the original press release and the premiere of this episode that description has been changed.

Mulder and Scully are chasing a monster!

Recap: Episode 3 Mulder & Scully Meet the Were-monster
This one is more humorous but feels a lot like classic X-files. This episode asks us to reflect on the definition of a monster. Is it a lizard looking man? Is it the man who desires to have a job, but wants to quit said job once it's obtained?

The episode opens with two people huffing paint in the woods. They hear a commotion and see a monster attacking someone.

It's the were-monster!

When the episode resumes Mulder is in his office lamenting that the X-files have been explained. He wonders if it's time to put away childish ideas like Sasquatch and other theories. Scully reveals they have a case concerning a monster.

Mulder and Scully travel to the scene of the crime and talk to the animal control officer who was attacked, though he can't provide a description. The paint huffers described it as a lizard man. Kumail Nanjiani plays the animal control officer. Nanjiani started a podcast The X-files Files where he reviews episodes. He has interviewed crew from the show as well, and he managed to get a part in this episode.

Animal Control is on the job.

 Mulder pulls up a photo app on his phone to capture a photo of the monster, but has a bit of trouble.

Mulder is having trouble with his smart phone.

The monster attacks Mulder and the animal control officer, but the flash of the phone sends it running.

Mulder is down but not out.

Scully runs to Mulder after hearing the commotion, and they track the monster to a porta-potty or so they think, but there they find a man in the middle of business.

It's monstrous, but not the monster they seek.

During the autopsy of a victim, Mulder posits theories, one involving a horned toad that shoots blood from its eyes. As Scully tells him, "The internet is not good for you."

Mulder and Scully return to the motel for the night. Mulder hears the crazy motel manager scream "monster" and stumbles upon a hidden room that the manager uses to peep on guests. The manager saw the man from the porta-potty transform into the lizard monster.

Mulder recovers pills from the man's room and talks to his psychologist. The alias on the pills was Guy Mann.

Scully finds Guy Mann working at a cell phone store, but he's gone by the time Mulder arrives.

Based on a suggestion from the psychologist Mulder goes to the cemetery where he has a strange exchange with Guy Mann. Guy Mann tempts Mulder to kill him, but Mulder refuses, asking him how he got like this.

Guy states that the animal control officer bit him and that turned him into a human. He was normally a lizard and first transformed just three days ago.

Notice the Kim Manners headstone.

He has an insatiable desire to put on clothes and get a job. It's a were-man, not a were-monster. His curse is having all of the worries about a job, retirement, and money that a typical person does. It's a funny commentary on humanity and The X-files.

Guy Mann is dressed exactly like Carl Kolchak from Kolchak: The Night Stalker in a seersucker jacket and straw hat. That show served as inspiration for The X-Files.
The headstone that reads Kim Manners is a reference to long time director for The X-Files original run. He passed away in 2009.

Scully is flirting with Guy Mann... wait, what?

Guy lies about a run in with Scully, of which Mulder calls him on and Guy admits he has a compulsion to lie about his sex life.

Mulder has a difficult time believing Guy's story.

Scully is going to talk to the animal control officer again due to a discrepancy from a lab report. On the phone with Mulder, waiting for the officer, she mentions wanting a dog again like her dog in the original run, Queequeg. Queequeg has only been mentioned in the episodes Darin Morgan wrote.

Scully is attacked by the animal control officer while still on the phone. Mulder races to the office to find that Scully subdued the culprit. Mulder expresses concern about her safety, to which she replies she's immortal.
This is a callback to the episode Darin Morgan wrote, largely considered the best episode of X-Files history, Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose. Bruckman could predict how people would die. When Scully asked him how she would die, he replied that she doesn't, she's immortal. Fans have wondered if she is truly immortal or if Bruckman just telling her what she needed to hear, believing that no one should know how they die.
It turns out the animal control officer is the serial killer.

Mulder runs to the woods to find Guy Mann, wondering if just maybe his story is true. Mulder finds Mann in the woods, who informs Mulder he must hibernate for ten thousand years. Mulder finds such a concept incredulous, but Mann transforms before Mulder's very eyes and walks into the woods.

