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Nov 3, 2017

The X-Files MSR Analysis Series: Season 1 Episode 4

“Conduit”

Previous episode analysis - 1x03 Squeeze.

This episode has some interesting developments for MSR, as it’s the first episode to delve into the Samantha Mulder backstory.

Not so much around what happened to Samantha, but what effect her disappearance had on Mulder and how that event has irrevocably altered who he is, and the course of his life. The bulk of the MSR here is Scully watching over Mulder, and noticing his changes in behaviour; seeing for the first time how damaged Mulder truly is.

The opening of this episode always intrigued me because it grounds the X-Files in the rules and procedures of the FBI that subsequent seasons often gloss over. Mulder submits a “302″ (a request to open a case file), as well as cover for travel expenses and there’s even a brief mention of Mulder’s ASAC (Assistant Special Agent in Charge) - who is Mulder’s current ASAC? I don’t think we ever meet him/her.

It’s kind of strange how in season 1 there is a strong sense of authority looming over the X-Files, like an axe waiting to drop, whereas later seasons you really do get the feeling they’ve just been left to their own devices, and that the only person they really answer to is Skinner - who for the most part, is pretty lenient with them.

The scene here with Blevins is good for observing the subtle shift that is occurring in Scully, away from loyalty to the FBI and the orders of her superiors, and towards loyalty to Mulder. Blevins tries to find out what Scully knows of Mulder’s sister and she refuses to betray Mulder’s confidence - but then Blevins shows her that Mulder opened the X-File on his sister’s disappearance himself, so she feels a bit more at liberty to share what she knows. Still, I like that she has no qualms with resisting a superior if it means remaining loyal to her partner.

Then Blevins tries to use Scully to undermine Mulder, and she sees straight through that shit.

Scully is so great in this scene - we all need a BFF like Scully. Being the utterly loyal BAMF that she is, without knowing Mulder’s reasoning, without any knowledge of the case, she puts herself out there to get the case opened simply because she trusts Mulder’s judgement.

She has faith in him that whatever has prompted him to submit this 302, there is a good reason for it - despite what others think - she doesn’t believe he’s a madman or a fool, and she’s willing to challenge her superior based on her faith in him.

Look at that, I can find MSR in any scene. Can’t quite decide if that’s a talent or a curse.

Now it’s the moment you’ve all been waiting for. Don’t deny it.

Mulder, Mulder, Mulder... first, what colour is that shirt you’re wearing? Did you put a yellow sock in with your whites?

Second, GOOD LORD MAN. He definitely gets a thrill out of flirting with her, because he’s pretty good at invading her personal space in surprisingly intimate ways - she’d have felt his breath on her face; that’s incredibly intimate. What was he thinking? Honestly, he probably wasn’t - I still genuinely believe he’s not aware of what he’s doing. He probably doesn’t even think of it as flirting.

Poor Scully - see her sharp intake of breath? I know, I know, she’s exasperated with him but c’mon... if you had this guy come at you like that wouldn’t you have a little moment? She even seems to take a split-second to consider this as she eyes his lips briefly.

What? Don’t look at me like that. When you make gifs, you inevitably end up seeing scenes frame by frame... you can’t help but notice these things!

The fact she never challenges this behaviour is just more evidence that she is attracted to him, because Scully has more self-respect than to let a colleague get up in her space if she doesn’t want it. Scully lets him get away with things like this repeatedly because 1. she’s comfortable with him - she trusts him and 2. she is professional enough to not let it interfere with their relationship or their work. But fuck me, Mulder makes it hard for her.

Scully then lets Mulder play teacher with his projector. Nawww, I miss overhead projectors. They phased out using them in X-Files episodes eventually too, but watching Mulder give Scully a little presentation always makes my heart do a thing.

He loves having someone to share this with, someone who is not just a skilled professional - a highly qualified scientist and doctor - but someone who looks at his work and applies their expertise faithfully. She takes him and what he does seriously, her challenging him is proof of that.

