“On Halloween, Mulder and Scully investigate the death of a corporate executive who may have been murdered by a thinking computer.“

Oh Jesus Christ. This episode is going to suck elephant ass, isn’t it? “Hey Scully, computer AI has been working toward sentience for decades and it’s only a matter of time before one of them pulls a knife on you and slashes you to tiny little ribbons.” — “Hey Mulder, why don’t you go fuck yourself, okay?”

I’d rather these two get high and listen to Ghost in the Machine by the Police.

EURISKO WORLD HEADQUARTERS, CRYSTAL CITY, VIRGINIA! Some disheveled, insufferable nerd named Brad who is wearing baggy clothes and John Lennon glasses is yelling at a the CEO of the software company that Brad kickstarted years ago back before computers were but a twinkle in anyone’s eye! CEO, Benjamin Drake, wants to downsize, and Brad is like “YOU’RE KILLING MY COMPANY BLAAAARRG!!”

Don’t fuck with my shit, man! I own this town! I own this town and I own this $4 T-shirt!

Little does this handsome CEO with the silver streaks at his temples know, the computer surveillance system is watching his every move in his office. The computer tricks him into entering his executive bathroom by flooding the place and ringing phones and locking doors and electrocuting him when he tries to stick his key in the keyhole. After the guy is dead, a booming voice comes from the really outdated computer: “FILE DELETED!”

Spooky! Sounds like one of the X-Files I’ve been hearing so much about lately! Mulder is going to be all over this one like his cum on an alien egg.

At the FBI headquarters, a real slimey-looking piece of shit agent is looking for Mulder. He’s Mulder’s old partner, Jerry, and Scully looks jealous. Jerry’s got a real humdinger of a case here: a computer did murder. Mulder doesn’t want to take it, but Jerry begs him. Jerry looks like he’s wearing a retainer.

So, since they have nothing better to do than chase UFOs and eat protoplasm burgers, Mulder and Scully head to Eurisko to scope things out. “How do you like that? A politically correct elevator,” Mulder smirks when the computer talks to them, a feature for the visually impaired. The computer must have heard this cute little quip, because the elevator suddenly jolts and sends them up more flights than they intended. Oh well, it’s probably nothing!

Have you ever been trapped in an elevator with a man for 40 hours, Scully?

Investigation of the lock that killed the CEO shows that the key completed the circuit on a faulty electrical component. “Faulty”, huh? OR, someone tampered with it. Much like Mulder tampers with so many alien eggs.

At the FBI House of Pancakes, the gruesome twosome join Jerry in briefing their dead CEO case to the higher-ups. Electrocution homicide is rare, like a good steak, which leads Jerry to believe that their perp is playing a game. Like Operation, except with less electricity! See, that’s called a funny joke I did. Mulder is mad, and we’ll see why in the next scene. Watch, I know it. He’s going to do some of that barely-angry confrontin’.

Jerry stole some notes about the case from Mulder’s desk. He claims he just filled in the blanks, what’s the big deal? Hehehe. Then he walks away.

Don’t give me that sexy look, you sexy Fox!

Time to head back to Crystal City again, because there was exactly one name on the suspect list: Brad Wilczek, the computer nerd who owns only one shirt.

This unwashed loser talks himself up while rebuking the visions and decisions of the stuffed shirts and suit-and-tie motherfuckers in his company. They only care about numbers and spreadsheets and counting their tiny, little beans. Brad is a VISIONARY! He followed the Grateful Dead around, you know.

“Let me show you something — Smart Home.” Brad turns on a TV screen with three different colors on it. It’s a high-tech surveillance system, years ahead of Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo and NeoGeo. Brad designs this shit, son, and he also designed the system at Eurisko… … … and if you even THINK that he committed murder, well, he’s going to eat his shirt! Don’t test him.

That evening, Scully drafts up her report. “Is Brad Wilczek a genius? I don’t know. But I do know this for certain: He has a predilection for elaborate gameplaying. He has an intimate knowledge of the Eurisko building. And he has a demonstrable motive for killing Benjamin Drake.” So if he’s so fucking smart, how come he’s going to be found guilty? Sap.

Elsewhere, Eurisko’s computer has hacked into Scully’s and pulled up her report draft. This woman’s gonna get got, I can just feel it.

Oh shit, Scully. Not the Blue Screen of Data Intercept!

Mulder and Scully are having a little sleepover in Mulder’s office, going over tapes, when Jerry knocks on the door and does a not-really-an-apology. BUT HEY, Jerry’s struggling man. He’s got assignments mopping floors and scooping up gruel for orphans now. He needs to earn his carrot again! That’s a phrase I didn’t just make up, right?

They kiss and make up, sort of, and Mulder pulls Jerry in to check out what they’ve been looking into. They borrowed some cool software from Georgetown to analyze speech patterns. The voice system in the Eurisko computer matches Brad Wilczek’s voice! Cool, huh? It only cost the FBI $40,000,000 worth of taxpayer money to confirm this, but it was dang worth it. I guess this means that Brad is guilty (?). Jerry’s gonna go get him! Please, Mulder, he needs a win, man! Let him have a win! And Mulder’s a nice guy. Too nice. It’s one of his many weaknesses, just above alien eggs.

