The X-Files: review of "Excelsis Dei"
review of "Excelsis Dei"
Surf the Halls
by Sarah Stegall
munchkyn@netcom.com
Like many viewers, I have been waiting for an episode
that lets Dana Scully take a case, and allows her own
investigative powers to shine. So when Mulder walks in at the
beginning of "Excelsis Dei" and finds her in the middle of a
case, I was thrilled. Agent Scully goes to bat for a nurse
(Teryl Rothery) who claims to have been raped by an invisible
entity. Mulder is immediately skeptical--there's a rare turn-
-pointing out that while they have several X-files on "entity
rape", none have been substantiated. Well, *something*
happened to Nurse Charters, because she is badly beaten. She
accuses a nursing home resident of attacking her; in Scully
and Mulder's interview with the accused at the nursing home,
he actually flashes both agents. Shortly afterwards, he dies
and an orderly is pushed--or falls--out of a window. Both
agents now smell a rat, and the investigation focuses on the
treatment administered the residents by the genial Dr. Grego.
The residents of the nursing home are showing a surprising
amount of progress in 'recovering' from Alzheimer's, a disease
with no known treatment or cure. Slowly the Team pieces
together a scenario which includes experimental drugs,
Oriental medicine, shamanism, and the spirit world.
Scully goes as far afield in her search for an
explanation as Mulder does, only down a different road. Since
this is Dana Scully's case, she goes after the extreme
possibilities on the scientific frontier: sick building
syndrome, environmental toxins, an experimental drug with
bizarre side effects. Scully even gets to rescue Mulder.
Gillian Anderson really shines in this episode. She
gives us a delightful Agent Scully: her dry humor when Mulder
gets defensive about his porno stash, her detached compassion
for the rape victim, her dogged determination to pursue the
case after Mulder is ready to go home. Agent Scully has her
hands on a mystery and won't give up until she has it flat
under a microscope. Her focus is intellectual--could there be
a fantastic cure for Alzheimer's here?--rather than emotional,
a stunning departure from TV's usual treatment of female
characters. And how good it is to hear her cool, precise
voice at the end of the episode, wrapping up the case but not
the puzzle.
David Duchovny continues to invest Mulder with self-
depreciating humor. Mulder as skeptic is refreshing and
hilarious: "Are you telling me that house is haunted?
Because if you are, you've been working with me too long."
Director Stephen Surjik confuses us with camera angles a
couple of times--why are the corridors in this building so
much longer than the building itself? But he achieves some
wonderful effects: the 'ghosts' following Dana Scully down a
deserted hallway made my hair stand up. Nitpick time: A 10
foot square bathroom, even granting some air space at the top
for Mulder and Charters, would hold more than three and a half
tons of water. Long before it filled, that bathroom floor
would have collapsed into the basement. But I loved it
anyway. When the door finally bursts, Mulder goes hall surfing
with Nurse Charters, a *wonderful* scene.
But the script, by Paul ("Quantum Leap") Brown, takes
several left turns without signaling: why does Nurse Charters
in almost the same breath claim both to have been raped by an
invisible entity and by a living man--is she asserting that
Hal Arden can travel out of his body? This is a confusing
plot point that should have been clarified. Brown still
managed a couple of surprises: I was flatly astonished when
Mulder uncovered the body of the hospital orderly composting
away in the mushroom farm. Ultimately, we are left with too
much mystery in this story. Nothing ties together the ghosts
(hallucinations?), the rape, the deaths of the orderlies, the
experimental drugs, the mushrooms. We are left not with
ambiguity, not with double meanings, but with no plausible
explanation at all! These mysteries, while intriguing, have
only their locale in common. We don't buy the coincidence, but
no other explanation is offered, not even a theory.
Agents Scully and Mulder, although hip and urbane, are
basically detectives, and the detective always functions as
the restorer of order. They are out to discover the truth,
which implies not just a truth to be discovered (and, we hope,
revealed to the audience) but a systematic universe in which
we may seek causes of effects and reasonably expect to find
them. These truths may not be material Mulder and Scully can
take into court, but they have to satisfy us, the viewers.
One can take the business of the unresolved case too far.
Taken to extremes, we risk losing any sense of an explainable
universe. In Friday's episode, we are left adrift in chaos.
This is supposed to be entertainment, not existentialist
philosophy. The audience demands more.
This episode could have gotten five sunflower seeds out
of five, but it left us with too many questions and lacked
that special frisson rippling down the spine that
characterizes the best episodes. I give it three sunflower
seeds out of five.
