List of The X-Files episodes

Agent Dana Scully is assigned to work with Agent Fox Mulder on the X-Files in an attempt to debunk his work on the paranormal. Their first case has them investigating apparent alien abductions. A near comatose man, Billy Miles, is taking his classmates, including Theresa Nemman, into the woods, where they disappear into a bright light.

Mulder & Scully travel to Idaho in order to investigate the disappearance of a military test pilot. They observe unusual aircraft activity, prompting Mulder to proclaim the existence of a government conspiracy. Mulder sneaks onto the military base and is spotlighted by one of the craft, but is captured by soldiers and has his memory erased before he is released.

Mulder and Scully investigate a series of murders where there appears to be no tangible method for the murderer’s entrance and escape. Eugene Tooms, a seemingly normal janitor, is suspected by Mulder to be a mutant who kills his victims and extracts their livers in order to prolong his existence.

As Section Chief Blevins expresses his concern with the direction of the X-Files department, Mulder becomes obsessed with solving a case that closely parallels an ‘encounter’ he experienced as a child... the abduction of his younger sister, Samantha.

The murder of a homeless man which is very similar in detail to a murder committed in 1947 leads Mulder and Scully to a legendary man-beast roaming in the forest near Atlantic City.

When an unseen force commits several murders where a young woman is present, Mulder suspects that it is the spirit of the woman’s former boss who was believed to have committed suicide but was actually murdered and he is protecting her from his business partner.

A computer with highly advanced artificial intelligence begins to kill in order to preserve its existence when it is deemed inefficient to continue controlling the workings of an office building.

When an Arctic research team mysteriously kill each other and themselves only days after drilling deeper into the ice than ever before, Mulder and Scully accompany a team of doctors and scientists to investigate. They discover an organism which infects living creatures and amplifies the host’s feeling of anger and paranoia, and the new team starts to deteriorate as they wonder who among them are killers. "Don't forget your mittens."

A mysterious force is sabotaging a space launch program which leads directly back to the commander of the team, who once claimed to have seen an alien in space while witnessing Mars from Earth orbit.

Mulder puts the future of the X-Files in jeopardy when he heads to a UFO crash site being rapidly covered up by the military. He is arrested and while in jail he meets Max Fenig, a UFO nut whose NICAP group has followed Mulder’s work on the X-Files. When Mulder is released, Scully urges him to return to Washington to face his superiors and try and save his job but Mulder finds out that Max is more than meets the eye and ignores Scully to try and save him instead.

When two fathers on opposite sides of the country are unexplainably murdered at the exact same time in the exact same way, Mulder and Scully find that their eight-year-old daughters are perfect twins and were created in order to continue The Litchfield Experiment, a eugenics project of the 1950’s which produced cloned boys named Adam and girls named Eve who have heightened strength and intelligence, but are prone to psychotic behavior.

Mulder investigates the deaths of British dignitaries at the behest of an old Oxford girlfriend. Bob/Cecil L’Ively is a pyrokinetic, and he wants Sir Malcolm Marsden’s wife. Cecil attempts to kill Marsden, with his ability to make fire come out of his hands, but Mulder stops him.

A death row inmate named Luther Lee Boggs claims that he is psychic and can lead Mulder to a serial killer in exchange for a lesser sentence of life in prison. The agents’ roles are reversed in this episode, with Mulder doubting Boggs’ claim and Scully believing him after she is told that she can communicate through him with her recently deceased father.

• First appearance by Sheila Larken as Margaret Scully.

A series of identical sexually-oriented murders, where the killer appears to be both male and female, draw Scully and Mulder to an Amish-type community of people who may be alien in origin.

When FBI Agent Jack Willis and bank robber Warren Dupre are both shot at the same time during a robbery attempt, Dupre dies when Willis is brought back to life. When Willis rushes out of the hospital and begins acting strangely, Mulder concludes that Dupre has come back to life in Willis’ body.

A psychotic criminal from one of Mulder’s past cases - John Barnett - is back to get revenge on Mulder for incarcerating him. Before Barnett’s release, a renegade doctor had found a way to reverse the aging process - using Barnett as his test subject. Mulder and Scully rush to catch the now-unrecognisable youthful Barnett before he carries out his threat to kill all of Mulder’s loved ones.

Mulder and Scully receive information from Deep Throat about a UFO that was shot down over Iraq and has been secretly transported to the US. However, Deep Throat then intentionally misleads the agents to prevent them from discovering the truth.

• First appearance of The Lone Gunmen.

Mulder and Scully travel to Tennessee to investigate the “Miracle Ministry” and its star attraction - a young man with the ability to heal people with his touch - when a person dies shortly after being healed. As more people start dying, the agents must unravel the earthly from the divine.

Mulder and Scully head to an Indian reservation in northwestern Montana to investigate a manslaughter case which Mulder believes may relate to the very first X-File ever created at the FBI, and its main subject: Lycanthropy.

Mulder and Scully travel to the remote Washington State National Forest when an entire group of loggers goes missing.

Eugene Victor Tooms (see “Squeeze”) is released from the psychiatric sanitarium in which he was incarcerated for assaulting Scully - and he needs to kill once more to get the final liver which will allow him to hibernate for another thirty years. Mulder and Scully race against time to find evidence of his involvement in the past string of murders before Tooms disappears again.

• First appearance by Mitch Pileggi as A.D. Walter Skinner.

After a detective and his former partner die in unexplained circumstances, the accidents are linked to a little girl who witnessed both deaths and Mulder believes that she may be the reincarnation of a policeman murdered by his colleagues.

Agents Mulder and Scully investigate series of murder in Mahan Propulsion Laboratory as a team of scientists die one by one and the only suspect is a mentally handicapped cleaner named Roland.

A seemingly unrelated car chase leads Mulder and Scully to a scientific lab encompassing a secret which could provide proof of a government conspiracy. However, individuals involved with the scientific experiment are being murdered, and the two agents must ensure their own safety. The two come across a flask containing strange DNA particles. All living things are built up of a string of four different DNA cells, but this flask contains both a fifth and a sixth. Scully and Mulder believe that this could be firm evidence of extra-terrestrial life forms. Scully also finds a small head sized alien - which changes her beliefs completely. At the end of this episode, the X-Files project is aborted.

