War of the Coprophages
“Waste is a terrible thing to waste”
This is a truly delightful episode, which I think is something we really need right now, particularly after the mytharc about the dangers of fascism (…and some plot points our current administration could get ideas from) and last week’s episode about the dangers of fundamental Christianity. Plus, even before those rather…unfortunately all too real, depressing storylines, we had a nice string of episodes that gave us commentary on the injustice of the “justice” system and evil men preying on lonely, innocent women and girls. The last “fun” episode we had was the brilliance of “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose”, but even there—while that remains one of my absolute favourite episodes—the take home message is a bit of a downer.
We’re definitely due for some pure, ridiculous, but brilliant fun from the mind of Darin Morgan this week.
Now, I will say that this particular episode falls short just a little bit compared to his previous two brilliant episodes (“Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose” and “Humbug”) because the ending of this particular…plot is a bit messy and unresolved. Darin Morgan himself wasn’t actually terribly pleased with the end result here. I do think it’s brilliant, and hilarious, and a truly enjoyable episode, but there is a…lack of cohesiveness, and a lot of really good ideas that didn’t quite come to a complete story. This episode, while brilliant (I swear Darin Morgan is one of the few show writers who really understands the show and the relationship between Mulder and Scully) doesn’t quite reach a 10/10 rating.
Because there’s that lack of cohesiveness, and a little bit of “messy” philosophy just sprinkled throughout the episode, this review is not going to be as in depth or long as some of my recent ones have been. I mean, I always hesitate to say that, because inevitably I go off on some random research tangent but. Expect this review to be more in line with my thoughts on “Humbug”, another largely just brilliantly hilarious episode. Also expect that this review will include a higher than usual number of GIFs and videos, because I do think to fully understand the humour and brilliance here, you do need to see some of the scenes. So, warning from the start that it’ll probably be “longer than your e-mail client can show” or whatever in an individual e-mail, but just click to see the full message. 😉
I feel I should also go ahead and warn you off the bat: This episode is about cockroaches. I am not going to include any images or GIFs of the cockroaches in this review, and I will try my best to not be too graphic regarding any of the scenes the roaches are involved in. But. Cockroaches are the foundation of this episode sooooooo if even reading about cockroaches freaks you out, probably stop reading this review now. You could skip ahead to the “completely platonic” coworkers section, because I do think that’s a key part of the brilliance of this episode and doesn’t involve the roaches directly. But definitely don’t watch the episode if roaches freak you out. While I think it is brilliant and enjoyable, if cockroaches freak you out you…probably won’t be able to see beyond that, and it is okay to skip this episode.
Personally, I’ve just unfortunately gotten quite used to cockroaches. I still don’t like them, and I do still get freaked out especially when one is crawling toward me (or flying 😱), the reality of living in both Hawaiʻi and now Florida is that…well, they’re just around. I know that there’s a stereotype that roaches are only inside homes that are “dirty” or whatever, and certainly an infestation of roaches can suggest neglect, hoarding, and a lack of hygiene. But also, sometimes they just…come inside your house when it rains. And your cat kills one at night and leaves the lovely carcass for you to find when you wake up. Or the roaches decide that all the cardboard boxes in your lab you hang onto (because you feel bad throwing all that cardboard and Styrofoam away) is a tasty snack and nice home. So, when you finally decide it’s time to go ahead and throw away some of those coolers, you inevitably run into some roaches.
It’s not pleasant, it always makes me itchy, but I’ve become remarkably good about not screaming when I see one. I’ve even become pretty good at just…carrying the whole box they are living in outside and letting them be free, as I do recognize that roaches have an important ecological role so, sure, go live outside in the leaf detritus. Now, sure, if I saw a roach (or several) suddenly crawling on me, like the characters in this episode, I’d probably freak out too. But perhaps this episode doesn’t really bother me because well…roaches are a reality. In Florida, certainly. No matter how clean you are, no matter if you have pest control, at least one will find its happy way inside your house or workplace to freak you out.
Anyway. If you are still reading this, hopefully my own talk of cockroaches didn’t freak you out. Again, I will do my best to not get graphic when describing the cockroach scenes in the episode, and there will not be any images or GIFs of the insects. But roaches do lie ahead.
Along with a lot of amusing banter, fun between our “completely platonic” coworkers, and some (slightly messy) commentary on mass panic and the reality of extraterrestrial exploration.
