The X-Files - Random Episode Discussion - Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space'

**neel luvs tony** · 03-28-2008, 08:09 AM

Welcome to the discussion thread for Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space'

Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space'
Season 3 episode 20
First Aired : 12-04-96
Episode Summary

When a couple claims to have been abducted by aliens, Agents Mulder and Scully try to get at the truth but everyone has a different version of the story, including the 'aliens' themselves. source

Quotes

Detective Manners: That's a bleepin' dead alien body if I ever bleepin' saw one.

Scully: In short, Roky showed signs of being what is known as a fantasy-prone personality.
Jose Chung: Agent Scully, you are so kind-hearted. He's a nut

Jose Chung - For although Agent Diana Lesky is noble spirit and pure of heart, she remains, nevertheless, a federal employee. As for her partner, Reynard Muldrake... that ticking timebomb of insanity... his quest into the unknown has so warped his psyche, one shudders to think how he receives pleasures from life.

Blaine Faulkner: The proper authorities showed up with a couple of men in black. One of them was disguised as a woman, but wasn't pulling it off. Like, her hair was red... but it was a little too red, you know. And the other one, the tall lanky one, his face was so blank and expressionless. He didn't seem human. I think he was a mandroid. The only time he reacted was when he saw the dead alien.

Links

Teaser
Mulder Screaming
More clips here

Random Pics

If any one wants to make icons and other artwork feel free to do so and post here

If you want me to add something to the opening post let me know

Little_Stewie · 03-28-2008, 08:52 AM

Hahaha, this epi was *bleeping* good.

I have to watch it again asap, then I'll contribute.

Btw, the actor who played Jose Chung was extremely good, IMO.

**Veiled Vesta** · 03-29-2008, 05:23 PM

Random episode discussion? I'm in!

Since I saw this recently I'm all set to discuss this to death... (I'm gonna kill this thread with my long winded rant, I can feel it.)

~

The teenagers, Harold and Chrissy, were easy to sympathize with: Harold because he was pathetic & confused and Chrissy because she was obviously freaked out by the whole experience. After the two crazy kids get abducted and... okay, the two aliens get attacked by the worst special effect monster I have ever seen, not only on this show, but ever. And I've watched a few episodes of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers recently. Don't judge.

Anyway, after the credits we get to some introductions. Scully meets Jose Chung, fawns over him as an author, there's lots of flattery exchanged along with apologies for lack of Mulder (no worries dear) and Scully must tell her version of the truth on the "alien abduction" case she worked with Mulder, fodder for Chung's book. Let the flashback commence!
Chrissy, the girl who was reported missing is returned. Probably Harold too. I like the little part where Chung asks what she prefers to use "abductee" or "experiencer" and Scully with her no-nonsense demeanor is sure she's neither. In the "flashback" Chrissy gets a visit from her date and I gotta point out the part where her dad shouts something like "What the hell's going on?" I don't know why I chuckled at that. Probably because I was half-expecting him to come out with a shotgun and attack poor Harold!

So anyway, we get our first look at the tough-talkin' detective who grills Harold on his hormones, then Mulder and Scully get their chance to interview him and I gotta say, when Mulder's all: "That's too bad, because the next rape you experience will probably be your own. In prison." I let out a long laugh. That's my first favorite line of the episode. I had to pause the blankety blank DVD, I was laughing so much! It may have been inappropriate and unprofessional but damn it, the line was just hilarious!

Scully and Chung talk about hypnosis and there's more compliments from Scully. Chung is already impressing me with his knowledge (only two scenes in. Man, this guy's really growing on me!

) After the nice non-believers' banter we see that they got Chrissy hypnotized. I like how her visions replace the people that are in the room with her (parents, hypnotist, or fave X-Files duo) with aliens. Nice editing and special effect. The girl's eyes are really dilated, I notice. Cool. (how this is what impresses me most in this episode, I cannot explain.) After Chrissy gives her sad, sad account of the First Date From Hell, Mulder and Scully step aside for a little chat. Basically, Mulder believes but Scully is skeptic; and in that one sentence, I have summarized the M/S dynamic in virtually every episode I've seen thus far and probably every episode I will see until the end of the series. What's this? Here comes Sailor-Mouth Detective! I love this guy.

He's not loving Mulder though: "You really bleeped up this case!" Second favorite line right there. In fact, many of the detective's bleepin' line are among my favorites.

