The X-Files (TV Series) The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati (1999) User Reviews

Made better sense with more viewings

[dwarol · 8/10 · 4 September 2006]

Like alex-ross77 this episode wasn't clear to me on first viewing. But after seeing the episode again recently it made more sense to me.

The brain disease Mulder had was caused by the alien "black ink" virus that was the ultimate alien invader of the series. Mulder became infected but was somehow able to hold out longer than anyone else had done even though he was dying. At one point the CSM commented on the irony that in advocating keeping Mulder alive all these years he (CSM) had found the one person who could be the basis for a race of humans able to withstand the virus. The scenes in the lab are of the CSM somehow transferring the immunity to himself with the hope of eventually transferring it to the others in his conspiracy.

I don't think Mulder was ever spirited away to some suburban dreamland, but instead was kidnapped directly from the hospital to the lab by the CSM. It was clear from comments made by the CSM to Agent Diana Fowley in the lab that Mulder was dreaming all this up while his brain was fighting off the infection. Ultimately it reflected Mulder's wish to have the burden of the X-Files lifted from him.

Not the best, but still very enjoyable

[Underclassman41 · 9/10 · 3 November 2011]

For me, this episode was a great showing of Mulder's sacrifices, also reminding us the sacrifices the others have made throughout the story. The hallucinations, or dreams, show Mulder that it is a joy to live a beautiful life, having all a man can ever hope for, and once again Scully has to come to be the key of Mulder's realizing that he must keep fighting, for only he can fight the future that needs to be fought to prevent the possibility of the ending of Mulder's dreamed life, the apocalypse that he could've, or should have prevented ...

I'm surprised there is no mention of the last scene in the reviews written before mine. it had a great meaning to me, especially after remembering the sentence "The child is the father to the man." - the last scene, where Mulder comes back to the boy and helps him build the spaceship, it is a great way to tell us that Mulder is back on his quest, reconnecting with the child, reconnecting with his old self, beliefs, sacrifices

The best of the trio.

[Sleepin_Dragon · 8/10 · 18 September 2022]

Mulder fights in his hospital bed for his very existence, a powerful adversary seems to hold his fragile life in his hands. Scully fights for her partner, but finds her efforts blocked.

Weird, it is such a weird episode, I've made no secret, I've struggled with this trio of episodes, but I did actually enjoy this third and final installment.

It is far from perfect, but having sat scratching my head throughout three quarters of this trilogy, I finally felt as though the pieces of the puzzle were falling into place.

I think it's fair to say that there is nothing here for a casual viewer, and even longstanding fans are going to have a bit of a job putting some of the pieces together.

I really enjoyed the imagery, and I actually loved the dream sequences. It was very complex, and arguably quite hard to follow, but very watchable, especially the scenes between Mulder and Scully.

Scully was a little frustrating here at the end, she still refuses to believe what's slapping her in the face.

I read a few reviews and summaries after watching it, and they were all as vague as one another, it made no sense, but I enjoyed it, I just hope that storyline is done and dusted.

8/10.

The Sixth Temptation of Mulder's Extinction... or something

[Sanpaco13 · 22 November 2009]

Yeah its pretty obvious that this episode was heavily influenced by Scorcesi's "The Last Temptation of Christ". I personally choose to not draw direct comparisons to the actual biblical story of Jesus though because then the writer's are literally saying that Mulder is Christ and CSM is God the Father and other stuff that I'm just not too comfortable with. I'm OK with comparing Mulder's mission to that of Christ's however. To a much smaller scale, Mulder's mission is a sort of redemption of mankind. Not exactly an infinite atonement, but still a paramount task. Mulder is shown in a dream, what might happen if he gives up his quest. He is shown an alternate life where he forgets all the sacrifices he has made and relaxes and enjoys life. Kind of similar to the episode where Byers has the dream about being married with a family and Kennedy was never killed. But in the dream, Mulder is married to Fowley and seems to age every time he blinks until everyone he has known is suddenly dead and CSM hides the destruction of the invasion from him. On the outside, Scully is trying to decipher the symbols found on the space ship and also to find Mulder. Albert Hostein makes an appearance or two by popping up like a ghost in Scully's apartment and then disappearing after saying a prayer. Ultimately, someone helps her to find all the things she is looking for and to find Mulder. We then find out that Scully and Mulder are each other's constants or capstones or some other and everyone cries tears of joy. I think... 8 out of 10.

