X-Files Episode Guide: Redrum

Teleplay by Steven Maeda; Written by Steven Maeda & Daniel Arkin

Directed by Peter Markle

This is one of the strangest episodes in the entire X-File canon. Not because it doesn't contain any supernatural elements, or because it doesn't seem stylistically different from a lot of stories that have come before, but because despite all this, Redrum doesn't seem to really be an X-File.

It's not that we haven't had episodes without Mulder or Scully in them, but they've usually been tied to filming difficulties (Unusual Suspects or Travelers) or because the writers were trying something with one of the major characters (Musings of a Cigarette-Smoking Man). The closest equivalent we've had in the previous seven seasons is Hungry, where Vince Gilligan took us to see the episode from the perspective of the monster. One could make the argument that's what Redrum is trying to do as well - albeit with a protagonist rather than a brain-sucker - but really that's not what we're getting.

This is a lot closer to an episode of The Twilight Zone than anything that we've come to expect from Chris Carter and his merry band. We have a central character, Martin Wells, who wakes up in a jail cell on Friday in prison for his wife's murder, gets shot while being transferred to prison, and spends the rest of the episode living backwards, trying to get the clues as to what the hell is going on. The episode has very vague X-Files connections - Scully's role is insignificant, and Doggett's is just barely larger - but its primarily the story of a man who is going backward in time to prevent the death of his wife, and to realize the sins that he has committed. Even the end of episode narration doesn't sound like the purple prose of Carter and friends, but the syntax of Rod Serling.

Now, the big question is, is this altogether a bad thing? Stylistically, it plays extremely well. Joe Morton, who at the time was one of the more undervalued character actors on any medium, gives a striking performance as Wells. And because we're seeing the episode through his eyes instead of the filter of the X-Files, he's allowed to give a more elaborate and structured performance than more of the guest stars on this series are allowed to give. (Its also rather intriguing to see him in scenes with Bellamy Young nearly fifteen years before they would end up working together on Scandal). There's a very clear, simple story for the series to follow, as Wells learns that what is happening to him, and the reason why the tragedy is about to befall him. The fact that he is allowed to triumph over fate is a rare positive ending for the series - the fact that he ends up in prison in the denouement seems more of an X-Files twist then anything else.

But the problems is, of course, this is the X-Files and not Twilight Zone.. The two series may have emerged from the same oeuvre, but they have entirely different styles. As ineffective as Mulder and Scully may often be when it comes to dealing with mutants and aliens and shadowy men, they are active protagonists in all of the adventures. Twilight Zone, by contrast, had an era that was mainly dealt in paranoia and the fact that fate could not be beaten. (That was, in fact, part of the thing that the two successive remakes often failed at - as well as the fact that they didn't have Rod Serling at the helm.)  That, in fact. is what the makes Redrum more of an X-Files story - if it were Twilight Zone, Wells would've murdered his wife in the act of trying to stop it.

More to the point, there is the problem of whether its a wise idea, at this stage in the X-Files run, whether the series should be destabilized in the first place. We're already dealing with a series where one leader character has literally vanished off the face of the earth, another is trying to fill his shoes, and the series is still trying to establish the third. Is it really worth it to try and tell a story that breaks all these rules, even if its a good one? It doesn't help matters that we're still not a hundred percent sure of the style of Steven Maeda, a writer who, at this point in the series, has one other X-Files script to his name. Vince Gilligan might be able to get away with something like this - maybe with a more fitting jab or two - but we're still not sure about this one. And as a result, Maeda doesn't even try to come up with a realistic explanation as to why time is flowing backwards only for Wells. Which may be for the best - I doubt even Mulder would've been able to come up with a theory that would satisfy anybody.

Despite all this - or in a strange way, because of all this - Redrum remains one of the more entertaining episodes of the eighth season. Paradoxically, the problems with the X-Files actually make this episode work a lot better - its hard to imagine it fitting in anywhere else in the X-Files canon. It doesn't indicate a good sign for the series future that this is what they need to do in order to make workable episodes. But as a one shot deal, it's well-acted, concise, and has a beginning, middle, and end. There's very few good episodes you can say that about.

My score: 4 stars.