3x23 Wetwired

[tree]

Another after school special! This one's about how television rots your brain. Think Blood but with TVs. Okay, I joke because I love it. This is an amazing Scully episode that's all about trust and the breakdown of that trust.



Writer: Mat Beck
Director: Rob Bowman
Originally aired: May 10th, 1996

Synopsis: A ~mysterious~ man gives Mulder a newspaper containing a report on a man who killed four people, all of whom he claims were the same man. When Mulder digs deeper he finds that similar incidents have been happening in the neighbourhood. Our agents watch a lot of video tapes and before long Scully becomes suspicious of Mulder's motives. She descends into outright paranoia and trashes her motel room like a rockstar. The Gunmen and Mama Scully make appearances! Mulder maybe has to ID Scully's body! Scully threatens Mulder at gunpoint! Scully looks pretty in a hospital bed!

Most Memorable Quote
THIS SCENE. Seriously, guise. Guise. Seriously.

SCULLY: It's not the truth, Mom. He's lied to me from the beginning. He's never trusted me.
MULDER: Scully, you are the only one I trust.
SCULLY: You're in on it. You're one of them. You're one of the people who abducted me. You put that thing in my neck. You killed my sister!
MARGARET: That's not true, Dana.
SCULLY: It is.
MARGARET: I want you to listen to me...
SCULLY: Mom, just get out of the way!
MARGARET: You trust me, don't you? You know that I would never hurt you. That I would never let anybody hurt you. That's why you came here, isn't it? You're safe here. Put the gun down, Dana.

Links
Autumn Tysko's review
Tom Carissimi's review
Transcript at Inside the X

Fanfiction
Nope.

Comments

[estella-c.livejournal.com]

Truthfully my first rewatch, and it made my heart happy! What a super show it was in its prime. I agree with Autumn's review; WW brings together all the good things that made X unique: the mysterious monster, the paranoia, the ship, the ACTING, the LG, in a tightly wound story that actually plays out and resolves with perfectly maintain tension. By the special effects guy!

I always like saying what everyone probably knows, that Scully's trash freakout is a homage to Gene Hackman's in "The Conversation." Likewise Mulder doing something similar though somewhat saner in EBE.

GA is a wonderful actress and she underplays a total mental breakdown with a blank face but hysteria-fueled, insectile physical moves. Her fear just builds and builds. DD was capable of putting in a good performance, and this was among his best. I think I disagree with Fish that he should have been screaming "SCULLY" as he went to identify the body. It would have made sense, but the effect would have been bad. I never thought David could emote too well (cf TFWID). Though I liked him chewing out the poor doctor in OB. He scolded, but he didn't scream.

Sure hope you guys are up on your acronyms.

I liked the nefarious (word of the week) doctor who got shot at the end. Ir was such a sympathetic and convincing performance.

Do we really believe that Mulder was colorblind? I think it was Jess Mabe who put "they let you into the FBI with that?" into a fic; she liked showing up the continuity absurdities. But I guess it's like the wedding ring; you have the option of using or ignoring it.

[estella-c.livejournal.com]

Oh--forgot to say--what the hell is Scully doing sloshing down soda in a power suit while Mulder is sensibly down to his undeshirt. She couldn't get into something more comfortable?

[wendelah1]

Yeah, it's a funny contrast. Mulder is walking around half-dressed and she's still dressed to the nines, right down to her high-heeled shoes.

[wendelah1]

I always like saying what everyone probably knows, that Scully's trash freakout is a homage to Gene Hackman's in "The Conversation." Likewise Mulder doing something similar though somewhat saner in EBE.

Everyone? You betray your cinephile roots. I never would have thought that but then I've never seen or even heard of "The Conversation."

It is a great episode, one of the best of the season. And I love the third season.

I like how Duchovny underplayed the scene with the Gunmen and at the morgue.

Do we believe Mulder is colorblind? He says he's colorblind. Are we supposed to think he's lying about it? What I believe is that the writers didn't do their homework on that one. What a surprise.

[maidenjedi]

Re: Mulder being color blind. I really have a hard time believing he is, and it doesn't really explain why he isn't affected here. I'd say it's more to do with he never really sits down and watches the tapes the way Scully does.

[wendelah1]

He tells Scully watched the video tape. 36 hours of it.

He tells the Lonegunmen he's green red color blind. Why would he say those things if they weren't true?

[maidenjedi]

I missed him saying he watched the tapes. I guess I assumed, we didn't see him do it, etc. My error.

I'm not saying he's NOT red-green colorblind, but it is one of those historically challenged pieces of canon, for whatever reason. I have a hard time with it because it seems like it would come up more often or affect more things in Mulder's day-to-day investigative work. Two times it could come up - 'Small Potatoes' and later in 'Dreamland' - it doesn't. In this episode, it seems like a throwaway statement to the Lone Gunmen so the writers don't have to contrive too much about why Mulder isn't affected. It's almost lazy, since it comes out of nowhere. IDK, this kind of thing in canon always just irks me irrationally.

[estella-c.livejournal.com]

I agree. It's an irksome bit of canon. It's not that Mulder is lying, it's just a kind of dumb resolution to the problem and I can imagine someone suggesting it at the last minute. Anyhow, ficcers do what they want. I actually just used it in a funny vignette. I think if it came up in a life-or-death situation one might hesitate. (Not that WW *wasn't* a life-and-death, etc.

[estella-c.livejournal.com]

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