It is a good episode! But consider whether reading about cockroaches is worth it, and then venture ahead if you dare. 😉
Invasion of Killer Roaches: The Case (?)
Hopefully you made your decision on reading this review and/or watching the episode. Because the episode opens on an extreme close up shot of a cockroach, being held (in his bare hands, I add) by an exterminator. This exterminator has been called to the home of Dr. Eckerle, who we will later learn is an alternative fuels researcher. Notable in this scene is that Dr. Eckerle seems extremely panicky about the roach infestation in his basement, while the exterminator is enjoying waxing on philosophically about the evolutionary “perfection” of the cockroach, noting that not even radiation kills them with 100% accuracy. And then the exterminator fatefully remarks that compared to the simple cockroach, humans are gods.
There is then a slightly amusing moment when Dr. Eckerle asks if roaches can live even when decapitated, to which our exterminator remarks “I just kill them buddy”. You know, immediately after he regaled the traumatized scientist with everything he knows about cockroaches. So, uh, my dude, it’s pretty clear you are actually quite fascinated by cockroaches and know quite a bit about them.
Perhaps he just wanted to get the traumatized scientist out of his way so he could continue on with the extermination work, spraying a fungal insecticide along Eckerle’s baseboards. One cockroach brazenly scuttles across the floor and doesn’t react even when sprayed directly with the pesticide. Annoyed, our exterminator steps on the cockroach, which merely chirps in response and scuttles away…while our exterminator reacts with sudden pain.
Presumably, we are supposed to believe that this roach was unusual in some way and directly caused the exterminator’s condition but given that our guy is grabbing at his side and gasping…to me, it looks like a classic heart attack. Or some kind of allergic reaction that caused anaphylactic shock and a heart attack, as Scully will suggest in a little bit here.
Of course, any assumptions about that are immediately cast to the side as we see many cockroaches come out of the home’s walls and start to cover the exterminator. At which point Eckerle returns to the basement and sees (or hallucinates?) the body covers in roaches. And. Well, rightfully freaks out, whether he’s hallucinating or not.
Now, this is one of the cases where Mulder’s random involvement has a full explanation. He drove up to Massachusetts because his apartment was being fumigated, he had no place to stay (stay with your girlfriend partner, Mulder! She’d love to have you) and read about apparent sightings of UFOs in this area of Massachusetts recently. And presumably Mulder enjoys driving as I do feel the need once again to point out the sometimes-silly geography of this show: Even if Mulder drove to the furthest southwest part of Massachusetts, that’s a six-and-a-half-hour drive. That he just did…for fun?
Anyway. Mulder is just hanging out in his car in the dark, talking on the phone with Scully, when the town sheriff suspiciously approaches his car. Mulder does give the explanation that he is there investigating UFO sightings, though not exactly on behalf of the FBI. The sheriff doesn’t seem particularly amused by this, but then freaks out upon learning Mulder was using his wiper blades on this clear night because some bugs landed on his windshield.
(Side note, with two parts. One, Mulder “not good with bugs” but that was really clearly a grasshopper or cricket that landed on your windshield, not a beetle or roach. Second, I kind of miss having bug corpses get all over my car on long road trips. I know some people say the decrease in this is due to improvements in car design, but I’m also fairly certain there are just fewer bugs, which is sad and alarming)
The roach attack that we saw at the episode opening is not the first roach attack this town has had. Two other bodies have been found apparently covered with roaches after death. Mulder notes that the other bodies were a molecular biologist and an astrophysicist, with our alternative fuels researcher being the witness here. I think there’s supposed to be some assumption I guess that because these are brilliant people, they aren’t likely to be a hoax or something?
Well, this is very clearly not the case with our next victim: A teenager who has decided that a cool way to get high is to inhale the fumes of some shit he is burning.
And yes, I mean literal shit here. “Dude, that's some good crap,” he says.
Teenagers are WILD.
This particular death is…uh…probably the most disturbing. After waxing on about how “open” these shit fumes make his mind feel, our druggie dude scratches at his skin and then (🚨warning, this is really gross🚨) (🚨no, seriously🚨) hallucinates (we assume…) a cockroach burrowing its way into his skin. (I’m sorry)
The druggie teenager starts cutting at his arms with a razor blade to get the bugs out and, well, I guess we presume cuts a major artery and bleeds to death. Notable here that while the other “stoner” witnesses aren’t exactly reliable witnesses, they themselves didn’t see any of the cockroaches the druggie shit-smoking teenager was screaming about. So, this one really was most likely a hallucination, possibly Ekbom’s syndrome brought on by that…shit-smoking.