Sarah Stegall
munchkyn@netcom.com
Surf the Halls
by Sarah Stegall
munchkyn@netcom.com
Like many viewers, I have been waiting for an episode
that lets Dana Scully take a case, and allows her own
investigative powers to shine. So when Mulder walks in at the
beginning of "Excelsis Dei" and finds her in the middle of a
case, I was thrilled. Agent Scully goes to bat for a nurse
(Teryl Rothery) who claims to have been raped by an invisible
entity. Mulder is immediately skeptical--there's a rare turn-
-pointing out that while they have several X-files on "entity
rape", none have been substantiated. Well, *something*
happened to Nurse Charters, because she is badly beaten. She
accuses a nursing home resident of attacking her; in Scully
and Mulder's interview with the accused at the nursing home,
he actually flashes both agents. Shortly afterwards, he dies
and an orderly is pushed--or falls--out of a window. Both
agents now smell a rat, and the investigation focuses on the
treatment administered the residents by the genial Dr. Grego.
The residents of the nursing home are showing a surprising
amount of progress in 'recovering' from Alzheimer's, a disease
with no known treatment or cure. Slowly the Team pieces
together a scenario which includes experimental drugs,
Oriental medicine, shamanism, and the spirit world.
Scully goes as far afield in her search for an
explanation as Mulder does, only down a different road. Since
this is Dana Scully's case, she goes after the extreme
possibilities on the scientific frontier: sick building
syndrome, environmental toxins, an experimental drug with
bizarre side effects. Scully even gets to rescue Mulder.
Gillian Anderson really shines in this episode. She
gives us a delightful Agent Scully: her dry humor when Mulder
gets defensive about his porno stash, her detached compassion
for the rape victim, her dogged determination to pursue the
case after Mulder is ready to go home. Agent Scully has her
hands on a mystery and won't give up until she has it flat
under a microscope. Her focus is intellectual--could there be
a fantastic cure for Alzheimer's here?--rather than emotional,
a stunning departure from TV's usual treatment of female
characters. And how good it is to hear her cool, precise
voice at the end of the episode, wrapping up the case but not
the puzzle.
David Duchovny continues to invest Mulder with self-
depreciating humor. Mulder as skeptic is refreshing and
hilarious: "Are you telling me that house is haunted?
Because if you are, you've been working with me too long."
Director Stephen Surjik confuses us with camera angles a
couple of times--why are the corridors in this building so
much longer than the building itself? But he achieves some
wonderful effects: the 'ghosts' following Dana Scully down a
deserted hallway made my hair stand up. Nitpick time: A 10
foot square bathroom, even granting some air space at the top
for Mulder and Charters, would hold more than three and a half
tons of water. Long before it filled, that bathroom floor
would have collapsed into the basement. But I loved it
anyway. When the door finally bursts, Mulder goes hall surfing
with Nurse Charters, a *wonderful* scene.
But the script, by Paul ("Quantum Leap") Brown, takes
several left turns without signaling: why does Nurse Charters
in almost the same breath claim both to have been raped by an
invisible entity and by a living man--is she asserting that
Hal Arden can travel out of his body? This is a confusing
plot point that should have been clarified. Brown still
managed a couple of surprises: I was flatly astonished when
Mulder uncovered the body of the hospital orderly composting
away in the mushroom farm. Ultimately, we are left with too
much mystery in this story. Nothing ties together the ghosts
(hallucinations?), the rape, the deaths of the orderlies, the
experimental drugs, the mushrooms. We are left not with
ambiguity, not with double meanings, but with no plausible
explanation at all! These mysteries, while intriguing, have
only their locale in common. We don't buy the coincidence, but
no other explanation is offered, not even a theory.
Agents Scully and Mulder, although hip and urbane, are
basically detectives, and the detective always functions as
the restorer of order. They are out to discover the truth,
which implies not just a truth to be discovered (and, we hope,
revealed to the audience) but a systematic universe in which
we may seek causes of effects and reasonably expect to find
them. These truths may not be material Mulder and Scully can
take into court, but they have to satisfy us, the viewers.
One can take the business of the unresolved case too far.
Taken to extremes, we risk losing any sense of an explainable
universe. In Friday's episode, we are left adrift in chaos.
This is supposed to be entertainment, not existentialist
philosophy. The audience demands more.
This episode could have gotten five sunflower seeds out
of five, but it left us with too many questions and lacked
that special frisson rippling down the spine that
characterizes the best episodes. I give it three sunflower
seeds out of five.
Sarah Stegall
munchkyn@netcom.com
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