This was a weird, stressful week, and life in general is only going to get even weirder and confusing starting for all of us in the US on Monday. I really meant to be trying to stay ahead of these episode reviews for at least the next couple weeks, since I’m going to be moving at the start of February. I still do have hopes I can get next week’s review written on the Monday holiday (distraction!) and then stay ahead so I’m not overwhelmed come my 8 February review, but we shall see. If I wrote several reviews this summer while travelling and then semi-delirious from COVID, I can keep up with these reviews amidst moving and impending fascism and working way too much, right? 🥲🥲
(Agreeing, or at least not explicitly saying no, to working ~50 hour weeks, teaching two labs this semester plus my main job, might have been a mistake)
All of that is to say that uh, well, I did start this with good intentions. I watched this episode last Sunday afternoon and 100% meant to keep up with writing the review throughout the week at the very least. And yet, here we are once again, mid-afternoon on Saturday aaaaaaaand I’m just starting the review.
Probably doesn’t help that this particular episode is also just…strange. It’s not bad, exactly, but it’s confusing and doesn’t really come together as a nice cohesive story. Overall, I think the story has a lot of really nice elements, and Mitch Pileggi did a truly incredible job telling us a story about Skinner, given the script he was working with. But, as we’ll get into, the “supernatural” part of the story seemed just kind of…plopped in there randomly, I guess to…keep with the supernatural monster-of-the-week pattern? It would’ve been more interesting to me if there was zero supernatural part to this story and it was purely a tangential conspiracy/mythology story. Because in the end, it does seem like that’s the idea the writers were trying to go for here. We just never really get down into what the fuck happened in this episode, instead spending time getting distracted by vague theories of supernatural causes that…do not seem to play any role at all by the end.
Notably, we are also approaching the end of season 3. This is episode 21 in a 24 episode season. Just like we had toward the end of seasons 1 and 2, looking back I get the sense the writers and producers were kind of just trying to fill time and space. This particular episode was written to center around Skinner because Duchovny and Anderson were exhausted (whyyyyyyy did we ever allow 20+ episode seasons, honestly???), which is good in theory, but not really a good reason to write a whole story if the idea wasn’t already there.
It’s still an enjoyable enough watch, and I did really like learning a little bit more about Skinner’s past and his struggles with his job and loyalties. The aspects of the story that the writers chose to focus on seemed off, though, and the story could’ve been written and told a lot better in my opinion, if there had maybe been more time and more incentive for a Skinner-centered show…not just incentive to write one to give Duchovny and Anderson some much deserved time off.
Well, let’s get into it, yes? 🙂
The Case: Skinner is a Murder Suspect
First, the episode opens with poor Skinner in his lawyer’s office. It is pouring rain outside, he is sad, and deliberately avoiding signing official divorce papers presented by his wife.
Skinner News #1: He’s married (though not for much longer).
Despite pleas from his lawyer, who is probably (?) the one who could get reprimanded for the official papers not being signed on time, Skinner leaves the office without signing the divorce papers. What’s one more day, right? One more day to wallow in the grief of your impending divorce, while still being officially married.
As grieving lonely people do, Skinner ends up sitting alone in a random hotel bar, drinking. A rather attractive young woman (Carina) approaches him, asking to take the seat next to him. She claims she’s being (mildly) harassed by another overenthusiastic man, meaning Skinner comes to her rescue, heroically offering to sit by and talk to an attractive woman.
And with a combo of probably several drinks and grief over his impending official divorced status, Skinner ends up getting a room at the hotel and taking Carina to bed with him.
Skinner. Need I remind you that you didn’t sign those divorce papers, and you actually are still married??? 😭
Anyway, they have sex. We see this from Skinner’s perspective, and halfway through their romp together, suddenly he sees not Carina above him, but an old gray-haired woman.
Until, that is, Skinner wakes up. To find Carina lying in bed next to him, her neck broken. Did someone else enter their room somehow? Did Skinner kill her intentionally, but doesn’t remember? Or, perhaps, did he kill her in his sleep, while he was dreaming of the older woman?