However. Mulder himself does find a roach at the crime scene and attempts to catch it. In this attempt, he somehow manages to completely crush the “insect” in his fist…emptying what look like metallic fragments into an evidence vial. His palm is now bleeding, cut by whatever that “insect” was made of.
Everyone now heads back to the sheriff department or hospital (unclear) so Mulder can get his hand cleaned and some of the evidence they found (the shit being smoked, whatever those roach remains are) can be examined. And it’s here that we have our third cockroach related death. The doctor fixing up Mulder’s hand is also freaked out by all the roach rumors and in the bathroom is seemingly also attacked by a swarm of roaches on the toilet. Again, with one witness (a nurse?) who does claim the doctor’s body was covered in roaches.
I’m going to skip ahead a little bit here actually to get to our fourth possible roach-related death, which Mulder is finally almost an immediate witness to. A man in the same hotel he is staying at is watching TV in bed, with the TV playing the news about all the recent deaths. All the recent deaths that might have involved cockroaches. We see some roaches start to crawl around this man’s bed as well, and then while Mulder is on the phone with Scully (more on that in a bit), a scream is heard. Which we presume is this man screaming. Notably, Dr. Eckerle is also staying at this motel, presumably too terrified to go back to his roach-infested house that is also…kind of a crime scene still, maybe? Dr. Eckerle is one of the first three people to find the man’s body, with all three of these first immediate witnesses claiming to see the man’s body covered in cockroaches. Mulder arrives quickly after to see the man is dead, but no roaches are visible.
Soooooooo. What do we actually have here? Keep in mind that throughout this whole ordeal, Mulder is on the phone with Scully back at her apartment in DC, passing on what he is finding. And Scully offers up her own thoughts on what likely caused the deaths. Not killer cockroaches, as Mulder wildly suggests, but reasonable medical explanations…with cockroaches perhaps present at the scenes, but maybe not infestations. And maybe sometimes just hallucinated to be on the bodies due to the mass hysteria now infecting the town.
Actual causes of death that are not killer cockroaches (possibly from outer space):
The entomologist is found to have died indeed of anaphylactic shock due to a cockroach allergy. Does seem pretty sudden and unfortunate given his profession, and I personally would’ve gone with the explanation just being a heart attack but. Sure. Not killed by cockroaches attacking him but, of all the deaths, we could argue his is most directly “caused” by cockroaches.
The druggie teenager died because he cut a major artery and bled out, presumably hallucinating the roaches because he, I say again, was getting high off of methane fumes derived from crap. Literal crap. 💩
The medical examiner/doctor had a brain aneurysm on the toilet. Perhaps roaches crawled on him, perhaps the nurse witness just hallucinated those because of the mass hysteria.
We don’t actually get a full answer to this, but even Mulder thinks that the hotel man likely died of a heart attack, essentially scaring himself to death
But. There is still the question of why all of these cockroaches are suddenly around the town and were seemingly present in large numbers at all of the crime scenes. Along with the question of that possibly metal exoskeleton of the one roach they (almost) captured.
The sheriff has an idea: Government experiments at a nearby Department of Agriculture facility creating killer cockroaches, like those killer bees imported by Brazil and released (For those who have already watched the show, note the probably unintentional 🐝 foreshadowing here). Mulder, already inherently suspicious of the government, and probably more so after learning of government experiments on their own people, decides hey, maybe this isn’t the craziest idea…
Dr. Berenbaum: A Love for Insects
And so, he decides to break into federal property. Again. No, he can’t just go knock on the door and start asking questions. Better to just break in and get caught, I guess?
OK, he doesn’t immediately get caught. Mulder is able to do some initial investigating of this “USDA” research site which…it turns out is just a house. A normal house…purposely infested with cockroaches. How fun!
It’s probably his freaking out about all the cockroaches pouring out of the walls that draws the attention of the scientist in charge of this site. Mulder was screaming quite loudly about the roaches.
