Xfilesseason2

The X-Files Season 2 (1994)

Picking up from the last season’s cliffhanger, the X-Files are closed. Mulder decides the FBI isn’t for him and becomes the manager of a local Home Depot while Scully decides to bear it all in several dozen soft-core skin flicks which aired on the Showtime channel. Walter Skinner tries to grow hair, then becomes a white supremacist, then tries to make meth in a trailer park, only to be beaten up by a biker gang at every turn, and The Cigarette Smoking man gets so many Marlboro miles he buys a really sweet NASCAAR jacket.

And the series ends.

No, not really. But the show did air on FOX, and would it really surprise anyone if things turned out that way? This is the network that canceled Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles for Dollhouse then axed that a season later…damn you FOX…damn you to hell…

In reality, FOX wasn’t too happy when they found out Gillian Anderson was pregnant, and wanted the role of Agent Scully recast. Chris Carter, the creator of the show, said “NOPE!” and shot around her ever-increasing belly. This explains why she’s not around so much in the earlier part of the season. And now, just take a moment to imagine the show without Gillian Anderson…wait, dear reader, you can’t? Me either. It would have crashed and burned and FOX would have lost one of the greatest shows it ever broadcast. Don’t argue this, it’s true. Gillian Anderson speaks to me on cold, lonely nights, and this is what she tells me.

The show itself is still trying to find its legs during this season, but it’s getting better at playing off the strengths and hiding the weaknesses. The episodes range from “I don’t regret wasting an hour but I won’t re-watch in on purpose again” to “HOLY CRAP THAT WAS FANTASTIC!” The mythology gains a key player, too, in the form of Alex Krycek, quite possibly one of my favorite characters in the series and one of the greatest villains of all time, when he shows up to be Mulder’s partner while Scully is doing autopsies or teaching med students. We first make his acquaintance in the fourth episode, ‘Sleepless’.

Not revealing too many spoilers here, but he’s a bad guy. Or, not really a bad guy, but his motives seem bad to Mulder. Or maybe he is a bad guy, and just works for the good guys? Or is he a good guy working for the bad guys? You never know with Krycek, and that’s what makes his character so special.

Three of my favorite episodes are in this season. The two part arc of Duane Barry and Ascension, where an ex-FBI agent holds a group of people hostage in a travel agency because he claims to have been abducted by a UFO. The latter episode sees Barry kidnap Scully from her home to try and offer her up as a trade to the aliens.

The other episode, ‘Humbug,’ is where the series really starts to find itself. Mulder and Scully are sent to a Florida town filled with sideshow freaks to investigate a series of ritualistic murders. Jim Rose and his traveling freak show guest star in the episode, and it’s played for a lot of laughs. This is the first time the series doesn’t take itself 100% seriously and can actually play around a bit, and that makes it one hell of an episode. I’m really glad they kept this tone and feel for later episodes of the series. They make for a nice break from the heavy, mind warping mythology outings some seasons can get really caught up in.

It’s still basically the same show it was in the first season, for better and for worse. Thankfully, it’s a lot more of the better this time around. It’s picking up quite a bit of steam, from a story standpoint, and really leads you into the third season with a desire to see what’s next.

2 ½ out of 4

reviewed by Seth Moore