“Je Souhaite” (French for “I wish’) will go down in the history of The X-Files for two big reasons. One, it is the first time the series has done three comedy episodes in a row. Perhaps the plan was to lighten the mood prior to the drama of what may or may not have been the series finale the next episode. Two, and more importantly, it is the last monster of the week episode to feature solely Mulder and Scully as partners. Tomorrow’s seventh season finale is a mythology story for the two of them, and they will hook up for a few more episodes before it is all said and done, but those will involve numerous characters added in the wake of David Duchovny’s departure. Things will never be the same again, so old school x-Philes like me have to savor the moment.
The episode features a 500 hundred year old woman--still hot, though--who discovered a genie back in the day. She wished for power and long life, so the genie made her a genie, too. Instead of a lamp, she is wrapped in an oriental rug. However unrolls her gets three wishes. Over the centuries, she has bounced from master to master, but granting their small-minded wishes has always turned out badly for them in the end. The genie has grown cynical of humanity because of the dumb things her masters want.
She is rescued from the rug by an idiot employee at a storage rental facility. The guy blows his first wish on making his boss shut up. The genie removes the guy’s mouth. The agents are contacted by the boss to investigate. They discover the former employee, Anson stokes, lives in a trailer park with his crippled brother Leslie and a huge yacht parked across several lots.The agents do not get anywhere with the investigation at this point.
Anson blows his final wish on invisibility, then is promptly killed when struck by a semi while distracted at the prospect of sneaking up to some unsuspecting girls for a little fondling. His body is discovered when a bicyclist flips over it in a cheap, slapstick pratfall that I still laughed out loud over in spite of myself. The special effects done to make the invisible Anson interact with his surroundings were done the old fashioned way, sans CGI save foor his autopsy, with much more impact, if you ask me.
The autopsy sequence is the best bit of the episode. Scully, who refuses to chalk the invisible body up to anything paranormal, is excited at the scientific discovery and alerts some Harvard Medical School professors to visit the morgue to see. Well, not see. You know what I mean. up until Scully paints the body, she is interacting with thin air as though there is something there. I do not know how many takes of the scene were filmed, but even in this, the best one, presumably, Gillian Anderson can barely keep a straight face while pretending there is a body on the slab.
Meanwhile, Leslie rescues the genie for three wishes himself. He is no brighter than his brother. Instead of wishing for his disabilities to be healed, he wants his brother back. Having never read “The Monkey’s Paw,” he forgets to be specific, so his brother comes back a mangled zombie. He blows another wish on something dumb, but cannot use his final wish before Zombie Anson blows up the trailer lighting a match with the gas stove on.
Mulder rescues the genie after the explosion, so he gets three wishes. Surmising past masters have made the mistake of wishing for selfish things, Mulder asks for world peace. The genie promptly gets rid of every human being on Earth other than him. (a world without people. How bad could that be?) He blows his second wish returning things to normal. While crafting his world peace wish as airtight as possible, he is convinced by Scully, who still does not believe the genie has powers, that the journey to world peace is part of man’s purpose. Maybe it should not happen because of one man’s wish. Instead, Mulder’s final wish is to grant the genie’s request--to be become human again.
Je Souhaite” is one of only two or three season seventh season episodes I consider classics. It features the agents in their original roles. Mulder is the True Believer who jumps to the conclusion way too early a genie is involved in the case, but with the lighthearted tone, the leap in logic is not horribly out of place. Scully plays the Skeptic, even clinging to science when examining an invisible body. Her skepticism even trumps her Christian beliefs when she convinces Mulder utopia should come by human effort without supernatural help. As in the past, her skepticism keeps him honest even though he was right about the genie and winds up being the hero by freeing her from her powers.
They saved the best comedy episode for last. “Je Souhaite” is fun, frivolous, and highly entertaining. There are some gruesome bits with the guy losing his mouth and Anson simplified, but both are played hilariously. It is a good thing the agents’ last monster of the week go around is such a marvelous episode. Tomorrow’s installment starts us on radical changes for the series’ increasingly rapid descent towards the end.
Rating: **** (out of 5)
“Je Souhaite” (French for “I wish’) will go down in the history of The X-Files for two big reasons. One, it is the first time the series has done three comedy episodes in a row. Perhaps the plan was to lighten the mood prior to the drama of what may or may not have been the series finale the next episode. Two, and more importantly, it is the last monster of the week episode to feature solely Mulder and Scully as partners. Tomorrow’s seventh season finale is a mythology story for the two of them, and they will hook up for a few more episodes before it is all said and done, but those will involve numerous characters added in the wake of David Duchovny’s departure. Things will never be the same again, so old school x-Philes like me have to savor the moment.
