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Millennium (The X-Files)

"Millennium" is the fourth episode of the seventh season of the science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered on the Fox network in the United States on November 28, 1999. It was written by Vince Gilligan and Frank Spotnitz and directed by Thomas J. Wright. The episode is a "Monster-of-the-Week" story, unconnected to the series' wider mythology. "Millennium" earned a Nielsen household rating of 9.1, and was watched by 15.09 million people in its initial broadcast. The episode received mixed reviews from television critics; some felt that the episode's plot was creepy and engaging, while others felt that it was not a decent conclusion for the Millennium television series.

Plot
Background Frank Black (Lance Henriksen), the protagonist of the series Millennium, is a freelance forensic profiler and former FBI agent who possesses the unique ability to see the world through the eyes of serial killers and murderers. For the first two seasons of the show, Black worked for a mysterious consulting firm known as the Millennium Group. He lived in Seattle with his wife Catherine (Megan Gallagher) and daughter Jordan (Brittany Tiplady). During the first season, Black and the Group largely focused on various criminals. During the third season, Frank returned to Washington to work with the FBI following the death of his wife at the hands of the Group. In the third season finale, Black realized that the Group was preparing to come after him, and took Jordan from school as they fled Seattle. Events In Tallahassee, Florida, on December 21, 1999, a memorial service is held for a former FBI agent named Raymond Crouch. His widow is approached by a mysterious man, Mark Johnson (Holmes Osborne), who claims to have worked with her husband. After the other mourners have left, Johnson returns to the funeral parlor, dons the corpse's clothes and places a cell phone in the coffin. One week later, Johnson is monitoring Crouch's grave when his phone rings; he walks towards the grave with a shovel. Subsequently, Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) are called in to examine Crouch's empty grave. They notice damage done to the interior of the casket; Scully theorizes that the scene was staged. A briefing is held by Walter Skinner (Mitch Pileggi), who notes that Crouch is one of four former agents whose graves have been exhumed; all four men had committed suicide. Because of the presence of goat's blood encircling the grave, Mulder states that the crime was an act of necromancy. After the briefing, Skinner takes the agents aside and asks them to investigate Crouch's possible ties to the Millennium Group, which is now dissolved. Mulder and Scully go to a mental institution in Woodbridge, Virginia, to visit Frank Black. Black is initially reluctant to help them, as he believes that any further involvement with the Group may hinder his custody battle for his daughter Jordan. When he finally agrees to assist, he explains that the four former members of the Group believe they can bring about the end of the world by killing themselves before the dawn of the millennium, acting as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Meanwhile, Johnson is changing a tire on his truck when a deputy comes upon him. Discovering Crouch's body in the back, the deputy attempts to arrest Johnson but is attacked and killed by a suddenly reanimated Crouch. Acting upon information from Black, Mulder concentrates on trying to find Johnson while Scully is attacked in the morgue by the dead deputy; Johnson saves her by shooting the deputy before disappearing. The two agents put all their effort in to finding Johnson before it is too late. Mulder breaks into his house but is locked in the basement and attacked by the four corpses of the FBI agents, managing to shoot and kill one of them. Black shows up; after tying up Johnson, Black shoots two of the zombies. As his gun runs out of bullets and death seems imminent, Scully arrives and shoots the final zombie, saving both men. Black returns to the hospital, arranging to have himself discharged. Scully informs Black that he has a visitor and brings in Jordan. ''Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve'' is on television; Black and his daughter leave just before the countdown begins. As the clock strikes zero and the crowd begins to sing "Auld Lang Syne" on screen, Mulder and Scully kiss to ring in the new year. == Production ==
Production