Honestly, I think he enjoys the challenge of proving the credibility of his theories under Scully’s scrutiny. That way, this back and fourth that occurs between them serves the very useful purpose of grounding Mulder and also challenges him to work for his theory rather than just believe anything and everything willy nilly - which we know he would definitely do without someone to watch over him. He enjoys it, but no doubt, it frustrates the fuck out of him sometimes too.

Although surprisingly, he seems quite chill about it today.

Soooo... slightly veering away from MSR for a moment...

Welcome back to Mulder’s Kitchen, people!

An interesting observation I made in this episode was that the apparent UFO sighting Mulder shows Scully on the projector from Lake Okobogee in 1967, looks awfully similar to a UFO we will see later in the series.

UFO From Lake Okobogee.

UFO from Fight the Future.

UFO from season 8′s This is Not Happening.

What are the chances that these are all in fact, the same UFO?

I always thought the FTF and This is Not Happening UFO were one in the same; that seems clear despite it seeming much bigger in FTF, but let’s just put that down to the SFX budget. The possibility that the FTF UFO was previously involved in abductions in the 60′s is an interesting idea, and nicely ties the events of this episode into the greater mythology. The mythology is always fun. I’m one of those rare unicorns that actually enjoys the mythology more than the stand alone episodes.

I know, I know... hey, hands off the unfollow button!

Mulder and Scully: Getting to the front door at the same time since 1993.

Also, Scully low key checking Mulder out. As you do.

Once you’ve seen it, you just can’t unsee it.

The dynamics of the next scene are really interesting, and quite heartbreaking when you think of all the loss in the room. Darlene Morris desperate for the return of her daughter Ruby, and Mulder, desperate to learn something that might lead to answers about what happened to Samantha.

Mulder is clearly very vulnerable walking into this house, the second he sees the Morris family photos, he’s transported to a time and a place that is long lost to him - and Scully sees his pain.

In that moment he is no longer the Oxford-educated psychologist, criminal profiler, Special Agent of the FBI, Fox Mulder - he’s the lonely 12 year-old boy Fox Mulder. Longing for connection to not just his missing sister, but to the life that was robbed from him when she was taken away. The photos of a once happy family, triggering in him recollections of his own loss.

Recall that in the pilot, Mulder tells Scully that after Samantha’s abduction his family fell apart - nobody talked about what happened, so he never had the chance to come to terms with it.

We know later in the series that his parents divorce in the wake of what happened to Samantha, so effectively, his whole world was destroyed. Imagine what that must be like for a 12 year-old child - the safety and security of home and family snuffed out in a single night then never addressed. Hey kid, your life is now a hollow shadow of what it once was - deal with it. He was just a boy with no capacity to deal with the enormity of what he had experienced, left to deal with the shattered pieces of his entire world - alone.

It may sound melodramatic, but I deal with this kind of childhood trauma all the time in my work, and the scars that are left can run very deep from far less traumatic experiences than Mulders. It’s actually miraculous in some ways, that Fox Mulder became a functioning, highly-educated, and productive member of society.

But he didn’t get off lightly, the consequence of his unresolved trauma is that these scars run so deep for him they are the greatest driving force in his life 20-odd years after the fact. And tragically, we know they will continue to drive him for the next 20+ years into the future.

Well, this is cheery, isn’t it? I could really brighten everyone’s day and tell you about my thoughts on what losing William did to compound Mulder’s trauma around the loss of love and family... but I’ll spare you that particular trauma.

We can see during the conversation with Darlene, that Mulder is still out of sorts - Scully is doing most of the talking. They’re talking about the night her daughter Ruby was abducted from Lake Okobogee, then Darlene drops this on Mulder and he’s like a deer caught in headlights.

Scully is again observing this change in Mulder and she’s worried for him; she’s never seen him like this before.