With the X-Files shut down, Mulder finds his own belief in the truth waning. So when an old political ally gives him a new reason to believe, he goes alone to an abandoned SETI program site -- Arecibo Observatory -- in Arecibo, Puerto Rico. Concerned for his safety, Scully has to track down his whereabouts before someone or something else does.

When a man’s decomposed body is found in the sewers of Newark, Mulder is given the supposed “grunt” work. But after Scully’s autopsy turns up a parasite living inside the body and a sewer worker is attacked and bitten by something, it opens up a whole new can of worms.

A recent rash of killings in the small town of Franklin, Pennsylvania brings Mulder to profile the murderers — a task made more difficult by the fact that none of them had any previous history of violence and all died at the end of their berserk rages. The only clues he has are some destroyed electronics and an unknown organic substance. The events lead to the discovery of a bizarre experiment on the town.

An audio cassette hidden in his morning paper brings Mulder to request the case of a scientist’s death consistent with burning, despite the lack of any evidence of any flames or burns. He is given his request...along with a new partner, Agent Alex Krycek.

• First appearances of Steven Williams as X and Nicholas Lea as Alex Krycek

An ex-FBI agent escapes from a mental hospital and holds several people hostage in a travel agency. Mulder and Krycek are sent in to help with the negotiations since the man claims to have been a UFO abductee.

A.D. Skinner reopens the X-Files, but Mulder is finding it difficult to work without the missing Scully. When he recognises a Los Angeles killing as the work of the Trinity murderers, a trio of killers with a fetish for drinking blood, it gives him work in which to immerse himself.

When Scully mysteriously re-appears comatose in hospital, Mulder drives himself crazy trying to find the people responsible. Though his quest for vengeance could make him exactly like those whom he despises.

A malfunction in a robot designed for volcanic exploration yields evidence of a lifeform living in the caves. When this lifeform seemingly causes the death of a member of the research team, Mulder and a newly returned Scully are flown out to the site to investigate before anyone else dies.

Mulder and Scully’s latest case begins with the rape and battery of a nurse in a Massachusetts convalescent home. What makes it an X-File is her claim that her attacker was invisible. But upon their arrival, they discover that the unrest is not limited only to the live – in residents.

The body of an old FBI agent is unearthed in Aubrey, Missouri. A serial killer is also on the loose in Aubrey. Mulder and Scully must determine the killer’s identity with Lt. Tillman.

A female corpse, dug-up and mutilated, is brought to Mulder’s attention by a Minnesota agent claiming it as the work of aliens. Mulder believes otherwise and is vindicated when a similarly mutilated prostitute is found. But while he gets down to business, the case begins having a disturbing effect on Scully.

New Hampshire teenagers feign an occult ritual in an attempt to score and inadvertently cause the murder of one of their group. When Mulder and Scully are called to look into the matter, the town’s real worshippers attempt to hide their tracks, though they fear that the boys’ attempt to “get some” got them more than they thought.

When a soldier stationed at a resettlement camp for Haitians drives himself into a tree, Mulder and Scully are called by the grieving and fearful wife. Her fears of a voodoo curse seem only to be reinforced by the beliefs and actions of many of the local residents, including a few of the other soldiers.

A newspaper ad placed to locate a certain doctor sets off the murder of several people with the same face. When Scully and Mulder locate another look -alike, they work to find him before the killer does. Coming to Mulder’s aid is another familiar face, but one he wasn’t expecting. Samantha, Fox’s lost sister, and his father, William Mulder, appear in this episode.

• First appearances of Peter Donat as Bill Mulder and Rebecca Toolan as Teena Mulder.

Reeling from the reunion with his sister, Mulder is thrown into a quandary when Scully is taken captive by the bounty hunter. However, when a trap set for him goes awry, the agents must head far north in order to attempt to unravel the mystery.

The agents are called in when a boatload of survivors from a US Navy Destroyer are found. What particularly catches Mulder’s inquisitive eye is that all of these sailors appear to have aged many decades in the course of days.

Mulder and Scully must find the paranormal among the abnormal when they are sent to investigate a long standing series of ritualistic killings which match no known patterns. The latest of which was the death of the “Alligator Man,” just one of many sideshow acts around which the town of Gibsonton, Florida is built.

A photograph taken just before the death of a two year – old boy yields evidence of some supernatural intervention which piques Mulder’s curiosity. When another death in the family occurs, the grandmother of the remaining child requests the aid of some Romanian ritualists (called calusari, “horsemen”) in order to cleanse the home of evil.

An ex-student of Scully’s asks the agents to help her with her first investigation concerning a number of disappearances with very few clues. Mulder ponders the idea of spontaneous human combustion but rethinks it when they find a man who is afraid of his own shadow.

Dudley, Arkansas is the site of the latest investigation for Mulder and Scully, who are sent to find a missing poultry inspector. The case takes a twist when another poultry worker is shot after she goes insane, giving Mulder a hunch that the townsfolk really are what they eat.

The trust that Mulder and Scully have is sorely tested when Mulder begins acting strangely. His aberrant behavior is compounded when the Lone Gunmen direct him to a hacker who managed to break into some very closely guarded files. While Mulder’s investigation leads him to long-awaited answers, Scully finds her career on the line, and the Cigarette Smoking Man decides to take some action himself.
Guest starring: Floyd Red Crow Westerman as Albert Hosteen Cameos: Chris Carter as FBI interrogator near the beginning of the episode.

The Cigarette Smoking Man works quickly to recover the stolen computer files, but finds himself thwarted by a man whom he hoped was dead. Meanwhile, Scully finds herself at a loss for her next step and turns to her family for support, since Mulder is otherwise engaged fighting for survival.

• First appearance by John Neville as Well Manicured Man

Mulder and Scully search for answers regarding the old photograph with his father and other unnamed men. Their search takes them to the abandoned Strughold Mining Facility where they uncover a dangerous secret.

Mulder is skeptical over a coroner’s report regarding the fifth person to be struck by lightning in a small Oklahoma town. Their investigation into the latest death seems to point to the only person to have survived a lightning strike, an emotionally-charged youth.

