Written by Scott Kaufer & Chris Carter
Directed by Michael Lange
At this point,
it's getting harder to slog through some of the episodes which, despite
changing the level of the sci-fi, are starting to get a certain level of
sameness. It's yet another episode
where one of the agents deals with a friends from the past, as well as the old cliché
of a law enforcement agent trying to deal with a threat from the past. Backed by
the horror cliché of a killer coming back from the dead. Followed with the cliché
of the government involvement in all this. Really, there isn't room for much
original material considering all the deadweight of these formulas.
Considering that
Mulder will come to face some of the most horrible villains, human and inhuman,
during his time on the series, it seems rather quaint to have him so up in arms
about the possibility of an armed robber and murderer coming back and
threatening him. (Perhaps he's truly upset that John Barnett keeps calling him
by his first name, which even he admits
he hates.) This doesn't have much force
on its own, and is weakened even further by the fact that there is nothing original or special about
this MOTW. A man is granted the Fountain
of Youth, and he uses it to reek revenge on the men who put him in
prison---- that's not a particularly original villain; it's not
even a particularly original criminal, even if he does have the hand of a
salamander.
I'll give some
credit to Carter and Kaufer--- they at least tries to come up with a plausible
explanation as to what makes Barnett younger. Using progeria--- one of the
rarest and saddest diseases known to man--- adds an element of pathos that the
episode would otherwise lack, and hard science that has been seriously lacking
from a lot of the last episodes. Of course, it then tries to make it part of a
government conspiracy, by having
mysterious men, like Deep Throat and the Cigarette-Smoking man (who
isn't even smoking in this episode) trying desperately to get the science for
themselves. Don't they have shadowy government cabals to run?
There are a lot
of episode in the X-Files canon that are derivative--- there are some this season that are that way--- but this one
seems determined to move at such a slow pace, by being derivative. First, we
see John Barnett die in the teaser. Then we see Mulder and Scully find out that
John Barnett is dead. Then Scully learns from Mulder what happened when he and
Barnett first met. Then we see a video tape of it happening. Then we have a
flashback to a courtroom where Mulder testifies to what happened. It's as if
the writers, rather than flesh out their story, have decided to engage in the
most overly clichéd kind of padding imaginable. And the moment we see Mulder
not take a killshot when he has to, we know that there's going to be a
situation where he will do so again, and this time take the shot. There should
be some significance from the fact that this is the first time we've seen
Mulder kill somebody, but the way they drag out his final moments seems like
just more padding. And the episodes ends with the hoariest of clichés, that we
"haven't seen the last of John Barnett."
We're now nearly
two-thirds of the way through the show's first season, and it seems like the
series still doesn't have a clear road map.
We can get chilling monsters of the week when Morgan & Wong are in
the driver's seat, but Carter still seems determined to link everything to some
kind of government conspiracy or alien pathology, even when it doesn't seem
necessary. And with few exceptions, when other writers have tried to take the
series into different places, they have no idea what works because Carter
doesn't seem to know what works. Young at Heart is a MOTW that is neither scary
nor interesting, and Carter clearly doesn't have any confidence, so he starts
pulling out every trick in what is currently a rather limited book. It's not
like this is really a terrible episode,
but it's symptomatic of the larger problems with the series that it just seems
ordinary. And for a series that's supposed to be paranormal, that's the worst
thing that could happen to it.
My score: 2 Stars
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