Also, can I just say quickly before we move on - that this kid is creepy AF.

Scully continues to pick up on Mulder’s strange behaviour.

Scully does try to approach this with him in an indirect way, letting him know gently she’s noticed his behaviour - but he brushes it off with his characteristic deflective humour. Scully will have to be a bit more direct to get through to him on this one.

Oh, quick intermission.

ZOMG HE TOUCHED HER BACK AGAIN! Yep, the small-of-the-back-touching love affair continues. This episode: Mulder goes in for the double-hander.

This next bit makes me chuckle, because these NSA goons are looking for Mulder, so why did they break into Scully’s hotel room, and not Mulder’s?

Were the rumours of their sleeping together going around the bureau this early in the game? Maybe they thought they’d be clever and break into her room and catch him?

We wish it were true, NSA goons... we really wish it were true.

But it’s all good, eventually they find our boy, Fox.

Hoo boy.

We interrupt this programme to bring you an important message: Mulder’s bed head is hot as fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu--

Scully makes the mistake of ratting out creepy kid Kevin to the NSA and Mulder is frustrated at her actions. The kid and his mother get hauled off in a somewhat uncomfortable scene, and Mulder looks around the Morris’ house, spotting from the window that their caravan has a scorched roof, which aligns with Darlene’s story of what happened on the night that Ruby disappeared. He rushes off to investigate, while Scully stays at the window, watching him.

All throughout this episode Scully has been watching Mulder. She knows what’s going on for him, but doesn’t know how to approach it.

Upon discovering that creepy kid has somehow acquired to ability to write Bach in binary (a story thread that never gets resolved, by the way), Mulder rushes to meet Darlene Morris to apologise to her for the NSA involvement, but she’s not interested and is hostile towards him now. She tells him to keep away from her and her son and Scully uncomfortably notices, yet again, that Mulder is being made more and more emotionally vulnerable by this case.

Also, I gotta say it again... this creepy kid, man. I feel like he would stab me up in my sleep.

Please stop looking at me like that, creepy kid.

At this point, Mulder has become fixated on Kevin and Ruby, and believes creepy kid is a “conduit” (eeeeeeyyyy the episode title!) and that he is linked to who/what abducted Ruby. Basically, Mulder thinks aliens are using Kevin as some kind of human TV aerial.

The aliens wanted to catch season 8 of Game of Thrones but arrived on Earth in 1967 instead of 2018, so they’re pissed they’re having to wait 51 years for it to air and are amusing themselves by abducting people for their own entertainment purposes.

How’s that for a theory, Mulder?

Ok enough kidding around, serious talk now... serious stuff.

Scully tries again to talk to Mulder about what is going on for him. She knows what is driving him, and why he is obsessed with finding Ruby - but she leaves it unspoken. It’s fairly clear that what she doesn’t say is that Mulder is seeing Samantha in Ruby.

Scully tries to tell Mulder that there is no evidence of an abduction; tries to break him away from his fixation on saving her, but he is a man possessed.

Does he obsess with saving Ruby to absolve himself of the guilt of not being able to save Samantha? To get information from Ruby that might shed light on what happened to his sister? Maybe both. But he’s determined to see it through, and Scully, concerned with his welfare, has no choice but to see it through with him.

I think this moment more than any other solidifies in Scully’s mind that Mulder isn’t just driven by wanting to know what happened to his sister; he’s in fact still deeply traumatised by her disappearance.

What Blevins suggested about Mulder’s personal agenda clouding his judgement is undeniable at this point, but she doesn’t use this knowledge against him - doesn’t write it in her report. She can see and hear the pain he’s dealing with - this desperation to save Ruby is a clear window into his desperation to save his sister.

She doesn’t have the heart to stop him after seeing that. She feels for him.

Things eventually come to a head, as Mulder refuses to give up believing Ruby can be saved despite the fact they have a suspect with a motive for murder in custody. Scully believes he’s so clouded that he can’t see what he’s doing - she can’t beat around the bush anymore, she has to come out and say it directly.

