X-philes, We Need A Hug Today (‘Home Again’ Recap)

Feb 9, 2016
7 min read

The fourth episode of Season 10 of The X-files, Home Again, was a rough one, guys, I’m not going to lie. And I don’t mean rough, as in bad, I mean rough as totally and completely emotionally draining. The episode itself was really great, and it had something we’ve never really gotten to see much of before between Mulder and Scully—real life, and death. And how sometimes that can be more devastating and leave you with more questions, than the paranormal ever will.

But first, the case. After the mysterious deaths of a man trying to “clean up” the streets of Philadelphia (a.k.a. relocate the homeless in a not-so-brotherly love way), Mulder and Scully are called in to investigate. Why? Because a man basically had his arms ripped out of their sockets by a Band-Aid-nosed Tulpa, that’s why. Also his head is in the trash. (The trash. Remember this, it’s important.)

As she’s examining the remains, Scully gets a call from William… Scully Jr., a.k.a. her brother Bill, who is calling from Germany to tell her that he’s just gotten a call that their mother has had a heart attack. Stunned, Scully stands up and Mulder immediately realizes something is very wrong.

“Scully?”

“That was uh, that was my brother he just—the EMTs found his phone number,” she says, in shock. “Well, my mom’s just had a heart attack. She’s in ICU in DC.”

Forgetting the dead body at their feet, Mulder takes Scully’s arm. “Go,” he tells her gently. “Go.”

“Yeah,” Scully answers distractedly.

Mulder reaches towards her like he very much wants to touch her, but Scully is already turning for the door. He watches her leave with a heavy heart.

And thus begins our heartbreak. We go back and forth between Mulder trying to solve this case before the “Trash Man”, as people call it, kills again, and Scully waiting in the hospital, desperately hoping her mother will wake up. She gets another shock when she finds that Maggie asked not for her or Bill, or even her grandchildren, but for Charlie, the elusive Scully brother we have yet to see after 23 years. Turns out Charlie isn’t the great guy we all thought he was, and for reasons unknown has been estranged from their mother for at least three years. *insert fandom shock here*

Scully gets dealt a triple blow when she finds out that, despite their long conversation on the subject after Scully’s coma in “One Breath”, her mother has decided to change her will. She no longer wants them to do everything humanly possible to keep her alive.

Bill is trying to get there as fast as he can and nobody can find Charlie, but you know who is there as another family tragedy unfolds? Mulder. There’s a trash man monster out there killing people, but Mulder is there for Scully. Because this is more important. Because no matter what, he loves her and will always be there for her. You can see it in Scully's face, his "I'm here" means more to her, more to all of us that he will ever know.

As they both sit vigil next to the hospital bed, Scully looks at Mulder and asks, “Back in the day, did we ever come across the ability to just wish someone back to life?”

“I invented it,” he answers. “When you were in the hospital. Like this.”

They share a long look full of history, love, and respect. A hint of a smile graces Scully's lips as she studies him a second and answers, “You’re a dark wizard, Mulder.”

He shrugs with a self-deprecating laugh. “What else is new?”

She smiles sadly. Here they are again, Mulder and Scully, facing life and all its tragedy together as one. Scully was there for Mulder when his mother died and when his father was shot. He was there for her when Krycek shot Melissa, and now he is there to hold his partner when they finally decide remove Maggie’s tubes.

Scully is not alone to watch her mother’s last breaths. It’s Mulder who is there by Scully’s side when Charlie finally calls to talk to his mother for the last time, and ultimately, it is Mulder who Maggie Scully directs her last words to upon waking up. “My son…” she says, taking Mulder’s hand. “Is named William too.”

Please don’t ask me to go into great detail about the next few scenes, because, well, I’m crying already. Let’s just say Scully is not ready to watch them take her mom away and it is Mulder who holds her in his arms as they do. There are tears. Lots and lots of tears, and clutching onto things we don’t understand and Mulder’s shirt and WHY? WHY GLEN MORGAN MUST YOU BREAK OUR HEARTS?! Maggie Scully was the X-files mom to us all—warm, welcoming, always there to comfort, protect, or nudge us in the right direction even if we didn’t want to hear it. She was there for Mulder when Scully disappeared and he was there for them both when Scully came back. When Scully is drugged and convinced that Mulder is out to get her during ‘Wetwired’, Mulder knows he will find her at her mother’s, and it is Maggie who convinces Scully to put the gun down. She’s not going to let anyone hurt her daughter. There were only four people in the world who could call Mulder ”Fox” all the time and Margaret Scully was one of them. And now she’s gone.