Skeptical of a famous psychic’s predictions regarding the murder of several prognosticators, Mulder instead finds someone who he believes truly can predict the future. Catching the killer could prove difficult, though, particularly if the murderer can also see into his future.

• This episode won two Emmys. One was for the writing, and the other was awarded to Peter Boyle for his guest appearance in this episode.
• This episode was named the 10th greatest episode in TV history by TV Guide.

A death row inmate makes good on his promise to come back from the dead and kill the five people involved in his death. The fear of his retribution has everyone scrambling to determine if they are on the list, while Mulder and Scully attempt to determine how he has returned to execute his tormentors.

Meeting insecure women through an on-line service, a serial killer seduces his prey with the right words. However, Mulder and Scully determine these killings are far from ordinary by the presence of a strange substance coating the victims, a substance which seems to digest the fatty acids in flesh.

Another failed suicide attempt by a patient in a military hospital interests Mulder with the talk of a “phantom soldier” which has prevented the man’s death. The general in charge is at first opposed to the FBI’s involvement until the invisible killer begins stalking him. But none believe when the primary suspect is a quadruple amputee.

When a young girl is kidnapped from her home, a fast food worker miles away collapses on the job, apparently experiencing exactly what the child is feeling. When Mulder learns that the woman was kidnapped and held hostage for years as a child, he begins to believe that she may be the key to help find the missing girl.

A mail order videotape of an alien autopsy blossoms into a much more complicated investigation when Mulder and Scully find the distributor of the tape murdered in his own home apparently by a high-ranking Japanese diplomat. While Mulder’s search for the video leads him to a train car, Scully investigates a Mutual UFO Network group and discovers several women who claim to know her.

Scully takes X’s advice to heart and investigates more into the implant she removed from her neck. Mulder, having ignored the advice given him, finds himself trapped on the train with a Japanese scientist and the man sent to kill him.

Mulder tracks a series of religiously motivated murders. Each of the eleven victims claims to have been stigmatic but all turned out to be frauds. When Mulder and Scully discover a little boy displaying inexplicable wounds of religious significance, they try to protect him from the killer they know will be coming.

A small town is plagued by deaths in which the bodies are found covered in cockroaches. Working from home, Scully has scientific explanations for all of them but Mulder — at the crime scene with an attractive bug expert — suspects the insects may not be organic, or earthly.

Agents Mulder and Scully visit a small town to investigate a series of bizarre deaths, mainly among high school teenagers. Evidence points to a Satanic cult. Moreover, people in this village, including Mulder and Scully, seem to be changed by the events — the weak and aggressive features of a person’s character are turned inside out. Mulder drinks, Scully smokes, a peace-loving school director becomes leader of the mob. Eventually Mulder notices some coincidence with strange astrological phenomena, and two teenaged girls turn out to be main suspects as a consequence.

Agents Mulder and Scully join Mulder’s former mentor, the FBI’s chief profiler, on a case involving a serial killer who claims to be possessed by a demonic force. The case gets even more mysterious when the suspect is apprehended and the murders continue. Mulder gets involved more deeply than expected and Scully as well as Skinner are deeply concerned.

When a French salvage ship sends a diving crew to recover a mysterious wreckage from World War II, the crew falls prey to a bizarre illness and Agents Mulder and Scully join the investigation. The investigation leads to the discovery of a familiar face, and to Skinners life being threatened.

While Mulder continues to investigate a bizarre illness that originated with the discovery of a mysterious World War II wreckage buried at sea, several government figures try to thwart their efforts. And as Skinner recovers from his shooting, Scully discovers that he is still in danger, from the man who killed her sister.

Agents Mulder and Scully’s assistance is requested for a case involving a man seemingly capable of bending people to his will. The suspect uses his mysterious abilities to manipulate Agent Mulder into a dangerous end game.

A series of deaths occurs immediately after an ancient artifact is brought to Boston from an excavation site in South America. According to Scully, the deaths appear to be the result of political terrorism, but Mulder suspects something more improbable.

A string of mysterious deaths of recent Chinese immigrants brings Agents Mulder and Scully to San Francisco’s Chinatown. The Agents team up with a Chinese-American detective to better understand the language and customs of the Chinese culture, but one thing remains frightening clear — all of the bodies are missing various internal organs.

When a couple claims to have been abducted by aliens, Agents Mulder and Scully try to get at the truth but everyone has a different version of the story, including the “aliens” themselves.

During a difficult time in assistant director Skinner’s life, he meets a woman in a bar and spends the night with her. The next morning, the woman is dead and he is accused of murder. Agents Mulder and Scully join the investigation to clear their supervisor’s name. As they unravel the threads of a conspiracy, they also learn more about Skinner’s personal affairs.

When a series of mysterious deaths and disappearances are reported near a lake in a small town, Agents Mulder and Scully are called in to investigate. With local folklore of a killer sea serpent running rampant amongst the locals, the agents must take their search for the truth to the water.

Agents Mulder and Scully uncover a dark conspiracy behind a bizarre series of seemingly unrelated murders in a small town. As the extent of the conspiracy is revealed, Scully's trust in Mulder is put to the test. Eventually, even Scully shows the symptoms of a severe psychosis leading to paranoia. She believes Mulder has moved to “the other side” and betrayed her and may even want to kill her. In the end, Mulder is led into a conflict between revealing his “contact” and providing the secret, but keeping the last murder unrevealed.

Agents Mulder and Scully search for a man who seems to possess strange powers, which leads to the discovery of a dangerous secret from Mulder’s past. The secret could bring Mulder and Scully to the brink of exposing the truth about alien existence.

The traditional opening credits text reads “The truth is out there”; however, in this episode, it reads “Everything dies”, a phrase spoken by the Alien Bounty Hunter to Mulder. Later in the episode, Marita Covarrubias, in her first appearance of the season, tells Mulder that “not everything dies”. While Mulder and Jeremiah Smith attempt to uncover the truth, the Syndicate realizes that they have a traitor in their midst. The informant known to fans as X dies in this episode, as he is discovered to be the source of the leak. As he dies, he scrawls the letters SRSG on the floor of Mulder’s apartment in his own blood. Later, it is implied that these letters stand for Special Representative to the Secretary General, and lead Mulder to Marita Covarrubias (who is the SRSG’s assistant).

