devilf
11-20-2000, 12:36 PM
I thought this ep was ok.. it felt like an earlier episode of the series, and had some nice moments.
The main problem that I'm seeing, though, is that the lack of Mulder is not being well-addressed in terms of Scully's motivations and "logic leaps." Unless Fox mindmelded with her last season, her behavior on this case was inexplicable. Up until about the last episode of last season, Scully would have agreed with Doggett on leaps of logic, but this episode she's hopscotching from idea to idea. If this case involved aliens, sure, I could see it, since Mulder has been abducted by them, but I think most other paranormal beliefs should be off limits for her. I don't think there's anything wrong with her having a healthy skepticism.
Another weird thing was this newspaper headline. Where did it come from, and why has no one else in the world seen the photo of the mutant manbat? Wouldn't this be the subject of intense interest among cryptozoologist, paranormal researchers, fortean scholars and the Discovery Channel? And Dogget just buys it - "well, it's in some hokey small town newspaper from the 50s so I assume we must be dealing with a monster."
Also, did someone come to town and brief the local PD to hate Scully? Her insistence at the beginning of the episode that the killer could be a human wasn't THAT far out, but the cops treated her like she said that Santa Claus committed the murders.
I do like Dogget being condescending. I think he told the detective in the attic that Scully was on the rag.
The main problem that I'm seeing, though, is that the lack of Mulder is not being well-addressed in terms of Scully's motivations and "logic leaps." Unless Fox mindmelded with her last season, her behavior on this case was inexplicable. Up until about the last episode of last season, Scully would have agreed with Doggett on leaps of logic, but this episode she's hopscotching from idea to idea. If this case involved aliens, sure, I could see it, since Mulder has been abducted by them, but I think most other paranormal beliefs should be off limits for her. I don't think there's anything wrong with her having a healthy skepticism.
Another weird thing was this newspaper headline. Where did it come from, and why has no one else in the world seen the photo of the mutant manbat? Wouldn't this be the subject of intense interest among cryptozoologist, paranormal researchers, fortean scholars and the Discovery Channel? And Dogget just buys it - "well, it's in some hokey small town newspaper from the 50s so I assume we must be dealing with a monster."
Also, did someone come to town and brief the local PD to hate Scully? Her insistence at the beginning of the episode that the killer could be a human wasn't THAT far out, but the cops treated her like she said that Santa Claus committed the murders.
I do like Dogget being condescending. I think he told the detective in the attic that Scully was on the rag.