It does not seem like too long ago I wrote the review for last season’s Christmas episode. We roll through these seasons pretty quickly, no? “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” is one of my favorite Christmas episodes of any series. It is obviously a ghost story, yet is not take the easy route and parody Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” is a very creative, arguably bitter little candy cane. Ergo, I like it.
On Christmas Eve, mulder invites Scully to go ghost hunting in a Maryland mansion in which two lovers alleged killed each other in a pact on Christmas Eve, 1917. Several other double murders have taken place over the decades, all on Christmas Eve. Mulder thinks the place is haunted by the spirits of the murdered. Scully shows up, but is irritated to discover what he wants her to do. She insists she is going back home to prepare for her family’s visit tomorrow. Yet, when Mulder goes in the mansion anyway, she follows, thinking he has swiped her car keys.
The mansion does have a certain lived in look. The agents wind up trapped in a locked room. A tapping under the floorboards leads the to rip them up and discover their own corpses. The two get separated while looking for a way out, each encountering a ghost. The ghosts are Maurice and Lyda, the two lovers who allegedly committed double4 suicide, but were involved in a murder-suicide instead. Whenever there are visitors on Christmas eve, the two attempt to get them to kill each other, too.
The ghosts make the agents suspicious of one another by playing with their true feelings. Mulder is revealed to be a narcissist who demands Scully be around him because he gets a kick out of proving her wrong. But he is a lonely man. That will never be enough to satisfy the emotional void. The other ghost convinces Scully she has no other pleasure in life than proving people wrong. She and Mulder feed off each other, but it is destructive.
The agents escape to run into one another, at which point Mulder does shoot Scully. Proving hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, she shoots him back. They are both clearly bleeding to death as they crawl their way outside. There is a strong implication the ghosts were controlling each one as he or she shot the other. The two realize they would never shoot one another under any circumstances, so they get up with the realization they are un harmed. They flee the mansion as quickly as possible.
Once they have left, Maurice and Lyda lament they failed in their task. Had Mulder and Scully not realized their friendship would not allow them to harm one another, they would have died from their ‘wounds.” Oh, well. There is always next year.
Mulder sits alone in his apartment, undecorated for Christmas, when Scully knocks at his door. She wants to know if any of what happened was real. He assures her it was not, then apologizes for being so selfish as to drag her out on Christmas Eve. She tells him not to worry about it. Although she is often very contrary, she likes being around him and wanted to be there. The two exchange gifts, even though they said they would not.
Speaking of Mulder as a narcissist, it does seem particularly selfish to drag Scully out at Christmas considering it is the first anniversary of her daughter Emily’s death. While that storyline was not as emotionally poignant as it was supposed to be, disregarding the incident entirely sounds extremely cold, even for Mulder. It is a turn off to see all that completely ignored. Is it an admission the Emily story was a mistake? I would not doubt it.
I did like the subconscious implication the two agents are going to a mansion in which murders traditionally take place on Christmas Eve because they secretly want to end their lonely lives. I am still not a shipper, but I appreciated how they realized they can alleviate each other’s loneliness when they temper their respective obsessive personality traits. One could apply that standard professionally and personally without implying romantically, but whatever floats you boat is all right with me.
One nitpick as a history buff; when Mulder is explaining the alleged suicide pact between, he mentions it is 1917 and American soldiers are dying all over Europe with influenza killing them at home. The latter is arguably true, even though the flu epidemic is mostly identified with 1918, but the former is absolutely incorrect. While the United States declared war in April 1917, the military was so unprepared to fight, it did not arrive until May 1918 and did not see combat until June. Our doughboys were quite safe on Christmas Eve, 1917.
Maurice and Lyda were played magnificently by Ed Asner and Lily Tomlin. Asner, a noted obnoxious progressive, even has a joke in which he claims he has friends in the ACLU who will hear about the FBI’s violation of his civil rights during this home invasion. I appreciated the clever reference. The amazing part is there are only four characters in the episode, which takes place largely in one room. It is like a well crafted stage play. I was never aware of the minimalist surroundings.
Ghost stories and Christmas go hand in hand as far as I am concerned. I guess there is something about the holidays that brings back the long dead ghosts of the past. I regardless think A Christmas Carol is overdone, so I definitely appreciate a new twist on a haunted Christmas teaching a life lesson. “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” does a fantastic job.
Rating: **** (out of 5)
It does not seem like too long ago I wrote the review for last season’s Christmas episode. We roll through these seasons pretty quickly, no? “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” is one of my favorite Christmas episodes of any series. It is obviously a ghost story, yet is not take the easy route and parody Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” is a very creative, arguably bitter little candy cane. Ergo, I like it.