What Scully comes to realise over the course of this episode, is that Mulder is a very damaged man. The guilt of not being able to save Samantha seemingly drives Mulder to project his sister onto Ruby, and in fact, various vulnerable women throughout the series. It’s a classic example of transference, to act out a trauma in similar scenarios with similar people in an attempt to resolve the distress it triggers. But Mulder never seems to fully resolve this - as recently as the events of I Want to Believe Mulder is still looking for is sister in the faces of vulnerable, victimised women.

Compare the conversation Mulder and Scully have in I Want to Believe with the conversation above from Conduit.

Even more recently, you also have Sveta in season 10′s My Struggle I, he is still compelled to save hapless women no matter the personal cost to himself.

In fact, I’m certain the reason Scully says to Mulder “you know what you’re doing” in My Struggle I isn’t because of some childish jealousy, it’s because she knows what he’s like - she’s been going over this with him for enough years to know, and that’s why she tells him he knows what he’s doing too, because he’s done it enough times to know why he behaves this way without needing her to tell him.

Okay, quick, run! Back to 1993.

What we’re seeing here in Conduit, is Scully experience this traumatised side of Mulder for the first time. Kinda makes you feel sorry for Conduit-Scully, doesn’t it? She’s got a looooooooong hard road ahead of her with this shit.

So, moving on. Mulder and Scully go looking for Darlene and creepy kid Kevin at Lake Okobogee, and on the drive there, Mulder admits - in a uniquely Mulderesque way - that she is right about him.

Mulderesque meaning as avoidant and indirect as possible.

I found this story of Mulder’s childhood ritual incredibly sad, because it’s as I said before - as a 12 year-old boy, he was not emotionally equipped to deal with the aftermath of what happened, and so his 12 year-old mind dealt with it in the only way it could - through this child-like gesture of closing his eyes and believing that if he wished for it hard enough, that she would be there when he opened them again. Hasn’t every kid done that; closed their eyes and wished?

Telling Scully this story is another defining point in their journey together. Mulder is a closed book to most people around him, and the long pauses tell me he even finds it difficult to tell Scully this. He’s not used to letting people get close - he fears it, because everyone he has loved has left him. Especially if you consider that at this point, he has also not long ago lost Diana too.

Gag.

But little by little, Scully is breaking down the walls. Even though she’s been challenging him every step of the way on this case, the one time she was right on the money was the most important time of all. She’s right, he is chasing his sister and he knows it. He knows what he’s doing; but can’t help himself.

Telling Scully this story is his way of acknowledging that.

Mulder and Scully finally arrive at the lake and find Darlene, creepy kid and Ruby. It first appears like Ruby was dumped by a biker gang, as she turns up unconscious in the forest just as the gang ride off.

SUPER FOX TO THE RESCUE!

Am I the only one who can’t help but think of Mulder as a dad every time he’s in a scene with a kid, now? In this bit with the biker gang, I couldn’t help but think of how awesome a dad he would have been. Then I feel sad because William.

Honestly, the thing that pains me most about the X-Files these days isn’t that Mulder and Scully split, it’s that Mulder and Scully never got to be parents, because they would have been awesome at it.

I think I need a little cry now.

So in the end, Mulder was right - Ruby was alive.

Later in the hospital, Mulder notes that Ruby has a chemical imbalance which suggests she had experienced prolonged weightlessness. Which means unless she was hanging out with the Biker Mice from Mars, she probably wasn’t with the bikers - that she actually was abducted. But it is strange when you consider the greater mythology, which posits that all “alien” abductions are actually abductions by the government using ARVs to carry out their alien-human hybrid project.

So who abducted Ruby and took her into friggin’ space then?! Some other bored aliens I guess?? The Bounty Hunters on a joyride?

Mulder desperately tries to get Ruby to talk about what happened to her, but she refuses.

