The X-Files - 4.

French title: Régénérations
translation: Regenerations

US Airdate: January 26, 1997 (Super Bowl Sunday)

writers: Vince Gilligan, John Shiban and Frank Spotnitz

director: Kim Manners

STARRING:

David Duchovny as Special Agent Fox Mulder

Gillian Anderson as Special Agent Dana Scully

Guest Cast:

JENNIFER CLEMENT as Michele Wilkes

PAUL MCCRANE as Leonard Betts

LUCIA WALTERS as EMT

MARJORIE LOVETT as Elaine Tanner

KEN JONES as the Bearded Man

SEAN CAMPBELL as the Local Cop

GREG NEWMEYER as the New Partner

DAVE HURTUBISE as the Pathologist

BILL DOW as Dr. Charles Burks

BRAD LOREE as the Security Guard

PETER BRYANT as the Uniformed Cop

DON ACKERMAN as the Night Attendant

LAARA SADIQ as the Female EMT

J. DOUGLAS STEWART as the Male EMT

A HEADLESS CORPSE WALKS OUT OF A HOSPITAL MORGUE TRIGGERING THE SEARCH FOR A HIGHLY EVOLVED HUMANOID LIFE FORM THAT POSSESSES UNIMAGINABLE REGENERATIVE POWERS.

Michele Wilkes, an Emergency Medical Technician, races an ambulance through the streets of Philadelphia as her highly-regarded partner, Leonard Betts, attends to a dying man. As the ambulance speeds through an intersection, it is broadsided by a truck. Wilkes survives, but she discovers Betts' decapitated body nearby. Mulder and Scully are brought into the case when Betts' headless corpse disappears from a hospital morgue. Scully theorizes that someone attempted to steal the body and sell it to an unscrupulous medical supplier. Securitv camera footage shows an unidentified person with a strange distortion around the head area leaving the hospital sans Betts' body. With Mulder's reluctant help, Scully fishes through the hospital's bio-disposal unit for the missing corpse. The agents recover the missing head, but the whereabouts of the body remains a mystery. As Scully performs an autopsy on the head, its eyes and mouth suddenly snap open.

A tissue sample taken from Betts' head is analyzed by a pathologist who determines that Betts' body was riddled with cancer. Mulder hypothesizes that Betts possessed unimaginable regenerative powers--perhaps the next step in Man's evolution. A fingerprint search reveals that Betts' real name is Albert Tanner. The agents interview his mother, Elaine, who claims that Albert died in an automobile accident six years earlier.

As Wilkes is transporting another patient, she recognizes Betts' voice transmitting over the ambulance radio. She locates Betts outside a Catholic hospital. Without warning, Betts pulls out a syringe and injects her with a lethal substance. A security guard witnesses the murder and handcuffs Betts to his car in which he attempted to flee. Betts slips out of the cuffs by tearing off his thumb.

When the agents search the trunk of Betts' car, they discover plastic bags filled with human tumors. Mulder postulates that Betts is ingesting the cancerous tissue in order to survive. They learn that the car is registered to his mother, who claimed not to know about Leonard.

Betts' advanced powers allow him to identify individuals who have tumors within their bodies. He attacks and kills a heavy-smoking bearded man after he leaves a bar. Afterward, Betts "gives birth" to a duplicate of himself.

The agents discover a storage locker key at Mrs. Tanner's home. When they open the door to the locker, the bearded man's body, its left lung missing, rolls into view. Using the bearded man's car, Betts attempts to run down Mulder and Scully. The agents dive for cover and open fire. The car bursts into flames, incinerating Betts.

Mulder tells Scully that Betts had ingested the bearded man's cancerous lung. Scully reminds her partner that Betts is quite dead and his not coming back to life. Mulder exhumes the body of the man Mrs. Tanner claimed was killed in the automobile accident. Inside the casket is a corpse identical to Betts. Mulder concludes that the fiery crash was a ruse-and the real Leonard Betts is still alive.

The agents stakeout Mrs. Tanner's home. When an ambulance arrives at the scene, Mulder and Scully race inside. They find Mrs. Tanner, still clinging to life, with a fresh surgical incision on her chest. Scully accompanies Tanner to the hospital. When the ambulance pulls into the hospital parking lot, she realizes Betts hitched a ride by hiding on the vehicle's roof. Betts jumps inside the ambulance and slams the rear doors behind him. Wielding a scalpel, he tells Scully she possesses "something I need." A scuffle ensues, and Scully kills Betts using defibrillation pads. Later that night, as Scully lies in bed, she wakes up coughing and finds a few drops of blood on her pillow. Blood drips from her nose, and she recalls Betts' haunting words.

I want to go out of my head somewhere

I wanna go crazy like the dogs in the yard

from Paul McCrane's "Dogs In The Yard"

from the soundtrack to the movie "Fame"

Yes, the same Paul McCrane that plays Leonard Betts. Ya gotta love that "I want to go out of my head" line! I was a big fan of the movie, "Fame", with McCrane's portrayal of a tormented homosexual a stand-out. What a switch THIS role was for him!

