The X-Files: Shapes (1.19)

It's an episode set on a Native American land reserve, so there's the predictable over-acting, the lazy stereotypes, the mystical old man with lots of monologues, and the distrust of the feds. For about two minutes, there are also some shenanigans with a werewolf, but it's all so misconceived that it barely raises one scare.

Scully is ridiculously irritating here, getting angry out of nowhere as she berates Mulder for believing that there's a possible werewolf on the loose, while her declaration that she was attacked by a mountain lion while standing in front of a mortally wounded nude man just mistaken for a grizzly wolf-dude made her look completely insane. We get that she's skeptical about all things supernatural, but yeesh!

The episode also does that annoying thing of hanging the mystery on something to do with the X-Files themselves, as if the writers felt they needed to prop up a weak script with some thrown-in hoodoo about "the first X-File". It's all really, really lazy.

David Nutter does direct some cool moments, the transformation was pretty great (despite being completely cribbed from An American Werewolf in London), while I liked the shot of Mulder shooting the model of the bear. But those two brief moments can't save the episode, which is boring, badly written and frustrating. Rating D

Credits
Guest stars Ty Miller (Lyle Parker); Michael Horse (Sheriff Charles Tscani); Donnelly Rhodes (Jim Parker); Jimmy Herman (Ish); Renae Morriseau (Gwen Goodensnake)
Writer Marilyn Osborn Director David Nutter