"The Truth Is Out There" Re-Watch: "The Walk" & "Oubliette"

 The X-Files

A pair of episodes featuring some actors that should be very familiar to anyone who was an avid television watcher in the '90's and early '00's. Let's get right into things.

"The Walk"

Fox Mulder: "I came down here wondering if it could be true, what Lt. Col. Stans was describing was a case of astral-projection."

Dana Scully: "What you're saying is this man, Rappo, is leaving his body and floating around town killing people?"

Notable Guest Star: Willie Garson as Quinton "Roach" Freely

Mythology or Monster of the Week: MotW

X-File of the Week: Lt Col. Victor Stans has attempted to kill himself twice at the VA hospital he's living at, but each time he claims that he's stopped by a "phantom solider." This includes the third time when he jumps into a scalding hot bath. This catches the attention of special agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully. The agents learn that Stans family was killed in a house fire along with another solider named Aiken, which is being covered up by General Thomas Callahan. Stans claims the same phantom soldier preventing his suicide killed his family and stopped him from saving them. When Callahan is targeted, the agents try to figure out who is the culprit: man or ghost?

Jaws?

When I was doing a little background on this episode, I read that it was based on a film called "The Men" that came out in 1950. The movie is about a World War II lieutenant who is crippled and dreams of walking again. The episode's writer, John Shiban, in his first episode writing for the series, decided to take this concept and marry it with the idea of astral projection. It's an interesting concept but one that I don't think is every fully realized. When you take that and add in the hurried visual effects, it's an episode that is pretty half-cooked overall.

I love when Scully interacts with military people. She may not have been in the military herself, but she grew up with a lifer as a father, so she knows what's going on and she's not going to be jerked around. When the agents are accosted by Captain Janet Draper for not going through the proper channels to speak with Stans, Scully is unfazed. She suggests that Draper go talk to Callahan while they continue their chat with Stans. When Callahan is trying to throw his weight around, Scully doesn't back down. She reveals that they know that Callahan is leaving things out of the soldiers files and she thinks he is covering it up for some reason. It just is one more reason Scully is a total badass.

There's a lot of talk about Gulf War Syndrome in this episode, but they sort of tiptoe around it. It's implied that a lot of these soldiers were in the Gulf War and that they suffered trauma. There's talk of Gulf War Syndrome which was what doctors caused the multiple illnesses that soldiers suffered after returning home. The agents mentioned that it was disavowed, but some of this feels like a thinly veiled commentary on it, but it never really goes far enough to the point where I wish they wouldn't have brought it up at all.

The antagonist of the episode, Leonard "Rappo" Trimble is thinly sketched. He had his arms and legs blown off and due to exposure to radiation he's able to astral project and with help from his accomplice or something. You would think Rappo would be more sympathetic. He's a soldier. He's dealt a raw deal, but he's not sympathetic at all. He's basically a caricature of someone who's mad at the world and he's killing children. It's difficult to have any sort of empathy for someone like that. His mailman, Quinton "Roach" Freely, played by the late Willie Garson of "Sex and the City" fame, is no better.

This episode is like a lot of the episodes of season three that aren't super successful. There is enough stuff there to make it interesting, but not enough to make it a great or even good episode.

Grade: B-

"Oubliette"

Fox Mulder: [referrig to Lucy's seizure and incoherent speech] "Whether she knew it or not, she was repeating the exact words spoken by Amy's abductor at the exact same time, twenty miles across town."

Dana Scully: "That's spooky."

Fox Mulder: [with a wry smile] "That's my name, isn't it?"

Notable Guest Star: Jewel Staite as Amy Jacobs

Mythology of Monster of the Week: MotW

X-File of the Week: Teenager Amy Jacobs is kidnapped by photography assistant, Carl Wade. Special agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully investigate the case. Mulder is invested due to the resemblance the case bears to the disappearance of his sister, Samantha. The agents come into the orbit of Lucy Householder, a woman who was kidnapped 22 years earlier in the same manner and seems to have some sort of psychic connection to Amy.

Little House crossover

It's always fun to do a bit of background reading on these episodes. Just like with "The Walk" and learning about the film it was loosely inspired by, this episode had the execs at Fox wringing their hands a bit at first. Initially, the age of Amy Jacobs was 12, but apparently this brought things a little too close to the real-life kidnapping and strangling of Polly Klaas. Polly was kidnapped out of her room at a slumber party, eerily similarly to Amy and was sadly killed by the man who abducted her in 1993. That's part of the reason why the character of Amy Jacobs was aged up.

There's a lot of things about this episode I really enjoy. First off, Amy Jacobs is played by a young Jewel Staite. If you're a sci-fi nerd, which you probably are if you're reading this, you know that she played Kaylee on "Firefly." So, it's fun to see her in this, one of her first roles. 

"The X-Files" is really great with these kind of episodes. It takes your typical procedural element and turns it on it's head by adding this supernatural element. In this case, it's Lucy being linked to Amy because they were kidnapped by the same man. There are a lot of cool elements. Lucy bleeding a mixture of her and Amy's blood. Her body basically being taken over by Amy and going through the same things that Amy's going through.

This interesting element is also where the wheels start to come off and I have some issues. My main problem with the episode is the character of Lucy. She has zero agency. She's a tragic character. A cautionary tale. A stereotype. A stand in for Samantha Mulder. A place that Mulder can throw all this displaced grief he has about not being able to protect his sister and in the end this is just another female kidnap victim that Mulder failed to save. So, this woman who has experienced major trauma that she's never worked through, that has impacted every facet of her life gets nothing. She gets coddled by Mulder. Forced to relive the worst experience of her life again and gets accused of being in on the new kidnapping by Scully and the other agent in charge. All so Mulder can feel something. Something that we've already seen him feel many times before.

And then, she ends up sacrificing her life for Amy's. And it's implied that she's redeemed somehow for doing this. Her life was only valid so this other girl would be saved sooner and wouldn't have to go down the same path. At 30 years old, Lucy was already a lots cause. So why not commit suicide basically to save this other teen girl who'd been missing a few days. And again, it's all about Mulder as he openly weeps over Lucy's dead body. Talk about your heavy handed metaphors. And just in case you weren't clear, Mulder spells out that Lucy died to save Amy and because it was the only way she could forget about the trauma caused by Wade. Look I get this was a common trope and still is, but I hate it and I think it's best we just move on.

Grade: C-

Next up, it's mythology time with Mulder getting stuck on a train trying to get to the bottom of an alien autopsy and Scully trying to learn more about her abduction.

What do you all think? I know I'm in the minority about "Oubliette." So, please, tell me what I'm missing. in the comments.