As men come to take Maggie Scully away (she was an organ donor so it must be quick), Mulder holds a heartbroken Scully in his arms.

“Her last words were about our child,” Scully cries, clinging to her partner and the mysterious quarter necklace her mother had been wearing. “Her grandchild that we gave away. Why did she say that? Why did she have to say that?”

Mulder closes his eyes, holding Scully tight. He doesn’t know either, but Scully’s not the only one deeply affected by the words.

As Scully watches her mom being taken away for the last time, she suddenly pulls back from her partner, urgently telling him, “Mulder, let’s drive to Philadelphia.”

“No—“

“I need to work.”

“No, no, no—“

“Yes right now—“

“No, Scully, I do—

“Yes, Mulder, right now—“

“—not right now—“

“I need to work. Right now!” She turns to grab her briefcase and coat before he can stop her. Mulder can do nothing but watch her walk away.

Knowing it’s what Scully needs, Mulder rejoins her on the case, which they do eventually sort of solve—yes, it’s a Tulpa. Yes, he’s killed all the people who were treating the homeless like trash because, as his maker, the artist who unwittingly created him says, “People treat people like trash.” He didn’t want anybody to get hurt, he was just trying to give all those people who are treated like trash a voice. “Through art, not violence.” He goes on to explain that, “All we do is hold a pencil. All we do is hold the clay. I think there must be spirits and souls floatin’ all around us. And if you think real hard, or you want them SO BAD, they come to you. And they become alive with a life of their own.” Realizing what’s happening, he turns the clay of the Band-Aid Nose man into a smiley face and walks off into the world, leaving one last art piece on the building overlooking the streets. Unfortunately for the last of the people trying to get rid of the homeless, he was too late to save her life.

Case closed, its subject matter, her mother, everything that’s happened over the last few days has gotten Scully thinking. Now more than ever she can’t stop worrying about William. As she sits next to Mulder on a log at the beach where they buried her father in “Beyond the Sea”, her mother’s urn at her feet, Scully breaks down and confesses her fears to her partner.

“I know now why Mom asked for Charlie, even though he was out of her life. She wanted to know before she left that he would be ok. She gave birth to him, she made him. He was her responsibility. And that’s why she said what she said to us. She wanted to make sure that we’d be responsible and know that William’s ok, even though we can’t see him.” She pauses and Mulder lets her talk.

“I know that as parents we made a difficult sacrifice to keep him safe. That it was for his own good to put him up for adoption.”

Mulder nods silently, looking down at his hands.

“But I can’t help but think of him, Fox,” Scully confesses, the use of his first name making Mulder look at her, even more heartbroken. “I can’t help it.”

“I believe that you will find all of your answers,” she tells him tearfully. “You will find the answers to the biggest mysteries and I will be there when you do. But my mysteries,” she says, now crying, “I will never have answers to. I won’t know if he think of me too, or if he’s ever been afraid and wished that I was there. Does he doubt himself because we left him? What questions does he have of me? The same that I have of this quarter.” Scully looks down at the quarter her mom was wearing when she died. Why did she have it? Who gave it to her? Scully will never know. Perhaps no one will.

Tears streaming down her face, Scully echoes Mulder’s heartfelt words to Guy Man last week, “I want to believe.” Mulder gets it, he totally understands. “I need to believe,” Scully finishes, confessing her last heartbreaking fear for her child, for herself, “that we didn’t treat him like trash.”

There are no words that will make Scully feel better and Mulder knows it. Reaching out he puts his arm around her, and for a brief moment it looks like their foreheads might touch, like they are close, so very close to getting back to where they were. Instead, Mulder pulls her towards him and Scully rests her head on his shoulder, leaning on a partner she’s leaned on for 23 years through thick and thin. They stare out into the water in silence, because times like these? There are no words. You just need someone to hug.