"I'm showing you how to take the road not taken."

[classicsoncall · 8/10 · 1 August 2017]

This episode was a lot like the story in 'Field Trip' in which everything going on with Mulder (and Scully) turned out to be a hallucinatory experience. Here, Mulder dreams of an idyllic life after being infected with an alien virus via the infamous 'black ink' from prior seasons. The virus has been reactivated by exposure to a unique source of energy emanating from an artifact discovered in West Africa bearing Navajo markings and passages from the Koran. Forgive me if it appears that the mythology arc of the X-Files seems to be wearing out it's welcome. I enjoyed them earlier on, but the constant back and forth on whether the existence of UFO's and extraterrestrials is real or not tends to make the story line somewhat weary.

What Mulder goes through in his dream state supports the title of this episode - 'Amor Fati' - a Latin phrase that means 'love of fate' or 'love of one's fate'. It carries an acceptance of events or situations that occur in one's life, something that Mulder has never been content with regarding his missing sister and the endless search for the truth about aliens. That Mulder would settle into that sort of existence defies everything we've come to learn about him over the prior six seasons of the series.

And then, just like that, Mulder is back on his feet after Scully issues her challenge to "Get up and fight the fight". It didn't seem credible to me that Mulder would make that quick of a recovery after being nearly in a coma for a good length of time. The revelation of Albert Hosteen's death, and especially Agent Fowley's murder off screen added another surreal element to the episode, more of a convenient way to dispense with unneeded characters for the continuation of the series. But then again, if Deep Throat could make it back for this story, who says they'll never show up again.

Utterly Amazing!

[worship_HIM97 · 9/10 · 27 July 2009]

This episode blew me away. The ONLY reason why I give it a 9 and not a 10 is because (even though I can't think of the name of the film) a great deal of Mulder's imaginings were borrowed from a film about Christ being shown what the world would be like if he were to live a "normal" life and not die for our sins. Therefore, I say that it's not as original as it could have been, but it is still amazing! I absolutely LOVE the scene in which Cancer Man opens up the curtains in Mulder's bedroom where he lies on his deathbed to see that the world is being destroyed, that it is burning up.

The final scene of the episode is totally and completely epic as well, a scene in which we see Mulder and Scully confess their need for each other. It is quite clear throughout this series that although it may not necessarily be romantic, there is an incredibly deep love between these two characters, probably more so than I can say for any two characters in any television series. Anyway, this episode is epic; I cannot stress it enough! It is by far one of my favorites of the series, especially since the question of Mulder's fate regarding his exposure to the "black-ink" virus is FINALLY answered.

Some Secrets Are Not For Us

[andyetris · 6/10 · 24 October 2006]

In the season 6 final episode cliffhanger, alien artifacts were discovered in Africa and Mulder's exposure even to images of their coded messages induced increasingly violent seizures. Scully, pursuing the artifacts to their source on the African coast, found an apparent alien spacecraft incised with religious scriptures. In the season 7 opener a noted skeptic, confronted with the evidence, went on a murderous rampage. When it appeared that the spaceship could actually raise the dead he completely lost his mind.

Meanwhile former CIA agent Michael Kritschgau appeared to know what was affecting Mulder, who had become seriously ill. However the Cigarette-Smoking-Man, assisted by FBI agent Diana Fowley, kidnapped Mulder for apparently sinister purposes.

Most of this episode is a hallucinatory dream of Mulder's in which he succumbs to the blandishments of the C-S-M. However he is nagged by feelings that he has been left in the dark (no duh!) Scully, realizing what is most important to her, is the true key to Mulder's survival.