Mulder begins this episode wondering if he should stop believing in silly myths only to come full circle, presented with a real monster that he can't explain.
It's silly to think Mulder wouldn't believe in such things or should discard such ideas. He's seen enough in the original series to know there are things that can't be explain. In some ways this season feels like a soft reboot. There are too many things to list that Mulder can't explain. What about Scully's abduction? How can he discard that as silly myth? This new seasons has Mulder questioning what he believes and the ideas in this episode fit into that. This is a good episode, but I don't count it as a classic. It's trying to be a little too glib. Turning the premise on it's ear and having Mulder play disbeliever just doesn't work. Wouldn't he have stopped believing years ago? Why stop now that he has access to the X-files? Just look at the crazy conspiracies he and Tad O'Malley mentioned in the first episode.

Episode 4 Introduction
The premise of the fourth episode has Mulder and Scully investigating a death that couldn't have been done by a a human being. Looking for clues from the episode title, I wondered if this could be a Victor Eugene Tooms episode, as the premise sounds exactly like his first episode. It's unlikely, and it shouldn't be. This season needs to stand on it's own. The most infamous episode of The X-files that was banned from television is Home, about an inbred rural family. Are there clues to be gained from the title? I hope not.

We've seen three episodes so far. None of them are classics, I wouldn't rank any of them as top episodes. Episode 3 is the best, but the mood never reaches the level of creepiness that the original run did so well.

Mulder and Scully.

Recap: Episode 4 Home Again
The third episode is the best of this season, but it never felt dark enough to compare to the original series run. I never got away from the feeling that the monster was always a man in a lizard costume.

A city official named Cutler is forcing homeless off the street. When Cutler goes up to his office, a strange looking guy appears on the street after a garbage truck stops for a minute. A shadow appears at Cutler's door after his lights go out and phone cuts out. At this point Cutler pulls out a revolver from his desk drawer. Did hey really have an unsecured, loaded weapon in his desk drawer? That's got to be some kind of violation.

Cutler has a gun and he's not afraid to use it.

Cutler gets I ripped apart, literally. The added gore still surprises me. The trash man walked barefoot on broken glass after the door exploded and then ripped Cutler's arms off. Trash Man tosses the arms into a garbage truck and then hops inside. Roll the theme song.

The Trash Man cometh.

At the scene, Mulder and Scully find a footprint with no ridges. Scully has to leave suddenly when she gets a call that her mom had a heart attack. Do we have enough episodes to delve into something like this? It feels like trying to cram too much in. With the limited number of episodes are the writers trying to wrap up as much as possible in case the series doesn't get another season?

The scene of crime has cameras that were knocked out of place with no help of identification. Very convenient for the perpetrator. Mulder finds a used band aid stuck to his shoe and saves it, for science I assume.

AT the hospital, Scully works in her son William again. Is there going to be any payoff to that? He's mentioned often and even imagined in episode two. Scully is upset to learn her mom changed her living will to do not resuscitate.

Landry, Mulder, and Huff.

School board president Nancy Huff is arguing with another city official Landry. She doesn't want the homeless moved to a vacant hospital as proposed, as that puts them within two blocks of a school. She posits one of the homeless people killed Cutler, and that puts the children at risk. A homeless man interrupts the conversation to tell Mulder "Band aid nose man." How convenient. The graffiti near the crime scene has also disappeared.

Mulder took the band aid to the lab, but it is completely clean. The Material is neither organic nor inorganic.

The street graffiti that disappeared was taken. Two guys cut a portion of the billboard to resell it to an art gallery. The image actually disappears this time and the two art thieves are killed by Trash Man. The blank canvas is signed in the corner as Trash Man. Why did Trash Man rip second guy apart but not the first. What does he do with bodies? Where does this trash truck go?

This episode feels like a traditional monster of the week, though all of the episodes move quicker and don't create the mood the old ones did. It doesn't spend enough time giving you that feeling of unease.

Nancy Huff is playing an old timey downtown song that lets you know something bad will happen. Trash Man appears. Who drives Trash Man's truck? The truck appears outside of lady's house. When it pulls away, Trash Man appears. Is he decomposing or what? He wears a bandaid on his nose. Why? Is it because trash smells bad? What is the method to his killing? He appears inside the house and then outside within seconds. He throws some of her in the trash amd some in the truck, jumping back in again.

Scully's mom dies after telling Mulder her son's name is William too. Giving up her son for adoption is weighing heavily on Scully.

The lab is able to determine from where the paint from the Trash Man signature was obtained. Scully's has super fast internet on her phone. She knows the paint store that sells the exclusive paint in seconds. We get a heels and a back in the day joke in one line, how quanit.

