CLOSURE

        After 7 seasons there was no way the discovery of what happened to Mulder’s sister, Samantha, would be anything but anti-climatic because this is something that should have been taken care of a few seasons ago. "Sein Und Zeit/Closure" should have had the same impact as when Dr. Richard Kimble found the One-Armed Man on the last episode of "The Fugitive" and found justice for the wrong that was done him. Of course "The Fugitive" didn’t drag on for 7 seasons and people who didn’t watch every episode most likely watched the last episode of "The Fugitive" because they knew it would be a coherent and satisfying ending to the series 4 year run. It is doubtful beyond a few non regular viewers that anyone cared what happened to Samantha and from past experience where we were told we would be given the answers only to find out we didn’t know any more than we did before.

        "Closure" was one of the lamest so-called closure episodes I’ve ever seen only because of what was done and said in previous episodes. We all know Chris Carter and gang have a tendency to forget what they said in previous episodes, but there has always been one overriding theme throughout all of them and that was Samantha was still alive and not in some never-never land where spirits take you. What a cop-out on Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz’s part. Was what they had been building up to these past 7 seasons was to have Mulder find out she "died" at 14 and has been living in limbo ever since. These two episodes totally contradict everything that was indicated in the excellent "Colony/End Game" episodes where the Alien Bounty Hunter told Mulder that his sister was still alive, and why was Mrs. Mulder acting like the person who claimed to be Samantha in "Colony/End Game" could have been Samantha since in "Sein Und Zeit/Closure" it indicated that she knew Samantha was dead. What about the files in "Paper Clip" where they find a recent tissue sample of Samantha’s in her file? In the end "Sein Und Zeit/Closure" doesn’t make sense on what we learned before. It was just a convenient way to try to wrap up Mulder’s obsession with finding his sister. It only makes me wish even more that they had John Lee Roche killed Samantha in the episode "Paper Hearts" because it would have changed everything as to what Mulder believed in from alien abductions to what happened that November night when his sister was kidnapped and would have moved the show in a different direction. It would have been even better if Mulder found her living a normal life away from the hands of Cigarette-Smoking Man and the Consortium and having Mulder decide whether it is worth it to expose her to CSM and to her past. Yes, it would have been predictable, but a far better conclusion than "Sein Und Zeit/Closure".

        Now some miscellaneous comments on "Closure":

-  It was wishing too much to go through one of these mythology episodes without one of Chris Carter’s pretentious voiceovers. I don’t know if it was my state of mind, but I started laughing when those souls started coming out of the empty graves with the holy type music playing in the background while Mulder drones on about God and starlight even though Mulder has always indicated he doesn’t believe in God or any benevolent power.

-  Was it ever explained why those parents were forced to write those ransom notes? If the children were taken to save them from a terrible death why were the parents punished for something they didn’t do or have control over.

-  Was there ever a funeral for Mrs. Mulder? Speaking of the Mulder family, if everything we learned in this episode is true then the Mulders are the most cruel and insensitive family ever shown on tv for how they treated their son. They let him believe for over 25 years that he was responsible for his sister’s disappearance and see how that disappearance tore his family apart and took an emotional toll on him. Needless to say these are people who never should have had children. How can Mulder at the end of "Closure" say he can move on because he is fine with everything now that he knows what happened to his sister? How can that be with parents who manipulated him and left him with guilt over his sister, who let him risk his life while trying to find out what happened to her even though they always knew. Also, with his knowing that her final years of life were spent dealing with horrible experiments. Is this what Chris Carter wants us to think of Mulder’s parents? Too ashamed to admit their compliance in Samantha’s kidnapping and that let Mulder deal with it his whole life.

-  Also, I couldn’t help thinking of the quote from the parent in "Paper Hearts" who finally found out what happened to his little girl. How it is better to sometimes not know what happened because it brought up everything they could have done to prevent it and one loses the hope of finding their loved ones alive. This came to me when Mulder said he was looking for closure on his sister. I still don’t see how finding his sister dead and existing in a never-never land would relieve him of the guilt of letting her be kidnapped and knowing she was experimented on for 5 years.

-  Did Harold Piller seem a plot convenience to anyone? A person who shows up with all the answers to move the story along because the writers couldn’t figure out any other way. So instead of Scully and Mulder doing most of the legwork they have Piller there who can conveniently talk to the walk ons and come up with all the answers. It didn’t help that the actor who played him was on "The Practice" the last two weeks as a very conservative judge who had an annoying way of pronouncing Mass-a-chusetts. Heck, I wanted to smack him every time he pronounced it that way and I come from a state that nicknames Massachusetts, "Taxachusetts".

-  It goes without saying that wig on Duchovny in the videotape of his regressive hypnotic therapy was something we don’t want to see again. This is the first time we have heard of any videotape of his therapy sessions because as far as we knew there were only cassette tape recordings of his sessions. Who was this person Scully was consulting on Mulder’s mental well-being? Did she have the right to consult someone and show these videotapes? He was never identified as to who he was or exactly what he does at the F.B.I. though I guess we are supposed to assume he is an agent who is a psychologist of some sort. Where did these Treasury files suddenly come from since we never saw them before in connection with Samantha’s disappearance. Once again this was all set up to try to explain things when the writers knew they couldn’t add everything up with what happened before so they bring in this unnamed F.B.I. person to update us on why Mulder believes what he does on Samantha and why it wasn’t true. This also goes along with Scully finding the burned up piece of paper in Mrs. Mulder’s garbage can of the order to stop looking for Samantha with CSM signature signing the order. Thank goodness Mulder said to Scully when she was telling him this fact that it wasn’t exactly news to him. So what if Mrs. Mulder had the original paper since there was a copy in Samantha’s file so it wasn’t a big secret and Mulder isn’t stupid enough not to believe his mother didn’t know more than she let on. He was stupid enough never to confront her about it though.

-  Hmm, it seems that operation on CSM didn’t go the way he expected since as Scully observed he doesn’t look good. What’s the old cliché, sometimes its best not to get what one wishes for.

-  Did anyone else find it a little much when we see Samantha’s and Jeffrey’s name written in the cement? Weren’t we always led to believe that Jeffrey Spender was brought up by his mother and CSM had nothing to do with him. Does this mean he was experimented on, too?

-  Are we to believe that after Mulder discovered which house Samantha lived in he would just leave and not even go in to see what he can find out. Why would he wait another day to inspect the house just so he could wait for Scully so they could do that little seance thingy for Mulder to find Samantha’s diary behind the bookcase? This was another hard to believe thing that in the 21 years after Samantha disappeared that no one found the diary via renovations to the house since it is doubtful the house was left empty after Samantha ran away. The scene where Mulder is reading Samantha’s diary was quite moving because it gave Mulder a chance to find out what happened to his sister and the person she became and to connect with her in a way he never has been able to in the past.

-  Of course, that old ER nurse has to live in the middle of nowhere so Mulder can wander off into the woods. Even though I hated how the Samantha thing was resolved I was quite touched when the 14 year old Samantha’s spirit came up to Mulder and hugged him because of everything it meant to Mulder. Though I still question whether where she ended up she was any better off than before, but that is a matter of one’s perspective on these things.

        "Closure" is a missed opportunity to take the Samantha kidnapping further, but instead of going out with a bang on Samantha’s disappearance we go out with a whimper. Hmm, she had to go through horrible experiments for years before "dying". Yeah, I’m sure that is what Mulder wanted to find out after all these years. At least "Sein Und Zeit/Closure" finally puts the Samantha mystery to rest.