Episode 1.3 "Squeeze"

Originally airing on September 24, 1993, Eugene Victor Tooms would be the first of the Monster, (not Alien) of the week episodes of the X-Files.  (Kinda a nice change of pace from the Government Conspiracy that we will grow to love...) It's been a really long time since I've watched this particular episode, I remember Tooms kinda grossing me out.  So here goes...

2 hours later, finally finished watching it, got busy and distracted.  Not my favorite episode.

The episode starts off with a well dressed man walking back to work.  Creepy shot of the sewer drain, and yellowish eyes.  (Maybe it's just me, but after King's IT, I have a major phobia of those kinds of drains.  Nothing good ever comes from them.)  The man makes a phone call home saying he's going to be late, but instead he becomes our 1st victim.  Suicide or X-File?  The doors and windows were locked from the inside, and the only other opening was an air vent that was less than 12 inches wide.  But the guy's liver was missing.  (Ick!  For those who don't know me, one of the Urban Legends that really bothers me is the Kidney Thief.  The other is Human's Lick Too, but that's beside the point....The Kidney Thief is where the person is out partying and wakes up the next morning in a bath of ice, with a note saying that the kidneys are gone.  Not sure why it bothers me so much, but it does.  And at this point, I was waiting for Kidney/Liver Thief)

Next scene we have Scully chatting with an old classmate (Colton) over lunch.  (Something that struck me, during their conversation, they are talking about another classmate "J Edgar Jr" and how he "locked down another World Trade Center bombing."  1993!)  Scully agrees to go to Baltimore to help with the Colton's case.  Of course Mulder has linked this current murder to several that had happened 60+ years before.  (Okay, now it is looking like maybe it's a Mutant version of Hannibal Lector that is REALLY old, Fava beans anyone?) Colton let's Mulder know about the missing liver and snidely asks if it sounded like the works of little green men.  Mulder's response was classic, telling him, a Reticulian's skin tone is gray. "They're notorious for their extraction of terrestrial human livers, due to iron depletion in the Reticulum galaxy... Do you know how much liver and onions go for on Reticulum?"  Mulder also discovers some really elongated fingerprints on the air vent.  Scully profiles and then catches Tooms (look Sunflower seeds, and fashion/jackets so large that the fat lady has called and asked for them back.), only he passes his poly test and the idiot Colton releases him.

Tooms follows his next victim home, then contorts and shimmies down the chimney.  Oops, continuity error (sometimes it's a problem that I do continuity for the community college's summer films, it makes me see errors everywhere.), the victim has gone to the fireplace to light the fire.  The match bucket is next to the fireplace on the floor.  Next shot, the man looking at a glass piece on the mantle, the guy then turns around to the coffee table and grabs a match from the bucket, (which is no longer on the floor) and lights the fire.  Tooms kills him.  Next Colton's team is investigating the murder when Mulder and Scully come on scene to check for clues.  Mulder notices the elongated finger print and the missing glass piece.  After doing some research and discovering that Tooms' home isn't really where he lives, Mulder and Scully go talk to the original detective from 30 years prior.  He shows them pictures of the suspect he had 30 years earlier, Tooms, and he's not aged at all.  At that point, Mulder and Scully go investigate Tooms' home from the address the other detective gave them.  We find a derelict building that, shock, one of the earlier victims had lived in.  Mulder locates a hole in the wall, where upon investigation reveals a bile encrusted nest. (YUCK! and a humorous encounter where Mulder asks if there was a quick way to get the bile off his hand without "betraying his cool exterior"... the taken treasures from the past victims are there as well.) Next a shot of Tooms hanging from the ceiling holding Dana's necklace.

Mulder leaves his stakeout position to some other agents, next we have Scully talking to Colton, and he tells her he's called off the stakeout, to go home.  Scully tries calling Mulder but gets no answer, Mulder not having been informed that the stakeout was called off, goes back to find the agents have left.  He goes into Tooms' building to find Scully's necklace in the collection of treasures.  Scully is home, getting ready for a bath when Tooms breaks in and tries to make her his next victim.  Mulder busts in, saves Scully and Tooms is locked up.  Mulder and Scully look in at Tooms as he is taking newspaper strips and making a new nest in the hospital.  The last scene is a sinister shot of Tooms in the mental hospital staring at the tiny slot that the orderlies put the food tray through.  (Which only implies that we aren't through with Eugene Victor Tooms, course we knew that because Season 1, Episode 20 is named Tooms)

I did write down a line that I thought was funny, but now I'm not sure where it was in the episode..."What is this the Anti-Waltons?"  I'm not sure why it struck me funny, but it did.  That's all I have for this episode.  I will resume with episode 4 on Monday.  Hope you all have a wonderful weekend.  Until then.  xoxo