They follow the buyer of the paint to a rundown, abandoned house . He points them to the basement where they see a guy that looks kind of like trash man but apparently blind. They find an artist and his studio in the basement. The artist insists on no lights. A sculpture of a head has a band aid on the nose. The artist insists if I cant see them, and they can't see me, I'm safe.

The artist claims he willed the trash man to existence. The emotion popped into the artists head to use violence, and now trash man uses it, killing people. The artist talks about responsibility and trash. People throw things away and then it's not their problem. When it's out of sight, it's out of mind.

The Trash Man sculpture.

Scully sees flashbacks of William's birth. The trash analogy connects with her, making her feel bad about giving her son up for adoption, like somehow she ducked responsibility.

Landry transplants the homeless to hospital. He smells trash and then the chaos of the hospital subsides. He's killed by Trash Man as Mulder and Scully are only seconds away but see no perpetrator exit the room.

The next scene depicts the artist leaving the abandoned house. His Trash Man sculpture now a smiley face, though there is a trash man mural on an exterior wall.

Scullys feels responsible for the son she gave up for adoption. She wants to know he is okay. She wonders if he thinks about her. How does he feels about what happened? She is plagued by these unanswered questions.

Episode 5 Introduction
In the fifth episode Mulder and Scully communicate with a comatose terrorist. With just two episodes left, this doesn't look like it will delve in to the overarching conspiracy. I guess they're are saving that for the final episode this year.

Welcome to the modern rendition of The X-files.

Recap: Episode 5 Babylon
This is my least favorite episode this season, worse than the muddled opener. It's a meta joke that never should have been made. Mulder and Scully are reduced to silly caricatures of themselves and we get two agents, Miller and Einstein, that are caricatures of Mulder and Scully. It feels like the modern remake of The X-files, and this remake misses the heart of the original. It misses what made the original good.

My guess is that the facsimiles of Mulder and Scully are primed for a full season reboot since Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny have indicated they aren't interested in a full season. I wouldn't be surprised with a season eleven featuring Miller and Einstein.

Young Mulder and Scully in a flashback? No!
It's agents Miller and Einstein.

This episode opens with a Muslim man praying. He picks up a friend and they drive to a museum. Before entering they ask Allah to ease their task, and then the building explodes.

Agents Miller and Einstein are on that case and come to Mulder and Scully.  Miller hopes to find a way to communicate to a comatose terrorist. Miller is the Mulder clone, open to the possibilities of the world.  Einstein is a more acerbic Scully, a medical doctor that stick to science. Mulder and Scully can provide no help.

At the airport, Miller and Einstein discuss their meeting. Einstein pities Scully stuck in the basement office, seeing it as a punishment. Miller opines the X-files as a dream job.

The only reason Scully would be there is because she loves Mulder, Einstein adds. Miller posits Mulder must value her open mind. It's this strange meta conversation that seems to have no relevance. The audience knows these things, we don't need the show to tell us.We especially don't need an episode about it.

Is next season Scully and Miller?

Scully calls Miller. She has an idea to communicate with the terrorist. Mulder calls Einstein. He also has a means of communication. It's too much of a wink and nod, and it's not even that clever of a joke.

Or is next season Einstein and Mulder?

Scully's method is to monitor brain waves, while Mulder's idea is to take hallucinogenic mushrooms. We're really distilling them down to absurdly simple ideologies.

What a strange trip this season has been.

The Lone Gunman cameo in Mulder's country western trip. The only catch is that Einstein gave Mulder a placebo. The power of suggestion is strong... I guess? Yet somehow, Mulder heard the location of the terror cell in his trip and the case is wrapped up before any more harm occurs.

This episode is just goofy. Mulder has a fake mushroom trip, yet still solves the case. The X-files became more humorous around season five. I still like the creepy episodes the best and this episode is definitely not creepy. The comatose terrorist is unnerving with his injuries, but it's not the same thing.

This episode concludes with Mulder and Scully walking hand in hand talking about everything they learned this episode and about the power of suggestion and hatred. Maybe I'm longing too much for the original episodes, but I'm pretty sure nobody asked for a modern remake. I believe the fans wanted more episodes like the original run.

It's a disappointing episode. The final episode goes back to the mythology. I'm glad this shortened season only devoted two episodes to the myth-arc. Any more would have just been a drag on the season.

