Look for episodes of The Lone Gunman too. This is especially important. That show was so far ahead of its time that it accurately predicted the use of a heavy commercial passenger jet as a means of destroying the World Trade Center.
There was an episode devoted to precisely that. More to the point, it was also ahead of its time because the plane was controlled remotely through a hack. A vulnerability in the planes flight control systems. This is something that is front and center of airline safety and security people as we speak.
Be sure to look up The Lone Gunman.
X-Files is STILL ahead of its time - as we speak. There’s one about a boy who can conduct lightning that essentially references both the physiology of eels and Nikola Tesla.
The pilot is still one of the best - the coma kid who would awake to aid aliens in abducting his classmates.
Wait until you see Purity Control. Thanks to you, Gillian Anderson is back on my list of five I get a pass from my wife. Antonio Banderas just went back on the market, so I have him to worry about on her side.
I have two X-Files CD’s from back in the day. Music from the show. Amazing stuff you won’t hear anywhere else. Haunting disturbing stuff - just the mainstream music they picked.
Anyway, I can’t wait for the show to come back.
Far and away, the most disturbing episode ever is ‘Blood’. The end will give you permanent goose bumps. Way, way ahead of its time for the day, and it is likely happening in one form or another as we speak. You can safely skip ahead and watch that episode without injuring your progress on the longer plotline if you want.
Definitely worth skipping ahead for ‘Blood’. Let me know what you think when you are done. I’ve seen it a dozen times (I own the VCR tape) and I still get the chills watching it.
I saw Blood. William Sanderson was good as the nebbish who is driven to become the next Charles Whitman. I wonder if the evil driving that is related to the evil spirit that animated the boy’s stillborn twin to kill his brother, father, and grandmother.
The whole early run of season two was great. I watch Castle and they do a status quo shakeup every now and then that lasts about two episodes and doesn’t fool anybody (Beckett’s quitting the force?! Oh, she’s back). They really sold the dissolution of the Mulder/Scully partnership and the shelving of the X-files by having it play out so long. Even though we knew it was temporary, they made it feel permanent for the characters. And, they used just the right amount of episodes from the abduction at the end of the Duane Barry two-parter through One Breath to really sell Scully’s ordeal.
I’ll watch the Lone Gunmen, but it’ll be a while. I think that ran alongside season 9 and I’m just approaching Soft Light. That’s the reason I started watching the X-Files, to see Vince Gilligan’s work before Breaking Bad/Saul.
A friend of mine also has a free pass list with his wife. His has people I’ve never heard of—who’s Mindy Smith?—but I can see Gillian as a candidate. Rather Dana Scully, who we will assume is much more conservative than her portrayer!