The X-Files - The Complete Second Season (Slim Set)

Among the standout episodes are "The Host," "Duane Barry/Ascension," "Humbug," "Dod Kalm," "Colony/End Game," and "Anasazi." These episodes are a powerful reminder that The X-Files, like no other show on television, can span horror, suspense, mystery, romance, drama, and comedy, sometimes all in the same episode, and always with the production values of a major feature film. --Eugene Wei

Description
In this second season box set, Mulder and Scully get glimpses of the global conspiracy as they investigate UFO's, alien abductions, genetic engineering, and ominous government agents.

As one may gather, I'm obviously an x-phile - how else can one explain a five-star rating for a dvd boxed set which isn't even available yet? Heck, I'm still waiting for my Season 1 gift set order from amazon to arrive.

Here's a rundown of the second season episodes:

1) Takes off from the season one finale. After the X-Files have been shut down, Mulder & Scully journey to Puerto Rico. 2) Introduces fan-favorite The Flukeman, a genetic mutation living in the New Jersey sewer system. 3) Residents in a small community suddenly become violent, apparently urged on by digital readouts ordering them to kill. 4) Introduces Alex Krycek (Nicholas Lea). 5) Mulder is in the middle of a hostage negotiation involving alien-abductee Duane Barry. 6) Continues from the previous; Mulder pursues Barry who has kidnapped Scully. 7) My personal favorite! Vampire-themed episode featuring Duchovny's then real-life girlfriend Perrey Reeves. 8) Scully is found, albeit in a coma. 9) Deadly lifeform living in a volcano. 10) Agents investigate a possible connection between several teenager disappearances and a religious cult. 11) Strange unseen attacks in a nursing home. 12) The personality of a serial killer is transferred to his granddaughter 13) An "escalating fetishist" episode, where one's relatively harmless "hobby" turns homicidal. 14) Satan worshippers pay for their laxity! 15) Voodoo episode. 16) Features horror genre fan-fave Brian Thompson (Fright Night, Kindred) as the alien boutny hunter. Mulder meets long-lost sister Samantha (or does he?). 17) Continues from previous. 18) Animal abductions from a zoo near a major UFO hotspot. 19) Partly inspired by "The Philadelphia Experiment". 20) Great episode featuring circus acts, Jim Rose, and the Conundrum! 21) Possession story featuring the Romanian holymen the Calusari. 22) Plague-like epidemic sweeps a prison facility. 23) Killer shadows. For Marvel comics fans this recalls powers of characters such as Cloak and The Shroud. 24) A town hides a terrible secret. Hint - read up on the New Guinea Jale tribe. 25) Cliffhanger episode. Hacker obtains all the Defense Department's files on UFO's - encrypted in Navajo!

NO BRAINER - Get this set of one of the most fascinating sci-fi TV series of all time!


Not better than the first season, but stunning. (spoilers)   June 1, 2000
Arkaan Semere (Canada)
68 out of 78 found this review helpful

It's difficult to say why The X-Files continues to capture the awe of the viewer. The first season introduced us to Agents Mulder and Scully, who connected with each other movingly in the first season, and we see how that effects them in the second as they continue to work together.

The second season stretches the mythology angle somewhat, but some of the stand-alones rank among the best.

Here's just a rundown on the best episodes (though all of them are definitely worth seeing).

---Duane Barry/Ascension/One Breath: The X-Files trilogy that abducted Scully! Now, we all know that Scully comes back, but these three shows held for me an intense fascination with the fate/free will ideas, and certainly engaged it's viewers in passionate discussions.---Firewalker: I don't know why I love this episode. I think that the seemless mesh of science, fiction, and suspense is what enthralled me throughout.---Irresistable: In introducing us to Donnie Pfaster, Chris Carter introduced us to one of the most evil villains in the show's history (not the coolest, mind you). I'd thought that the second season had peaked with this episode, but along came---Colony/End Game: The episode that showed us Mulder's abducted sister! (or a clone, or an alien-human hybrid). Scully gets taken by the bionic killer people (my friends claim this is why that I'm not an X-phile, having no clue what they're called. Oh well). Not as good as many other mythology episodes, but still notable for Mulder's attachment to his partner.---Dod Kalm: My favourite of season 2. No way to truly describe it, but it was enchanting and magical, thrilling and inspiring, a combination of technical brilliance and artistic majesty. Gillian Anderson deserved an Emmy for this and Irresistable.---Anasazi: Ending with what was the best Mythology episode to date, I'd be a fool to tell you what happened.


