Severed Review: "This Is Not Happening"
By Aderyn

Despite the rather corny titular posturing to the contrary, this week's
episode of The X-Files actually did happen. And, as the first in a trilogy of
angsty pangsty sweeps-whoring chapters it made an ardent effort to be
*happening*. To secure its vogueish status, 1013 decided to throw a little
of everything into the mire. And so it was an ep which rabid fans, non-
viewers, stoned llamas and heretical CHarcists could all appreciate.
*Finally*.

Skull: Hey, want a drag of this?
Aderyn: Sure. What is it?
Skull: Stone. I found it on the floor of the Abbey courtyard.
Aderyn: <inhale> . . .Damn, it's *good*. Weird, but good.
Skull: Very, very *good*.

The first right-on thing about TINH was the introduction of a new female
character, Special Agent Touchy Feely Reyes. Scullyists had feared that
Annabeth Gish's character had been introduced to replace She Who Has
*Hair*, but they needn't have worried. It's debatable whether a Goth with
a permanent Robert Smith-esque lipstick smirk, a worryingly salacious
penchant for personalised licence plates, and a habit of lighting up
Morleys"smoke-one-and-you're-doomed-to-be-the-love-child-of-all-
Eeeeeeeevil"cigarettes, could ever be worthy of a pseudo religious order.
However she had righteous dark hair, and so has all the worthy attributes
of a potential Scully adversary.

Skull: Oh please. ScUliE ('sHAIR) rOolz, remember? Worthy adversary,
my ass. Sheesh, I sometimes wonder how focused you really are.
Aderyn: Why? Coz I don't have a Scully-do like you? That's fighting talk.
My hair could kick your ass in its devotion to Scully.
Skull: I think a duel is in order. The challenge: whose hair is the most
scullycentric.
Aderyn: The Time and Place: Whenever I hit a creative block, and need
to break up the stinky crap I'm about to type.
Skull: Pretty soon then?
Aderyn: Abso<inhale>lutely.

There must have been some eyerolling at the similarities that the new
character bore to both Spiritual!Melissa Scully (RIP), Queequeg (RIP)
and da Vinci's Smirking!Monalisa (again, RIP) [note: does anyone else
see a pattern emerging here?] However, the arrival of a newbie, and a
girly-girl at that, was something that even the most jaded of fans could
surely eventually herald. It was the perfect opportunity for Dana
Katherine to sit around with her new chum and talk about girly stuff like
bourgeois hysteria and the carnivalesque in feminist theory, menstrual
cramps, and to braid each other's hair. Well, at least that would have
been the reality of Dana and Monilissa: the pre-teen years. The reality for
Dana and Monilissa: the consenting adults, was somewhat different, as
Reyes showed Scully just how much feeling and touching she could do.

Skull: You're being very irresponsible. Suggesting that slash is alive and
well on XF is just cheap, not to mention provocative and erroneous.
Agent Scully DID NOT have sexual relations with that woman. I repeat,
she did not have sexual relations with that woman.
Aderyn: Hey, I didn't say anything about rumpy-pumpy between the two
of them. I meant the other kind of feeling and, erm, touching. Yeah, I was
going to add that Monilissa whipped out her crystals and flashed them in
front of Scully. Then she sucked on an Altoid mint, donned some knee
pads, got down to the touchy-feely business, and then capped off the
night by pursing her lips around a Morley's cigar. I mean how is that
suggestive? Huh?
Skull: ...Oh never mind.

The X-Files has never shied away from ridiculously paranoid plotlines,
farcical familial sagas, character deaths and subsequent resurrections,
and good puffy hair. It was only a matter of time before the show decided
to air an episode that paid tribute to the sub-sub-genre to which it owes a
great debt - soap. Not even the cheapest of frothy daytime TV
melodramas could compete with mouldy abductees falling from the skies,
a pregnant Special Agent racing after some ghoul who had stolen her
new Nike sneakers, and special guest star Sue Ellen Ewing as a
hysterical abductee, still drunk, still collagen enhanced, and still
*fabulous*. While this foray may not have been to everyone's taste, it was
interesting to see the usually stoic Scully lose her cool - and lose it she
did, by screeching, wailing, and stomping her feet at Sue Ellen. While
some fans, quite understandably, chose this moment to develop selective
amnesia and slip in to a denial-coma, I personally feel that the best
moment from the episode then occurred. It wasn't subtle, but it was a
retro-referential revelation as Ms Ewing started to hysterically dig for oil,
and inadvertently produced a giant drain that sucked all those who were
scabby, dying, and/or had lacklustre hair into the hereafter. Serves them
right for not being beautiful enough.