From home, Brad tries to hack into Eurisko’s computer with no luck. Angry and panicked, he runs to the Eurisko building to sit at the computer console. Jerry, meanwhile, enters the building and makes himself at home. Brad, the super brain genius, is having a hard time outsmarting the computer and is realizing that its AI has advanced to the point of actual conversation. Like, damn.

Jerry enters the elevator, but sensing the threat, the computer interrupts Jerry’s elevator ride and sends him plummeting down the shaft from the 30th floor. Brad tries to stop it before it’s too late, but all he can do is watch it happen. In a nice moment of “whoops, we fucked up” during production and directing, Jerry is seen through the surveillance camera pinned to the floor of the elevator when he should, instead, be pinned to the ceiling if the elevator is falling. Color me livid.

Mulder watches the footage of Jerry’s descent. Mulder also watches the concurrent footage of Brad panicking and looking helpless. Odd. He tells Scully that Brad probably didn’t do it, and now Scully begins her exasperation for the episode. She tells him to go home and jerk off and take a much-needed rest. Your “best” buddy just died in an elevator. Give yourself a little tender me-time, buckaroo.

This is the third friend Fox Mulder lost in an elevator accident. First was Jimmy Crandall, who pressed all the buttons on the Sears tower elevator and starved to death. Second was Matt “Elevator Daredevil” Jones, who crashed his motorcycle into the elevator’s closed doors.

NO! NO TENDER ME-TIME YET! Mulder travels to Brad’s residence where other higher-level agents tell him he’s out of his jurisdiction. Directionless, Mulder turns to the Deepest of Throats for some of that well-informed guidance! Brad Wilczek is under investigation by some REALLY GOOD agents of the FBI because of his incredible advancements in AI technology. The Department of Defense wants it all for themselves.

Mulder visits Brad in jail, who keeps insisting he’s guilty. Mulder argues that he’s innocent. Brad tells Mulder he’s full of beans.

“After the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Robert Oppenheimer spent the rest of his life regretting he’d ever glimpsed at an atom,” Brad swallows.
“Oppenheimer may have regretted his actions, but he never denied responsibility for them,” Mulder rebuts.

Brad knows that, in the hands of the government, some scientific discoveries and advancements are too dangerous. He doesn’t want to make the same mistake Oppenheimer did. Mulder still insists that he’s innocent. It’s a killing machine now! Sentient! Conscious! It’s its own entity now, and with that comes accountability! So let’s destroy that cocksucker.

Scully says blaming the machine is a cop-out. Mulder is like “no”. Scully says there’s no way that this AI is advanced beyond DECADES and DECADES of current technology. Mulder is like “‘fraid so”. And then Mulder leaves again to go talk to Brad and destroy that cocksucker.

They make computers now that can fondle your prostate, Scully. I’ve seen them. They’re incredible.

Scully gets a call at 1:30am that’s just static-y white noise. She checks her computer, which is currently being visibly accessed by someone. She asks for a trace on the call. Once she learns it’s coming from Eurisko, she agrees to help Mulder and Brad destroy that cocksucker.

The two sharply-dressed Federal B of I agents try to enter the building’s parking garage, but the gate comes down and smashes the car. Mulder is casual about this computer having just tried to kill both of them and he says “let’s take the stairs!” So they do. And then the electricity goes out. So it’s flashlight time, and they stumble and bumble their way to the relevant floor. With some quick thinking, Mulder dons a rubber glove and sticks a screwdriver in to the keyhole, which sends sparks flying EVERYWHERE. I’m talking sparks EVERY WHICH WAY, man. He could’ve been killed! lol

They continue maneuvering around the stairwell looking for another way in: the vents. OK, I’m done commenting on this part because it takes them about two hours to move through. Let’s cut to the chase: Mulder makes it out, but Scully gets stuck. The computer starts blowing air through the vents at about 120 miles per hour. She bounces around like a pinball and almost gets chopped up by some fan blades. We’ll get back to her in a minute, I’m sure she’s fine.

Mulder is in the control room now trying to use his TI-82 graphing calculator knowledge to override the computer. It works. He works on installing a virus, but the building’s current systems engineer pulls a gun on him. He’s Claude Peterson, a mole for the Department of Defense, and he’s not going to let Mulder get away with… oh, Scully made it out. Who’s pointing the gun at who now, eh?

It wouldn’t be an episode of X-Files without Dana “Annie Oakley” Scully pulling out a gun!

“This operation is more sensitive than you can possibly imagine,” the mole says, telling Scully that she’s making a huge mistake and that she and Mulder will hang for this shit. Mulder installs the virus. The computer goes haywire. Mulder inseminates some alien eggs. The computer eventually shuts down. It says bye to Brad.

A cozy bench chat between Mulder and Deep Throat ensues. The government has detained Brad Wilczek. The computer has been completely killed and the defense department is unable to salvage any trace of the AI. Killed. Dead. Immoral if you think about it, huh?

The defense department has six hours to find a trace of AI before the computer goes to the metal shredder. The AI blips on… unbeknownst to the systems engineer…

Next Time on the X-Files

Season 1, Episode 8 — “Ice”
Scully is having a party and instructs Mulder to go buy bags of ice at the convenience store. Mulder gets sidetracked and plays Space Invaders at the arcade for eight hours.