Unfortunately, Skinner claims to not remember anything after he and Carina got the room together. It’s actually not even clear if he remembers having sex with her. And with no alibi, a refusal to take a polygraph test, and no initial evidence of any other intruders in the hotel room, our Assistant Director Skinner is now the prime suspect in a murder case.
Scully conducts an autopsy on Carina’s body, finding that she was indeed strangled and her neck broken, with no other evidence of a violent struggle. Suggesting that Carina was either killed in her sleep, or perhaps very quickly and suddenly during an otherwise very intimate act. Skinner’s fingerprints are the only ones on her body, again really just solidifying him as the prime suspect. Sure, there’s always the possibility I suppose that someone else entered the room wearing gloves, and this stranger killed Carina, but the only actual evidence collected paints Skinner as the prime suspect. A prime suspect claiming memory loss and refusing a polygraph (though, honestly points from me there since polygraphs are bullshit pseudoscience). Doing absolutely nothing at all to help clear his name or present evidence of other suspects.
Despite this seeming for all intents and purposes a very open and shut murder case, neither Mulder nor Scully are ready to let this go. Yes, they don’t really know anything about Skinner’s private life, but they do know he has done nothing but stick his neck out to save their careers (and lives!) many times over. Any other investigator would probably stop at the most logical suspect, who isn’t even trying to defend himself. But Mulder and Scully, they’ll keep digging to see if there’s anything at all suspicious about the victim, or the circumstances Skinner found himself in.
Now, one thing that Scully does find at the very end of her autopsy: Carina’s body has a strange glowing/fluorescent substance around the nose and mouth, visible only once the lights are turned off. This strange new evidence doesn’t necessarily contradict the “a broken neck killed Carina” finding, but is something more to investigate and question. What else might have happened to Carina before or after her death?
Back to that later, but first, our agents are off to do some investigating into our victim. Turns out Carina has more than one side: In addition to working as a secretary, she worked as an escort for a very high-end escort service in DC. Could Carina possibly have other enemies then, from this second job? Powerful men in government who don’t want the details of their intimate private lives getting out?
A possibility. But, we also learn further details that continue to not paint Skinner in the best light either. The head of the escort service (Lorraine) informs Mulder and Scully that Carina was working for her the night before, as an escort. Carina gave Lorraine Skinner’s name and credit card number for her services. Which would suggest that Skinner knew what he was doing the night before. Yes, he wasn’t exactly in the best state to be making decisions about who he took to bed and when but…he gave his credit card number.
Or did he? Note that Lorraine only said that she took Skinner’s credit card info from Carina. She never spoke to him directly. And when later confronted by Mulder, Skinner seemed surprised to learn that Carina was an escort. It would be very easy for Carina to take Skinner’s card out of his wallet after their encounter, while he was asleep, and pass off the information to her boss. High end sexual/financial fraud.
Now, Skinner does still look suspicious, but the suggestion that Skinner really might not have known that Carina wanted payment for her services makes her look at least somewhat suspicious as well. We still don’t have enough information to clear Skinner’s name, or to provide an alternate theory as to how the murder happened. Indeed, Skinner himself doesn’t seem 100% sure what transpired the night before. He still hasn’t told anyone about his dream (or hallucination), or the fact that he’s depressed about his divorce, or overall, his general very troubled mental state.
At this point, Mulder has more confidence that Skinner didn’t murder anyone than Skinner himself does. Because these past months have not been an easy time for Skinner:
Inside Skinner’s Troubled Mental State
Digging some into Skinner’s recent past, Scully finds that for the past several months, he has been receiving treatment for REM sleep disorder behavior. This is a disorder that causes people to act out their dreams while they are sleeping. A relatively rare disorder all things considered, but one that has been the cause of dozens of cases of sleep-related violence. With this disorder, people remember what they were dreaming about, and likely even that in their dream they were reacting to the dream events—such as trying to push off an attacker in a dream, or running away from a train as in the example that Scully gives. But, because they are still asleep, sufferers are not conscious of the fact that they are physically acting out their dream reactions, and potentially harming themselves or others in the room with them.
