Just like in 'Tooms', when I didn't even remember 'Squeeze', I was a little confused for the first few minutes of 'Kitsunegari'. OK, so Mulder and Scully apprehended someone, and that's when I should have realised this would be a sequel episode continuing from a similarly creepy first episode - Mulder and Scully never worked together before the series began. It should have been obvious that this was a followup to something we'd already seen.
When they started to describe the suspect, though, I thought, "Wow, that sounds like Pusher." And of course, it was, and this episode was no less disturbing, but possibly not quite as good as 'Pusher'. In trying to recreate some of the intensity of that one, I think something was kind of lost, but I'm not entirely sure what.
About midway through this episode, I guessed that something was up with Linda Bowman, and the best I could come up with was that she had a similar ability to Pusher. I never would have guessed that they were twins, though in hindsight, I suppose that might have occurred to me, since it's only one of the most common tropes about special abilities people have. Of course he has a twin.
And while I understand her desire to protect her brother, I guess the show is really trying to imply that people will do anything for family, no matter how awful their family members are? Or is it just that this kind of power lends itself to abuse in the worst way possible?
I did like that Linda operated very differently from her twin brother, though. While he was after the power of trying to get people to kill themselves, she was almost exclusively interested in the mind game of it all. She was manipulating people in a much more devious and complex way, leading Mulder and Scully to think her brother was either up to his old tricks or just changing his style, but then turning out to be behind pretty much everything. Modell himself just seemed to treat the whole thing as kind of a joke. That is, until he committed 'suicide by cop' with Skinner by pointing his finger at him.
Maybe he'd finally had enough. I think that's the biggest problem with this episode, really. His motive and actions are now even less clear than they were back in 'Pusher', when he just seemed to be a psychopath with no particular agenda other than going up against Mulder.
And one more issue I had was that Mulder is again treated as just a delusional person who has no clue how to do his job. He may have some weird theories, but he's still an outstanding FBI agent and profiler. The guy knows what he's doing, so maybe other people should listen to him, even if there's a guy around who can manipulate people's thoughts.
The other thing I only just realised is that they made a subtle mention early in the episode that six months ago, Modell just woke up. Six months ago, of course, being when Linda discovered she had a twin and a very powerful ability. So the implication, then, is that she forced him to recover from his injury. And of course, she used that same powerful ability to kill him and relieve him of his pain at the end. I guess this gun shot wound was just too much to overcome with the uh, power of positive thinking.
But most of the episode is kind of a wild goose chase and isn't really that interesting or tense. The main tension comes in the final scene with Mulder and 'Scully'. This was actually extremely well conceived and shot, because I couldn't figure out who was who until Scully raised her gun and shot the real Linda Bowman. I was as confused as Mulder, which means the scene worked.
I didn't really worry that Scully had shot herself - that was the first giveaway that she wasn't real, at least, but when the real Scully entered, I was definitely afraid that Mulder would shoot her. Well, as afraid as I can be considering she's a star of the show and won't die, especially not after they just resolved her whole cancer storyline.
Also, as I did when I watched 'Pusher', because it took place in Northern Virginia, I have to comment on the geography. Modell wouldn't have been at Lorton, as that was a prison for the D.C. Department of Corrections, despite being located in Virginia. And 'Falls Church' was, uh, bad. Not just because it was Vancouver - that much I've come to expect. But I don't think Falls Church really has any properties like the one they went to. There just isn't enough land for it. Everything in Falls Church is kind of small.
Though I guess the idea of an FBI safe house in Annandale might kind of make sense?
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