SEASON 1

SEASON 2

SEASON 3

SEASON 4

SEASON 5

FIGHT THE FUTURE

SEASON 6

SEASON 7

SEASON 8

SEASON 9

By ejluther

We all know Mulder and Scully chased answers to hard questions for years – but what about the age-old query, "Where's the beef?" Why, it's in this episode, RED MUSEUM! Along with some actual continuity and foreshadowing! Let's get started, shall we? A bit of back-story, first – Mulder's mysterious and oh-so-vague informant, Chris Carter – um, I mean "Deep Throat", was seemingly killed in front of Scully in the season one finale when he croaked his final words, "Trust – gasp – no one." But do they listen? Of course not. In fact, there's lots of duplicitous women from the past, half-insane UFO abductees and creepy disfigured Mulder-imposters waiting in the wings for our favorite FBI special agents to blindly trust in the future. But, for now, let's go to the museum…the Red Museum.

Fade in – a large sign announces "J.A.S.D. BEEF" as we enter a beef processing plant. Cattle meander through the maze of fences that inevitably lead to their deaths as the camera pans across their hairy little faces. An abrupt cut shows us the end result – a raw slab of cow-torso. The meat is thrown upon a cutting table to be sliced in half, while other chunks of meat are thrown about and soon the blood-splattered workers are breaking for the day. A guy creepily with what kind of looks like a chain-link purse thrown jauntily over his shoulder winks toward Beth as he makes his exit and, now, we're following her. If you've ever seen an XF pre-episode teaser before you know something creepy is about to happen – but will it happen to Beth or because of her? She sighs, "See you tomorrow", and we cut to the exterior of a house wherein a standard teenage boy and his little brother are watching some sort of police bust on the tube. The little one is sitting way too close to the screen so I start to suspect that the XF in question will be about "The Boy Who Sat Too Close To The TV And Went Blind!" and the havoc he wreaks about the world! But, no - it's only Season Two so we won't hear the scraping of the barrel for years now. Beth walks in (now decked out in high-waisted mom-jeans and a denim shirt) and greets her boys, both of whom seem nice and normal. After some banter about pizza for dinner (Beth doesn't want pepperoni – get it? She's sick of meat.), she walks into the bathroom and now I know this has to be it – bathrooms are typically dens of doom on this show and so I'm ready for a man-sized snake to slither from the electrical socket and suck her brain out and replace it with spaghetti or something. Beth starts to unbutton her shirt and show us her bra when we switch to the POV of someone else – is it Snakeman?!? No, just some pervy guy peering at Beth's chest while breathing heavily – very Psycho. From the shot it appears he's behind the mirror so perhaps he's itsy-bitsy and living in the medicine chest - hey, it's possible. Anyway, he's wearing glasses so we can identify him later and Beth continues to strip while staring at herself in the mirror, the way we all do. Mirror-perv suddenly steps away and the phone rings. The older teenaged boy answers it and quickly hangs up after agreeing to something – he plays "got your nose" with his brother and calls him "butt-crumb" while saying he'll be back in five minutes. Yes, he calls him a "butt-crumb". Cut to worried mom on the phone saying he's now been gone for four hours and she doesn't know who called him. Didn't they have *69 back then? Say, did you ever wonder who picked those particular two digits for the call-back function? Someone named "Beavis" or "Butthead" is my guess. Anyway, worried mom strokes the head of her younger son as we fade to an outdoor scene. Soon, missing nose-snatcher wearing only white briefs that are nasty and dirty comes into frame, desperately grasping a tree before lumbering off. A pair of deputies driving by watch as the boy stumbles into the road in front of them. As they approach we can see scratches and bruises on the boy's body and they recognize him as Gary Kane, calling him by name. Gary looks as though he's tripping on some bad acid as the deputy tries to calm him down. Gary remains like a frightened animal as he stumbles away, turning around to reveal his bare back upon which someone (something?) has written, "He is one". We fade to black and are left to ponder, "One what? One victim? One bad mother- (shut your mouth!)?" I'm sure we'll find out soon.