Enter our (attractive) entomologist: Dr. Bambi Berenbaum. She gives a perfectly reasonable explanation of the research. The USDA is studying the cockroach behavior and biology to develop better ways to eradicate the pests. It’s not quite clear why this research must be done in a house, rather than a dedicated laboratory, but if I had to guess I’d say they are probably trying to directly study exactly how the roaches behave when inside a house rather than their “natural” wild environment. I would personally still argue that you could create a house-like environment in a more controlled setting, rather than what seems like just…apparently within, or at least very close to, an otherwise normal, inhabited neighborhood.
It’s pretty clear that Mulder is immediately enchanted by Dr. Berenbaum, even if he is…quite horrified by the insects that she professes a love for. Which, I do just have to note here that I, personally, find Dr. Berenbaum’s pure scientific admiration for insects indeed quite endearing. Perhaps I relate to this even more as a shark biologist, another misunderstood and often feared/reviled creature. Her scientific interest in just understanding what makes these insects function is quite amazing. A real scientific fascination, just as pure and honest as she proclaims insects themselves are.
Now, I don’t think Mulder would’ve remained quite as enchanted by Dr. Berenbaum if she hadn’t mentioned his pet project: UFOs.
A New Idea on UFOs
In addition to her government research on cockroach management/eradication, Dr. Berenbaum is working on her own little pet project involving the roaches. As most scientists end up doing. 😉
She has a roach sitting in an electrical field, and explains to Mulder that because the insect’s body is naturally electrically conductive, when the insect is exposed to a specific electric charge, its body will glow with specific colors.
I…admit I don’t actually understand a word of that. I’ve stated several times that physics is my weakest science subject, and of all the physics topics, electricity baffles me. But, sure. Whatever electric field she exposes the roach to, its body does emit a blue glow.
Due to this reaction between electric fields and insects’ naturally conductive bodies, Dr. Berenbaum theorizes that “UFO” sightings are actually large insect swarms flying through electrical fields at night. The emission of a colored light, interference with radio/TV signals, the movement of the light in a “nonmechanical” manner, even the humming sometimes heard when “UFOs” are seen could all be explained by a large swarm of insects in a single area.
I don’t think Mulder quite buys this theory, but he is further endeared to Dr. Berenbaum just because she brought up an interest in UFOs. Personally, I think her theory seems quite likely! I mean, as someone who knows nothing about electrical fields and very little about insects. The explanation she gives certainly makes a lot of sense, and way more sense than alien ships visiting from another planet. Sorry Mulder.
Insectoid Robots: Dr. Ivanov
Jumping back now to the motel and the scene of our fourth (possible) cockroach-related death. Guy in the motel probably didn’t die because of the cockroaches, but it definitely does seem like this possibly slightly seedy motel is dealing with a cockroach infestation. An infestation they are trying to deal with, placing roach motels in the room. This is where Mulder is finally able to get his sample of a live roach.
Which he naturally brings to his new best friend crush, entomologist Dr. Berenbaum.
Whatever this “bug” is…it doesn’t seem to be just an insect. What initially looked to be the “bug’s” genitalia (used to identify species, so not that weird that they’re examining a cockroach penis) appears to instead be something mechanical…not organic insect genitalia at all.
Bringing us to two possibilities here:
This is some sort of weird insectoid robot that was created by a scientist on Earth, that somehow got into this town. Perhaps several of the roach robots given the earlier metal robot that cut Mulder’s hand
Still a robot, but a sentry sent by some 👽 extraterrestrial 👽 beings for exploration
We (Mulder) will start with Option #1, as it turns out that in addition to housing a USDA research site, this small Massachusetts town is also home to a robotics researcher, one who does specifically base his robots off of the mechanical and behavioral designs of various insects.
Enter Dr. Ivanov and his adorable robots. One of the geniuses of basing robots off of insect behavior is that their behavior is generally much less complex. I need to state again that I myself understand very little about robots and artificial intelligence and programming, but from what I do gather, one of the big problems with trying to make intelligent robots capable of tasks is that we often try too hard to base them off of human intelligence. Which is extremely complex. Insects have a different sort of intelligence and behavior, primarily just reacting to their environment: move toward this moving object, scurry away from this dangerous object, go toward the light, etc. Insects naturally rely on fairly simple sensors and reflexes to move and react, which I gather are much easier to program and create an “intelligent” robot capable of fairly simple, but necessary tasks.