So, if Skinner has indeed been suffering from RBD, this could be a very reasonable explanation for what happened that night. He was dreaming about something, or someone attacking him, and reacted while he was still asleep. Reacted by strangling the person in bed next to him, thinking she was the figure from his dream. Which would explain why Skinner does not remember attacking Carina: He wasn’t conscious while he did so. He thought he was still in his dream, and wasn’t aware of his physical body movements.
What has Skinner been dreaming about, that caused him to visit the Bethesda Sleep Clinic? According to his patient records, he has had a recurring dream of an old woman visiting him in his dreams—just like what we see him hallucinate in his dream of having sex with Carina. Sometimes, the old woman straddles Skinner’s chest in his dream, suffocating him. Which, uh, yeah, that’s pretty violent and would certainly cause one to react violently against the dream figure. And, unfortunately, if anyone else is in the room, against that other person in bed.
The theory that Skinner attacked Carina in his sleep, and doesn’t remember doing so is a perfectly reasonable one all by itself. It’s further possible, I think, that since Skinner hasn’t been sleeping well, was drinking, and upset about his divorce, perhaps his dreams that night, as well as his body’s physical reactions, became even more pronounced and violent, leading the unfortunate accidental murder of his sexual partner.
Now, I’m not so sure that Skinner would be willing to use that as a defense in court. He is actually probably already frightened of exactly the scenario that Scully lays out here: That he killed Carina by accident, acting out in his sleep. Even if that is possibly a defense that could be used in court (sleepwalking has been a successful defense in a handful of cases), I’m not so sure that Skinner would be willing to put it forward even to save himself. First, from what we gather he is incredibly private and likely wouldn’t want to admit his troubled dreams and overall increasingly unstable mental state. And second, even if he did, I think Skinner would have a really hard time living with the knowledge that he killed someone, someone who was completely innocent. Even if he did it unconsciously, without intent. I get the sense that Skinner still feels he is at fault there, unable to control his mind and his actions. Resulting in the death of an innocent woman.
So. We have that as one theory: Skinner killed Carina in his sleep, reacting to a dream, but doesn’t want to admit or face the facts of what happened.
Mulder, being Mulder, of course has a second theory upon hearing that Skinner has been dreaming of an old woman. Maybe, just maybe, this old woman is actually real, and has been haunting Skinner in more than just his dreams…
A Succubus Attached to Skinner?
Mulder’s theory is that the old woman is in fact a succubus, a spirit who visits men at night “usually” in the form of an old woman.
OK, I know this is all completely mythological supernatural stuff, but I have no idea where Mulder or the writers are getting their myths from. Granted, I haven’t done a deep, deep dive into succubus mythology either, but my surface research tells me that a succubus was actually usually described to be an attractive young woman, though one with bird claws or a snake’s tail on closer look. Succubi were further described as needing to have sex with men for their own survival and, yes, becoming attached to the men they visit. Just as Mulder describes.
But I couldn’t find anything that suggested a succubus would harm other women who got close to “her” man. Instead, the repeated sexual visits by this…demon (?) creature would tend to harm the man himself, as she took sexual energy from him to survive.
Again, I recognize this is all mythology anyway, but I am curious where exactly the writers got their research from. Or, if as often seems to happen, the writers just heard the term “succubus” and decided to mostly create their own mythology around the term. It’s probably the latter. Which I don’t actually have as much of a problem with this time, since succubus mythology is fairly widespread throughout cultures and history, so at least they weren’t appropriating and misrepresenting an indigenous cultural myth this time.
Anyway. Mulder’s theory here is that Skinner is being haunted by a succubus, in the form of an old woman. He suggests also that sometimes succubi may become so attached to “her” man that she attacks any woman who comes close to him. Perhaps, then, it was the succubus that killed Carina, and not Skinner at all.
Surprisingly, Scully reacts to this theory as if it’s a perfectly reasonable one. It’s…incredibly out of character for her that she listens to Mulder’s theory, studies the drawing he shows her, and then decides that the weird fluorescent glow around Carina’s mouth must indeed be evidence that a succubus attacked Carina!!! I dunno, maybe Scully is also desperate to find any explanation that does not implicate Skinner (conscious or unconscious) as the murderer. And she did see that strange glow…
Unfortunately, the glow around Carina’s mouth and nose is no longer present when Scully takes Mulder down to view the body. Further, the sample she collected and sent off to one of the FBI labs found no analyzable substance in the container. Does this mysterious succubus substance disappear over time? Is someone (supernatural demon or otherwise) covering their tracks, destroying the evidence?