• Herrenvolk means Master race in German.

Mulder and Scully travel to the rustic small town of Home, Pennsylvania where they find evidence of an unspeakable crime.
Guest starring:Tucker Smallwood as Sheriff Andy Taylor
Sebastian Spence as Deputy Barney Paster
Karin Konoval as Mrs. Peacock

The mysterious deaths of several African-American men whose skin color has turned white sends Mulder on a quest into African folklore.
Guest starring: Willie Amakye as Samuel Aboah
Carl Lumbly as Marcus Duff

Agents Mulder and Scully investigate a group of bizarre abductions in which the only clues are inexplicable photographs. But when Scully is the next intended victim, Mulder must get into the killer’s head.

Agent Mulder’s search for an informant inside a cult compound leads Scully and him to one of the cult leader’s wives. What they soon discover is an unexpectedly close connection with the woman.

Bizarre murders in a hospital’s plastic surgery unit lead Mulder and Scully to suspect a supernatural force may be responsible.

Taking a page from the Superman comic “Lex Luthor: The Unauthorized Biography,” this episode details the previous exploits of the Cigarette Smoking Man. Mulder, Scully and Byers meet with Frohike, where he details what may be Cancerman’s real life.

A diplomatic courier carrying deadly cargo involves Agents Mulder and Scully in a dangerous web of intrigue, which leads Mulder on a trip to Russia.

Scully and Skinner attend a suspicious Senate hearing, while Mulder and Krycek face off in a Russian gulag.
The phrase "E pur si muove" that is shown instead of the "The Truth is out there" means "And Yet it Moves." This comes from a legend that famous philosopher Galileo Galilei muttered this phrase after being forced to recant his belief that the earth moved around the sun in 1633, before the Inquisition. Galileo Academy of Science and Technology. Retrieved on 2007-07-29.

Agent Mulder is haunted by an old case in which young girls were killed and hearts cut from their nightgowns, Soon Mulder becomes suspicious when the killer taunts him with the idea that one of his victims may have been Samantha.

Deadly rain in a migrant workers camp sends Agent Mulder and Scully on the trail of a mythical beast — El Chupacabra.

• El Mundo Gira means "The World Spins" in Spanish.

The disappearance of a man’s body from a hospital morgue leads Mulder and Scully to investigate the strange circumstances surrounding the man’s death. However, for Scully it will lead to a horrifying revelation.

On a solo assignment out of town, Scully meets Mr. Wrong, a man whose tattoo does not want to share him - especially not with Scully.

Fear for Scully’s health sends Mulder to investigate the bizarre circumstances that may explain her mysterious abduction two years ago, while Scully takes a more practical course to quell her illness.

A murder in a Jewish community leads to the deaths of the killers, forcing Mulder and Scully to determine whether vengeance or larger forces are at work.

• Title refers to Kaddish as the part of Jewish mourning ritual.

The mysterious assassination of a high-ranking military official has Mulder and Scully racing against the clock to stop a seemingly unstoppable - and invisible - assassin.

While celebrating Scully’s birthday, Mulder learns of Max Fenig’s death in a plane crash. What the agents soon discover is that the circumstances surrounding the crash may have been alien.
Guest starring: Joe Spano as Mike Millar
Tom O'Brien as Sgt. Louis Frisch
Scott Bellis as Max Fenig

The investigation continues for agents Mulder and Scully of the apparent downing of Flight 549 by a UFO. They encounter deadly opposition from the military which continues to cover up the truth of incident.

Mulder and Scully investigate a murder for which the suspect presents an incredible alibi — that the death was foretold by an old man able to see into the future.

A small town is “blessed” by babies being born with tails. Mulder and Scully arrive only to encounter a suspect who proves nearly impossible to identify.
Guest Starring: Darin Morgan as Eddie Van Blundht
Christine Cavanaugh as Amanda Nelligan

Agent Mulder launches a criminal investigation into a bizarre death which he finds has connections to A.D. Skinner. Meanwhile, Skinner makes his own deal with the devil in a desperate attempt to save Scully from the cancer that is taking over her body.

Mulder and Scully track a series of murders that lead to a home for the mentally ill and a clue that makes no sense: each victim had a purported warning from the dead. However, while Mulder makes some surprising discoveries, Scully is reminded of her own mortality.

Scully is concerned for Mulder’s well-being when he suffers from a memory loss while investigating a case — and is the only suspect in a brutal double murder.

Mulder discovers the ultimate proof of extraterrestrial life while Scully’s cancer gets worse... but she may not be the agent whose life is over.

Scully helps Mulder fake his death, but comes under intense scrutiny; Skinner is suspected as the traitor inside the FBI; and Mulder breaks into the Department of Defense in a desperate bid to save Scully, but while doing so he finds himself facing the truth about the aliens he has been chasing.

Filmed in black-and-white, The Post-Modern Prometheus chronicles Mulder and Scully’s investigation when a letter from a single mother leads them to a small mid-Western town where a modern-day version of Frankenstein's monster lurks, Jerry Springer is an obsession, and Cher plays a significant part.

When ‘Pusher’ Modell escapes from prison, Mulder and Scully race to catch him before he can take revenge against his favourite target — Agent Mulder.

• The title means "fox hunt" when literally translated from Japanese.

While investigating bizarre exsanguinations in Texas, Mulder kills a teenage boy whom he "mistakes" for a vampire. Awaiting a meeting with Skinner, Mulder and Scully attempt to get their stories “straight” by relating to each other their differing versions of what happened during their investigation. Gillian Anderson actually voted this her favourite episode.

In 1990, a bizarre murder leads young agent Fox Mulder to question a former FBI Agent who investigated one of the first X-Files dating back to the 1950s — a case which may have involved Mulder’s father.

Agents Mulder and Scully investigate a murder that seems to have been committed by a blind woman, but Mulder suspects that her involvement is not what it seems.

The unexplained death of a young handicapped girl prompts Father McCue to ask Scully for her help, but her investigation leads her to a mystery she’s afraid to understand.