Many different research groups have indeed used insects as inspiration for creating robots, though I had a bit of trouble finding any robots currently in active use (not just research in the lab) that were fully inspired by insects and have similar capabilities and locomotion. It is a really interesting idea! And does indeed sound to me much simpler to create large numbers of these such robots, as they would only need the same basic programming and mechanical design, rather than some large, complex computer brain that can process many signals. These robots might not be useful for a large variety of tasks if they don’t have a mechanical…brain that can really process a lot of signals, I guess, but I can see them being really useful for things like collecting weather data (fly toward the storm!) or search and rescue, crawling into small spaces and just reacting to objects (slash people) in the environment, directing people outside the danger area to where rescue needs to be done.
Of course, sometimes the robots are just used for research, and are very cute:
And the goal would be to use robots such as these for extraterrestrial exploration. Certainly much easier to send robots to other planets than people, as we have already learned and done.
But are there possibly other alien civilizations that have the same idea?
The Realities of Extraterrestrial Exploration
See, the assumption certainly would be that these metal roaches escaped from Dr. Ivanov’s lab or the lab of some other researcher and I guess are now just…exploring this small Massachusetts town? Maybe they’re learning from the organic roaches!
But, uh, Dr. Ivanov doesn’t recognize the “microprocessor” on this roach at all—not as one of his robots, nor any robot design he may have read about colleagues or fellow researchers creating.
Bringing us back to Mulder’s idea: These are robotic probes from outer space, sent by an alien civilization.
Which, yes, on the surface does sound like yet another one of Mulder’s crazy ideas. As we hear from Scully toward the start of the episode, the statistical probability that there is intelligent alien life somewhere else out there in the universe is extremely small. So small that the very fact that human intelligence was created seems improbable in itself. I’ve stated in the past that I think it is likely there is some form of alien life on other moons or planets, created by chance through similar chemical reactions that created DNA and life on earth. But, any alien life out there is most likely viruses (“life”), bacteria, or small worms like those freaky guys in “Ice”. The idea that there are other intelligent human-like alien creatures with UFOs, travelling vast distances, across time, to visit our planet is…well, a bit crazy. I don’t know why exactly Mulder remains so stuck on the idea of “Little Green Men” rather than…more reasonable expectations of the other kinds of life that might exist in the universe.
But, let’s assume there are alien civilizations with intelligence similar to or greater than that of humans. If that were to be true, why would the immediate assumption be that they have complex flying objects they can use to travel? Or, that even if they do have spaceships (we do too, after all), that they would consider the best way to research/explore other planets would be physical travel to those places? We don’t even do that!!! We sent humans to the moon a couple times, and that was hugely expensive, and we really only did it to beat the Russians. Pretty quickly the realization came that space travel for humans is hard and takes a long time for even “small” distances in space, and we can get similar if not better knowledge about other worlds by sending robots to those planets.
So, I guess all of this is to say that I do really enjoy both Scully and Dr. Ivanov poking fun at Mulder’s ideas of physical extraterrestrial exploration by “little green men”. Not in an antagonistic way, but both by using science and logic to say basically “It’s highly unlikely that intelligent alien life exists, but if it does, those creatures probably aren’t traveling to us themselves. They’ll send robots, just like we plan to do”.
IVANOV: “Anyone who thinks alien visitation will come not in the form of robots, but of living beings with big eyes and gray skin has been brainwashed by too much science-fiction.”
The Spread of Mass Hysteria
The second lovely commentary that we get in this episode is regarding how quickly rumor spreads and erupts into mass hysteria, causing people to act irrationally and with fear. Which then causes further rumor and misinformation. And then the people who are acting irrationally actually end up causing more harm than the real “danger” that may have existed in the first place.
Unfortunately, we all have at least some experience with this, given the random sudden toilet paper shortages that happened before COVID began to spread within the US at truly elevated levels back in 2020. Why did everyone need to by toilet paper? Who knows! But we needed it, apparently. We’re all going to poop so much more than we would normally, so we need this toilet paper!
