X-Files Episode Guide: Medusa

Written by Frank Spotnitz

Directed by Richard Compton

At this point in the season, its hard to figure out what the hell X-Files is trying to be. There has been some new energy injected into it with the character of Doggett, but for the most part, the series seems to be falling into a pattern of redirecting old storylines with Scully now doing Mulder's lines and Doggett getting the old Scully's. And rather than deal with any of the issues that seemed pertinent at the beginning of Season 8 (you'd think by this point Scully would be showing a little) we seem to be getting episodes that are retreads of older storylines.

Medusa seems to play into that trope all too easily. We have our agents in an enclosed location for almost the entire episode. Doggett and Scully are headed down into a Boston subway line where a man has died under suspicious circumstances with a team of strangers. They have to figure out what the cause is of what may be a killer or a contagion. Save for the fact that there is an artificial deadline, being stupidly enforced by a nose to the grindstone bureaucrat, this could be Ice or Darkness Falls. We even have a similar effect with electricity eating people like acid much in the same we saw the mites do way back in the first season episodes.

But Frank Spotnitz is not Morgan or Wong or Chris Carter. He's made some great strides forward in his writing, particularly during this season, but monsters of the week have not been one of his specialties, and what we get is a lot closer to Firewalker than either of the classic episodes. Spotnitz seems to be aware of this, and tries to add a few wrinkles, by keeping Scully on the sidelines for almost the entire episode, tethered electronically to her partner and the rest of her team as they delve deeper and deeper into the underbelly of Boston's underground. The idea of a government conspiracy is pretty tired by now, but at least its a little fresher by having it be a local conspiracy being handled by this bureaucrat who seems more interested in the trains running on time than the fact that people are dying in the subways. After years of dealing with all the machinations of shadow governments, its almost refreshing to have an episode where the problems are simply ones of municipalities.

Unfortunately, the word that is key in all this is 'almost'. Aside from these textual changes, this is as boilerplate as the X-Files can be at this point. The characters that join Scully and Doggett on this sojourn are little more than ciphers, which considering that they include such fine character actors as Penny Johnson as Dr. Lowe and Ken Jenkins as the Boston official whose sole purpose seems to be to keep reminding everybody that they're on a clock. (Really, you'd think by now the FBI would have some pull over whether or not a crisis supplements evening rush hour.)  The burns are interesting effects to watch the first couple of times, but by the time we get to the final act, they seem cheaper than we're used to by this point in the series. And while its slightly more interesting to have this creature come from the sea, there's so little done with the idea that you think they might as well have had it come from a volcano, because there's very little texture that's different from anything we've seen. The fact that there's a coverup when the episode comes to an end is almost ridiculous, we've heard it done so many times.

Medusa's best moments, like so many of the good ones that work throughout Season 8, belong to John Doggett. The fact that he's still not asking any questions about why his partner is refusing to go underground is a testament to his loyalty. He may not believe in the paranormal even now, but he's still prepared to approach this with an open mind. He is more than willing to put himself in harms way to try and save people's lives even when his own partner tells him to get the hell out. And the solution he comes up with to save the people on the subway shows a level of inspiration that we're not a hundred percent sure even Mulder could come up with. The fact that there is a level of trust built up between Scully and Doggett is rather remarkable,. Ironically, its finally starting to solidify when it will be scattered away in just a few episodes.

Medusa is a lot stronger than many of the episodes we've had so far, but the sad truth of the matter is, we've still seen it done before and far better. And based on what we were promised when Season 8 began, the impatience with even the casual fan of the series must have been even heavier than before. It would've been disappointing to follow this kind of episode even if Duchovny were still with the series. Now, with the season more than half over, its becoming less and less clear what the show is trying to do. This episode would've been a waste of time last year; it barely passes muster with Robert Patrick in it. Are we ever going to get back to what we've been promised?

My score: 2.5 stars.