The assassination of a chess grand master leads Mulder and Scully into an investigation that they soon discover strikes at the heart of the X-Files when they learn that the real target was a telepathic boy named Gibson Praise. While Agent Spender attempts to keep the investigation to himself, Mulder and Scully are joined by Agent Diana Fowley, a woman with a history with Mulder, to investigate it. What they discover leads the Smoking Man to strike back at them like never before.

• This episode was the last filmed in Vancouver prior to production moving to Los Angeles. The audience at the chess match was made up of local fans as a 'thank you' to the city for hosting the production during its first five years. The title of this episode and the first episode of the sixth season reference the move. The fire which destroys the X-Files office gave a credible explanation for any discontinuities between the Vancouver and LA sets. 

With the X-Files reopened, Mulder and Scully eagerly hunt for a deadly creature in the Arizona desert. What they find seems to support Mulder’s revived belief in aliens, but is discredited when the agents are not reassigned to the X-Files, with Spender and Fowley taking over instead.

With Mulder trapped in a car by a seemingly deranged man, Scully races to determine if the man is suffering from a deadly illness — and if Mulder is in danger of becoming the next victim.

An anonymous tip finally brings Mulder and Scully to the mecca of all UFO lore — Area 51. But when the agents witness the flight of a mysterious craft, their lives are profoundly — and perhaps irrevocably — altered.

Scully begins to suspect that her partner’s strange behavior is more than it appears to be, while Mulder fights to return his life to normal before it’s too late.

On Christmas Eve, Mulder convinces Scully to put aside her gift wrapping and stake out a reputed haunted house. But they discover a pair of lovelorn spectres living inside the house who are determined to prove how lonely the holidays can be.

• The episode has the smallest cast of the entire series with Gillian Anderson, David Duchovny, Lily Tomlin and Edward Asner the only actors involved.

When a mother is accused of killing her unborn child, Mulder and Scully discover that the father has his own secrets, and he’s not the only one.

In a small town plagued by drought, Mulder and Scully come upon a man who claims to be able to control the weather — at a hefty profit. Yet the agents discover a force of nature at work even more powerful than the weather, and just as unpredictable.

Assistant Director Skinner is poisoned. Mulder and Scully have 24 hours to save him, but in order to do so, they must determine who wants him dead, and why.

Scully learns that she, but not Mulder, is being given a chance to prove her worth at the FBI, and - paired with a new partner - she investigates a crime scene photographer with an uncanny knack for arriving just in time to see his victims final moments. What she does not expect is for Death to play a role himself.

When Cassandra Spender is returned, Mulder, Scully and Agent Spender find themselves facing the exposure of the conspiracy involving extraterrestrials; while the worried Syndicate take evasive measures.

While Cassandra reveals the truth about the alien conspiracy to Mulder, her ex-husband - the Cigarette Smoking Man - does the same to Agent Spender in an effort to convince him to work with the conspiracy. But even as Mulder is deceived by Agent Fowley, Scully stays true to the investigation, and the two find a surprise ally. Meanwhile, the Syndicate reach the climax of their plans, only to find that the end is not as they expected.

Having been re-assigned to the X-Files, Mulder and Scully are looking forward to cases again. Instead, Arthur Dales, now living in a Florida trailer park, calls the agents for help when a neighbouring family disappears; and, with a hurricane approaching, Mulder and Scully find themselves trapped with a group of residents in a building where there really is something in the water.

• Note that “Agua Mala” translates into “Bad Water” in Spanish.
• The episode won the ASC award.^[1]

The world is trapped in a time loop, and only one woman seems to know. A bank robbery is committed over and over again until Mulder and Scully can make it go right.

Several disappearances at an idyllic planned community lead Mulder and Scully to go undercover as a married couple. However, what they soon discover is that the ruler of this small community enforced his rule with a Tulpa creature from Tibet.

• Mulder picks the names he and Scully use undercover, Rob and Laura Petri. (Mulder insists it’s pronounced "like the dish” (Petri Dish.)
• Scully insists she will be picking the names for their next undercover assignment.

An Asian dog, called the Wanshang Dhole, thought to be extinct is blamed for several killings. Mulder and Scully join an obstinate Sheriff, a seemingly eccentric hunter, and a reclusive canine expert to find it. However, there is more mystery to the expert than meets the eye.

After a prison camp is destroyed by a tornado, an escaped inmate is suspected of killing the warden. As the inmate hunts down his old girlfriend, he finds out where his child is and attempts to take him back. Mulder and Scully set out to find him and discover that he has the ability to pass through solid matter.

Guest starring: John Hawkes as Phillip Padget 

While working in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947, young cop Arthur Dales (the brother of the Arthur Dales who started the X-Files) stumbles across a “negro” baseball player who is actually an alien with a love of the game hiding among humans.

• Darren McGavin - who played the first Arthur Dales in two previous episodes, filmed two scenes before illness forced him to step down from the project. M. Emmet Walsh was called in, and the script rewritten, to accept the changes. McGavin’s scenes are included on the DVD.
• The name of the team Josh Exley plays for is the "Grays," which is possibly based on the real-life Negro League baseball team the "Homestead Grays." This could also be a reference to the supposed race of aliens known as the Greys, that is often the basis for many films and television shows, including the X-files.
• The title of the episode is an offhand reference to the title of Bernard Malamud's baseball novel The Natural --- later adapted and remade in 1984 as a well-known film starring Robert Redford.

While at a conference in Las Vegas, The Lone Gunmen run into the enigmatic Susanne Modeski (Unusual Suspects). After deceiving Scully into joining them the trio soon find out that Susan’s new fiancé is planning to use her new brainwashing drug for political assassinations.

• The character, Morris Fletcher, makes an appearance at the casino bar and expresses an interest in Agent Scully, whom he doesn't remember from Dreamland/Dreamland II.
• Although he doesn't appear in the episode, David Duchovny's voice is briefly heard during the fake phone conversation with Scully.

The skeletonized remains of a young couple are found in the fields of North Carolina. When Mulder and Scully go to investigate, they find that a giant fungal life form releases an LSD-like drug into the air with spores, and then slowly digests its victims. Mulder and Scully fall into its trap and are not sure of what is reality and what is fantasy.