("You bet your blankety-blank bleep I am." and "These kids' stories couldn't be more bleeping different!")

Another interview with that Harold kid and we see more of the Weirdest Abduction Ever. Okay, I know it's redundant to call an abduction story weird, but I'm sure you all understand what I mean. One of the aliens the kid saw in the ship was smoking? And talking in English? O-kay... alot of other bizzare things happen in this episode so I won't get hung up on this one scene.

Scully managed to get a great line in there after Mulder is all "So what if they had sex". She says "So, we know that it wasn't an alien that probed her!" It's chuckle worthy, definitely.

And then of course, my favorite Detective comes in saying he got a phone call from "some crazy bleephead," saying he witnessed the abduction, and if they "feel like talking to this blankhole?" Fourth fave line right there; bleep yeah!

The blankhole in question is talking about the visit he got from two men in black after writing his story down. One of them is, as someone mentioned in the M/S thread and I Googled it, wrestler and governor of some state Jesse Ventura! That's pretty neat! Not to judge or anything but he convinced me that he was a super intellectual Man in Black rather than a mindless wrestler. I hope none of you are wrestling fans!

The whole Lord Kinbote (Kinboat? Kinnboat? Kinnbote? How do you spell that?) flashback was too weird even for me. I'm not sure what that was about, just gonna have to agree with Scully and Chung that the guy was a fantasy-prone nut. Much like a certain FBI agent who believes the sex-orgy manifesto.

(Loved the scene where Scully is all tactful regarding Mulder when talking to Chung; a total contradiction to that night with her "Mulder, you're nuts!" accusation! I'm gonna make this my fifth favorite line.)
Another re-hypnotization of the girl and the detective brings us another lead: "I just got a call from some crazy blankety blank saying he just found a real live dead alien body." To the conspiracy mobile!

From bleep head to crazy blankety blank, we are introduced to a nerdy guy who really wants to be abducted by aliens. You give paranoid, geeky believers of EBEs a bad name! The Lone Gunmen PWN you! *ahem*

So this guy recounts his part of the story to Chung where he discovered the "real live dead alien body" and how when he called the proper authorities to report it, he was dismayed to see some "Men in Black". Thus comes quite possibly the best scene of this episode: "One of them was disguised as a woman, but wasn't pulling it off. Like, her hair was red? But it was a little too red, you know? And the other one: the tall lanky one? His face was so blank and expressionless. He didn't even seem human. I think he was a mandroid. The only time he reacted was when he saw the dead body." Then Mulder reacts to the body.

Dear God that must've been a fun scene to shoot! If I wasn't already laughing like an idiot, the Awesome Detective's line: "Yeah, that's a dead bleeping alien body if I ever bleeping saw one" would've done me in, for sure! I love how Scully manhandles that geeky guy. Closest thing to female interaction he'll get? I'd say its safe to assume so. (I've lost count of favorite lines and scenes, I'll just say count this whole scene as seventh, eighth, and ninths faves.

)

With all the great cameos, I'd have to say my least favorite is Yappi. But in a way that I like to hate him. Heh. So an autopsy video of the dead alien, conducted by Scully, gets in the hands of a network dumb enough to show it and have Yappi the Lame host it. I'm putting my money on the Fox Network. Tenth favorite line/scene: Embarrassed Scully in real life as well as Flashback Scully finding out their dead alien was just a guy in a mask. (And he would've gotten away with it too if it weren't for those meddling kids, er, FBI agents.

) So the Air Force finds out about this, let Mulder and Scully know that the guy was one of their AWOL pilots, and manage to steal the dead guy from under their noses (seriously how long where Mulder and Scully away from the body? Do they not have guards in that autopsy bay?)

Return of Men in Black Jesse Ventura!

He steals the geeky kid's "alien autopsy tape" from his VCR, and totally shuts him up with a swift - I don't know the wrestling term for it so I'll just call it - spine cracker. Wow, awesome! And it gets even awesomer when Mulder gets his licks in. Slapping him silly and threatening him using virtually the same words Scully and the MIB used, it's just all hilarious! :rofl: The whole scene recounted from this poor, geeky kid's POV makes my 11th favorite scene/line; along with a Dungeons and Dragons quip.

