The X-Files (TV Series) Dæmonicus (2001) User Reviews

Great episode with one or two flaws.

[Sleepin_Dragon · 8/10 · 1 October 2022]

Doggett and Reyes investigate Professor Josef Kobold, an inmate at a mental institution, whom is linked to several ritualistic deaths.

I really did enjoy this episode, it is a good old fashioned monster of the week episode, a battle of good an evil, with the regulars sticking to their guns, unwavering and resolute.

Great visuals, dark and twisted, with some really chilling theories, it does have the horror vibe, and that's the side of The X Files that I have always enjoyed.

We've generally had episodes where Doggett has rightly been the focus, with storylines that felt specific for his character, and those have been great, this time, it's very much a Reyes story, it fits her background and her expertise, Gish has absolutely nailed it, she's great.

The frustrations, there are a few of them, Agent Doggett, I feel there are quite a few inconsistencies to his character here, in one episode he's coming round to believing, in the next he's steadfast against believing, he's softer, then he's harsh again. Scully.....her presence feels intrusive somehow, she's like a guest that's wandered into the wrong wedding, but is too polite not to leave.

James Remar was terrific as Kobold, analmost Hannibal Lecter type of character, he gave me the creeps.

Overall, this was a cracking episode, 8/10.

"So what are we talking now, The Ghostbusters?"

[classicsoncall · 8/10 · 24 August 2017]

It occurred in prior episodes but in this one it was pretty blatant. Have you noticed that Agents Doggett and Reyes routinely acknowledge each other using their first names, 'John' and 'Monica'? As opposed to Scully and Mulder who always called each other, well, Scully and Mulder. And they (Scully and Mulder) had seven seasons in which to grow their familiarity with each other so that using first names wouldn't have been considered less than professional. I just find it interesting that the writers would put the characters across this way.

So I had a little trouble processing what was going on with mental patient Josef Kobold (James Remar) relative to the murders being committed. You really have to take it on faith that he was somehow manipulating escaped patient Dr. Richman to kill the Mountjoys, guard Paul Gerlach (James Rekart), and Dr. Monique Sampson (Andi Chapman). But how did Kobold get Richman to commit suicide after taking Scully hostage near the finale? That Kobold's evil plan all along was to escape the mental hospital is a given once we see and hear Doggett's explanation of 'Daemonicus', but there were so many factors that could have gone wrong with his plan that it seemed less than credible.

Aside from the sheer volume of Kobold's vomiting jag, and the garter snakes sewn into Mrs. Mountjoy's bullet wounds, the most demonic thing that occurred here was Kobold's insight into Doggett's fear of accepting evil while forcing him to consider culpability in the death of his own son years earlier. - "Perhaps you feel that chasing ghosts will answer the questions which damn you". I thought that was a pretty powerful scene, outweighing the consolation Doggett might have felt over solving the murders, but failing to keep Kobold a prisoner.

By the way - anyone buying the idea that Doggett took the time to figure out 'Daemonicus' was worth fifty extra Scrabble points?

Anyone for Scrabble?

[Muldernscully · 9/10 · 5 November 2007]

I don't recall Dæmonicus every being a favorite episode of mine. But I really liked it this time around.

Dæmonicus was written and directed by Frank Spotnitz. I think he does an excellent job of writing a great mystery that isn't revealed until the very end. I also liked the way he directed it, especially with the scene transitions. The sped up cloud scenes are very interesting and different looking. The demonic faces fading into Josef Kobold's face is nothing new but I really liked the chessboard scene transition, hinting that the agents were involved in a chess match.

Dæmonicus has hints of 'Pusher' and 'Beyond the Sea' in it. Pusher, for Kobold controlling other people with his mind, and Beyond the Sea for an inmate trying to help the agents catch an at-large criminal. Though they're not close enough to say he ripped off his idea from those two episodes. It just has those small elements in it.

It was odd to see Reyes getting advice from Scully to go with her instincts. It seems Reyes does that anyway. I like that Doggett was right all along about Kobold manipulating them all, but Reyes and Scully refused to believe him. It's a small consolation to him in the end when he is proved right, because the villain gets away.

The one qualm I have with this episode is at the end when the agents are explaining the case with the chalkboard and the word 'Dæmonicus'. Apparently, Kobold used the word to choose his victims because parts of their names were in that word. But that only explains four of the six victims. I think that Spotnitz wanted to tie in the whole episode into that word to make it look really cool, but it doesn't quite work, since it doesn't account for all the victims' names.

Other than that, I was intrigued with Dæmonicus from beginning to end. The vomit scene is probably the grossest scene I've seen in the X-Files. Kudos to Frank Spotnitz for this well-conceived episode.

Do you believe in the power of the devil?

[Sanpaco13 · 10/10 · 7 February 2008]

Dæmonicus is one of the few season 9 episodes that I like. I like it a lot actually. Rarely am I faced with an episode in which I can tolerate Reyes' random ramblings and crazy ideas. It is interesting in this episode that Scully seems to join sides with Reyes even if its just because they are both worried about Doggett. Two things make this episode great for me; first is the creepiness factor, and second is Agent Doggett.

I really enjoy the teaser. It is probably one of the scariest teasers I can think of from the entire series. Just to mention a few of the other creepy elements/scenes: the great masks that the possessed men wear, the way the fan stops moving when Reyes touches the wobbling scrabble piece but then starts right back up again when she is snapped out of it, the way the clouds move way too fast while we hear some kind of backwards evil chanting, the forest in general and when they find the guy hanging upside down out there, and finally the puking scene. I love the puking scene. I can't help but be both terrified and amused at the way this scene goes down. First its totally random when the doctor starts puking on Doggett but then he continues and grabs his head and collapses in it as he continues to let forth a continuous stream of green psychic plasma puke.