Background X-Files remake of George A. Romero's (pictured) cult 1968 zombie film Night of the Living Dead.|alt=an older man with black glasses smiles at the camera. "Millennium" serves as a crossover with the Fox series Millennium, also created by Chris Carter. Although Millennium, which debuted in 1996, had enjoyed critical acclaim, it suffered from low ratings and was cancelled after its third season. Unfortunately, the final episode of Millennium had been filmed before the cancellation notice, resulting in the series concluding on a cliffhanger. Incidentally, this episode is actually the second crossover between The X-Files and Millennium; the previous crossover involved a minor character—author Jose Chung—from "Jose Chung's From Outer Space", The idea to use zombies for "Millennium" arose from a separate aborted project. Reportedly, Stephen King, who had co-penned the fifth-season episode "Chinga", wished to write an episode based on George A. Romero's cult zombie film Night of the Living Dead (1968). Zombies as a plot device were then later relegated to what would become "Millennium". Spotnitz later admitted that the episode "was not completely successful, I suppose, but still seems worth it for having brought back Lance Henriksen." The episode is notable for featuring the first actual kiss between Fox Mulder and Dana Scully. Gillian Anderson later explained that, "David [Duchovny] and I knew the kiss was coming. [...] I felt the editors of that episode milked it in a very effective way." Clark was later hired to come in and record a voice-over bit announcing the year 2000. == Themes ==
Themes
by the Millennium Group.|alt=The image is of four humanoids riding horses. The first is a skeleton in a cloth, the second is an older man carrying a scale, the third is a shirtless man yielding a sword, and the final is a man in regal attire wearing a crown and wielding a bow. The episode makes prominent use of John 11:25–26 from the Christian Bible, which reads "Who soever liveth and believeth in me shall never die". The episode also deals with the Book of Revelation, particularly verse 1:18, "I am he that liveth, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys to Hell and of death". Donaldson argues that Johnson and the Millennium Group have taken Jesus' promise of eternal life and resurrection too literally, resulting in "a recreated cycle in this life rather than escape into the next". ==Reception==
Reception
.|alt=The image is of an older man with glasses wearing a black shirt. He is looking past the camera, smirking. Ratings "Millennium" first aired in the United States on November 28, 1999, on Fox. The night the episode aired, FX showed a nine-hour Millennium marathon, featuring episodes that were closely related to and led up to the crossover. The marathon was hosted by Lance Henriksen leading up to the premiere. The episode aired in the United Kingdom and Ireland on Sky1 on April 9, 2000, and received 870,000 viewers, making it the sixth most-watched episode of the week. Reviews "Millennium" received mixed reviews from critics. Ted Cox of the Daily Herald called the entry "creepy" and "visually captivating", particularly praising the installment's "use of light and dark symbolism". Rich Rosell from Digitally Obsessed awarded the episode 5 out of 5 stars and wrote that "there were a lot of big, big things going on in this ep , starting with Millennium's ace profiler Frank Black [...] reluctantly helping Mulder and Scully solve the apparent suicides of four FBI agents." Rosell ultimately concluded that the reason the episode was a success was due to Mulder and Scully's kiss, a moment he called "inevitable" although he did note that "many think [it] really signaled the beginning of the end." Zack Handlen of The A.V. Club awarded the episode a "B". He called the entry "tired" and wrote that it was "both too ambitious and not epic enough" to bring closure to Millennium. Matt Hurwitz and Chris Knowles referred to the episode as "controversial" in their 2008 book, The Complete X-Files. Kenneth Silber from Space.com was critical of the episode, writing that "this episode vividly demonstrates that what Carl Sagan once called 'the burden of skepticism' is no longer being shouldered by anyone in the series. Why else would Mulder's assertion that a necromancer has successfully raised the dead provoke such a languid response in a room full of FBI agents?" Robert Shearman and Lars Pearson, in their book Wanting to Believe: A Critical Guide to The X-Files, Millennium & The Lone Gunmen, rated the episode one-and-a-half stars out of five, noting that the episode's premise felt, "stylistically wrong for Millennium." Paula Vitaris from Cinefantastique gave the episode a negative review and awarded it one-and-a-half stars out of four. Vitaris noted that, despite the teaser and first act being "promising enough", the episode "slides downhill rapidly with a storyline that crosses the border into ludicrous." Paula Vitaris noted that the kiss "seems stuck on to the episode by a tack in its complete irrelevance to the storyline or Mulder and Scully in general." Handlen wrote that the scene, coupled with Black getting his daughter back, was "the only scene which comes close to justifying the episode’s existence". Furthermore, he enjoyed the ambiguous nature of the kiss, noting that it could be "just a one time thing, or maybe it’s the start of something, or maybe it’s just a continuation of something that’s been going on for a long time now, right under our noses." ==Footnotes==
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