TV - The X-Files Season 5, The Top 5

Is this Season the time that it all changed? Steve Taylor-Bryant starts looking at The X-Files season 5...

Something happened in Season 5 and I can’t quite put my finger on it. Some of the episodes were still as epic as the previous seasons but, for some reason, my love of the show started to dwindle slightly. It could be I had become immune to the monster of the week format or could see right through government conspiracy. Whatever the reason, Season 5 started a slowdown of my enjoyment. That being said there were still some outstanding episodes and here is my top five.

5 - The End.

FBI Special Agent Jeffrey Spender: "I'm just trying to run this thing right. Not like some ridiculous, paranormal free-for-all."

Agent Jeffrey Spender is put in charge of a case of an international chess master who was felled by an assassin's bullet during a tournament. Mulder believes that the target was actually the man's opponent, a 12 year-old chess prodigy by the name of Gibson Andrew Praise. Mulder soon realizes that the boy's skill isn't so much at chess as it is to read the thoughts of others. The boy is under protective custody but the conspirators have brought in someone whose sole task is to get his hands on the boy: the Cigarette Smoking Man. Testing shows that Gibson uses part of his brain that doctors know little about. For Scully, it may be the link they need to firmly establish the alien conspiracy theory. Mulder's pursuit of the case comes at a very high cost however.

4 - Redux/Redux II.

Scully: [a Catholic priest enters Scully's hospital room] "You'll be in my prayers."

Mulder: [Rising to leave] "Have the Father say a few "Hail Mulder's” for me."

In a flashback to 24 hours earlier, Scully returns to her apartment to find Mulder waiting for her return to tell her that there is a dead man in his apartment. He now accepts that he has been duped all of these years into believing the UFO conspiracy and is convinced that Scully may have been given her cancer as part of that plot. He also believes the conspiracy reaches into the depths of the military and the FBI. Mulder uses the dead man's ID to infiltrate the defense research agency where Kritschgau is employed and learns why the military started the UFO hoax. The Cigarette Smoking Man finds something interesting in Mulder's apartment. Scully learns that the ice core samples have interesting microscopic life forms.

With Scully in a hospital ICU, the FBI hierarchy learns that Mulder is alive. So do the conspirators but the Cigarette Smoking Man continues to argue that Mulder is worth far more to them alive than dead. He points Mulder in the direction of a cure for Scully's cancer but apparently pays a heavy price for doing so. He tells Mulder that the alien conspiracy is real and offers to prove it to him. His proof however doesn't quite satisfy Mulder who appears before the FBI review committee to reveal the identity of the conspirator inside the FBI.

3 - Patient X/ The Red and the Black.

Mulder: "One more anal-probing gyro-pyro levitating ectoplasm alien anti-matter story and I'm going to take out my gun and shoot somebody."

Victims of alien abductions are being killed which confounds those responsible for the alien conspiracy. They also have a problem on their hands when Alex Krycek returns to the U.S. from Russia. Maria Covarrubius tells them he has a boy with him that may be particularly problematic. Scully and Mulder meanwhile are at odds. Mulder no longer believes in the alien conspiracy theory convinced that it was all a hoax to hide government experiments. Scully believes the alien conspiracy to be true and visits Cassandra Spender who, like herself, was abducted and has an implant in her neck. She is the mother of FBI Agent Jeffrey Spender who asks her to leave his mother alone.

Scully survives the mass killing but has no memory of what might have happened. She agrees to undergo regression hypnosis and recalls what happened, including that Cassandra Spender was re-abducted. Agent Spender refuses to believe anything to do with his mother's abduction stories. The conspirators now realize that there is a war among the aliens and that the alien resistance fighters would make formidable allies. The Well-Manicured Man also reveals that, courtesy of Krycek, they may now have a vaccine against the black oil. It doesn't appear to work as promised however.

2 - Folie a Deux.

Mulder: [Mulder is restrained in a hospital bed] "Five years together, Scully. You *must* have seen this coming."

Mulder and Scully are sent to Chicago after a telemarketing firm receives anonymous threats. The company is particularly concerned as they had an employee go postal in a different office and wants to avoid another dangerous incident. One of the company's employees, Gary Lambert, is convinced that his boss Greg Pincus is literally a monster who no one else can see for what he really is. Lambert takes everyone, including Mulder, hostage but during the incident Mulder realizes that Lambert may not be the deranged madman everyone is making him out to be.

1 - Unusual Suspects.

Frohike: "You know, with that long, blond hair, you'll be the first one in here that gets traded for cigarettes. I'm gonna be laughing my ass off."

The origins of the Lone Gunmen and their relationship with Mulder are revealed in this episode. All three were at a computer and electronics trade show in Baltimore in 1989 when they put their antagonism to one another aside to help a woman, Susann Modeski, who claims her boyfriend kidnapped her daughter. In fact, she's a government scientist on the run from security officers. She tells them about a massive government conspiracy and they inform their new found friend Mulder, who finds it all a bit far-fetched.

Synopsis and quotes - IMDb.

Image - XFiles Wiki.