1.05 - Jersey Devil
Open on New Jersey, 1947. Curious if there’s any theory offered later on in the series why so many crazy things seemed to happen in that year. This is a Monster of the Week episode, through and through.
Unfortunately the scene at the beginning when the good-natured father is dragged away to his death is comical, at least to me. I think what does it is how he’s framed by the car window and yanked offscreen, like an old vaudeville act. His scream fades as he’s taken and it’s goofier than they want it to be.
Shortly after, the police officer calling “It’s in here, it’s as tall as a house” while peering into a cave that is, well yeah, seemingly not large enough for something that tall – I don’t want to nitpick this episode or any of the others, especially when the real problem may be that I just didn’t connect with what they were doing. It’s easy to lampoon decades old TV production, and I’m not going to give myself over to that temptation. At least, not much.
Two of the strongest parts of this episode are supporting actor performances. First, Wayne Tippit as Detective Thomson, croaking all of his lines out in present day, the foil to Mulder’s bushy-coifed determination. Detective Thomson isn’t gruff as much as he’s like a really pissed off frog with a badge. He doesn’t want any of your shit and plays the role of territorial local cop perfectly.
Second, Michael MacRae as Ranger Peter Brullet, whose job it is to relate the spookier details of potential Jersey Devil sightings. I freaking loved his character the second he showed up. Every line unrolls out of him with a natural ease, you just believe every moment he’s on screen. Things he’s seen and heard in those woods make him uneasy, he’s not afraid to show Mulder that, and his delivery of the line “The Devil” in response to the question “Scared? Of what?” clinches his MVP status in this episode.
Aside from those two fellas the best part of the episode is Scully’s storyline. We see her at her God Son’s birthday party to put in place the thematic through line of motherhood.
“I don’t think I’m cut out for this,” Scully says at the party while the kids make a ton of fucking noise in the other room. It sets up the third act of this episode, which Andrea saw coming a mile away, but took me by surprise because I was too focused on the scene where Scully’s friend asks “What about that guy you work with?”
“Mulder?” Scully asks, as if it could’ve been anyone else.
“Yeah, I thought you said he was cute.”
Gillian Anderson proves right here in this scene why she’s a great actress. It’s a subtle and quick moment but it’s filled with nuance, layers upon layers of character.
“He’s a jerk. He’s not a jerk,” she says, and yes, she changes her mind that fast. After a pause and some thought she says “He’s obsessed with his work.” Smash cut to Mulder walking through the New Jersey forest in his nice tweed suit. Maybe it’s tweed, I don’t know. Fact is, he stayed behind to chase down a very, VERY thin lead and made Scully drive back by herself (“...a three-hour drive. In Friday night traffic!”).
This episode’s monster of the week is forgettable, but the aspects of Scully it reveals are not. That line about Mulder’s obsession, plus earlier when she tells him that no, she in fact does not have a date, proves this episode is really about work/life balance and the concept of what “having a life” really means.
Scully’s friend, the mother of the God Son, says “First you have to get a life” in response to Scully asking when she would possibly have time for a family. It’s a comment in a long line of comments in the history of humanity that boils down to: What you really need to do is the exact thing that I’m doing. Usually this is said with no harm intended, although it invariably carries harm with it nonetheless. I really doubt Scully’s friend meant she was living no kind of life, or that she was wasting her time working for the FBI, or if she didn’t right the ship immediately she’d end up alone forever. A lot of that can be inferred, however. Scully was happily engaging in the conversation though, so it’s not vicious.
I think the monster of the week plot itself can be summed up by Mulder searching for any homeless person who knew the victim they traveled there to investigate. He finds someone who says yeah, let me show you something, then roots around in his home made of potato sacks and random cloth. What he shows Mulder is a drawing of a human, it’s literally just a person. It’s almost a stick figure, it’s that simple. No gaping maw, no talons – it is a human with shaggy hair.
Mulder uses this ridiculous picture as his key piece of evidence. I suppose I could say here that his work obsession is one reason he’s so willing to take huge logical leaps, to hang around and “dig deeper” when all signs point to literally nothing. I do think that happens occasionally, but here? Here I think the episode just isn’t that strong.
Strangely relevant to our current moment in history, Detective Thomson is very concerned with the local economy and keeping the dollars surging into town. Mulder tells him this Jersey Devil thing would scare off all that crisp, crisp cash and he knows it, thus no investigation and his bullshit interference with Mulder’s investigation. Cue comparisons to Amity Mayor Vaughn, played by Murray Hamilton in Jaws. It’s not a crazy comparison, either, because they’re both protecting their city’s pocket books rather than the citizens, and they both even have those crackling voices. All hail the Economy, Our American Purpose.
One other thing this episode does, and indeed the series as a whole does, is allow humor through, the purposeful kind. Mulder’s call to Scully from the drunk tank is great. Their chemistry supplies a magnificent platform for that humor. It’s rare, because that chemistry also allows for so much more, really the entire goddamn range of human emotion. Super rare.
Post-drunk tank breakfast, Mulder filthy from his night in a jail cell (they LOVE putting little smudges on the characters’ faces when they’ve had any kind of experience outside of their norm), he tells Scully it’s time to get down to the real investigatin’ because E V I D E N C E.
“I have a date,” Scully says.
“Can you cancel?” Mulder asks, and barely pauses before doing so.
“Unlike you Mulder, I would like to have a life.”
“I have a life,” he responds.
Scully chuckles but brushes it off. This is all setup for when we see Scully on the date. “You’ll understand when you have kids” her date says. He’s not as obnoxious as possible, but I think the viewer (or at least me) feels protective of Scully, so a lot of what he says comes off as annoying and self-interested. Her pager goes off and Mulder apologizes for interrupting the date. “That’s okay,” Scully says. She knows exactly where she wants to be.
The end is somewhat poignant but lacks weight because there’s not enough done to make you care about the “monster.” Better than the monster of the week wrapup is Scully getting a phone call and an offer for another date. She tells Mulder yes, it was the same guy she had dinner with, and Mulder asks if she’s going again. Nope, she’s not. Some good lines at the end skewering gender roles.
Monster of the Week plot - Eh, forgettable.
Mulder and Scully character development - Pretty great.