Darlene arrives to put the kibosh on any further abduction-talk, and Mulder is bereft. He needs to know what happened to Ruby - he’s trying to make sense of what happened to his sister through Ruby, and he can’t make sense of it. He’s once again, left open - highly vulnerable, and Scully doesn’t know what to do to help him.

Neeee nawww it’s the grammar police! I think you mean ‘important to whom’, Darlene.

Scully is again left to observe Mulder’s pain, and is powerless to do anything to ease it, the door is being shut in his face and there’s nothing either of them can do about it.

The hand she physically places on his shoulder here I always felt was a symbolic gesture of their friendship at this point - she’s protecting him, keeping him safe. Mulder no doubt feels very alone at this moment, but she’s been there for him, watching over him, supporting him through this whole thing; without her being there to protect him from himself, I suspect Mulder would have done something he would have later regretted.

To see it properly, I needed to make a full 24fps gif, but watch as she grasps his shoulder - the way she soundlessly mouths Mulder’s name and lets out a breath she was holding in. She can see what will happen next if she doesn’t stop him. It’s all Scully can do for him now.

Gotta, say, Gillian Anderson is phenomenal, isn’t she? Just that tiny acting choice made such a difference to the power of this moment - the awareness she gives Scully of how vulnerable Mulder is and how he’s not thinking straight - she has to think for him - to protect him. I don’t often talk about the acting, I analyse this like they are real people - because that’s what I do - but I just had to mention this because it’s so subtle yet so affecting. Bravo Gillian.

Now, for the final scenes of the episode. This is where I am going to get highly interpretive, so I fully expect some of you to not share my views on this.

I believe the final scenes of this episode reflect the balance of influences in Mulder’s life. The trauma of his sister’s abduction and Scully.

I don’t want to make this too much about Scully, even though this is an MSR analysis and I have a talent for making everything about MSR ha. But I do think there is a dichotomy at play here.

The past - Samantha; and the future - Scully. Hurt and healing.

Scully wants to help Mulder, she doesn’t see him as just a work colleague anymore. She wants to help him if she can. She listens to his regression hypnosis tapes; trying to understand – she’s come to care about him a great deal at this point.

She writes no report, doesn’t share any of what happened with Blevins, her focus is on this damaged man. Beyond superficial attraction and professional loyalty she wants to try to be there for him - as a friend.

Then it’s our first time to see Fox Mulder break down. He’s sitting in a church, staring at a childhood photograph. It’s significant, I think, that the photo is of both of them, not just Samantha. He’s mourning for not just her, but for the boy he once was, for the promise of a life he once had.

It always intrigued me that Mulder found himself sitting in a church, since we know from various bits of dialogue throughout the series that Mulder is almost certainly an atheist. He isn’t aware of Scully’s Catholicism at this point, so his being there is ultimately an unexplained anomaly.

So stepping away from the characters again - twice in one analysis! - I wonder if it’s a symbolic choice by Chris Carter. Because Scully is wearing a cross from the pilot, so her faith was always a planned part of her character.

My interpretation, then?

It’s the dichotomy of influences in his life I mentioned earlier being visually represented. He’s alone in his grief, holding the symbolic representation of his trauma - a photograph of his lost childhood. But there is always that comforting presence, he always has Scully to look out for him, even in his darkest moments - and as the seasons progress, we see this bear out. I like to think of Mulder being in the church as a symbol of Scully watching over him, just as she has watched over him throughout this episode.

Well shit, that was a long one. The longest yet I think? I seriously hope this is not going to be a continuing trend! I think there are some episodes, especially in the early seasons where things are happening for the first time which means it will take me a bit more work to get into the characters heads. Also, this episode had a lot of heavy Mulder-centric stuff, but I think it ties into his relationship with Scully in many ways, so I hope I was able to effectively represent that.

Next up. 1x05 - Jersey Devil.

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