Episode 6 Introduction
The sixth and final episode, as the title suggests, is a bookend to the first episode. Where the first episode focuses on Mulder, this one focuses on Scully.

They're here!

The X-files mini-series wasn't bad. There were some solid episodes, three and four, and weaker episodes, one and five. I'm guessing six is going to be a weak episode. It's going to be mythology and I'm betting it will leave the series open for another season, movie, etc. Or it may leave the season open for Agents Miller and Einstein. I'm glad Chris Carter didn't try to make six episodes of serial myth-arc.
My main complaint is that this season wasn't creepy and unnerving like the original run. This season relied more on humor (or even gimmicks) like the episodes after season five when the original series moved to Los Angeles. Granted there are some very good episodes in that run, but this season's episodes all felt like mimicry. The editing was always a bit too quick, never giving scenes time to become creepy.
I enjoyed this season and I want to watch it again, but I don't know if that's mostly nostalgia. I don't consider any episodes to rank among my favorites. Episode three - Mulder and Scully Meet the Were-monster had a great concept, but it didn't have much of a story, and it didn't pull everything together at the end. Episode 4 - Home Again felt more like a classic monster of the week episode, but it still felt weak. Episode 5 - Babylon was my least favorite. It felt like bad fan fiction and it reduced Mulder and Scully to caricatures.
Will we get another season of The X-files? I think we will, though the big question is which pair of agents will return?

Recap: Episode 6 My Struggle II
The sixth episode begins with Scully recapping her tenure at the FBI and her alien abduction in a scene that parallels the opening of episode one. She references her alien DNA again, the fact realized in episode one of this season. The CGI shot of Scully transforming to an alien was a neat trick, but a bit much. Just because the show can, doesn't mean it should.

O'Malley, it's me.

Mulder is gone, but Tad O'Malley is back and telling everyone about dormant alien DNA.

For some reason Einstein is with Scully and Skinner wondering what happened to Mulder. Scully needs to test Einstein's DNA because if she doesn't the plot will come to a halt. Scully needs a sample without alien DNA, but at the hospital they encounter a dazed man with lesions on his shoulder. The way he is introduced you know there will be more people with his symptoms.

 

Scully, Scully Jr., and young Mulder... I mean Miller.

Why are Miller an Einstein in this episode? Scully states it's already happening as she goes on a crazy rant. I have no idea what she is talking about. It's insane as she leaps to conclusions. It's pure nonsense and it may just be the craziest rant Scully has had in this show. She sums it up stating that "Anthrax is the canary in the coal mine." She's digging deep, but not coming up with anything worthwhile. For whatever reason the population's immune systems will fail.

Miller conveniently clicks on a computer icon that locates Mulder's exact location.

Contrivances come in pairs, so Scully gets a mystery call from someone who can explain everything. It's Monica Reyes because this season needs someone to represent seasons eight and nine.

After Mulder and Scully blew up the Cigarette Smoking Man (CSM), the show ret-conned him back into existence and he summoned Reyes. He's going to de-populate the world. I don't remember him being a megalomaniac before. I guess rising from the dead changes you.

A great action scene. Mulder can handle himself.

The CSM sends a messenger for Mulder. In one of the best fight scenes of The X-files history, Mulder and the messenger square off, ending in Mulder's success, asking the man, "Who are you?"

Mulder meets CSM who claims to have changed the time table and offers Mulder a spot at the big table, assuring him Scully will be there too. CSM removes his mask and reveals he looks like Red Skull. I don't know why that was necessary. The show uses CGI now, that's great. Miller finds Mulder while Einstein and Scully tro to science out a cure.

Can a cure really be developed that quickly? How are they going to distribute it?

Hospitals are over run as anthrax cases give away to flu and bacterial infections. It's the Spartan virus. The world is dying and only Scully's DNA can save it.

Tad is an unnecessary addition that updates us on information we already know. The virus is breaking out everywhere and everybody needs a little bit of Scully. I tired of the frequent cuts to his 'show'.

 

Scully needs her kid but doesn't know where she is. The episode and season end with a space ship appearing over the bridge. Miller and Scully look up at the pale blue lights of the ship.

 

A parting shot of Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny.

This episode was full of nonsense. As the minutes ticked down I wondered if we'd get a to be continued. We didn't, but we also didn't get any answers. It it aliens or government? The show seemed to distinctly setup a quest for find Scully's son. So long X-files, see you next year.