Skull: Seeing as we're in Denialville at this time, I should probably tell you
that I slept with your husband. I was drunk. *So* sorry.
Aderyn: Well, I've been having an affair with your Latin Lover, Fabio. I've
had five illegitimate children by him. He told me that he lurves me. Can
you ever forgive me?
Skull: Yeah, whatever. Oh, and last week, while you were having that life-
threatening surgery to remove all your major organs, I forged your will,
buried you alive and ran off with your money. Ch-ch*ing*.
Aderyn: Oh that small matter <distainful sniff>, well this seems like a
good time to tell you that I'm a thirtysomething FBI agent, who
investigates paranormal phenomena. I recently had IVF so that the eggs
my beloved hid from me could be re-implanted with his sperm to create
the next Messiah. I'm now pregnant with an alien baby, and my hair is
more interesting than my current personality.
Skull: *Really* Aderyn, you've just ruined the believability of this section
of dialogue.

Gillian Anderson is the most amazing actress, and TINH highlighted her
talents definitively. Her peerless skills were emphasised this week by two
GA specials - staring at computer monitors until her tear ducts
overflowed, and emoting solely through her hair follicles. While detractors
could argue that her successes and prizes can be attributed to an over-
bright monitor, and some hair-spray, the reality is that at the very least,
DAMN, her hair can *act*. It was flatly restrained during the autopsy
scene, with nary a strand out of place, as if in respect for the dead she
was about to butcher. In the woods it puffed up, as if in defiance at the
woes that were about to befall her. Truly inspired follicular acting choices.

Skull: Talking of inspired follicles...

[Skull's hair swells up to resemble the perfection that was the Scully-do in
<snicker> "Travelers".]

Aderyn: Very, erm, impressive? Heh heh. Now it's my turn -

[Aderyn's hair calls Ma Scully on the Clunky White Phone, for one of
those neato mother-daughter schmoopy talks]

Skull: 1) I'd like to make an official complaint. It's *totally* unfair that
you're the one writing this dialogue. 2) Is it just me, or are you making
even less sense than usual? 3) Pass me that Stone, pronto. I need my
fix.

Never let it be said that I am biased towards Gillian the MAGNIFICENT;
her XF co-stars are okay, I guess. In this ep that was billed as "The return
of Wassisname", we got to see dear Moldy again. He was squeezed out
from the unforgiving lips of the Mothership from above, and crash-landed
back onto our screens. DeeDee was apparently paid millions to look like
ass for the two minutes' work he put into this ep. He's worth every penny
- it's not every actor who can stuff maternity-padding into their oral cavity,
and wear this tricky internal costume with such an esoteric expression of
pithy epigrammatic bemusement - so that their cheeks start to resemble
two saggy buttocks. All the prizes, part deux.

Skull: And part trois is MINE. ALL MINE!
Aderyn: We'll see. . .

[Skull's hair flattens itself into a sombre helmet, and conducts an autopsy
on some stinky corpse]

[Aderyn's kick-ass hair screams "I'm a Medical Doctor!" and boots Skull's
hair OUT of the mortuary.]

Skull: 1) Your hair has an attitude problem, 2) not to mention a Mulder-
like capacity for inappropriate behaviour. 3) I declare myself the winner of
this contest, because Scully would *never* wear boots while slicing and
dicing a stinky corpse. It's <drumroll> not hygienic! 4) Nyah!!
Aderyn: Huh? What did you just say? <shrug> Light up another of those
Stones wouldja? Me like the Stones, and they're really helping to take the
edge off my Severed Girl PAIN.
Skull: The Stones are okay, but I'm more of a Beatles girl myself. I always
had a thing for Ringo, ya know?
Aderyn: . . .Huh? <inhale> What were we talking about again? <shrug>

There were a few weaker moments in this episode. It seemed a little out
of character that manly Doggett would suddenly develop sneaker-envy
and prance around in the woods after trendy Jeremiah Smith. It seemed
even more unlikely that when Scully woke Skinner in the early hours, he
opened his apartment door wearing nothing but a push-up bra, fluffy
bunny slippers and a cheesy grin. Everybody knows that it's WRONG to
sleep in a bra, not to mention uncomfortable. Minor characterisation
quibbles perhaps, but ones that rather marred my enjoyment of the
episode.

Skull: Brassiere etiquette aside, what the hell was Scully doing at
Skinner's apartment in the middle of the night?!
Aderyn: I think they were star-gazing.
Skull: Watching the last couple of seasons of XF, you mean?
Aderyn: Tea Leoni is gorgeous on a dark night. . . a very dark night.

