'The X-Files' Season 11, Episode 10: 'My Struggle IV"

Alright, it's been long enough.  It's time to finally wrap this up and close the book on "The X-Files".  Up until now, the "My Struggle" episodes have all been bad.  When I brought up the idea of a fourth entry, I was largely kidding, yet here we are.

Credit where it's due, this is the best of the bunch.  It's not god-awful like its predecessors.  There aren't any mind-bogglingly stupid plot twists (well, one, but I'll get to that).  While the "end of the world" aspect is brought up again, the episode is largely a race to find William.  It's simplicity works in the episode's favor.  Unfortunately, the fact that the ongoing story has been largely ignored means that any sense of tension is gone.  To be fair, the stand alones have been quite solid, so it worked for the season as a whole, but it doesn't stop the fact that this whole thing feels rushed and underdeveloped.

Unlike "The Truth", this episode doesn't spend a lot of time just summarizing and explaining the plot of the show.  It does, however, recycle some elements.  This isn't unsurprising as they are both series finales of sorts.  Once again, the X-Files are closed and once again Smoking Man is killed.  Normally, three gunshots to the chest of an old man would be fatal, but we did see him take a sidewinder to the face and come back unscathed, so I'm guessing the finality of this death depends on whether the show comes back or not.  Same goes for the closing of the agents' branch.  It's been done before, but given that this is supposed to wrap things up, it really can't be avoided.

Oddly enough, it does leave some loose ends.  Skinner's fate is never determined and the last shot of the episode shows that things may not be as in the clear as one would have hoped.  Honestly, I could have done without that.  If you're going to wrap things up, do it.  That sequel hook was kind of pointless.

Before that, though we have to talk about the ending.  Long story short, William lets himself get offed by Smoking Man to stop the impending apocalypse (I'm pretty sure spoilers are no longer an issue at this point, yes?)  While the character was underdeveloped, it did let him die a noble and somewhat sad death.  Even the two agents are rather devastated.  Unlike the season opener, actual effort is put into making this a sad scene.  Credit especially goes to Anderson, she was acting her ass off here.

Sadly, it's undercut the the aforementioned stupid plot development.  The two agents are reeling from not only the death of their son, but the revelation that he wasn't theirs.  Smoking Man cooked him up in a lab and used Scully as a surrogate of sorts.

It's now, seconds after William's death that Scully decides to reveal that she is really pregnant with their actual child.    This is just stupid on so many levels.  Sure it gives the two agents a more uplifting note to go out on, but really?

Overall, this episode was...adequate?  It had some structural problems, but the last few minutes are really the only cringe-worthy parts.  Some of the dialogue is clunky, but again, it's been much worse.

One last thing, and this is something of a nitpick, but don't the agents know Reyes?  They worked with her a while back, right?  She doesn't do much here, but when she does contact them to give them a warning/lead, they talk as if they have no idea who she is.  I feel like this is another thing that the show did before, but I might be remembering it wrong.  Maybe it was a meta-jab at the character, nobody remembers her because she really hasn't done anything important as of late.  It doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things, but it's still strange.

I'm kind of hoping that this is it.  The relaunch did ultimately validate it's own existence, but I'd hate to see the show try to wrap itself up for a third time.  Let's just call it a job done (or a case closed, eh?) and move on to other things.

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'Castle Rock' Episode 7: 'The Queen'

The last episode had Ruth Deaver reveal that she (at least believes) that she has become disconnected from linear time.   This episode brings the idea to central focus, as she takes center stage, bringing us with her on a journey through time.  This allows the episode to revisit certain scenes and put them in a slightly different context, but it also allows us to get a better look at events that had only been discussed in episodes prior.

I had mentioned my theory that her condition was akin to Picard's in "All Good Things.." This turns out to partially be the case, but there's also  shades of "A Christmas Carol".  We see two Ruth's, with one largely invisible (though she does seem to be able to see herself) in several scenes as she places her chess pieces around.  I get that they indicate that she's not in her time, but I'm not sure how that helps her "get back".  The jumps seem to happen at random and she has no control over when they happen.  Maybe it's a focus thing? I don't know.

Matt Deaver, her husband and Henry's adopted father benefits the most from this as we get a better look at what life was like in the Deaver household all those years ago.  It turns out that the preacher was more than a little unbalanced.  He doesn't do anything directly, but his dialogue (as well as the actor's delivery) shows us what a disturbed individual he really was.

Ruth herself also shines.  Spacek had a lot of weight to pull and she did a great job of it.  You can see her fear, disorientation, concern, and joy throughout the episode.  Had she not done such a good job, the episode might have fallen flat, but as it is, it stands as likely the best episode of the season.  I kind of feel bad for the next episode as this set the bar quite high.

The time jumps can be a bit confusing at first, but the episode is still very well constructed.  You can tell that a lot of effort was put into making this work and it paid off.

We also get some strong hints as to the identity of "the kid".  Ruth herself is convinced that it's Matt back from the dead.  Whether intentionally or unintentionally, he seems to go out of his way to confirm this. Given his lines of dialogue, you can see why Ruth jumps to the conclusion that she does.  He knows a lot about her and about their history.  While I knew it was all a red herring (again, I spoiled myself on this big reveal,) there is one line here that pretty much tells you who he is.  Not much is made of it now, but it'll probably be elaborated on later.

As with many episodes prior, this one ends with a bang...literally.  Ruth accidentally shoots Alan.  Had I been keeping up, I'd probably be more concerned with dropping a major spoiler, but at this point, I don't think we need to worry.

That scene gives us the plot based wham moment that makes for good binge watching, but the following scene where Ruth is transported to Alan first showing up on her doorstep is what really made the ending work.  The look on Spacek's face just sells the weight of the scene and it'd be hard not to mark yourself as being hit hard in the feels after that.  I mean, damn. 

So yeah, if you couldn't figure it out by now.  This episode was amazing, a fantastic hour of television if ever there was one.  Hopefully, the remaining episodes can keep it going, because the show is really starting to shine.

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