Leading me to Doggett. I enjoy Doggett's struggle in this episode. He is asked the question, "do you believe in the power of the devil?" Doggett responds by saying that in effect he doesn't actually believe in the devil at all and that it is all a story made up to scare people; however, as we continue to watch Doggett sees more and more evidence of evil. He is coming to the point where he can't really deny the presence of evil and because of this he becomes extremely defensive and zealous about making sure that he disbelieve anything anyone suggests about the matter. Scully and Reyes even confront him on it. At the end it appears that Doggett has found a solution that disproves any presence of evil throughout the case but as Reyes says in response to Scully's question about what one thing Doggett was afraid to explain is not that Reyes felt the presence of evil but that he did.

The ending of the episode is perhaps the only thing that doesn't sit well. The explanation that Doggett comes up with in the word Dæmonicus may make sense to Reyes but when did anything that made sense to Reyes ever make sense to anyone else? I thought it was an extremely far fetched explanation and had too many holes. Then again this may just be a way of saying that Doggett was so afraid to explain the presence of evil that he was willing to accept any other explanation at all no matter how far fetched as long as it didn't involve the devil. The true answer to "do you believe in the power of the devil?" should be only in as much power as we give him. I give the episode a 10 out of 10.

So-so episode with a terrible finish

[dgraydgrey · 5/10 · 14 January 2014]

I'm actually a fan of the ninth season of this show, but this episode was a mediocre outing. It reminded me of one of the less successful episodes of "Millennium", with Robert Patrick standing in for Lance Henriksen, and it even contains a reference to that show's ouroboros icon. And hey, I'm as down as anyone for a possible reuse of a leftover "Millennium" script, but not an unfinished one.

Since I'm free to spoil things in this review, I'll point out that the main paranormal or super-normal aspect of the episode - Kobold's ability to get people to do exactly what he wants, to extreme lengths - isn't only left unexplained; in fact, the episode never even begins to explain before it's suddenly over. Even worse, it's a bored rehash of a concept used in one of the show's best and best-remembered episodes, "Pusher" (which already got its own so-so sequel episode earlier in the series). "Pusher" was ultimately about its subject's fears rather than his abilities, and the semi-explanation for those abilities reflected that; in "Dæmonicus", the script's demands that we consider a deeper cause for the episode's events ring hollow, because the narrative plays too loose to explain what's happened and moves too fast to linger on the characters who drive it.

We're given absolutely nothing to go on in "Dæmonicus". Evidence appears and disappears from scene to scene without ever being addressed; in the most glaring example, a mysterious liquid sample goes to a lab for testing and is promptly forgotten, even though the episode continues to suggest that the results might be very relevant to the audience (and to the heroes) all the way to the end credits. That is a cardinal sin for a show like this one. "The X-Files" routinely depends on enlisting the viewer's aid in resolving stories that often remain mysterious from the point of view of the show's heroes. When the creators give us nothing to work with at all, they're cheating. The ending to "Dæmonicus" isn't David-Lynch-ian ambiguity; it's Ed-Wood-esque floundering, and it doesn't even bother to explain the identity of all of the victims, which is all it really tries to do in the first place.

If we accept the supernatural explanation, that Kobold was somehow in touch with elemental, Satanic evil and that's how he controlled his victims, then the supposed intricacy of his plan - the entire heft of the episode's events - isn't impressive at all. It means Kobold just put the whammy on his victims and had them do back-flips for no reason when his goals, even his goals to hurt and manipulate, could have been met much more simply, albeit not in a way that would fill out the length of the episode. That makes "Dæmonicus" just a "Pusher" rip-off, only without that episode's character-driven depths and with an unnecessarily convoluted evil plan.

If we accept the creepy-crawly mundane explanation, that Kobold's just that great of a manipulator, then the show doesn't add up, because off- camera, Kobold drives people to do absolutely ludicrous things, even for mental patients (or their totally sane guards), things that benefit only Kobold and that far outclass the game he plays with the show's main characters or the couple in the cold open. But we're never once given a scene suggesting how he carries out those manipulations, since nothing in Kobold's "manipulative" scenes with Doggett lead us to believe that Kobold would be able to talk somebody into shooting a stranger, shooting themselves or putting on Kobold's clothes to take a bullet for him while he flees a crime scene. All we ever get goes is an explanation (very early in the episode) that Kobold was committed to the asylum in the first place after a successful past attempt at manipulating others to kill for him, which raises questions rather than answering them.

"Dæmonicus" is disappointing, because the episode, while far from original, moves along at a very rapid pace, if less like an X-file and more like a contemporary procedural from the 2010s. The dialogue between Reyes and Scully gives some decent insight into the balances and imbalances of the new, Mulder-less trinity of the show while never losing sight of the action. Doggett is given the bulk of said action, and as a hard-charging cop matching wits with a killer, the character's perfect for it. Given the not-great script, the cast acquits itself well, including the guest star (sharp-eyed viewers will enjoy James Remar, aka Dexter's dead dad, in this 2001 role as a serial killer). An ending that filled even some of the plot's holes would have made the episode a measured success. As it stands, it's fun enough to watch "Dæmonicus" while binging on Season Nine, but the ending will make you frown.