And, finally, if this succubus is real, who else might be in danger because they are close to Skinner?
Sharon Skinner in Danger
At the surface, you’d think that Skinner’s soon-to-be ex-wife shouldn’t actually be in much danger, right? Even if there is a jealous succubus attached to Skinner. Sharon is the one who asked for the divorce, Skinner moved out, and from what we hear Sharon tell Mulder and Scully, their marriage hasn’t been a close one for quite a long time now. If there is indeed a succubus, Sharon Skinner really isn’t currently much of a “threat” or competition for Skinner’s affections.
Except, seeing first hand Skinner’s strange behavior, and hearing about him possibly being a murder suspect, Sharon is now suddenly very concerned about her soon-to-be ex-husband. Sure, they don’t have a close relationship, and maybe they never really did, with Skinner increasingly refusing to let his wife in on his thoughts and fears. But Sharon still cares about the man she spent (probably) a couple decades of her life with, and she wants to be there to…comfort him?
The little scene with Sharon and Walter in his house is another kind of bizarre little interlude that doesn’t really go anywhere. I think the only purpose was maybe to show that Sharon was trying to get close to him again, just a little bit. So, if there is indeed a succubus, the demon would have a reason to be jealous again. I guess? But nothing at all really happens. Sharon talks to her husband, begs him to open up just a little bit for her, strokes his cheek and…she leaves. They don’t even kiss!
Still, the fact that Sharon went to visit Skinner at all was enough to put her in danger. Either from a succubus, or Skinner himself, or (maybe) whoever is trying to frame Skinner. After falling asleep on his couch holding one of their wedding photos (how sweet and sad!), Skinner is woken up again by the police, who tell him his wife has been in a terrible car accident. Driven off the road by another car.
It is a bit confusing though why Skinner is immediately the suspect in his wife’s accident as well. Was there a description of Skinner’s car from a witness to the accident? Maybe, but then if there was a witness to the accident, who presumably called it in immediately, how would Skinner have had enough time to return home? Is Skinner just the first suspect because Sharon is his wife, and he’s been acting suspicious already—already a suspect for one murder—and…the police don’t want to investigate anyone else? Perhaps, there is a deeper motive pushing Skinner as the suspect (more on that conspiracy in a little bit). Overall it just seems to me that the police focus in on Skinner as the cause of Sharon’s accident a bit too quickly, without, as far as we are told, any initial evidence that the car that caused the accident was Skinner’s.
Now, OK, they do turn out to be correct (at least on the surface). Skinner’s car, now back in the garage, has the exact front end damage that would be expected based on where Sharon’s car was hit. The airbag was deployed (side note: Can you really drive with a deployed airbag???) The engine to the car was still warm when the police got to Skinner’s house, indeed suggesting he could have just returned from driving it. And, just like on Carina’s body, Skinner’s prints are the only ones found in the car. Which does again make Skinner indeed the most logical suspect, especially with his very recent unstable behavior and the murder he’s a suspect in, which he claims no memory of.
Plus, once again Skinner’s only alibi is that he was asleep, alone. Mulder and Scully both still desperately want to believe their boss is innocent, and they want to help figure out what is happening. But first, Skinner needs to help himself and tell someone about the visions he’s been having:
The Old Woman: Demon or Guardian Angel?
Faced with being a suspect in his wife’s accident, Skinner is finally willing to at least tell Mulder a little bit about his dreams, and his fears of what is happening to him.
Yes, Skinner has been receiving treatment for his sleep disorder for the past several months. But it turns out this is not the first time he has encountered the figure of that old woman. The woman first came to Skinner during his near-death experience in Vietnam, when he was the sole survivor of a violent ambush on his company. The old woman watched Skinner bleeding out for a while, but in the end picked him up and brought him to safety. Saving his life. At the time, like the majority of young men who found themselves in a terrible war, Skinner coped with various drugs, and so dismissed the old woman as yet another hallucination. But she did save his life, back then.