I have possibly slightly more than normal experience with the spread of mass hysteria and people acting irrationally as someone who lives in Florida, with hurricanes. If you thought people went wild buying up unnecessary amounts of toilet paper in 2020, imagine having that happen up to three times a year whenever a storm comes. Everyone’s gotta buy gas, and food, and bottled water (for some reason), and so much toilet paper. Because you can’t slowly prepare by buying stuff throughout the year ahead of time, knowing full well there’s at least a 50% probability a hurricane or tropical storm will hit the state every year. For example…
Sorry, some personal annoyance there. Basically just saying here that Darin Morgan wrote that scene in the convenience store perfectly. With everyone freaking out, and creating other rumors based off the first one (“Roaches aren't attacking people, lady. They're spreading the Ebola virus. We're all going to be bleeding from our nipples!”), and reacting to perfectly normal, innocent occurrences like a box of chocolate candy spilling with fear.
…At least Scully got some nice chocolate candy for free out of that chaos, I guess.
Case Conclusion (?): Importation through Manure
The conclusion of this case actually ends up being fairly simple. This town has a USDA research site, the lab of an artificial intelligence insectoid robot scientist, and an alternative fuels research site.
“Waste is a terrible thing to waste”
The site, it turns out, where our Dr. Eckerle works. This site is researching creating fuel from methane gas emitted from manure. And very recently imported a shit-ton (😉) of animal dung from other countries. Cockroaches are one of many insects that feed on feces (coprophages), so the most likely explanation is that a new species was imported into the state through this shipment. Perhaps this new species also doesn’t react the same way to usual pesticides or insecticides, further explaining how they spread apparently so rapidly to so many locations throughout the town. It’s probably Dr. Eckerle himself, who is terrified of cockroaches, who has been spreading them, to his house, to the motel, even possibly to the sheriff’s office if we assume he was questioned there.
No real mystery, then. You ship in a lot of poop, you’re going to naturally also get a bunch of shit-eating insects, especially if that poop wasn’t shipped frozen or treated or anything. And this shit looks still very fresh in the alternative fuels research warehouse…
Here, I need to note again that as a scientist who works with animal poop samples every day, it doesn’t happen often, but I have gotten one or two (dead) beetles in with my samples. Not insects eaten by the animal, but insects enjoying a nice 💩 snack that then got scooped up with the sample, frozen, and transported to my lab.
It is unfortunate that this happened to Dr. Eckerle in particular, as he really does seem to have a strong phobia of cockroaches. He was most likely hallucinating at least the number of cockroaches present at the two death scenes he was witness to. It does feel a bit odd that after the day or so that he had, that Dr. Eckerle would decide to return to his warehouse where he knows there are roaches but…sure. Freaking out, not thinking clearly, must run back to try to kill all the bugs, I guess?
Which he does succeed in! Mulder tries to reason with Dr. Eckerle, explaining where the roaches likely came from and that they should be studied but our freaked-out scientist isn’t having any of that, so he decides to shoot Mulder.
Firing his gun in a warehouse full of methane gas fumes. Igniting those fumes, causing the whole warehouse to explode, and unfortunately also killing himself.
But at least the main colony of invasive, foreign roaches is dead.
Metal Insects: A Remaining Mystery
I definitely am going to argue that our agents did indeed solve the main case. The main colony of these foreign introduced roaches is indeed dead, and they figured out where they came from. It even seems that the larger hysteria in the town was solved, as we learn that while the town continued to lose its mind the night before—with several lootings, car crashes, pesticide poisonings, and assaults—no one saw any cockroaches that night. Really, this probably was largely a case of mass hysteria ignited by rumors about cockroach infestations. Plus, some probably real cockroaches seen, as does naturally happen sometimes.
So, OK, main case solved. I’m sure the sheriff is grateful for their help, and Mulder and Scully could justify any expenses they incurred to the FBI, even if this wasn’t a case they were assigned. Something was solved!
The mystery does still remain about those metal roaches. And I guess it’s fine to have that open-ended, leaving us with the question of who might be using insectoid robots to explore Earth. Aliens? Another country?
But it is a little bit frustrating, to me at least. There were at least two of these strange metal insects in the town…could there be more?
We do leave Dr. Ivanov to investigate that part of the case, which is nice. Dr. Berenbaum forgets all about Mulder (who has Scully now anyway) and goes off to share her brilliance and love of insects. Another beautiful love story begins.
Our “Completely Platonic Coworkers”
OK, so all of that was fun, but really in my opinion the best part of this episode is the real connection, love, and jealousy we see here between Mulder and Scully. Chris Carter can pretend all he wants that his agents aren’t in love, but Darin Morgan gets it. Our two agents may disagree on many things, but they understand each other, want to protect each other, and above all cannot STAND ever being away from each other.
