Stephen King Country

Content warning - Schizogeny - discussion/depictions of child abuseContent warning - Chinga - above average violenceSchizogeny often ranks amongst the least favourite of all The X-Files, and its really hard not to see it in that kind of light. How the plot fits together, what even is Man with Axe's deal, and how do the villain's powers remotely work are all questions left unanswered by a confusingly shot ending. Nor does the villain seem to have any kind of actual plan.People overlook evidence and come to strikingly unsatisfying conclusions and even Mulder's oft-noted tendency to read the script doesn't really aid him. Still, for lesser known games, its fun to see MDK in the episode even if this is a fleeting neat moment.Chinga should be fine. Great even. Stephen King had already written a huge amount by 1998, and yet this episode (in addition to being grossly offensive in Spanish) is something of a mess. A hugely entertaining mess but a mess nonetheless.Starting with a pretty horrific sting, the episode struggles to navigate between slightly weird and serious and winds up as comedy for the most part. Its not really meant to be as funny as it turns out and the less than effective special effects don't help. Something of a shame this is King's only contribution to the series...Support the show