The X-Files - 3.

French title: Meurtre Sur Internet
translation: Murder on the Internet

Italian title: Liposuzione

US Airdate: November 3, 1995

writer: Jeffrey Vlaming

director: David Nutter

STARRING:

David Duchovny as Special Agent Fox Mulder

Gillian Anderson as Special Agent Dana Scully

Guest Cast:

Timothy Carhart as Virgil Incanto

Glynis Davies as Monica

James Handy as Detective Alan Cross

Suzy Joachim as Jennifer

Randi Lynne as Lauren MacKalvey

William MacDonald as Agent Kazanjian

Aloka McLean as Jesse

Catherine Paolone as Ellen Kaminsky

Kerry Sandomirsky as Joanne Steffen

A SERIES OF MELTING CORPSES LEAD MULDER AND SCULLY TO A KILLER WHOSE INTEREST IN THE WOMEN HE MEETS ON THE INTERNET IS MORE THAN JUST SOCIAL.

When a lonely, overweight woman with connections to Internet chat rooms turns up on the coroner's table, Mulder links her to earlier disappearances of women looking for love in all the wrong places. Despite the local detective's objections to Scully on the team, her analysis reveals strange discrepancies in the victims weight and body composition: somehow the killer removed all the fat from the corpse. But how do Mulder and Scully catch a murderer whose M.O. resembles that of a scorpion than a human being? The investigative team itself becomes the target of a killer with monstrous appetites as the agents track a bizarre stalker.

As for his name, my first guess was that "Incanto" was a take off on "incognito", which means "concealed under disguised character", and I'm sticking with it, however, our more scholarly friends on the Net have added a different take. With regards to the Italian poetry the character translates, apparently Dante's "Inferno" is split into sections called "cantos", and the Roman poet, Virgil, guides Dante through the first two books.

Mulder tells Scully the test results of Incanto's skin sample at 10:13 (Chris Carter's birthday is 10/13)

In the quotes, I've included all the email messages in this episode, as the ep speaks to us all who use computers, whether you're male or female. Personally, I got a kick out of watching how the email/internet community connects to save Ellen at the end, with her last message going to the woman down the hall, the second-last name on their list. Although I have mixed feelings about how the FBI were able to obtain all the phone numbers and names of the women online with Virgil. Scary when you think how *public* your private life is....what files should YOU be password-encrypting hmm? ;-)

(Emails in chat room, Ellen is Huggs, Virgil is Timid)

Huggs: I'm not sure it's such a good idea for us to meet.

Timid: Why? What are you afraid of?

Huggs: Disappointment. Rejection. The usual round of suspects. (Virgil smiles)

Timid: Believe me, I know. I've been down that road once or twice. But you can't hide behind your computer forever. (Ellen gives that some thought) .... Can you?

____________________________________________________________

(Ellen's email to Virgil, after she stood him up at the restaurant, which *forced* him to kill the prostitute; he smiles after he reads it)

Message: 231721 (wow! that's a lot of email)

To: Timid

From : Huggs

I'm so sorry. Can we please try again? I'll explain when I see you. I promise not to flake out.

Apologetically yours,

Ellen.

____________________________________________________________

(Ellen's almost-last email, and frankly, she sends some dull emails, doesn't she?)

To: Joanne Steffen

From: Ellen

You won't believe who's here right now, I don't know if I should tell you or not. I have to go. Details in the morning.

Ellen.

____________________________________________________________

(the FBI email message, followed by the artist's sketch of Virgil)

WARNING: This man is wanted by the F.B.I. and should be considered extremely dangerous. If you have any information, immediately contact 800-555-0132

____________________________________________________________

Scully: "I'm not observing, I'm performing it myself."

Cop: "You're a medical doctor?"

Scully: "You sound surprised."

Cop: "I dunno, I guess maybe I am."

Scully: "Why?"

____________________________________________________________

Mulder: "Scully, I wouldn't have made a good Amway salesman, I knocked on more doors..."

____________________________________________________________

Holly MacLean: (the prostitute) "Uh uh. No kissin'. Anything else you want is fine, but no kissin'."

____________________________________________________________

Mulder: "Okay, it's not yet the finely detailed insanity that you've come to expect from me, it's just a theory. But what if he's not doing this out of a psychotic impulse but rather out of some physical hunger? Maybe he needs to replenish this chemical deficiency in order to survive."

Scully: "From a dry skin sample you're concluding what? That he's some kind of a fat-sucking vampire?" (be really careful saying this one!)

____________________________________________________________

Scully: "Yeah, scorpions predigest their food outside of their body by regurgitating onto their prey but... I don't know too many scorpions who surf the internet." (have you met the folks in alt.tv.xfiles? kidding, I'm kidding...)

____________________________________________________________

(after Virgil confesses to killing 47 women, Mulder leaves Scully and Virgil alone, a guard outside the door)

Scully: "Why?"

Virgil: "You look at me, you see a monster......but I was just feeding the hunger."

Scully: "You're more than a monster. You didn't just feed on their bodies, you fed on their minds."

Virgil: "My weakness was no greater than theirs. I gave *them* what they wanted. They gave *me* what I needed."

Scully: "Not anymore!" (she turns to leave)

Virgil: "I morti non sono piu soli. (I think, it's Italian, so I'm not sure) (Scully turns in shock) The dead are no longer lonely."