The X-Files “The Sixth Extinction: Amor Fati”

Well, it finally came out here:  Mulder has a brand new daddy.

The Case: Is Mulder Still Psychic?

The Rest:  The episode opens with a rare monologue from the Smoking Man.  Hey, why not?  But then comes, you know, that moment:  after giving Mulder the drug that allows him to come to his senses (maybe), he tells Fox that he, the nameless Smoking Man, is Mulder’s real father.

So, sure.

OK, to be fair, the series has been hinting for a while that there was something between the Smoking Man and Mulder’s mother Teena.  They had some tense scenes together in various episodes, including apparently this one, and it all comes down to the Smoking Man telling Mulder who his real daddy was and then taking him away to a really nice suburb where Mulder gets a house, finds Deep Throat still alive, and then shacks up with Fowley because…

OK, I’m not feeling the Mulder/Scully thing this time around, maybe because I know where it all goes and my general feeling the Scully deserves better.  But Fowley?  Seriously?

But wait, why did Mulder just let the Smoking Man drive him to some gated community where he can hang out with Deep Throat, Fowley, and even the Smoking Man’s extended family?  Doesn’t that seem pretty darn unlikely?  On so many levels?

Yeah, it’s a weird dream sequence.  Turns out Mulder is the first alien-human hybrid and the Smoking Man is doing something with him to, I dunno, cure the Smoking Man’s cancer or something.  Or stop the alien invasion.  Or let some people survive it.  I have no idea.  It’s not like what Scully’s doing is making any more sense.  Michael Kritschgau is untrustworthy but later killed.  Skinner tells her not tell him things, but he’s attacked in his office by a mystery figure, so he might be OK now.  Albert Hosteen comes to Scully’s apartment despite the fact he’s in a coma on the other side of the country.  There’s some talk about the extinction of the human race.  It’s just…a lot.

But for all that Mulder and Scully are doing things that don’t always make sense, this time around, there’s also the basic idea that the two look out for each other.  Mulder thinks he’s dying of old age in his dream while the Smoking Man doesn’t age, but then Scully shows up to tell him off.  In the real world, Scully finds Mulder and takes him home thanks to the help of strangers.  Fowley is murdered off-screen, which seems wrong, and Mulder confesses that Scully…is his closest friend, the one person he can rely on to tell him the truth, and that’s what his dream taught him.  Scully says the same and kisses him on the forehead.

You know what?  That I don’t mind.  They can be friends and allies.  It’s about the only thing in this episode that either made sense or didn’t annoy me.

Up next, some guy with a strange appetite.