And now she’s back, at least in his dreams. Why return now, 25+ years later? If she was a succubus, wouldn’t we think the demon would “need” Skinner and stay attached to him for that whole time? Further, if a succubus was going to feel threatened by other women, why wouldn’t the succubus have attacked Sharon, you know…over two decades ago?
To be clear, we never get an answer to any of this, and this is partly why I find the random insertion of the “succubus theory” and the old woman overall incredibly frustrating and honestly kind of unnecessary? My theory, however, is that the old woman is in fact not a demon, but some form of guardian angel, coming to Skinner in times of need. She saved him all those years ago in Vietnam, and maybe, just maybe, has returned to him now to warn him. I don’t have an explanation for why in his dreams the old woman sometimes seems to suffocate Skinner. Perhaps she’s just really trying to get him to wake up. Wake up to the conspiracy threatening his career and his life. Wake up to realize where his loyalties lie, and what work he needs to do with the position he has in the FBI.
Uncovering a Deeper Conspiracy to Weaken Skinner
Our first real hint that maybe Skinner is being framed for these murders—in attempt to bring him down and discredit him—is seeing CSM watch Skinner and Mulder talk about the old woman from Skinner’s dreams.
We further learn that despite no real concrete evidence being enough to charge Skinner in either the murder or Sharon’s accident, his recent behavior at least is enough to put Skinner’s job in jeopardy. Scully and Mulder are called to speak on Skinner’s behalf in front of some other FBI directors. Mulder, still trying to clear Skinner’s name, misses this meeting, and all Scully can tell them is what I just stated: Yes, Skinner looks suspicious, but none of the evidence by itself is concrete enough to convict Skinner without a doubt of either the murder or his wife’s accident.
The FBI committee doesn’t seem particularly concerned about that, though. Instead of questioning Scully further about the evidence, they bring up the fact that Skinner keeps signing off on whatever the “X-files” unit investigates. The subtext is clear: Skinner is no longer doing his job—keeping Mulder in check and making sure The Syndicate is able to continue doing its work, covering up gross injustices against the public.
Notable also is the fact that The Syndicate already tried to kill Skinner—or, CSM and his pet assassin did, at least. That attempt on his life back in “Piper Maru” failed. Not only failed to kill him, but also failed in threatening Skinner or putting him “in his place”, as Skinner was more determined than ever following his shooting to solve Melissa Scully’s murder and help his favourite pet FBI agents.
Also, we should remember that the rest of The Syndicate wasn’t exactly happy about CSM’s (apparent) plan to assassinate Skinner. Killing a powerful FBI assistant director would only draw attention to their activities. Better to leave Skinner alive, but discredited and without hope. With no one at the FBI on Mulder and Scully’s side anymore.
MULDER: I think Skinner's probably worth more to them alive in disgrace than dead and buried.
Solving (???) the Case
Though Skinner is currently out of a job, Mulder does have new “evidence” to possibly at least incriminate someone else in Sharon Skinner’s accident. With the help of our beloved Agent Pendrell, he was able to determine that someone else was driving Skinner’s car and left the impression of their face on the deployed airbag. So, if someone else was driving Skinner’s car, that same person could’ve killed Carina, right? All in an effort to frame Skinner, make his behavior seem unstable, and completely discredit him.
Unfortunately, the people working so hard to frame Skinner are several steps ahead of our agents still. When Mulder and Scully return to Lorraine’s (remember: the boss of the escort agency), they found she has already been killed. Though the scene was staged to look like a suicide. The men framing Skinner got to Lorraine first, before she could tell Mulder and Scully that another man hired Carina.
Apparently this mystery man from the pixelated facial recreation regularly works with Lorraine’s company to hire out escorts…but not for himself. Another escort, Judy, seems to imply that the mystery man hires out escorts to kind of…trap (?) powerful government men. Probably not usually to frame powerful men for murder, but I can imagine rather as a form of blackmail: “Hey, I have evidence that you hired a prostitute. Pass this law, or stop this law from passing, or I’ll put that information out you and humiliate you.”