The particular gem of this episode is Scully’s jealousy regarding Bambi, but there are a lot of other cute “I love you” moments too:
Let’s start with Scully saying “Mulder, where have you been? I've been trying to reach you all day!” It is unclear if this is a weekend or a weekday, but either way I feel like the deepest mystery we never get an answer to here is why was Scully so desperate to talk to Mulder? It doesn’t seem like she had anything pressing to discuss with him but just missed her partner and wanted to talk to him. 🥹 I mean, OK, she also likely wanted to make sure her favourite idiot hadn’t landed himself in custody again, but it really feels to me like Mulder and Scully talk every day, and she does get worried and lonely when she can’t get ahold of him. 🥹🥹
Our agents then just sit on the phone, with Scully listening to Mulder’s philosophical thoughts on alien life before countering with her own scientific thoughts on the statistical probability of any intelligent life. Mulder is in love. This is exactly the kind of counterargument he wants regarding his thoughts on alien life.
(credit) Scully is not bothered at all by Mulder’s little joke above, finding him just as endearing as he finds her. 🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹
Mulder constantly calling Scully to report on the case he has stumbled upon in Massachusetts, asking for her medical advice.
“Sorry to bother you.” “It’s no bother.” 🥹🥹
(credit) Scully sitting at home on her night off (presumably) just casually doing research to help Mulder with his case.
After losing contact with Mulder when he broke into government property (again), Scully went to bed with the phone right next to her head so she could immediately be there to help him when he called her back
(credit) This one I need to include the video for so you can fully understand her tone of voice. Poor Scully is terrified that Mulder is going to confess that he’s in love with this scientist named “Bambi”
It wasn’t until Scully found out Mulder had made contact with another woman that she decided, “Oh hell no, now I really must come up there!!!”
(credit) Jealous Scully “This is no place for an entomologist”
(credit) Mulder “You know, I never thought I'd say this to you, Scully... but you smell bad.” He thinks about how she smells? He enjoys her perfume??? 🥹🥹🥹
“Smart is sexy.” AKA, I love you Mulder, please love me back.
(credit)
The X-Files is a Comedy
The other brilliance of the episode is some of the just very casual, sometimes subtle funny moments. Darin Morgan is a genius.
Mulder makes a joke about how a lot of people think of government workers as pests, too.
The flea shampoo “Die Flea Die” Scully uses on Queequeg, plus the roach/insect killer “Die Bug Die”
(credit) Mulder, are you sure you don’t scream like a girl?
“You look pooped.” Also notably enjoyable is the sardonic smile Mulder shoots to Scully after the sheriff’s joke.
The 90s™
Not a ton here that is truly unique to the 90s, but I do enjoy seeing Scully’s adorably tiny mid-90s laptop once again.
Also very amusing is Mulder’s huge desktop, which he is able to just smack to get his word processor to start working again. 😂
Goofs/Bloopers/Fun Facts
Other than my slight frustration with the open-ended “metal robot roach from outer space” mystery, I only have one goof, and it’s a minor one, that is also a common misconception so:
Scully tells Mulder “Did you know the inventor of the flush toilet was named Thomas Crapper?”
First, I do love that she just has this fact at the top of her head in the middle of the night
But it’s actually not quite true
Thomas Crapper was a plumber in the mid-to-late 1800s, and he did make improvements to already existing flush toilets, increasing their popularity
The first flush toilet was invented in 1596, and the first British patent was granted before Crapper was born, in 1778.
Also, the word “crapper” was in use before he went into business, it didn’t derive from his last name
You do have to wonder though if he felt that his last name fated him to a career in plumbing…
Many, many fun production facts:
The title of the episode refers to Orson Welles's infamous 1938 radio broadcast of "The War of the Worlds" and the panic it caused
Further, the name of the town in this episode (Miller’s Grove) is a parody of the setting of “The War of the Worlds” (Grover’s Mill)
Piles of faux dung were created using an organic, feces-free substance
As a scientist who works with animal poop daily, I admit I’m actually a little disappointed they didn’t use real crap.
Debbie Coe, the animal trainer for series, used around 300 cockroaches for filming.
Only one of these cockroaches died during the filming—due to old age
Director Kim Manners was very pleased with the “acting” of his roaches
Cast and crew members humorously recalled that Manners even began giving orders to the insects, with cinematographer John Bartley saying, "when I saw Kim Manners talking to a bucket of cockroaches, that was a highlight for me.”