Anyone hoping for a nice crisp denouement is in for a major disappointment as this is even muddier than "One Son," season 6's conclusion to the mythology story arc. This simply isn't a continuation of the mythology; what's actually happening is the snipping off loose ends as two formerly important characters are terminated - with extreme prejudice - while as for the alien spaceship...

The episode "Closure," later in the season, will finish off what little remained of a sub-plot that drove much of the most interesting parts of this series. Whether you liked "the mythology" or not it's hard to see it treated this way!

The Last Temptation of Mulder

[Muldernscully · 7/10 · 10 April 2007]

The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati attempts to fool us big time. The Cigarette Smoking Man(CSM) approaches Mulder in the hospital with a cure for his psychological condition. We knew from the previous episode that Mulder can read thoughts, but apparently CSM can as well, though it's never explained how. The two carry on a thought conversation. Mulder just needs to go with CSM to wherever and CSM will cure him of his affliction. CSM then takes Mulder to a new life, where an old acquaintance once thought dead, is alive and enjoying life with a family. His sister and her children are living happily with CSM and Diana Fowley gives herself to Mulder for his new life. All this is very bizarre, especially when viewing it for the first time. You just can't believe that all of this is real. Which it isn't. We find out that Mulder is dreaming all of his while lying on an operating table, about to share some of this brain with CSM. Mulder has the appearance of Jesus Christ on the cross, with his spread out arms and a "crown of thorns" on his head. Apparently, this episode borrows heavily from the film "The Last Temptation of Christ" which I have never seen. I don't really care for all the Christ/savior references strewed throughout this episode, but I did enjoy this "new life" for Mulder which we are made to believe is really happening for the first half of the episode. It really trips you out. The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati is heavy-handed at times with its symbolism, but still manages to entertain, and trick us, for half an hour at least.

WTF? Did David Lynch write this episode?

[mrnunleygo · 1/10 · 1 October 2023]

I've always been a huge X-Files fan, but wasn't able to watch episodes from the sixth season on, so I've had to catch up later. I consider this the WORST episode of the X-Files I've ever seen. I'm thinking the writers must have written themselves into a corner with no idea how to get out of it (like what happened to "Lost"). Obviously Sci-Fi requires a certain suspension of disbelief, but the story still has to make sense within the context of the imagined universe it has created. Nothing in this episode--along with the one before it--makes any sense whatsoever. One trivial but obvious example: In the midst of a crisis, Scully goes to see Michael Kritschgau, where she deletes a bunch of files from his computer that she didn't know he'd hacked, then immediately leaves. Uh...why she did she go there in the first place? There are a whole lot of unmotivated actions or ones that contradict everything we've learned about a character. I decided by the first commercial that a lot of this had to be a dream, but even dreams have a certain logic to them. The two "Sixth Extinction" episodes do not.

Who cares?

[sollyharv · 4/10 · 6 March 2021]

At this point the overarching story of The X-Files has completely lost me. I have absolutely no interest in following it's endless convoluted twists and repetitive soap-opera conflicts. The show seems to have no interest in evolving its narrative beyond what was established in the first couple of seasons; it's storytelling style has completely stagnated at this point. From here on out I'm sticking with the show for the one off episodes only, which are still pretty consistently good.

Weakest of the trilogy

[alex-ross77 · 11 March 2006]

After two underrated episodes, 'The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati' really disappointed me with its boring storyline. For instance, Mulder has a unidentified brain disease, which makes Cancer Man kidnap him to a strange house where in dream-like visions Mulder sees his abducted sister and Diana Fowley tries to seduce him into living with her.

Then, I started to wonder about the spaceship? Answer: Forget about all that, this episode only really focuses on Mulder and Cigarette-Smoking Man, giving us no answers.

3/10 I've never been a mythology lover, but this is just annoying and far too confusing for me to enjoy.