Milagro

"It's called a milagro. It's a Spanish word for miracle."

I say it's called "Hoo Boy". That's a Scullyist's word for 
THANK YOU for an emotion laden and tense character study of 
Dana Scully. It sorta feels like Christmas to me. It's no 
secret that I'm a sucker for episodes like this. However, 
what makes this different is that it is so much more than 
just a Scullycentric episode. It's well written, well directed, 
one of the scariest shows we've had in a long, long time, and 
the acting was phenomenal. "Milagro" was made even more special 
for me because for the first time in a long time I actually 
felt I learned things about Dana Scully, but at the same time 
they were things I already knew finally brought to the surface. 
I can say unequivocally that this one is going down in the books 
for me as an all time favorite episode.

What an absolutely perfect episode for Gillian Anderson. She's 
always been the master of conveying feelings without words and
she was called on to do this repeatedly in "Milagro". The 
elevator, the scene on the phone, the church reactions, the 
moment in the autopsy bay, sitting on the bed in uncomfortable 
sexually charged silence all spoke volumes. Scully's reaction 
to the loneliness observation was so breathtakingly layered. 
Her shaky "My life's not so lonely... it's actually anything 
but" left me shaking my head and saying "you just keep telling 
yourself that dear". I have to take time to single out that 
scene in the church. Gillian nails this scene as the intensely 
private Scully's self assurance is stripped away by a stranger 
with too much information. Her eyes filling with unshed tears 
and her unsettled demeanor even stays with her as she relates 
the story to Mulder, impatient with his automatic posit of the 
contrary. We've seen a lot of sides to Scully, and a lot of 
dangerous moments, but the sheer terror of the last attack and 
subsequent unguarded breakdown as she literally clawed at Mulder 
was one of the most emotionally wrenching things this series 
has ever served up. Gillian stole my heart all over again by 
once again sharing with us the mysteries of Scully's heart in 
"Milagro". Can someone please give her another prize now? 
It's time.

Another acting joy of this episode was that despite being a 
showcase for Scully, Duchovny decided to show us what he is 
really capable of as well. From his alpha male posturing in 
the elevator, to the masked hurt and confusion Mulder felt 
over Scully's admirer, to the fear as he found Scully in his 
apartment and pain as his friend sobbed, he was on in "Milagro". 
A favorite simple moment was Mulder's reaction to Scully's 
snapping at him for making her schedule, a pouting confused 
second of "What did I do?".

Phillip Padgett fills up his pages with prose precise with 
descriptions of events, emotions, and character. His writing 
reflects Chris Carter's at his most overblown - like one big 
long philosophical dead guy speech. Here the prose works 
perfectly. This said, the autobiographical nature of the 
writing in this piece cannot be ignored. Shiban, Spotnitz, 
and Carter all tell us a lot about the way they feel about 
writing and these characters they have created in this piece. 
Padgett, while certainly unsettling and odd, lacks malice. 
Kudos have to go John Hawkes for being able to bring such 
calm and compelling honesty to his delivery while speaking 
of things as creepy as stalking. Through Padgett the writers 
voice their insecurities and process: staring endlessly at 
blank paper, having written failures, desperately wanting a 
positive opinion (I loved the bit where Padgett asks Mulder 
if he liked his book), trying to find motive, the characters 
becoming so real that they end up controlling you. They also 
use "Milagro" to tell us just how much they love Scully. While 
"Milagro" does focus on Scully's physical beauty it also spends 
a lot of time focusing on her inner beauty. All the things, 
strengths, weaknesses, power, and insecurities that make her 
such a complex, fascinating, and enigmatic character. 
Unfortunately, in The X-Files, you always hurt the one you 
love.