Several "incredibly detailed" rubber cockroaches were also created for the episode to supplement the live insects, with crew saying you could put the rubber roach next to a real one and be unable to tell the difference
“Frass” is a scientific term for insect excrement, making Sheriff Frass’ name a joke in itself
I didn’t note the relevance/joke of this one myself (perhaps it would be more notable in the 90s), but at the grocery store riot, a sailor in a classic Navy uniform grabs a bunch of chocolate and pantyhose
These are both items heavily rationed during WWII
Look for this at the start of the video I’m going to post below 😉
There are two instances of the show “breaking the fourth wall” in this episode.
First, a cockroach scurries across the camera lens when Mulder and Dr. Ivanov are talking, scaring the viewer into thinking an insect is crawling on their TV.
Just before the credits roll at the end, the sound made by the roaches in the methane/poop factory can be heard
Won’t seem relevant now, but the “stoner couple” we meet in this episode (the ones who survive) are going to become an ongoing joke in Darin Morgan’s episode, even 21 years after this episode airs in a season 10 (reboot) episode
At the end of the episode, a Blaberus giganteus is the roach we see in Mulder’s apartment next to the cake he is eating
First, look that up at your own risk, because that bug did freak me out. That’s a big one!
I’m not sure exactly why, but something about the way this one’s head moves separately from its body did look mechanical rather than natural to me and I was a bit horrified to learn, no, that’s a real species
Probably less freaky when living in its natural cave or rainforest environment. Infinitely creepier inside a DC apartment
The common name for this species is a “Brazilian cockroach” and while I’m not sure if the writers or directors meant this to be intentional (rather than just using a particularly freaky looking roach), this does actually harken back to the sheriff’s earlier statement about “Killer bees”
African “killer” bees were imported to Brazil and bred with honeybees from Europe, and then these hybrids were released and spread throughout the Americas
The car crash when Scully walks into the convenience store wasn’t scripted, but everyone just rolled with it, making the scene seem more realistic about the full panic that was going on in my opinion. Unclear if the dude bumping Scully’s shoulder was scripted. Gillian Anderson certainly looks really annoyed there, too, but could be scripted or not knowing how good of an actress she is
Overall Thoughts/Summary
Episode rating: 9.5/10. I don’t know if my review really gave this episode justice, but I truly think everything about it is brilliant. The casual humor is top notch, nothing is actually overly graphic regarding the roaches, and the chemistry (and jealousy) between our agents is unmatched. We also get to delve into the reality and likelihood of extraterrestrial travel and exploration, with three scientists this time giving Mulder perfectly logical theories/ideas on aliens, UFOs, and intelligent life in the Universe. It does drop just the smallest amount in my rankings because there is a slight lack of cohesiveness or conclusion to this story, and I guess…I dunno, I could’ve done without seeing one or two of the roach deaths if in return we could get more philosophical musings on extraterrestrial life and artificially intelligent robot probes between Mulder and Dr. Berenbaum or Dr. Ivanov.
X-files cases “solved” to date: As I stated, I would say they conclusively solved the case of this episode. Sure, there’s still the question of whether some of those roaches weren’t roaches at all…but explorative probes sent by an alien civilization. I can’t quite tell if Mulder is typing out his final thoughts regarding that in his official report to Skinner on this messy, sudden case he found himself in. But if that is why he’s typing out those thoughts, Poor Skinner. He just wants to read facts, not more of his agents’ inner thoughts and questions…
7/10 cases for the season, 42.5/58 overall
As often happens, this review ended up a lot longer than I imagined it would. Granted, over 1200 words were about our “completely platonic agents”, the humor, and a lot of fun production facts, rather than my own recounting or in-depth thoughts about the episode. Hopefully you also enjoy our agents’ banter and Darin Morgan’s brilliant humor.
Next week we are treated with yet another purely fun episode in “Syzygy”, and we’re also going to get more very jealous Scully. The next episode doesn’t stick in my mind quite the way “War of the Coprophages” did, which could mean it’s mediocre or that it’s good but just not particularly memorable. It is, notably, an episode written by Chris Carter, which can be very hit-or-miss, even though he is the show creator. We will see. I know it’s a fun episode, but we’ll see if it is good and has a cohesive, (mostly) sensical story.