XF has long enjoyed a dalliance with the leitmotif of fat babies, and TINH
came up trumps with a delightful shot of fat-head Mulder, the Nemmens
baby and all the other wailing abductees that fell from the sky. Perhaps it
was a little overstated to suggest that the impact of these interstellar
vacationers hitting the earth was enough to cause an earthquake in the
Seattle area. However, it did rather bring home the point that if the aliens
are going to colonise the earth by impregnating the oversized faces of
their captives, they'd better first ensure that they cushion the ground in
preparation.

Skull: Or maybe they could thoughtfully provide parachutes for the
plummeting pregnant people. Hitting the ground from that height has to
*hurt*. It's no wonder that Mulder was looking a little poorly.
Aderyn: You will find alternate exits at the rear of the spaceship. In case
of emergency, please press the call button and an attendant will release
you from your bonds, and remove all sadistic dental equipment as soon
as possible. . .so that you can plunge to certain death in relative comfort.
Enjoy your flight!

Visual metaphors abound in CC's creations. It's always been a joy to
witness the placement of shape and colour that give the show a
semblance of continuity. The shape that XF loves the best, and the one
most fitting its oeuvre is the circle. From the Scully-significant ouroboros,
to Mulder's wedding ring, to the noose that CC has created for himself via
his ineptitude, to the shape of the toilet bowl that the rats burst through in
the classic Teso Dos Bichos. These cyclical references are the sole
thread that tie all seasons and eps together. In TINH the reference was
the somewhat heavy-handed gargantuan drain that each of the dying
characters circled before being squished down the plug-hole by
unsympathetic doctors.

Skull: Now I'm no doctor, and I don't even play one on TV, but I thought
that was a little rude.
Aderyn: Maybe he meant it literally. Maybe the people in question really
were drawing rings around a drain.
Skull: Or dancing the Hokey-Pokey around it.
Aderyn: Or playing The Farmer in the Dell around it.
Skull: Or urinating around it.
Aderyn: ...now THAT'S rude.

Every XF fan is surely something of an ambulance chaser, and TINH
gave us scene after scene of medical mumbo jumbo, yummy doctors,
and incomprehensible terminology. Me happy. Perhaps it was a little
overstated to have the whole cast converge in the ER at the soapy
cliffhanger of an ending, but it was a valuable indicator of just how much
it's possible to care about these fictional characters. It would have taken
a stony heart not to have been moved by the sight of Skinner with chronic
bra indents on his upper left clavicle. Mulder's head that had lost its body.
Sue Ellen's drain lacerated lips that needed to have emergency collagen
implants. And Scully, dear Scully with her severe tear duct malfunction.
Jeremiah was a healer, but couldn't stop showing off in his new Nike
sneakers, and so was virtually useless - a turn of events that means that
we viewers now have to wait though the month of March on tenterhooks
to see if these ailments will ever be cured.

Skull: I'd love to make a smart assed comment at this point <yawn>, or
maybe viciously argue with you just for the hell of it. . . but I can't be
bothered.
Aderyn: You think we've had Too. MuCh. StOnE?
Skull: Yeah, maybe. I'm feeling a little desensitised and confuzzled about
stuff. <scratches head> Even *your* hair is starting to look good.
Aderyn: Oh deah gott, this *is* getting serious. We'll never regain our
chainsaw sharp faux-bickering if we carry on over-indulging like this.
Skull: Okay, I have a plan - I'll light up one more Stone, and then we quit.
Alright?
Aderyn: One more <inhale>, and then we quit. Sure. <happy nod>

"This is not happening" has long been the modal line uttered by twitching
philes after viewing a new chapter of XF. This episode was a pleasant
surprise, for the very fact that it proved that CC Brainfart could still get it
right once in a while, and produce a *happening* piece of prime time
television. . . what exactly *happened*, I can't recall at this time, but I'm
sure I typed some stuff about it earlier in this review? Something about
fat babies sent down from above clutching bars of soap so that they
could clean some drain that was being circled by an ambulance with a
personalised licence plate which was driven by Skinner who was wearing
a bra who smoked Morleys and who looked like ass because he'd just
been cried on by Touchy-Feely Reyes and fallen on by Mulder who'd
been decapitated by an over-bright computer monitor. . .Oh, and Scully's
hair looked good.

Skull: Ad? It's time. One more puff for the road?
Aderyn: Oh yeah.

[Skull and Aderyn take one more puff for the road, and fall into a
drugged heap on the floor. Will they ever recover from the dreaded
Abbey Stones? Will they ever have the courage to write another Severed
Review after this stoopidly contrived cliffhanger? Will I ever find the ring
that I lost down the back of the sofa last week? Tune in, sometime in
April, to find out.]

-end.