Original Air Date: November 24, 1995
Episode Grade: C+
I’ve never really enjoyed the mythology episodes of The X-Files. I don’t find aliens or vast government conspiracies to be that interesting, and I think this show is better when it takes itself less seriously. “Nisei” has a lot of problems—unwieldy action sequences, out-of-character behavior from Skinner, and somewhat racist overtones. This is a two-parter, so stay tuned for the conclusion.
Recap:
A windowless aluminum train car is uncoupled and left until dark. Black sedans roll up, and a group of Japanese men board the car. (Mark Snow hits the tribal pan flute track hard; the music on this show is…racially problematic.) Inside the train car, the men, now dressed in white suits, perform an autopsy on something with green blood. Then a SWAT team crashed the party and brutally murders everyone. Nothing to see here, people. Nothing to see here.
Cue the credits!
Mulder and Scully are back in their basement office, where they watch a video of the alien autopsy. Scully makes a crack about Mulder’s penchant for porn and then takes a swipe at the Fox network.
Team Spooky tracks down the address of the man selling the autopsy tapes. They arrive just in time to find him executed and see someone running from the house with a briefcase. Mulder gives chase. When he finally corners the fellow, they have a brief, unsatisfying kung fu battle. Mulder arrests the miscreant, who refuses to answer his questions in anything other than very growly Japanese.
At the precinct, Skinner demands to know why Mulder and Scully are detaining a high-ranking Japanese diplomat. Mulder “forgot” to turn in the briefcase he got from the diplomat. Inside are satellite pictures of boats and a list of UFO enthusiasts. Mulder heads back to DC, and Scully stays in Allentown to check out the UFO group.
Mulder meets with the Lone Gunmen. Frohike is wearing a fur vest; he looks like a faun. The ship in the photo is the Talapus, which was a salvage ship looking for a lost WWII Japanese submarine carrying gold bullion. Mulder thinks maybe it found something else.
Elsewhere, the Japanese diplomat is murdered in the black sedan that picks him up from the precinct.
The next day, Scully arrives at the home of Betsy Hagopian, the UFO enthusiast. A brunette in a Laura Ashley sweater answers the door, joined by a tall redhead. They smile knowingly and tell Scully that she’s one of them.
The women call the rest of the group to come over. They introduce her to fellow abduction survivors, whose stories are eerily similar to her own experience. They all have sad, sincere expressions and tragic fashion sense. Scully says she can’t remember. She doesn’t want to remember.
Meanwhile, Mulder runs around the shipping yard in search of the Talapus, his black trench coat billowing like a cape. He breaks into the ship and begins to search for evidence. He finds a jumpsuit with the name of the vessel, but before he can find anything else, the same SWAT team from the opener arrives. Mulder escapes by jumping into the harbor. These SWAT guys are not observant.
The group shows Scully that they all have the same mark on their necks—and they all carry around the implants they had removed in an assortment of pill bottles and film canisters. Scully freaks out and gets up to leave.
The two group leaders take Scully to see Betsy, who is in the advanced stages of cancer. They tell her that they’re all going to die the same way because of the tests, because of what’s been done to them.
Mulder emerges (Hours later? It’s dark now, in any case.) and skulks around the shipyard. He peeks into a large warehouse, where he sees the windowless train car, now tented with plastic. It’s a hive of activity, with armed guards and men in hazmat suits.
A disheveled Muler returns to his apartment (#42, in case you forgot) to find the door open. It’s been ransacked, and Skinner is lurking there in the dark. Skinner informs him that the Japanese diplomat was murdered (and makes a joke about pearl diving; stay classy, show!). Skinner demands to know where the briefcase is. He wants the case, and he wants the burgeoning international incident out of his office. He won’t be helping Mulder out of trouble this time. Because he’s usually on Mulder’s side?
Mulder meets with his senator friend, who tells him to return the satellite photos. Mulder is all like, “But the truth! It’s out there!” His senator friend tells him about the events of the episode opener and gives him the names of the doctors who were murdered.
You know, I think my love of arrogant guys who wear glasses and roll up the sleeves of their white, button-down shirts began with this show. Scully tells Mulder what she discovered with the UFO group. Mulder shows her a photograph of Japanese doctors, and Scully insists that she’s seen one of them before. He says that the doctor has been dead for two decades and shows her pictures of horrible experiments.
Mulder thinks that the Japanese were continuing the Nazi experiments to create a human-alien hybrid. He doesn’t understand why Scully doesn’t believe him. She says believing is easy, but she needs proof.
Scully takes her implant to a techie doctor person, who says that it’s a manmade microprocessor. Similar chips have been used to help the disabled communicate using electromagnetic impulses fired directly into the brain.
Mulder clambers around a train yard in search of the Box Car of Doom. He sees more Japanese men arrive and lead a figure in an opaque plastic suit out of a white van. The train pulls away, and Mulder runs after it. Hey Fox, those things can do like, 150 mph. You’re not gonna make it.
Scully rewatches the alien autopsy tape. She recognizes the doctor—the one who was supposed to be dead—with the distinctive white stripe in his hair and mustache. He was one of the men who did experiments on her.
The same assassin who killed the diplomat intercepts the Japanese doctors at a passenger train terminal. Are supposed to be rooting for him? Because he’s sinister as hell. (If Stephen McHattie looks familiar, it’s because he’s been in a ton of stuff, including Reverend Driscoll on Haven.)
X meets Scully at her apartment. He says that Mulder is in danger, girl. She has to stop Mulder from getting on the train. She calls him on his cell and tells him to let it go. If there’s one thing he can’t do—besides enunciate—it’s let something go.
Nostalgia Vision 