A truly amazing series!   August 3, 2000
37 out of 46 found this review helpful

The whole series of The X-files is truly amazing, but the second season will always be my favorite. There is something about this season that just makes you hooked onto the show. I mean don't get me wrong, all the other seasons are great too, but if you don't watch this season than you won't understand other things in later seasons. Also the fact that it's on DVD just makes it better viewing. My advice? You should really buy this season! And as for Gillian and David, you both are truly amazing actors! Not that they're going to read this, but just so everybody out there knows!


Undoubtedly The Greatest Season Of The X-Files!   January 12, 2003
Mr. Bartolozzi (London, England)
27 out of 31 found this review helpful

The final episode in Season One of The X-Files, "The Erlenmeyer Flask" proved that this show could go from excellent to flat out stunning. In this episode, Deep Throat was killed and The X-Files was closed down. It truly was a superb season finale and helped the show continue for a second season, which was a million times better. Season Two gained The X-Files popular critical and commercial acclaim, in which the show won awards at the Golden Globes, Digital Hollywood Awards, Saturn Awards and the Environmental Media Awards. David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson as FBI Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully respectively were born to play these roles and this aspect is what makes the show so excellent.

Season Two picks up where Season One left off with the episode "Little Green Men." This is where the mythology arc of the show really begins to take off. Mulder races to make contact with a downed UFO before a secret government team can cover it up. "Duane Barry," the Emmy-nominated episode, is another in the mythology arc in which a gunman who claims to have been the subject to alien experimentation holds Mulder and a handful of others hostage. "Ascension" is kind of the conclusion of the previous episode (Duane Barry), in which the gunman takes Scully hostage and takes her up onto a mountain top and has her abducted by unseen forces so that they will leave him alone. Scully fights for her life in the episode "One Breath" after been deposited back onto Earth.

The Season Two two-parter in the form of "Colony" and "End Game" is undoubtedly some of the most gripping, enthralling and absorbing episodes in X-Files history. Mulder makes a stunning discovery regarding his missing sister, who he believes was abducted when she was only a young girl. Scully's life is also in danger when an alien bounty hunter tracks her down. These aliens have the ability to take the identical form of anyone they want to. The scene where the alien appears to be Mulder and goes to Scully's apartment, only for the real Mulder to ring Scully's mobile is one of the most symbolic scenes in the history of the show. Scully is taken hostage by these bounty hunters and Mulder must rescue her, but discovers a shocking alien plan to colonise the Earth. In the final mythology episode of Season Two - "Anasazi" - things get really ugly for the agents when Mulder's father is killed by Alex Krycek, Mulder's enemy who works side by side with the Cigarette-Smoking Man. Mulder and Scully also uncover a chilling link between a UFO cover-up and secret government experiments in a huge box buried underground in New Mexico. There are bodies everywhere...bodies of aliens. One cannot describe the suspense a fan experiences between the end of this episode and the Season 3 opener which concludes this Season Two finale. Absolutely amazing.

The stand-alone episodes of this season include "The Host," "Blood," "Sleepless," "3," "Firewalker," "Red Museum," "Excelsius Dei," "Aubrey," "Fresh Bones," "Soft Light" and "Our Town." One of the best stand-alone episodes is "Irresistible." The agents track down a death fetishist whose horrifying obsession involves removing hair and fingernails of dead women. The way the man acts all kind and friendly makes it all the more freaky, especially when Scully (who is having trouble dealing with the case) is taken hostage by the man. In "Die Hand Die Verletzt," the agents persue a group of school teachers who worship the devil led by a Satan-worshipping and demonic substitute teacher. Scenes such as the one with the snake in the basement is one of the most famous scenes in the show's history and you'll feel like crying when the teenage girl tells the agents about her horrifying experiences with these teachers - two of whom are her parents.

