Wednesday, August 26, 2015

The X-Files - S3:E3 "D.P.O."

[ S3:E2 "Paper Clip" <<< Season 3 >>> S3:E4 "Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose" ]

Honestly, I love the mythology episodes, but after the tour de force that was "the merchandise trilogy", I'm kind of looking forward to settling in for a string of easy, monster-of-the-week episodes. And this is a pretty straightforward one, starring Giovanni Ribisi as an aimless youth who has gained some unusual powers after being struck by lightning in an Oklahoma town. (I'm beginning to think "freak-of-the-week" is a far more frequently accurate term). Also appearing in this episode is a young Jack Black. The stylistic opener channels Stephen King's Christine, with the music, and the car, and the pizza delivery punk who gives off a bit of a greaser vibe. This is one of those episodes that's fun for a watch, but isn't super memorable otherwise.

(As an aside, this is probably a normal thing for FBI agents, having to step in on what often start as local cases, but in a lot of these episodes Mulder and Scully have to go through the town sheriff in the course of their investigations, and it's just interesting to see the different kinds of sheriffs they encounter. All of them have different personalities, but they mainly come in two categories: those that are friendly, and willing to bend over backwards to help out the agents, and those that are very territorial, and resent the FBI stepping on their toes. This episode's sheriff is definitely the latter, as is apparent when he gleefully rips into Scully for not doing her "homework" on the town's local lore).

Memorable quotes:

Zero: Aw, man, you should'na done that.

Scully: I don't understand.
Sheriff: Well that's as clear as glass.

Mulder: This is the first lightning strike I've ever seen that left behind a footprint.

Scully: So you're saying that he's some kind of a lightning rod?
Mulder: No, I'm saying that he is lightning. And we've gotta get to him before he strikes again.

Scully: You said yourself, sheriff, even science can't explain how lightning works.

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