So I don't know if you're all still reading this but I'll try and wrap it up: Mulder gets into a weird conversation with the other AWOL pilot in a diner but Chung offers his unintentionally funnier version as told to him by the cook who worked there. Now I'm not sure which version to believe. Mulder's version could be explained in that the military men who came to get the guy also "brainwashed" the cook into forgetting AWOL pilot-guy. Then again, Chung's version in which Mulder eats a whole sweet potato pie and asks all those bizarre questions (bizarre to those who don't watch the X-Files

) is, well, funnier and just as plausible; to use a well known quote "I want to believe." (Bizarre diner scene is my favorite number 12 scene/line.)
After he leaves the diner and checks on Scully in her hotel room, he is surprised by the Men in Black! Woo! I love Jesse Ventura's answer to Mulder's loud "Where's Scully!?" Not only because of how he delivers it: "Oh, she uh... went to get some ice" but because it's true!

This just reminds me of that one scene all the way back in season 2's Humbug where the little manager is under Scully's trailer and when Mulder catches him he says that he's merely fixing her plumbing, in a way that sounds just a bit suspicious. But he was telling the truth! I am too easily amused. This episode made my sides hurt.

Oh right, I have to wrap this up: Alex Trebek! Or rather "someone who looked incredibly like him". Of course, when prodded by Chung, Scully must admit she doesn't remember that last scene with the ice, Mulder in her room, the Men in Black, and whatever else happened that's too crazy for our virgin ears. She only knows that the next morning she woke up and saw Mulder in her room. Woo hoo! Oh wait... they weren't in bed together? Damn. The shipper in me, however, wants to point out that it must have gotten pretty hot in that room to melt all that ice in the bucket that Mulder put his hand in. *wink wink* (Yeah, or maybe it was Lord Kooky with a heat beam in cahoots with the MIB. You never know with this episode.

) So the detective ruins that nice little moment of temporary amnesia to report that they "just found your bleepin' UFO." Did I mention how much I bleeping love this detective?

So in conclusion, Air Force cover up ("Bleep"), closure that isn't really closure-y enough for Chung (poor guy) and Mulder can't get him to stop from writing his book because he has no idea what happened to those kids either (of course...) Enough of an episode discussion Neel?

I loved this episode and if I were prone to give ratings, I'd give this a perfect 10.

Cindy3138 · 03-29-2008, 05:38 PM

I'm off to watch the ep (while I still have some peace and quiet at home) and I'll post my thoughts tomorrow.
BTW, great review/discussion Hestia

.

**neel luvs tony** · 03-30-2008, 08:02 AM

Quote:

Enough of an episode discussion Neel? I loved this episode and if I were prone to give ratings, I'd give this a perfect 10.

Bleeping YES!!(I hope I used that word the right way)

LOVED reading it. I will comment later about it though after I have seen the episode. I got season 3 by *cough* some other means. It's your fault.

I would love to read long reviews of the episodes you like and post them in the season discussion threads, we have those too

Spookyfan · 03-31-2008, 02:56 AM

Well must admit this is one of those episodes I didn't really like.

greyocean · 03-31-2008, 04:30 AM

All i can say is the scream. Oh my god, i was rewinding and rewinding and nearly had a heart attack it was THAT funny.
Oh my god. i loved it

Cindy3138 · 03-31-2008, 07:41 AM

Okay I did watch it but really have nothing to say except to list my favorite moments in the episode. The beginning with the "How the Hell should I know" from the alien was a very WTF moment for me when it first aired and now I find it hillarious. There's the close up of the poster which I totally adore. The Men In Black, Lord Kimbote, the guy who trips over the "alien body" "Roswell! Roswell!"

, I don't know why but when Scully says "But Mulder I don't even remember letting you in." it always makes me laugh, and Mulder eating the pies are all favorites of mine.

**neel luvs tony** · 03-31-2008, 07:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spookyfan (View Post)

Well must admit this is one of those episodes I didn't really like.

you are probably the first poster on this board I have met who has said that. I want to why

Spookyfan · 04-04-2008, 05:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by neel luvs tony (View Post)

you are probably the first poster on this board I have met who has said that. I want to why

I'm unique

Hmmm... you want to know why. Well, I don't really remember, I only remember I didn't really like it. I should rewatch it to tell you why

codyw1 · 10-17-2009, 04:28 PM

Darin Morgan's masterpiece.