"Fearful Symmetry" involves rare zoo animals being abducted and impregnated in a case which Mulder believes may be linked to alien conversation. "Dod Kalm" sees the agents stranded on a 'ghost ship' which is in an area of the sea which accelerates the ageing process of the victims on board at an alarming rate. Mulder and Scully must find a way to survive of the stranded ship through means of fresh water. Gillian Anderson is superb in this episode and deserved to win an Emmy. "Humbug" was the first humorous episode of the show and was a huge success, further proving that this is a unique show that can scare and absorb you, while making you laugh and cry. In "The Calusari," the agents investigate a young boy possessed by evil while being exposed to the ancient ritual of exorcism. It's episodes that include evil and Satanic subjects that really, really scare me. I couldn't sleep after watching this episode! And the agents go behind closed doors to stop a grotesquely disfiguring virus that is killing off prison inmates at an epidemic rate in the episode "F. Emasculata."

OVERALL GRADE: 10/10

Season Two of The X-Files is definitely a highlight of the entire show. Every episode is absolutely excellent, but all touch you and affect you in different ways. There are not many shows that can do this, but The X-Files pulls it off to maximum effect. Fairly confident that The X-Files was here to stay because of the huge success of Season One, Chris Carter put all his effort into Season Two of the show. After the show just went on to become a global phenomenon, Carter gained more ideas for Season Three. One thinks things can't get any better after Season Two, but they can. And they do.


The X-Files Season 2 The excitement continues.....   November 13, 2002
K. Wyatt (St. Louis, MO United States)
24 out of 25 found this review helpful

How does one begin to describe the perfection that is this second season of "The X-Files?" Speaking from the perspective of having watched these shows as they aired, anxiety and anticipation doesn't begin to describe the four month wait between seasons one and two. In season one's finale "The Erlenmeyer Flask," we see a mere glimpse of how this television series can go from greatness and kick it up even higher to absolutely stunning. The X-Files are closed and we also lose "Deep Throat" in this episode, played by Jerry Harden who is an excellent actor.

Season two picks up with "Little Green Men" and the introduction to "X," "Deep Throat's" protege and his replacement and Special Agent Fox Mulder's inside source. We also get to start seeing the "Mythology" of the series start to take some real form. To hide the fact that the ever beautiful Gillian Anderson is pregnant, the producers come up with some wonderful filming techniques. Then to top it off they come up with the plot line for "Duane Berry."

Every episode of this season qualifies as amazing, enthralling, stunning and any number of ways to describe that which is great. Some notables: "The Host," because it's just creepy and kind of like an accident, you don't want to look at it but you have to. "Sleepless" because it has Tony Todd who, when he chooses the right parts, is such a wonderful actor. "Duane Berry," "Ascension," "3," and "One Breath" for the masterful way the writers and producers skillfully scripted out Gillian Anderson's pregnancy in Dana Scully's abduction. Not to mention the wonderful job that Steve Railsback did in the role of Duane Berry. "Firewalker" because of its simplicity and the scientific curiosity it created. "Aubrey" because of its ability to surprise and scare you. "Die Hand Die Verletzt" because it makes you wonder what your neighbors are up to. "Colony" and "Endgame" for their X-Files mythology aspect, plus the scenes with the submarine were stunning. "Humbug" was their first attempt at humor and they carried it off with perfection. "The Calusari," shades of "The Exorcist." "Soft Light" in which Tony Shaloub gives an excellent performance playing a scientist that found a little more than he was looking for. "Our Town" just gives you the idea you don't want to stop in the wrong town. "Anasazi," what a wonderful season ending cliffhanger with the mythology in full stride. The only bad thing about "Anasazi" is that it was prelude to a four month wait to find out what happen next. "Colony" is also David Duchovny's debut as a writer for the show.

The seventh disk also contains some wonderful and enlightening special features. The only true minor complaint that I can think to register about this DVD set is the case in which it comes. The outside cover has interior flaps that seem to incessantly get caught on the case that holds the disks. Thanks for sticking it out and reading through this.

Episode List:

Little Green Men
The Host
Blood
Sleepless
Duane Berry
Ascension
3
One Breath
Firewalker
Red Museum
Excelsis Dei
Aubrey
Irresistible
Die Hand Die Verletzt
Fresh Bones
Colony
End Game
Fearful Symmetry
D0D Kalm
Humbug
The Calusari
F. Emasculata
Soft Light
Our Town
Anasazi