One Breath

One Breath could be the best myth/arc episode of them all. Mulder's mad scramble to save Scully's life leaves you breathless. With all the scenes of Mulder running around and confronting people, you need some scenes to relax and take a breather. One Breath accomplishes that with the hospital scenes and Scully's other-worldly experience. It makes for an episode that paces itself well, mixing the drama with the action to perfection. The introduction of Melissa, Scully's sister is nice. It's funny to see a sibling so completely opposite of Scully. My favorite scene is with Mulder, X and overcoat man down in the parking garage. The execution of overcoat man using silhouettes instead of a direct camera shot is great cinematography. The confrontation between Mulder and CSM is also awesome. Plus, with the appearance of the Lone Gunmen for some comedy relief, this episode is extremely well-rounded. One Breath is an A+.

The return of Scully should have been more dramatic than it was portrayed. The entire episode revolved around sentiments of mulder towards Scully and less about finding out the truth. The story also portrayed Mulder as a weak person in the sense that he tendered his resignation and did not pushed hard enough to find out the truth. The scene when he was in the room with the cancer man could have been more intense and when he was presented with the chance of taking revenge he bailed just because of some sentimental carp Scully's sister fed him with. I am sorry but i was expecting more form Mulder than this. After all the X files are all about finding the truth than building emotions.

I wish this had been transmitted before 3, this seems to complete a trio of episodes, concluding the events that started in Duane Barry. Whereas 3 almost ignore Dana, this focuses primarily on her.

I enjoyed this episode very much, and for different reasons, I love X files because of the horror, tension, excitement, this was great for different reasons. This is a hightened emotional episode, and does a lot to drive the characters of Mulder and Skinner primarily.

Mulder learns more about those around him, it's a powerful, revealing episode.

Duchovny is tremendous throughout, that scene where he breaks down was so sad.

Excellent, 9/10.

One Breath the Limerick:

Scully returns but asleep

And causes her mother to weep

A man steals her blood

Mulder and X say he's mud

And Mulder's guilt almost leads him to defeat

When I first watched this episode I remember feeling a little betrayed and I hadn't really liked it as an episode since until now. I think a lot of the reason behind this is that I feel like there just weren't enough answers given or even enough new questions asked about the mythology. This is the first episode with Scully back after being in abducted and all that she really does the whole episode is sleep and sit in a boat and stare. This story is really about Agent Mulder. Because he feels responsible for what happened to Agent Scully he tries to suppress his guilt and anger by trying to find the members of the syndicate who are responsible and make them pay so that he won't have to face his own guilt that he is feeling.

I think what has kept me from giving this episode a higher rating in the past is that there really isn't anything much more than character and story development in this episode. No aliens or monsters or paranormal unless you count the two scenes with G. Owens R.N. the guardian angel. However I do think that the story development and dramatic elements were quite well presented and lately have grown to appreciate these elements a lot more.

After rewatching this there are a lot of things that I overlooked that have heightened my opinion of the episode. I love the scenes with Agent Scully's sister Melissa where she calls Mulder by his first name. Interesting how so many of the women in Mulder's lives tended to be as "spooky" as him but he ended up with the only one that wasn't. The confrontation between Mulder and X in the hospital garage was also great. The scene with Skinner telling Mulder about being in the Vietnam war was a wonderfully acted scene on Mitch Pileggi's part and I think this led into using him as a more main character other than occasional guest star. I also have always liked the way that David Duchovny does his crying scenes and the one in this episode was great. I felt that I could understand how he felt because I have had similar break down moments. Finally, I love the confrontation of Mulder and the Cigarette Smoking Man in his apartment. I love how Mulder completely owns him yelling "Shut up! Tonight I'm asking the questions!" and then slaps the cigarette out of his pompous mouth. The look on CSM's face at that moment is priceless. And then right after that CSM is able to completely manipulate Mulder by calling him on his own guilt for what happened to Scully. This just shows how good CSM is at manipulating people into doing what he wants them to do. What a great bad guy!

All in all after viewing this with a more open mind I have realized that even though I didn't like this episode on first view it really does have some wonderful moments that are very important to the mythology. Unfortunately I think the episode is just presented wrong. I have to give this episode an 7 out of 10.

This is the last part of a trilogy of sorts that started with Duane Barry.

Touted as a character-driven triumph for the show, for my taste this plays like better-than-average soap, but still dull as dishwater. The X-file problem is that there is no multifaceted vision behind the whole, oh there is some noodling with dreams in this episode and the usual conspiracy that goes nowhere and we're supposed to find exciting and 'deep', but what we see in any given portion of this is crushingly pedantic.

You'll see no better example of what I'm talking about than in Scully's deathbed dreams; Scully on the boat is certainly a memorable image, but the whole layering is trite, we know exactly what is the dream's distance from reality, who is dreaming and what it means, all perfectly clear which defeats the point of wanting to know.

Further proof; the episode ends with the usual 'we have no such person working here' twist.