A bizarre rock inscribed with Navajo writing is found in Côte d’Ivoire, and its discovery is closely followed by the death of the African scientist involved. While its appearance in Washington begins to affect Mulder’s mental health, leading him to turn to Agent Fowley for help; a disturbed Scully - determined to disprove the theory that life on Earth began with aliens - heads to New Mexico and finds a dying Albert Hosteen - who has discovered that the rock includes passages from the Bible, and a map of the human genome. While Mulder breaks down in a mental institution, Scully journeys unexpectedly to Africa.

Skinner and Michael Kritschgau work desperately to attempt to discover what is wrong with Mulder, who is imprisoned by his own frenetic brain activity, but they are unaware of Agent Fowley’s duplicity. Meanwhile, in Africa, Scully and a professor unravel the secrets of the spaceship buried on the Ivory Coast, which may prove that life originated elsewhere, and all religion was based on the Navajo contact with alien life.

Returning to Washington to find Mulder gone, Scully joins Kritschgau and Skinner - who is still being forced into betrayal by Krycek - to find her partner. However, the Cigarette-Smoking Man has taken Mulder to a place where all his problems are gone...or so it seems. And Diana Fowley is forced to make a choice about her loyalties.

In a unique episode told from the point-of-view of the “monster”, a fast-food employee with unusual cravings becomes the focus of an FBI investigation. The victims appear with no brain and a suction hole in the forehead.

The head of the Millennium Group, which believes the apocalypse will happen on the new year of 2000, resurrects the dead for use in the bringing about of the apocalypse, and Mulder and Scully have to ask the help of criminal profiler Frank Black, a man with former experience with the shadowy group.

• This episode is a form of closure for Chris Carter’s other television series Millennium, which was cancelled in 1999.
• This episode marks the first actual kiss between Mulder and Scully. Their first kiss in “Triangle” was only part of a dream sequence.
• Everyone present on the set on the day of filming the kiss signed a non-disclosure agreement regarding the scene.^[2]

When a school student becomes the prime suspect in the bizarre murder of a police officer, Mulder and Scully are sent to investigate. They discover that the boy and a couple of friends have been playing with the ability to accelerate their movements to a frequency the human eye can’t perceive.

Mulder and Scully meet Henry Weems, who appears to be the luckiest man in the world. But - if he’s so lucky - why is he on the run from the mob, and why is everyone around him so unlucky?

Reverend Orison releases Donnie Pfaster, Scully’s former kidnapper ("Irresistible" Season 2), from jail in the hopes of passing judgement on him. What he discovers instead is that he has released pure evil, and it’s headed for Scully....

The Amazing Maleeni, a small-time magician, performs an amazing feat to impress a heckler - he turns his head 360 degrees. So when he is later found without a head at all, Mulder and Scully arrive on the case and discover an angry ex-con, an unimpressed rival, and Maleeni’s twin brother all seem to have something to do with the plan to rob a major bank.

When a small town church is the site of a number of ritualistic-like murders, fingers are pointed to the Church of God with Signs and Wonders, a church where the Bible is read literally, and punishment is dealt deftly. But soon the agents realise that the difference between the peaceful religious and the fanatics may not be very much at all.

While investigating the bizarre disappearance of a young girl from her home, Mulder becomes obsessed with the number of children who have vanished in similar ways. Scully’s fears that he is emotionally involved due to his sister’s disappearance 27 years earlier are heightened when Mulder’s mother dies, apparently of suicide.
Sein und Zeit is the original title of German philosopher Martin Heidegger's influential 1927 book Being and Time.

As Mulder is forced to accept that his mother’s death was by her own hand, he is led by a man whose son disappeared years earlier to another truth - that his sister may be among the souls taken by ‘walk-ins’, saving the souls of children doomed to live unhappy lives. Together, they embark on a journey that will reveal to Mulder the truth about his sister’s disappearance.

A filming of an episode of COPS gets in the way of the investigation by Mulder and Scully of a monster that feeds on fear. While Mulder embraces the publicity, Scully is not so sure...

• The entire episode is filmed like an episode of COPS, and was shot by their cameramen.

The Lone Gunmen summon Mulder and Scully to a virtual reality firm when the new game they have helped design is thwarted by a bizarre female computer character whose power is much more than virtual.

• This was the second episode written by William Gibson, the first being Kill Switch.
  

After a prominent doctor discovers his father-in-law dead, the word ‘Theef’ written on the wall in blood, Mulder suspects hexcraft may be the source of threats against his family.

After a young boy with cancer, whose parents don’t believe in medical treatment because it is against God’s will, recovers miraculously, Scully is intrigued. What she soon discovers is that his cure is not miraculous, but scientific - the work of the Cigarette-Smoking Man. Eager, if wary, to learn of the truth behind his secrets, Scully agrees to travel with him to get the cure to all mankind’s diseases... but the catch is that she can’t tell Mulder.

• This episode was written by William B. Davis who plays the Cigarette Smoking Man.
  

On two separate stakeouts, Mulder and Scully search for elusive killers - Scully in an abandoned warehouse in a dirty neighbourhood, and Mulder in cosy suburbia.

While Mulder is away in England, Scully is led by coincidences, chance, fate and possibly a higher power to a married man whom she had an affair with during medical school, and a look at the life she didn’t choose, forcing her to make choices about her future.

• This episode was written and directed by Gillian Anderson who plays Scully.
• This episode is the second of only two featuring non-diegetic music not composed by Mark Snow in the entire series. The song is The Sky Is Broken by Moby, although at one point it is diegetic when Mulder plays it on a boombox.
• In the opening of this episode, while Mulder lies on a bed, Scully is shown putting clothes on and leaving the room, possibly after having sex with him.
• The backstory regarding Scully, Dr. Waterson, and why his daughter hates Scully was originally much more involved and complicated, culminating with the suicide of Waterson’s wife after Scully had left medical school. The intended story, which had to be cut for time, is detailed in the commentary track by Gillian Anderson on the season 7 DVD extras.
  
