AIR DATE:  April 27, 1997
Written By Howard Gordon and Frank Spotnitz
Directed By Kim Manners

	This episode was the true Skinner episode as compared to last
season's "Avatar" where we only get to know Skinner a little bit, but
never truly find out the man behind the person.  In "Zero Sum" we see the
true Skinner who is willing to sell his soul to save a person he cares for
deeply, and still try to stick to his principals.  We finally find out
what Skinner sold his soul for in an attempt to save Scully's life, and
what a price it was to pay, too.  The truth of it is I never suspected
Cigarette Smoking Man (CSM) would make him go so far as to be directly
involved in a cover up, but CSM, being the evil man he is, decides to use
Skinner for a job one of his underlings could have done.  The reason for
having an underling doing this type of job of destroying evidence is to
protect them (CSM & gang) if they happened to get caught.  Having Skinner
do it ups the stakes for CSM since we see Skinner won't follow orders as a
lackey would for CSM.  CSM, instead of doing a simple clean up job which
I'm sure is what he was assigned to do by the Consortium, he decides to
use it as a way to gain more control over Skinner.  Of course, Skinner
being Skinner there is no way CSM is ever going to be able to get the kind
of control he was hoping for by doing this to Skinner because Skinner will
only go so far.  I guess this might have been CSM's way of seeing how far
Skinner would go or an attempt to break Mulder's trust in him. Either way
he failed.

	I think CSM fully understands now he can't push Skinner around
after Skinner came so close to killing him.  This is one of the few times
we have seen CSM shaken up since I think he honestly was surprised Skinner
did come so close to killing him.  It is probably the first time anyone
actually came that close to killing him.  To tell the truth I wish Skinner
had killed CSM like Det. Kellerman killed Luther Mahoney on this past
week's "Homicide".  These two shows could be used as contrast of how
different evil characters are dealt with since in a way both CSM and
Mahoney have killed and manipulated people to protect themselves.  Also,
they both have done things to other people regardless of the consequences
to those people as long as they got what was wanted from it.  CSM is using
people without their consent for experiments to further their project and
Mahoney was distributing drugs, not caring what the consequences were to
his neighborhood as long as it gave him money and power.  As with CSM
where nothing sticks to him for Mulder and Scully to bring to justice,
Mahoney had the same ability except in the latest "Homicide" episode he
lost control and gave the cops an opening to bring him to jail.  The
difference is this time the two main detectives, Lewis and Kellerman, were
sick and tired of Mahoney getting off so Kellerman in a fit of anger
shoots Mahoney in a somewhat cold blooded manner (it can be debated
whether it was since Mahoney still had the gun in his hand not pointing it
at anyone and he was egging Kellerman on).  Skinner must have been feeling
the same way since he has seen CSM get away with murder, knows he is
responsible for Scully's illiness and CSM was egging him on during the
confrontation. This is why I wish he had shot him because I think at that
moment it would have been in character for Skinner considering his
emotional state at the time and his belief CSM will never be brought to
justice.  It definitely would have changed our perception of him as a
person and there would have been great debates about whether or not it was
right for Skinner to kill him.  I definitely don't look at Kellerman from
"Homicide" the same anymore because it calls into question his character
as a person and a police officer.  It goes without question Mahoney got
what he deserved, but it is questionable whether Kellerman had the right
to shoot him just as it would have been for Skinner. 

	Here is something I never thought I'll write, but this episode
worked fine without Scully in it.  One of my common complaints about
episodes I don't like is the lack of Scully and Mulder involvement in the
case.  The funny thing is even though Scully wasn't in the episode she was
the underlying motive behind everything in this episode, from Skinner
destroying evidence for CSM to Mulder not trusting Skinner then trusting
him when Skinner tells him why he did it. 

	Now the miscellaneous comments on "Zero Sum":

- My anti-smoking part of me is about to come out, but Jane deserved to be
killed by those bees since she was smoking in the restroom.  Boy, nothing
gets me more upset than to go into a restroom where someone had smoked.
Also, she wasn't even smoking the X-Files cigarette brand of choice,
Morley's, so she deserved to be killed even more.

- Did those killer bees have a homing beacon telling them to split the
scene in 5 minutes so no one would catch them?  They are not your father's
killer bees.

- I've always liked on X-Files how sometimes Mulder's computer is on his
desk in some episodes and in others it is nowhere to be seen.

- I have a hard time believing the police hadn't gone over the crime
scene.  It might have been more believable if Jane's cigarette hadn't been
left in the same place where she dropped it.  Come on, no one stepped on
it as they were moving the body? 

- Oh yeah, when can I hire Skinner to come over and clean my house.  Boy,
the man can do a bang up job cleaning.

- The plant where Skinner took to burn the woman's body was it the same
plant from "Herrenvolk" where Mulder, Scully and J. Smith and the Bounty
Hunter had a little run in?

- My favorite scene of "Zero Sum" was in the police station parking lot as
Skinner gets in the car and drives off you can see a cat run off under a
car on the left.

- The security at Skinner's apartment complex must be lax:  CSM men steal
his gun from his desk, Mulder doesn't buzz to get in, he just goes up to
Skinner's door and later on Mulder breaks into Skinner's apartment.  I
think it is time for Skinner to move since his apartment has become as
easy to break into as Mulder's apartment.

- Gee, last year I was hearing reports of a honeybee shortage and wouldn't
you know it the Consortium was working on the problem to produce thousands
of bees from one lava.  Sure they're killer bees, but damn it those plants
have to be pollinated. 

- You would think Mulder would be more paranoid about his files.  Not only
is Skinner easily able to get into his e-mail and erase them, but he puts
the uniblonder's address and phone number in his rolodex.  This is why I
wasn't surprised to find out the uniblonder worked for CSM since she
didn't seem to care much about keeping her identity a secret.  One more
thing, is she truly working for CSM or is she working for the Consortium
pretending she is working for CSM?

- I thought it was pretty cool how there were so many bees covering the
light fixture it made it appear it didn't work.

- Fairly ingenious way to spread smallpox, but you would figure it would
have been more efficient if it only took one bee instead of the hundreds
it took for it to work.  Well, it is the beginning stage so I guess this
is a way to get all the kinks out.

- You've got to be wondering about the people who run the Consortium when
they decide it is better to ship the bees via mail instead of moving the
bees themselves.  Looked what happened to one shipment, it ends up in the
damaged mail section and creates havoc.

- Well, I guess I'm never going to get my wish of them not bringing back
the Chunky Italian Guy.  Nothing against the actor, he just doesn't seem
menacing enough to me.

- You almost get the feeling it was the late Agent Pendrell who Mulder was
wishing was working on the picture instead of the no name agent.

- I put my vote in for the killer bees to make more appearances over the
oily aliens since most insects give me the creeps and they appear to be
ten times more threatening than the oily aliens.


	"Zero Sum" was a good solid conspiracy episode.  It gave us more
insight into Skinner's character, and the show pulled off the impossible
by having a show that didn't feature one of the main characters.  This was
made possible by a good script by Howard Gordan and Frank Spotnitz, and
Mitch Pileggi's acting was excellent as a torn man who is walking a fine
line between compromising his principals and keeping them.  Hard to
believe there are still 3 episodes left because this episode could almost
have been the season finale.


Claudia
E-Mail:  Claudia.Cauchon@unh.edu

4/29/97

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