"Surekill"

"It's time to be your own man Randall, it's time to think for yourself."
Originally Aired 1/7/01

My first X-Files episode was "The Host" in my senior year high school English class. It was odd because that sums up my entire experience of high school English right there- we watched tv shows and movies more than we actually read important works of fiction like most kids do. One time a teacher even read to us, a chapter from Of Mice and Men, followed by watching the movie. So forgive me if my knowledge of Of Mice and Men mostly comes from Looney Tunes, and the big lug who asked, "which way did he go, George?"

I mention Of Mice and Men because that's what this episode reminded me of, with it's triangle of characters formed between two men and a woman. One man is the brains, while the other is larger, stronger, and acts like more of a lackey. The woman comes between them and ruins their plans, schemes, dreams, whichever you should call it. However, this episode seems to flip that scenario slightly. It appears that this episode "Surekill" wants the female to be the one with the plan of running away to a better life and standing in her way are the brothers. Although this episode is a bit muddled and I'm not sure who is actually the sympathetic character here- the female, Tammy, who is stealing money which was originally stolen from drug dealers; or the brother, Randall, who's manipulated by by his brother Dwight into doing his dirty work. It;s hard to tell because I don't think the writer knew either. The female, Tammy, who works for Dwight and Randall, and is embezzling money, might almost be like a Jackie Brown-type character, in that she's justified in taking it since it was blood money from drugs. Maybe I'm just reading too much into the Jackie Brown reference since Dwight is played Michael Bowen, who was an FBI Agent in that movie as well.

The aspect of this episode that I do like is the X-Files element, which has one brother with seemingly x-ray vision that allows him to see through walls. That heightened ability meant that his twin brother's sight was negatively effected, rendering him "legally blind." Shooting through walls is pretty cool, and led to a few neat set pieces where a man's head splatters blood all over the inside of a jail cell, and another where a wall looked like swiss cheese from several bullet holes. Yet the other brother's disability seems to come and go. If he needs to use a lighter to see Tammy's eyes, then how could he see the answering machine blinking from across the room? Oh well. The X-Files never lets logic get in the way of a good visual.

While Season 8 has been a return to form and a focus more on the supernatural and horror movie-styled plots of the early seasons, I'm at a point now where I want some humor. Those early episodes had dark subject matter while the mood was somewhat lightened by a few choice one-liners from Agent Mulder. I do appreciate the growing team-work between Doggett and Scully but some humor would be welcome. I feel like that humor creeps back into the series eventually with the return of David Duchovny. For now, the team of Doggett and Scully is coming along nicely and their scene together when Scully suggests x-ray vision is another step on Doggett's path- he doesn't deny her theory and shoot it down as rudely as he did in their initial case. A good scene or two can't save this episode though and I doubt I'd revisit it until the next time I'm running through the series in order.