• Trivia Fact: At 24:08 into the episode, as Dr. Waterson flatlines and Scully is attempting to get his heart going, the camera begins to pan back. The room is presumably empty as Scully yells for a nurse. If you are watching the widescreen presentation of the episode, a hand can be seen (presumable of the cameraman) being quickly withdrawn from on top of the I.V. drip monitor at the bottom right corner of the screen.

While protecting a man due to testify against the Morley cigarette company, Skinner is horrified when the witness dies mysteriously. What the agents soon discover is that a new brand of cigarette has a dangerous secret...

An entrepreneurial Hollywood producer, and college friend of Skinner, picks up the idea for a film based on the X-Files, however the agents find that the level of realism in their fictional portrayal is somewhat questionable.

• The theater audience in this episode largely consisted of crew members and their families as a 'thank you' for their involvement with the show. Originally the entire audience was to have been made up of this group, but Gillian Anderson became ill after the filming of "All Things", and production was pushed back a week. Extras were hired to fill the spots of people unable to adjust to the changed schedule. This episode was written and directed by David Duchovny

Mulder and Scully cross paths with a pair of doppelgangers whose close proximity yields unlimited mayhem.

In Je Souhaite — French for “I wish” — Mulder and Scully find a man and his dim-bulbed, wheelchair-bound brother who choose three wishes which backfire increasingly. The cause of which is an indifferent genie whose willingness to grant wishes belies a deeper motive.

Newly-promoted Deputy Director Kersh assigns pragmatic Agent John Doggett to head up the task force searching for Mulder. Meanwhile, an increasingly defiant Skinner assists Scully as they search for the alien ship, which is systematically removing evidence of alien existence... and is next headed to the deserts of Arizona, and Gibson Praise.

At a remote school in the Arizona desert, Doggett, Scully, Gibson and Skinner - as well as a host of students and agents - don’t know who to trust as the bounty hunter works among them; and - in a spaceship close by - Mulder is tested on.

Having been assigned to the X-Files, Doggett joins Scully on a series of gruesome murders where they learn that their investigative techniques are less than similar.

• This is the first episode of the series without David Duchovny and as such he no longer appears in the credits and some extra images have been added.

Working alone, Scully pursues a cult that worship a slug-like organism; but in her efforts to save an injured stranger, she discovers she’s in over her head.

Having been kidnapped for ten years, a little boy mysteriously reappears but hasn’t aged one bit. While the case stirs up painful memories for Doggett, suspicion stirs that the boy isn’t all he seems.

After his wife is murdered, a lawyer friend of Doggett's tries to clear his name of the crime but the days regress backwards.

Doggett and Skinner work to avert the murderous spree of a religious cult leader, while Scully takes time off to deal with the early stages of her pregnancy.

The fatal shooting of a realtor while alone in a cinderblock jail cell has Doggett hoping motive will yield more than method, but they soon learn that there is more to this case than meets the eye.

Doggett and Scully encounter a dead man who is still living - only somewhat changed. What they discover is a man made of metal, enacting vengeance on those he believes created him.

• This episode contains a humorous reference to actor Robert Patrick's (Doggett) perhaps most well-known role prior to The X-Files, that of the liquid-metal T-1000 android in Terminator 2: Judgment Day:

Doggett: — "What’re you saying? Ray Pearce has become some kind of metal man? ‘Cause that only happens in the movies, Agent Scully."

When a mystic smuggles himself out of India, Scully and Doggett give chase as his murderous spree starts terrorising two families in suburban Washington, D.C. But Scully soon comes upon a crisis of faith when she realises how dissimilar her techniques are from Mulder, even as she tries to be the believer.

Doggett comes upon an old case about a professed ‘soul-eater’ that Mulder kept secret from Scully, which he hopes will ultimately prove the truth behind Mulder’s abduction.

• David Duchovny is listed in the main credits and makes appearances in a few flashback scenes.

A string of bizarre deaths in the tunnels of the Boston subway system sees Doggett join a team of professionals underground to investigate; while Scully has to defy the train authorities above land, who are determined to get the trains up and running within hours.

When a mysterious man claims his wife was fertilised with an alien baby, and then killed and the baby stolen; Doggett is skeptical, while Scully realises that the woman’s story is similar to her own. While Doggett attempts to understand the motives of his friend and government contact Knowle Rohrer, Scully questions her own pregnancy and its conception.

• David Duchovny is listed in the main credits and makes appearances in a few flashback scenes.

Doggett calls on another agent, Monica Reyes, to assist in the Mulder case, but Scully’s fears about finding him come to a head with the sudden recovery of abductees seized at the same time.

• The episode was nominated for an ASC award for cinematography.^[3]
• This episode marks the first appearance of Annabeth Gish as Monica Reyes.

Three months after Mulder’s funeral, a former abductee awakens from the dead and Scully pins her hopes on resurrecting her partner; while Skinner is offered a loathsome deal by Krycek.

Mulder secretly conducts his own investigation after a man is gunned down on the White House lawn attempting to inform the President of a planned alien invasion. However, he is soon in over his head as he tries to expose further evidence of colonization.

• The three words on the note for the President are “Fight the Future”

Reyes enlists Mulder’s help investigating a killer’s connection to the unsolved murder of Doggett’s son but Mulder soon finds himself clashing with Doggett.

Mulder and Doggett are asked to investigate several deaths aboard an oil rig, but Mulder is convinced the rig is carrying an alien black oil; meanwhile a heavily pregnant Scully attempts to protect Mulder in absentia.

With Scully on maternity leave, Doggett is paired with an enthusiastic young agent who knows everything about the X-Files, and her apotheosis of Mulder and Scully leads to him learning a thing or two. But when Harrison and Doggett disappear, Mulder defies orders in an attempt to find them.

Mulder, Skinner and Doggett come up against the horrible consequences of the Syndicate’s pact with the aliens, as a hybrid attempts to erase all evidence of the tests - including Scully’s soon-to-be-born baby. The men call on Reyes, and - reluctantly - Alex Krycek to help them.

Mulder, Doggett and Skinner face off with the alien replicants as they desperately try to expose the conspiracy within the FBI. Meanwhile Scully goes into labour in a remote location, but Reyes soon learns they may be no safer there.