First off, this episode aired in the most hyped spot of the year in North America, after the Super Bowl, so the Powers That Be wanted an episode that casual viewers would understand, but also one that wouldn't "gross out" these same casual viewers. In my personal opinion, the gross factor was way too high for some people (not me, I'm tough), AND people who had no idea that Scully had been abducted earlier in the series were hit broadside by the cancer. So, I'd be interested to hear what the new viewers thought about it all and whether they stuck around for any more eps.

It WAS rather ironic to find the show in this highly-coveted time slot. Merely one year ago, us xphiles were seen as freaks of nature, but now look at us huh? Naaa, naaa, told ya so :-) For what it's worth, this ep garnered its highest rating ever, number 6 overall.

The show left me a bit cold, but the final 5 minutes or so made it all worthwhile. First we get to see Scully in action, Emma Peel reincarnated with her glorious high kick, and then we feel the same fear as we see in her eyes when Betts says, "I'm sorry, but you've got something I need." We've known since the "Duane Barry/Ascension/One Breath" story arc, that Scully should get the same cancer all the other women abducted have, but we never knew when it would be dealt with. It never occured to me through the whole episode that Betts would need something Scully, of all people, had. Stay tuned for more on this storyline, coming up in "Momento Mori" for now.

The art direction, yet again, was outstanding, for this scene in particular. Scully is devastated by what Betts said, Mulder hasn't a clue what's wrong with her, he closes the car door on her, and her face is now darkened by the tint on the car window. She's alone and literally in darkness. Chills.

For fellow nitpickers like myself, note that Betts' EMT number was 208, Scully's nosebleed starts at 2:08AM and "One Breath" is episode 2.08. This is the one where Scully is returned. Couldn't slip that past us Chris!

Great scene with Mulder acting all squeamish when Scully wanted him to reach into the biohazzard waste container. Poor old Mulder, must be hard keeping that male ego in check sometimes :-)

Much debate amongst the fans over the smoking biker in the bar. Was it Cancer Man (William B. Davis) in disguise? Someone mentioned that the gold lighter from "Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose" was the same one seen on the bar table next to the biker. Can't confirm, just passing on the info.

Bit of a continuity error when Scully is talking about Betts' mother living "right here in Pittsburgh". Only problem was they were in Maryland at the time! Oh well, keeps us on our toes.

Another couple of problems with Michele, Betts' fellow EMT worker. Why was she so surprised in the opening shot with how Betts diagnosed the patient, when later on, talking with Mulder, she made it sound like it happened all the time? And are they short of EMT workers in Pittsburgh? Seems a bit cruel to send Michele back to work the day after an accident that decapitated her partner!

Points to the writers for bringing us around to a real life xfile type situation with the cancer. Not many of us will meet monsters in our lives like Betts, or the flukeworm guy, or even a talking tattoo, but more of us than we know will be touched by cancer in some way. It's a dark place we really don't want to go to, but through Scully, we have to, like it or not.

Mulder: "It's weird, huh?"

Scully: "Mulder, what are we doing here?"

Mulder: "Did I mention that Mr. Betts had no head?"

Scully: "Yes. So? I mean, you're not suggesting that a headless body kicked his way out of a latched morgue freezer, are you? Are you?!"

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Mulder: "Made himself at home. Maybe he was home."

Scully: "Leonard Betts?"

Mulder: "Yeah."

Scully: "Without his head."

Mulder: "Yeeeah."

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Mulder: "What did your examination uncover?"

Scully: "Well, I haven't exactly performed an examination yet."

Mulder: "Why not?"

Scully: "Well, because I uh... I experienced an unusual degree of post-mortum galvonic response."

Mulder: "The head moved."

Scully: "It blinked at me. I mean I know exactly what it it's...it's...it's residual electrical activity stored chemically in the dead cells, it's..."

Mulder: "Blinked or winked?"

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Mulder: "Confused yet?"

Scully: "Yeah."

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Scully: "Why do I think that Charles Darwin is rolling in his grave right now?"

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Scully: "The remains are dipped in the epoxy and, once it's cured, the specimen can be sliced for examination."

Mulder: "Or you've got yourself a nice paperweight."

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Mulder: "You're afraid to cut into it. Scully, you're not saying that it's alive, are you?"

Scully: "No. I am certainly not saying that at all."

Mulder: "But has it crossed your mind that it's not quite dead, either?"

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Mulder: "Will the real Leonard Betts please stand up?"

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Scully: "There isn't a creature walking this earth that can regrow its head."

Mulder: "Worms. Cut a worm in half and you get two."

Scully: "Mulder. They're worms."

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Mulder: "On the other hand, how evolved can a man be who drives a Dodge Dart?"

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Scully: "Mulder, I don't know what you're getting at here. Regeneration of an entire body? I don't know why I'm standing here listening to this."

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Scully: "So what do we do?"

Mulder: "We get a slice to go."

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Mulder: (holding evidence bag with a torn off thumb) "Siskel or Ebert?"

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Scully: "Mulder, I think I'm going to need your help--your arms are longer."

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