Love and motive are woven throughout the story. The crime 
involves the extraction of the heart, and in the end the 
writer has his own heart ripped out by love literally and 
figuratively. It is interesting to me that Scully twice 
denies to Mulder (her unspoken reaction telling us all we 
really needed to know about how she wishes Mulder to view 
her) the truth of Padgett's writing even after earlier 
telling him Padgett knew her "life story". He certainly 
seems to know the yearning in her heart, but not enough to 
control it to get him the naked pretzel he so desired. I'm 
going to go out on a limb here and take a stand that Scully 
was not controlled by Padgett at all. His presence, his 
unsettling and flattering understanding of her did give 
her an overwhelming compulsion to find out more, but not 
because he typed it. Perhaps because she is so rarely 
complimented. Perhaps she needed to know how he knew so 
much about her. She's not sure she understands her motives 
for staying to talk to him, but we don't always understand 
the things we do. Sometimes curiosity compels us. Padgett 
may be astute enough in his observations of her character 
to recognize the "self denial of her senses", but he can't 
use that recognition to get her where he wants her. She makes 
her own choices. Loneliness is a choice when two people who 
clearly love each other spend most of their time hiding their 
hearts. Scully may indeed be "already in love" as Padgett 
observes, but for both Mulder and Scully this affection still 
only surfaces as "the old unconscious at work" as the stranger 
recognizes.

This is, in my opinion, some of director Kim Manner's best 
work on the show. He uses the camera as a stalker as well. 
They did some interesting and subtle things with costuming, 
camera, and Gillian's movements to accentuate Scully's womanly 
features. Where often in the show her figure is hidden beneath 
pants suits, this was not the case in "Milagro". She spends 
more time in a skirt than usual and the camera travels slowly 
up her legs more than once. As Padgett listens at the vent in 
the other room the camera peers down at Mulder and Scully from 
above giving the audience a tease of cleavage (as does the 
uncharacteristically unbuttoned one button further than normal 
shirt she wears to the church). The sweater clings to her. 
The camera slowly and affectionately swirls around her, then 
Padgett, then her again as Padgett describes what we have 
enjoyed for years in her mind, her passion and her appearance 
while detailing her thoughts. Manners uses uncomfortable close 
ups of her lips and eyes to stare at her as Padgett does 
unashamed and blatant in the elevator. He hides the camera 
behind a pillar while watching Scully in the church. All 
making the audience focus on the same thing Padgett sees 
the way he sees them - a beautiful, desirable woman. 

I have to also mention Mark Snow's score here which was one of 
my favorites he has done. The steady, growing bass beat of a 
heartbeat that permeated it sometimes almost unnoticeable and 
other times (as in the teaser) tense and overwhelming gave the 
episode even more heart.

Once again, a sincere thank you to all for a brilliant episode 
that captured all that is the complex character of Dana Scully.

Random Musings
--------------

-Retread alert. Damn, but it's been a long time since I've 
been able to say that. Angelo Vacco who played the funny 
kissing, console jumping, heartless 16 year old (yeah right, 
we're buying that one - next time change the script to reflect 
an age at least remotely plausible) has also been seen as the 
gas station attendant saved by his hair in "F. Emasculata" 
and the miraculously healed guy who got to have Scully stroke 
his tummy in "Talitha Cumi".

-Date Stamp: We don't get anything exact, but all signs point 
to the week of February 8th. One of the letters Padgett got 
was postmarked "Feb 8" and then we had the Valentine's Day 
wish in the paper. One of the note cards I could read also 
had a date of 1/24/99 fitting with this time as well. The 
only odd thing was the phone bill which indicated a last 
billing date of 11/30. Well, maybe since he never makes any 
calls they only bill him once a quarter... 

-Of course this date does conflict with other episodes such 
as "Arcadia" where they claim it is their first X-File back 
in late February.

-Speaking of that postmark, the letter was mailed from "Your 
Town, USA". I think that's located right on the border of Your 
State and That Other State right in My County. A River runs 
through it.

-Did Mulder just swallow that mouth full of toothpaste? Eww.

-So we learn that Scully has been driving the same car since 
at least 1993 and has indeed lived in Georgetown for quite a 
while as well, thus putting a final cap on that little mystery.

