“Space” S1 E9
Who didn’t want to be an astronaut growing up? It is one of those professions that all little kids dare to dream about. These people were heroes; pioneers exploring an endless new frontier. So even if he wasn’t obsessed with aliens, Agent Mulder was probably still going to look up to astronauts.
Mulder even gets his own superstar astronaut hero to look up to, Lieutenant Colonel Marcus Aurelius Belt (played by character actor Ed Lauter). When Mulder was a kid he watched Belt fix his space shuttle while in space just in time to reenter the atmosphere and land safely. Except something happened to Belt. He claimed to have seen a ghostly figure approach him and still has visions of it today. The standout characteristic of the ghost is that its face resembles the face seen in the Cydonia region of Mars.
The Man on the Moon possesses Belt
Mulder and Scully are brought into NASA by a communication officer, Michelle Generoo. She believes that someone inside NASA is sabotaging the launches. But Belt, who is now a mission control supervisor, thinks it is all bogus. This is a classic MOTW case for Mulder and Scully as the space ghost (not the superhero kind, or the coast-to-coast kind) seems to plague different members of NASA, specifically possessing Belt and forcing him to sabotage the last few missions. Unfortunately, it shows its cards way too early as the ghost scares Generoo, but it continues to try and pass the ghost off as a manifestation of Belt’s post-traumatic stress.
Rating: 6/10
“Fallen Angel” S1 E10
The one aspect of the X-Files mythos that kind of bugged me was just how attractive David Duchovny is. Haha. He is pretty clean cut and fit for someone with the crazy level of obsession Mulder has. The character of Max Fenig is much more in line with what I think of UFO hunters. Scrawny. Grizzly. Bespectacled. Unkempt. Frazzled. Possibly schizophrenic.
Max Fenig
If there was ever a doubt that Mulder wasn’t 110% devoted to his cause, this episode completely debunks any of that. On a lead from Deep Throat, Mulder goes off the grid to check out a crash site that the US military is trying to secure. The official story is a runaway train compartment leaking radioactive waste. The confidential story is that a Libyan jet with a nuclear weapon crashed. Mulder doesn’t believe both. Based on Max’s intel, Mulder, with the help of Scully who showed up to get him back to the office, dig up a little more dirt on the situation.
Whatever the case, we know that neither is definitely true. An invisible figure (visible to us through a Predator type effect) is running around the error causing 5th and 6th degree burns on anyone that gets in its way. While Mulder is fascinated with Max and the evidence that Max was once abducted, a bigger craft is showing up on all of the military’s systems.
Thanks to Max and his unambiguous connection to alien life, this is The X-Files’ first real reveal that there is alien life. Max is possessed by said invisible figure. Mulder, being the big brother to the world after losing his sister, tracks him down. Mulder finds him floating in a column of light in a warehouse until he disappears altogether. That is the tip of the iceberg though. This foreshadows the end of the X-files investigations forever. The even bigger reveal is that Deep Throat is working for the FBI knowingly leaking information to Mulder, possibly to undermine any investigations he may have in the future.
P.S. Max gives an awesome reading of a line that could rank up with “Trust No One” and ” The Truth is Out There.” “Someone’s always paying attention.”
Rating: 9/10