(Side note: Ah, a vestige of slightly better days. Sadly, this form of blackmail would not work today, since no one cares. See Matt Gaetz.)
Mulder and Scully have Judy call the mystery man so they can now trap him, hopefully, trying to cover up his tracks once again. I assume they’re hoping to catch the mystery man in the act of trying to kill Judy, the last open thread who could reveal this conspiracy. Unfortunately this plan almost doesn’t work: The mystery man slips past Mulder waiting downstairs to catch him and enters the hotel room where Scully and Judy are waiting. He knocks Scully out and comes very close to killing Judy before we have Skinner entering to save the day, actually murdering someone this time.
Soooo, how did Skinner know where to go? Also frustratingly unclear. At least in part, we can theorize that he knew he was being framed because Sharon woke up after he poured (some of) his heart out to her and told him that she saw the man who was driving the other car. But, how on earth did Skinner know to go to that specific hotel, to that specific room? More messages from his “guardian angel” old woman, perhaps?
After the mystery man is murdered, all of the cases are closed quite quickly. There really isn’t much of anything to link the (dead) mystery man to Carina’s death or Sharon’s accident. In the latter case, likely Sharon regaining consciousness and remembering Skinner wasn’t driving the other car cleared his name there. But everyone seems to just forget about solving exactly what happened to Carina?
This is seemingly a whole conspiracy thing, orchestrated by CSM, so of course with one of their men dead, they will want to cover their tracks and not push further investigation of the case(s). Even if, yes, that means they failed to fully discredit Skinner, and he is now back in his job as Assistant Director. Innocent, perhaps, but also discredited and suspicious jussssssst enough that maybe at least he doesn’t have as much pull or respect among other FBI directors now.
So, this whole episode is bizarre, right? We started with the theory that a succubus killed Carina, and ended with the (strong) suggestion that this was all a conspiracy to frame Skinner and remove him from the FBI, so it would be even easier to discredit and stop the work of the “X-files” unit. Except we don’t really have any evidence of that conspiracy, either. The slightest hint we get is CSM watching Skinner and Mulder in the interview room.
My remaining question here, though, is if this all was a conspiracy, no succubus involved, what the fuck was that mysterious glowing green substance around Carina’s mouth?!?! Did the mystery murderer put it there, maybe hoping that Mulder, or even Skinner, would really push the supernatural theory, which would really work to discredit Skinner and make everyone think he’s unstable? It’s just weird and frustrating to me that the succubus theory lasts for like…one scene, and then we move on to Skinner being framed by the government.
Overall, I guess I personally just would’ve preferred that we focused more the conspiracy aspect, maybe even completely removing the random succubus theory. Maybe Skinner has been suddenly struggling and seeing the woman from his Vietnam days again because CSM has been drugging him, causing unstable behavior and memory loss. I mean, I recognize we already had that scenario at the end of season 2 with Mulder, but I would’ve liked more of an explanation as to 1) Why the old woman suddenly reappeared to Skinner and 2) How exactly CSM (and whoever else) worked to frame Skinner. Including what the fuck they might have done to have that mysterious green glowing substance appear on Carina’s mouth…
The case is closed at least, if maybe not fully solved. Skinner’s name has been cleared…and maybe CSM (and others) hope that these events might work to actually put Skinner on edge and make him think twice about going against their directives for the “X-files” unit.
Our “Completely Platonic Coworkers”
Sadly, we’ve got nothing. No silly flirting between Mulder and Scully, and also zero chemistry between Skinner and his wife. Instead, we get just get a weird, uncomfortable sex scene with Skinner and a prostitute who he…imagines as an old woman.
The X-Files is a Comedy
A single casual little joke here from our porn (and sex?) obsessed Mulder, who is at least happy that Skinner is having safe sex while having a mental breakdown:
The 90s™
I don’t really have anything here, either. I guess, as I’ll get to in one of the “goofs” I point out, the incredibly pixelated images that were generated from the “latent image” or whatever left in the airbag are very “Oh. Wow. I guess that was considered high tech for the 90s?”