• In this episode only, the part of Baby William was played by executive producer John Shiban's infant son Jerry.

Doggett begins his investigation of Deputy Director Kersh and search for Mulder. He encounters obstructions at every turn and no one is willing to cooperate.

• The style of the opening credits are changed in this episode, with the addition of Annabeth Gish and, after 7 seasons as a recurring character, Mitch Pileggi.

Shannon McMahon, a former Marine associate of Doggett’s, reveals to Doggett that she is a super soldier. This leads them to a clandestine laboratory where secret experiments are taking place on board on a naval ship.

With Scully reassigned to the Quantico Training Academy, Doggett and Reyes investigate their first X-File together — a series of satanic ritual murders - which sees their different investigative techniques working together.

• As Mitch Pileggi was absent from this episode the opening titles were altered and only featured Gillian Anderson, Robert Patrick & Annabeth Gish. This version was used for all the episodes in the season without Pileggi.

A vicious murderer threatens Doggett and Reyes and then vanishes, or does he? Doggett is shot and Follmer discovers that Reyes was the shooter, or was she? The only thing certain is that someone is one step ahead of everyone else.

Scully, Doggett and Reyes investigate when a teenager dies while performing a daredevil feat for a cable access show, but his death is soon revealed to be caused by a disturbing family secret. This show includes several references to former Pink Floyd frontman Syd Barrett.

Scully is hopeful about reuniting with Mulder when a complete stranger offers new information about what drove him into hiding. Yet her trust in the stranger may place Mulder in even more danger.

With no knowledge of his identity or his past, Doggett is found wandering a dusty Mexican town. While he struggles to piece together his memory, he finds himself embroiled in a smuggling plot, and - across the border - Scully and Reyes attempt to find him.

• The cantina in this episode was named for Katrina Cabrera Ortega, who was initially a production assistant on the show then served as the show's researcher for the final three seasons

Reyes takes the lead while investigating an X-File case, surrounding a man found skinned alive. When she discovers that he had visions of a similar thing, she calls on Scully’s expertise to help on the investigation, which pays off when they find a link to 1960 - a link which may be deeper than it seems.

When rubbings from the spaceship resurface, the FBI hides its investigation from the X-Files. Meanwhile, Scully is forced to take drastic measures when she discovers a threat to William.

Distrustful of both Skinner and Follmer, Scully circumvents the FBI’s investigation into the kidnapping and does her own, assisted by Reyes and the Lone Gunmen. Her fears are heightened when she learns Mulder may be dead, and William is kidnapped by the alien cult.

Awakening in a surreal hospital (which a companion believes to be Death’s Waiting Room) after being hit by a car, a comatose Reyes struggles to wake herself up before her organ donor card is acted upon. Her only link with the outside world is a possibly autistic woman named Audrey Pauley. Outside, Doggett and Scully begin to suspect that outside forces are conspiring to end her life.

Quotes

Doggett: I was thinking about getting a cat.

Reyes: (laughs) There are cat people, and there are dog people. You’re a dog person, John.

• This was the final episode of The X-Files written by Steve Maeda, who was also a staff writer on Harsh Realm. The character Nurse Whitney was named after Dr. Whitney Carr Edwards who served as medical consultant for the last five seasons of The X-Files, as well as the last season of Millennium and the entire series The Lone Gunmen and Harsh Realm.

Doggett is determined to find an error in the DNA evidence that freed the convicted “Screwdriver Killer” whom he nearly caught in the act 13 years earlier. But as the case takes several twists, Doggett finds himself at odds with Scully and Reyes as he attempts to prove his theory.

In the race to catch a serial killer, Scully and Reyes find themselves relying on numerology, their powers of deduction, and a mysterious, card-playing stranger. Meanwhile Doggett attempts to liaise with the police on the case, and finds that his time on the X-Files has somewhat changed his opinions.

Agent Harrison takes Reyes and Doggett on a drive into the mountains, after a woman stabs herself repeatedly and her widowed husband refuses to let anyone see their son. When Harrison’s young admirer shows up at Scully’s door and convinces her to come with him and save them, they discover that monsters under the bed may be more than just the product of a young boy’s vivid imagination.

When Morris Fletcher approaches the agents with information related to the supersoldiers, they turn to the Lone Gunmen. But the Gunmen and Jimmy are already knee-deep in a bio-terrorist’s plot to release a deadly toxin, and his links to the mysterious Yves.

• This episode served as the series finale of the cancelled X-Files spin-off The Lone Gunmen.

Doggett finds a strange disfigured man in the X-Files office, and - on a whim of Scully’s - they test his DNA. But the surprising answers they find become even more surprising when William’s life is put on the line.

• Despite co-writing and directing the episode, David Duchovny makes only a "blink and you'll miss it" appearance.
• The two doctors in this episode, Drs. Edwards and Newman, were named for Dr. Whitney Carr Edwards, who served as medical consultant for the last five seasons of the series, as well as the other 1013 productions Millennium, Harsh Realm and The Lone Gunmen, and Dr. Charlie Newman who was one of two forensic pathologists who consulted on the program. The other forensic pathologist was Dr. Carl J. Schmidt.

When one of Scully’s students displays an inordinate ability to profile serial killers, his insights reopen the murder case of Doggett’s son.

• The episode was nominated for an ASC award for cinematography.^[4]

Doggett, Reyes, Scully and Skinner stumble on to a bizarre murder case where the main suspect is a man with an unusual obsession with The Brady Bunch. Despite their initial differences - both in investigative style and love of The Brady Bunch - the four of them soon learn that the man’s telekinetic ability is the ultimate, undeniable proof of an X-File.

Mulder is placed under military arrest, but with the surprising help of Deputy Director Kersh, Scully, Reyes, Doggett, Marita Covarrubias, Gibson Praise, and Jeffrey Spender, Mulder's broken out. Mulder and Scully travel to New Mexico where Black helicopters destroy a pueblo - and the Smoking Man.

• David Duchovny returns to the show and the opening credits for this two-part series finale. This is rare as most regulars who return to a show are usually^{[citation needed]} billed as "Special Guest Stars." This also marks the most number of cast members (five) to be featured in the opening credits of the show.