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How The Ghosts Stole Christmas


Episode: 6X08 (Yes, this is right)
Airdate:
12/13/98
Written by:
Chris Carter
Directed by:
Chris Carter
Guest Cast: Ed Asner as Maurice and Lily Tomlin as Lyda


Images from "How The Ghosts Stole Christmas"


'Tis the night before Christmas /At a dark, Gothic house /Where two creatures are stirring /As they play cat and mouse /With Scully and Mulder /Who've arrived on the scene /To explore double-murders /Since 1918.






A few notes before I start the review. First I'd like to say, what a phenomenal episode! Chris Carter has done it again. The only thing I was dissatisfied with was that it didn't show what Mulder and Scully got each other for Christmas. Other than that though, it was great! This is the X-Files we are used to - scary, spooky, and thrilling. I love the other kinds of episodes too, don't get me wrong (Dreamland and Dreamland II are two of my favorites), but we haven't seen this kind of episode in the X-Files since last season. The thing I have to say, is, I was surprised at the ending. It wasn't like the spoilers had said, but I'm glad I DIDN'T know. It made it all the more thrilling. So if you want to be surprised on that, you may want to skip the end.


The episode starts with Mulder sitting in his car looking at the mansion. Scully pulls up in her car, wanting to know what was so important that Mulder wanted her to be there on Christmas Eve. She tells him she has Christmas wrapping to do, but in the back of her car are wrapped gifts.

Mulder tells her the story of two people, Maurice and Lyda, who had made a lovers pact and killed themselves in 1918. He thinks that their ghosts are now haunting the house; there have been double-murders of people who had since lived in the house.

Scully doesn't want to stay and is ready to go home until Mulder leaves to go into the house. Scully can't find her keys. When she gets in the house, she asks Mulder if he took them, but he did not.

Suddenly the door slams shut, locking them inside.

ACT ONE
The two of them hear noises as if someone is walking around on another floor. It is obvious Scully is scared, but for awhile she gives Mulder her rational explanation, that basically they are imagining the sounds because it is what they would expect from watching horror movies. Scully finally admits that she is scared, but that she has no reason to be.

MULDER: Tell me you're not afraid.
SCULLY: All right. I'm afraid. But it's an irrational fear.

Going upstairs, Mulder tells Scully about how there was three double-murders in the last eighty years, that were all on Christmas Eve. In the one room, they see that a light is on, even though it wasn't before.

Scared, Mulder tells her:

MULDER: I got your back.
SCULLY: Thank you.

Scully, then Mulder, go inside and the door slams. They hear noises coming through the floor. Mulder stoops down to look at it, and then sneaks up behind Scully, scaring her, making her scream. She is not amused. Mulder tell her that he thinks there is a hiding place in the floor. He moves the floor boards and underneath are two bodies, a man and a woman. Mulder says, "I was half right." Scully has a shocking revelation - the woman is dressed like her. After she tells Mulder this he says, "How embarrassing." She then realizes that the man is dressed like Mulder. She thinks it is them.

Moving to the next room, they find it exactly the same. They go back and forth between the rooms looking at both at once seeing that they are indeed the same. Upon closer inspection they find that not only do they look alike, but they are the same room, because the bodies are in the floor of the second room as well.

Trying to figure it out, Mulder steps out of the room thinking he will come back through the other door, however, he doesn't. Scully tries going through but doesn't find him. They are yelling for each other when the doors slam shut and they are locked inside.

Mulder sees the other door and walks through, but once again he's in the same room, but no Scully.

ACT TWO
Mulder is pulling on the door trying to get to Scully when he shoots at the knob so it opens. Behind the door is a brick wall.

Suddenly a man, Maurice, comes into the room wanting to know what Mulder is doing in his house. Mulder is yelling wanting to know what is going on, and to find Scully.

Maurice sits Mulder down. Mulder puts his head in his hands.

MAURICE: Do you drink?
MULDER: No.
MAURICE: Take drugs?
MULDER: No.
MAURICE: Are you overcome by the impulse to make everyone believe you?
MULDER looks up at MAURICE.

Maurice starts telling Mulder what is wrong with him (Mulder). Maurice is in the field of mental health, specializing in disorders and manias related to pathological behavior as it pertains to the paranormal. He tells Mulder that people like him all tend to fall into the same category. When Mulder asks him what category that is, he says that he's:

MAURICE: Narcissistic, overzealous, self-righteous, egomanic.

He tells Mulder that he is a workaholic and will eventually have a wacko breakdown. I guess Mulder can be programmed, categorized, and easily referenced. Maurice asks Mulder if he spends every Christmas alone. Mulder tells him that he's not alone, he came there with Scully. He asks how Mulder got her to come. Did he steal her car keys? He tells Mulder that he only listens to her rational explanations because he is afraid of loneliness. (Shipper's note: We all know it is because he LOVES her, NOT because he's lonely...:)

Mulder doesn't agree with him. He just wants to find Scully. Maurice tells him to go through the door, but there is still a brick wall, which Maurice insists isn't there. The wall disappears and he proves wasn't real by walking through it.

MAURICE: Brick wall? (points at Mulder) Or brick wall? (points behind him) Go ahead, change your life.

Mulder tries to do the same and smacks his face against it.

Meanwhile, Scully is trying to get out when Lyda comes in. Scully points her gun at Lyda who is acting frightened as well. They both thought the other was a ghost. Scully apologizes to her for scaring her, telling her that she is scared because they found two bodies. When Scully turns around to look at the floor, the furniture is moved back into place; the bodies are gone.

