I think it's safe to say 'Audrey Pauley' is one of the best episodes in the entire series, and with only nine episodes to go, it is very likely the best episode in the remaining run. I just don't see how they can top it at this point.
This was utterly spectacular. Much like 'One Breath', there was not a single moment until the end where I was confident things were going to work out OK, even knowing - or assuming that Reyes was not about to be killed off in the middle of the season. It was tense and heartbreaking, and gorgeously filmed.
I know I commented a couple of episodes ago that it was too late to be developing Monica Reyes's character now, or at all, really, since she was only introduced as a regular character this season, but damn if they aren't doing a good job trying to prove me wrong.
Unlike Scully's story in 'One Breath', we're shown early on in the episode why Reyes is in a coma - or at least, we're shown the most obvious possible reason. And boy did that crash look horrific. In an already well-made episode, that was yet another very well shot scene. Intense, quick, and scary. Like a real car crash, I'm sure, seemingly over in an instant.
But it wasn't until Doggett started investigating the doctor and the other patients who had been disconnected from life support that it was clear Reyes wasn't seriously injured in the crash itself and that her condition, whatever you want to call it, was brought on by the malicious doctor whose actual motives are only ever theorised. We're never told, and it doesn't really matter, why he was putting his patients in a state where they would appear brain dead just so he could take them off life support. It was implied he was trying to harvest organs, but it's possible he was just a serial killer and that's how he went about it.
I'm somewhat surprised, given Scully's experience in season two, that she was so quick to give up on Reyes. Did Mulder never tell her how close they were to pulling the plug and letting her die? Considering all she's experienced since then - the possibility of still being held captive underground by a fungal colony and otherwise hallucinating her life notwithstanding - I can't believe she wouldn't be fighting right alongside Doggett to try to give Reyes the same opportunities.
In some way, I suppose that's not really relevant, since this isn't Scully's episode. Like 'One Breath' was for Mulder and Scully, 'Audrey Pauley' is clearly the same for Doggett and Reyes, although perhaps with only nine episodes left, they won't drag out that relationship nearly as long.
But I liked Doggett's dedication here. I've usually found him kind of bland and uninteresting, but he's nothing if not loyal and dedicated. His confrontation of the doctor reminded me a lot of, well, you could probably see this coming a mile away, Mulder's confrontation of the Smoking Man in 'One Breath'. Though I'm fairly certain this confrontation will actually result in an arrest. Speaking of which, I found it somewhat amusing that the doctor was so concerned about the possibility of a malpractice suit considering if he was caught doing what he was doing, he'd be facing criminal charges and life in prison if he was lucky enough not to face lethal injection himself. That would have a certain poetry to it, wouldn't it?
The story of what was going on in the real world hospital was interesting enough, but where I think this episode really stood out was in Reyes's story in the virtual hospital that may or may not have only existed inside Audrey's mind.
The lighting and framing were perfect, but more important, especially where the plot was concerned, was the set, which lacked completeness, and very deliberately so, as we found out. Audrey never left the hospital, so as far as she knew, there was nothing outside it, and she couldn't read, so as far as she was concerned, the forms were all gibberish (it would be hilarious if that was rot-13) and there were no labelled signs, because things like that would escape her notice.
It was an entire world built by someone who was only partially informed about what that world should look like. But interestingly, like Audrey's world in the hospital basement, it was safe. There were no dangers within this world, and the only fear Reyes had was being forcibly pulled from it by dying in reality, which unfortunately happened to the other two patients, and Audrey herself, before Doggett was able to work out what the doctor was up to.
I loved watching Reyes's investigative process in this world. There were so many fewer clues, and she was still able to work out why it was the way it was, and with Audrey's help, find the way back to her body and her life, just before she was about to be cut off from it permanently.
And if this episode was meant to make me ship Doggett/Reyes, well, I'm kind of getting there. I think my desire to see Mulder and Scully get together really developed some time around 'One Breath', or otherwise the middle of season two, so this isn't at all surprising for me.
I really thought they were going to kiss at the end.
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