TV Review: The X-Files Episode 5, “Babylon”

By Jeffery X Martin

This week’s episode of The X-Files: The College Years gives us hope, but in the totally wrong way, leaving the viewer just as confused about the diretion and meaning of the entire series as Mulder and Scully are about the existence of God. Where the hell did this brilliant episode come from? Compared with everything else we’ve gotten from the reboot, this episode is as unexpected as hearing your toddler recite the Iliad in the original Latin while loading her diaper up during Yom Kippur.

Mulder and Scully end up working with a new younger pair of doppelganger agents (Miller and Einstein, both of whom smell like “spin-off”) on the case of a Muslim terrorist, still alive after a restaurant bombing. While Scully and Einstein are convinced the man is in a coma, Mulder and Miller are convinced there’s a way to talk to the guy.

It involves entheogens.

Yep, Einstein provides Mulder with the substances he needs to go tripping balls and somehow hook up with the comatose man’s subconscious to find out more information. The question of Mulder talking to someone in a space outside of life and time is the main hallucinogenic thrust of the episode.

Of course, it takes drugs to do it, and the shrooms take hold of this episode in a strange and hilarious way. Can we communicate with each other on a different, etheric plane? Are magical mushroom this universal language? The outlook is good, but we still need to break this episode down.

The Good

–Mulder getting faced and line-dancing might be one of the greatest things I’ve ever seen. No matter what else takes place in this series, I can’t be mad about that. It’s one of the greatest sequences of the entire series.
–Skinner’s beard is still hot.
–There are so many musical references in this episode, it might as well be an episode of The Venture Bros. Joyous and brilliant.

The Bad

–These new agents who look just like Mulder and Scully? Shouldn’t someone be investigating them for being creepy pseudo-twins? You mean to tell me no one examined them for being creepily just like the main characters of the show? Bullshit. Scully should have been shoving DNA kits up their asses, according to the rest of the show. This episode should have been a shower of blood and semen.

Instead of a plot-line that threatens to tear the world apart, this episode is a call for unity. It’s a weird departure. It’s a weird episode. It’s also the most fun we’ve had with Mulder and Scully in a long time. It’s a shame there’s only one episode left. If the next episode is good, then I will be evenly divided on this reboot. That means I will talk about it until true balance is restored.

You know how I get drunk and someone brings up the last episode of LOST and my fists clench and I end up in jail again? Yeah. It could happen.

We shall see.