User Reviews

In a 3 part episode (that begins with the excellent season 6 ender "Biogenesis") we see Fox bouncing from violent rages to catatonia, due to hyperactive brain function from an unknown cause, that seems related to the discovery of a crashed UFO on a beach on the west coast of Africa.

Several recurring characters make an appearance in the 3-part trilogy, including Cancer Man (making a stunning revelation), Mimi Rogers as Agent Diana Fowley, (Fox's former lover, who still carries a torch for him), the evil henchman Alex Krycek, and Michael Kritschgau (John Finn).

I really liked the blending of suspense, drama, UFO mythos and the alternating storylines from the beachfront on the Ivory Coast (where Scully tries desperately to examine the crashed UFO - that's covered in mysterious hieroglyphics, and that Scully works frantically to decipher in part 2 in the belief that they are somehow related to Mulder's brain dysfunction... to Mulder's sickroom, where Skinner and Michael Kritschgau (John Finn) are frantically trying to help fix Mulder's mysterious condition before it kills him.

Scully and Mulder are in the early stages of their on-screen romance by now, and Gillian Anderson really (at long last) is genuinely touching as she portrays her newfound affection to Mulder - who's too zonked out to reciprocate.

The trilogy episodes are full of plot twists, dramatic moments, and startling revelations. And there is not one bit of filler in any of the episodes. In fact this storyline could have easily been fleshed out to make the plot of the second X-files movie in 2008 ("I want to believe") instead of the clinker they cranked out instead. But there's more then enough of what we love about "X-Files" in the 3-parter that I rank the trilogy eps easily among the top 10 all-time X-files episodes... If you're a serious fan, don't miss them.

Well its been a long time since I reviewed Biogenesis, so watching this episode felt a little like starting a book in the middle. But that aside, I enjoyed this episode. Most of the episode focuses on Mulder's condition and Skinner bringing Kritschgau in to help find out what's wrong with him. They inject him with some chemical or other which filter's out gamma brain waves or something other so that Mulder can actually communicate. They find out that whatever is happening to Mulder is giving him the ability to anticipate the future. And read thoughts. But it is taking his brain to such a level that it is routinely killing his body. I love the scene where he is guessing which screen is showing the UFO. Anyway, for whatever evil reason, Fowley is there to stop Skinner from helping Mulder and gets him kicked out. Then Scully is in Africa with a crazy guy who starts messing with the powers of the spaceship they found to start doing Pet Sematary stuff like bringing frogs back to life and even African dudes with stubble. But when the African stubble dude comes back he then kills the scientist with the same machete. "Sometimes dead is bettah" as Stephen King's characters might say. Anyway, Scully escapes the crazy guy before all that, but then she sees some vision of a shaman or something telling her to go away. So she does. And she goes back to DC and the episode ends eventually. The story is pretty good and Kritschgau is always fun. 9 out of 10. Losing a point simply because the whole African ghost guy was completely irrelevant to anything in the episode.

While Mulder lies nearly comatose in a Washington hospital bed, Scully is in West Africa trying to make sense of an alien artifact and the coincidental appearance of a variety of paranormal events - a plague of locusts, ocean water at the boiling point, and a sea of blood. Intermittent visions of a native shaman create more and more doubt in her mind as to why she's there, abruptly leaving when the shaman states to her, "Some truths are not for you". The Primitive African Man (Conrad Roberts), as listed on the credits page, had about the coolest voice ever, making even Darth Vader sound a little squeaky.

The creepy Dr. Barnes (Michael Ensign) from the Season Six cliffhanger 'Biogenesis' gets what's coming to him in this episode as well. Determined to get the credit for the discovery of the alien artifacts and the spaceship off the Ivory Coast, Barnes is dealt a fatal machete blow from the native he killed earlier in the story with the same weapon. What?!?! Something is reviving the dead, and I for one wouldn't be surprised if there was a bit of voodoo and zombie action going on here. Off the top of my head, I thought Barnes was attempting to frame Scully when he killed the native, but unless it comes up in the conclusion of the story, it'll have to remain conjecture.

The coolest move in this story occurred when Scully brought her pro wrestling talent to the fore to deck Barnes with that wooden chair. High tailing it back to Washington, she has to sweat things out for Mulder to get back to normal. I always thought Mulder's brain was way ahead of everyone else's when it came to the X-Files. By the way it looks, we have our confirmation.