-I wish they'd bothered to provide the actors with a prop that 
at least held some resemblance to the close up they inserted 
of the milagro besides being round. The piece Scully was always 
fingering was flat and had nothing on either side as opposed 
to the 3 dimensional textured piece we saw up close.

-How funny that as the voice over was talking about providing 
a pretty picture of herself Scully was removing bloody clothes 
with mussed up hair.

-What a Model!Mulder moment as he sauntered up to the crime 
scene with that spiked up hair and the shades. 

-Can anyone think of a reason beyond obvious plot device that 
the gardener would be wearing that hood on a day that bright 
and warm? The bad hair day excuse does not even work in this 
case.

-Frank's Fashion Spot: OK, it's time to talk about this. 
Surely, *surely* Scully owns something other than black suits. 
We know she does. We've actually seen them. Really, we have. 
What is it with this season? Is there some sort of costume cost 
cutting going on here to pay for the move to Los Angeles? It's 
a dark dark time in Dana Scully's closet. Black shirts, black 
suits, black coats, black shoes, black bra. Well, I doubt 
anyone had a problem with the black bra. Still. I'm not asking 
for a return to unfortunate beige period. Really. I'm just 
asking for a little color once in a while. I swear when she 
was doing the autopsy I half expected her to be wearing black 
scrubs. 

-Also, is it just me or are those heels getting progressively 
higher as the series continues? We've long since left three 
inch heels for progressively higher ground.

-I'm starting to wonder just how many identical white shirts 
Scully bought on sale so she could bleed all over them. Next 
time I see her in that shirt I'm going to be paranoid the 
whole episode that she's gonna end up with some sort of hole 
in her chest.

-Great moment: The light bulb popping out the second time. 
It just wasn't meant to be.

-"Milagro" or "Tithonus" for the Emmy committee this year? 
I'm thrilled Gillian has such a difficult choice to make. I 
think I'd go with this one though.

-So now Mulder's apartment has a great burning incinerator in 
the basement. I must have missed it in "Anasazi".

-Nice little touch: Scully, her shoes off and head back, 
comfortably lounging in Mulder's apartment.

-That Scully really brings out the fire bug in a boy doesn't 
she? It seems every slightly psycho guy with the hots for her 
spends a lot of time burning things.

-My God, I'm glad I'll never have to ride on an elevator with 
that Padgett. Talk about the ride from hell. He just stares 
at people. After those close ups of Scully in the elevator 
for a second I wondered if he was going to stare at her ass 
as she left the elevator and we'd get a close up of that too.

-I found it interesting that Scully referred to the office to 
Mulder as "your office", but I think this is more because it 
*is* his office rather than she has her own elsewhere. The 
office has always been saturated with Mulder - his door, his 
desk, his space - even though she also occupies it.

-I really enjoyed the things I learned about Scully in 
"Milagro". Things like her awareness of her strengths and 
weaknesses as an investigator and her desire for attention 
as a woman undercut by her desire to be respected at her job 
in a traditionally male field. Even the fact that she may be 
a runner and her appreciation of art and architecture is 
welcome information.

-We finally get to see Scully in the process of getting laid, 
so of course it is an underlit fantasy. Once again, Scully 
only gets to have sex in a fan's writing. Also, what is it 
with their unwillingness to actually light a kiss so the 
audience can see it? If they are going to go to the trouble 
of filming it can we at least enjoy it?

-The fanfic parallels are impossible to ignore. I think this 
was my favorite example: "Even now as she pushed an errant 
strand of titian hair behind her ear she worried her partner 
would know instinctively what she could only guess." I swear 
I was half afraid he was going to mention that her titian 
hair held the scent of strawberries.

-I loved the moment when Mulder physically switched their 
places as she argued his usual side. It does seem like we're 
getting a more open minded Scully this season than ever before. 
It's a welcome trend as far as I'm concerned.

Autumn
"Loneliness is a choice."