Goofs/Bloopers/Fun Facts
Goofs:
The aforementioned incredibly pixelated image. Again, I’m sure this was high tech for 1996, so I don’t have any problem with that. I don’t know if it’s truly possible to recreate a face from the impression that was left on an airbag, but let’s put that to the side for now and just focus on the goof: How on EARTH was the other prostitute able to actually recognize a man from this super grainy, pixelated image?!
There were notably several times when someone who was “dead” was clearly either breathing or their eyes were moving under the closed lids. Not even like “you had to really be looking”, but noticeable even while mainly focusing on Mulder and Scully speak
This mostly just again speaks to my feeling that a lot of this episode—its writing, production, and filming—were quite rushed, and everyone on the cast and crew was exhausted by this point in a very long season
Fun (?) facts:
Mitch Pileggi's sex scene with guest actress Amanda Tapping was supposed to be a closed set, but David Duchovny insisted on barging onto the set and giving him notes.
What the FUCK, David?
One of the parts of this episode was that it's mainly set in a torrential downpour.
However, this was one of the few times that it wasn’t raining at all in Vancouver, so all the rain had to be created by the crew.
When Skinner talks about his past in Vietnam, he says he was "no choir boy; (he) inhaled."
This is a reference to Bill Clinton's answer, when asked, that he tried marijuana once in college, but he swore he didn't inhale.
A scene between Skinner and The Smoking Man was removed from the final cut due to time considerations.
WHY was this cut, but all the weird talk about the succubus was left in?!?! A confrontation or discussion with CSM would’ve been 1000x more interesting than trying to shoehorn in some vague supernatural “explanation” for the events
According to writer Vince Gilligan, Skinner was originally supposed to be a villain, but because Mitch Pileggi was such a good actor, the writers decided to make his character an ally to Mulder and Scully.
Overall Thoughts/Summary
Episode rating: 5/10. This episode had a fairly strong foundation: A conspiracy to frame Skinner for murder(s) in order to discredit him and finally remove a strong ally of Mulder and Scully. I just don’t feel the story here was executed very well. The conspiracy part got muddled with the random brief suggestion of a succubus being involved. Other than briefly seeing CSM spy on Mulder and Skinner, we don’t know how this conspiracy was executed. As I noted above, apparently a scene with CSM and Skinner was cut due to time, which I feel was a poor decision. We’ll never know what that scene was or what it might’ve revealed, but I still strongly feel this would’ve been a much better episode if the supernatural plot point was removed entirely. I wish we’d explored the conspiracy to frame Skinner more.
Despite those (pretty heavy) faults in my opinion, the episode remains at least an enjoyable enough watch. I think that largely comes down to Mitch Pileggi’s incredible performance. With the script and plot he had to work with, Pileggi did an incredible job portraying Skinner’s troubled state. I am glad Skinner becomes a central character in the show and (minor spoiler?) a forever ally to Mulder and Scully. He does make the show stronger, and though the plot of this episode was bizarre and meandering, it was nice to learn a little more about Skinner, and the struggles he’s been feeling about his job and the work he is sometimes asked to do. Skinner himself is learning where his loyalties lie, finding his strength and power to fight back, even when that means his life and career might end up in jeopardy.
X-files cases “solved” to date: This is another difficult one that I’m not really sure how to classify. It certainly seems by the very end of the episode that they determined who was behind the murders…and Skinner shot him before the man could kill the second prostitute. Now, none of our agents quite seem to figure out that (it appears) CSM/The Syndicate were really behind this whole deal but well…that’s also kind of on the writers for making it very unclear what the fuck was happening throughout the case.
But you know what, I think as far as the FBI is concerned, this case is closed and the man responsible for the murders of Carina and Lorraine and attempted murder of Sharon is now dead. So, I’m gonna go ahead and give them this one.
14/18 cases for the season, 49.5/66 overall.
Next week we have “Quagmire”, which is one of my favourites. It’s another fun little nature mystery, with some very good Mulder and Scully interactions. Season 3 ends with a nice series of very good episodes, so at least we have that to look forward to over the next couple of weeks.
Everyone stay safe and as sane as possible tomorrow (the 20th!) ❤