Scully proceeds to point her gun at Lyda again. Suddenly Maurice walks in the room. Maurice tells her that Mulder is nuts and that Scully needs to be careful. He says that it's about trust. Scully tells them to both put their hands up. When Lyda does this, her robe comes open. She has a large whole through her abdomen. Scully walks over and takes Maurice's hat off. He has a similar one through his head. Scully faints.

Back in the [other] room, Mulder is trying to climb out. Lyda sees him but meets him on the other side. Mulder touches her, thinking she is a ghost, but she is solid. He realizes that she is Lyda and the man is Maurice, but that they have aged. Mulder pushes her against the wall.

LYDA: Masher!
MULDER: Frump!

Mulder asks her whatever happened to the lover's pact. She points to various books on the bookshelf, and the pop out by themselves. Finally she finds the book she's looking for, "The Ghosts that Stole Christmas."

Lyda tells Mulder that she was once young and beautiful like his partner. She gives him the book, showing him a picture of herself and Maurice.

LYDA: I'm assuming you came here with similar misconceptions.
MULDER: We came her looking for you.
LYDA: Oh, yeah? You didn't come here to be together for eternity?
MULDER: (laughs) No.
LYDA: Because you're filled with despair and woeful Christmas melancholy?
MULDER: Why?
LYDA: Maybe it was your partner then.
MULDER: What about her?
LYDA: You knew this house was haunted.
MULDER: Yeah.
LYDA: Maybe you two should have discussed your real feelings before you came out her. I'm speaking from experience.
MULDER: What experience?
LYDA: I'm not gonna get into semantics. A murder-suicide is all about trust.
MULDER: I thought you had a lover's pact?
LYDA: (laughs) Poetic illusions aside, the outcome is pretty much the same.
LYDA opens her robe to reveal the hole in her abdomen.
MULDER: (sickly) Oh!
LYDA: I don't show my hole to just anyone.
MULDER: Why are you showing it to me?
LYDA: Well, it's not like you're going to be eating any Christmas ham, is it?
MULDER: Oh. You're trying to tell me that Scully is gonna shoot me. Scully is NOT gonna shoot me.
LYDA: Suit yourself. But if you shoot first, for her the rest is an act of faith.
MULDER: I wouldn't shoot her.
LYDA: Maybe she shoots herself.
MULDER: I wouldn't let her.
LYDA: The bodies under the floor. Maybe that was just some kind of ?union? symbolism. Or maybe there's a secret lover's pact.
MULDER sighs. (Sadly like her wishes they were!!!)
MULDER: We're not lovers.
LYDA: And this isn’t a pure science...But you're both so attractive, and there'll be a lot of time to work that out.

Lyda holds up Mulder's gun, which he finds is missing, telling him to take it. He doesn't. She tells him this will be his last Christmas alone. Lyda disappears into thin air and the gun drops into Mulder's hand.

In the other room, Scully wakes up. She tries the door again, but it's still locked. Maurice is in the room. He tells her that he locked it for protection from Mulder. He has her car keys, and asks her if she knows what Mulder's capable of, suggesting that he took them. He says that he's seen it happen many times in that house.

Mulder is calling to Scully so she makes him unlock the door. Mulder walks into the room and shoots.

ACT THREE
We see that Mulder was not shooting at Maurice, but Scully. He is shouting at Scully. He is telling her that it's either him or her. She tells him that they can work it out, that he doesn't have to do this. He tells her that there is nothing for them to go back to, but more loneliness. He proceeds to shoot Scully in the abdomen!

Scully falls backwards as Mulder looks on. He says, "Merry Christmas, Scully," and then puts the gun to his head.

The scene flips and Lyda is standing with the gun to her head and says, "And a happy new year."

The scene flips again. Maurice is trying to pull Mulder away, but then in another shot, it is Lyda he is pulling away.

Suddenly Mulder runs in and finds Scully and is over her not knowing what happened. He asks her what she did. She tells him that she didn't believe he'd do it. That she would... He looks down and in his hand is the gun. Scully says, "Merry Christmas, Mulder." The gun goes off and his chest starts bleeding. He falls to the floor.

Lyda looks up from the floor laughing. The record of "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" starts.

Scully is crawling, when Mulder crawls into the room. (Yes, I know once again he HAD already been in the room, but, well, you'll see). Both of them are crawling across the floor, both pointing their guns at each other. Scully tells him that she's not going to make it. Mulder tells her that she's not [leaving] without him. She tells him that she's scared, and he says he is also. They put down the guns. Mulder says that they should have thought of this, and she says he should have. He says that she shot first, but she says that she didn't shoot him, he shot her.

Mulder realizes what is happening and stands up. He looks down and touches his chest that is covered in blood. There is no wound. He tells Scully to get up, that she's not shot, that it's all in her head. He pats her stomach (!), she is all right as well.

They open the door and walk out, and they are outside!

Maurice and Lyda are sitting in front of the fire, knowing that they almost had Mulder and Scully, but not quite. They must not think of their failure, there will be more Christmases. They think that Mulder and Scully are lonely, but they say that they (meaning Maurice and Lyda) haven't forgotten the meaning of Christmas. They hold hands.

Back at his house, Mulder is watching television when someone knocks at his door. It's Scully, she couldn't sleep. He invites her in. She says that is was all in their minds and asks for conformation, which he gives her. He tells her that he knows they said they weren't going to exchange gifts but he got her something anyway. He pulls out a long gift. She says that she got him something too. She hands him a gift shaped like a video tape.

They sit down on the couch happily and start to open the gifts as the camera pans away out the window where snow is falling. "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" is playing in the background.



Based on the Redux II scale (1-10, as Redux II being a 10 [now with Triangle being an 11, above the scale])
Overall Rating : 8.5
Shippy Rating: 4


Images from "How The Ghosts Stole Christmas"





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