The Lone Gunmen
Australian Conne-X-ion
Episode Guide
"Pilot"


       The X-Files Australian Conne-X-ion Main Page   Back to Episode Guide Main Page



Episode 1AEB79

Title: Pilot

First screened in Australia: August 30, 2001
First screened in the USA: March 4, 2001

Credits: Director: Rob Bowman
Writers: Chris Carter, Vince Gilligan, John Shiban & Frank Spotnitz Starring: Guest Stars: Plot: Chris Carter, creator of The X-Files, brings you The Lone Gunmen. Three computer-hacking conspiracy geeks, Byers, Frohike and Langly, dedicated to the truth, not the semi-lies disseminated by government and big business. No institution is too large or too powerful to avoid their investigations. In their first case, they search for answers when Byers' father dies in a mysterious car accident.
After a myterious and beautiful interloper thwarts their heist, the Gunmen unravel a conspiracy that hits closer to home.
Sofcom
My Rating: 7/10
Comments to be added

Where Have I Seen That Face Before?
At the time of appearing in the pilot of The Lone Gunmen, London born Zuleikha Robinson (Yves Adele Harlow) had only one role to her credit, a movie called "Timecode" starring Xander Berkeley (from the Ice episode of The X-Files and Glenne Headley (from The X-Files Movie).

For more information check out Zuleikha Robinson Online.

George Coe (Byers' father) has starred in many TV movies as well "Diamond Men", "A Rumour Of Angels", "The Mighty Ducks", "Blind Date", "Micki + Maude", "The Amatuer" and "Kramer v Kramer". On TV he starred in "Max Headroom", had a regular role of "LA Law" and has appeared in episodes of "The West Wing", "The Practice", "The Pretender", "Law And Order" and "Moonlighting".

As an actor Tony Morelli (Assassin) has appeared in "Aftershock - Earthquake In New York", "Timecop", "Ernest Rides Again", "Alive" and "Spot Marks The X" and an X-Files episode "Paper Clip". As a stuntman he's worked on "Criminal Law", "The Accused", "Look Who's Talking", "Bird On A Wire", "Legends Of The Fall", "Reindeer Games", "Romeo Must Die" and "The X-Files".

Garvin Cross (Navigator) has appeared in two X-Files episodes, "Herrenvolk" and "Fearful Symmetry" . He's also appeared in episodes of "Sliders", "Outer Limits", "Millennium" (2 episodes), "Stargate SG1" and "First Wave". His movie roles have mainly been limted to TV and B movies such as "Sole Survivor", "Y2K", "Atomic Train", "Hardball", "Crackerjack" and "Cyberjack". He's also done stunt work on "Turbulence 3", "The Proposal", "Deep Rising" and "Needful Things".

Wally Dalton (Ray Helm) has also done stunt work on the Australian movies "Romper Stomper", "Quigley Down Under" and "Return To Snowy River". His acting roles include "Sole Survivor", "The X-Files Game", "Assassins", "Free Willy 2" and the mini series "The Thorn Birds", "Hollywood Wives", "Flair" and "Intensity". He's appeared in episodes of "Millennium" (2), "Stargate SG1", "The Fugitive" (2), and "Northern Exposure" (2). He was also a writer on the old "Barney Miller" series.

Jim Fyfe (Kimmy The Geek) played Jimmy The Geek (his twin brother?) in The X-Files episode "3 Of A Kind" where you can find details of his acting career.

Steve Makaj (ND Man) is a regular on "Stargate SG1" and appeared in episodes of "Dark Angel", "First Wave" and "Harsh Realm". His movie roles include "Along Came A Spider", "Chaindance" and "It". He's also appeared in 4 X-Files episodes: "Gethsemane", "Redux", "DPO" and "Ascension".

Mark Gibson (First Guard) has appeared in a number of TV movies plus "The 6th Day" and episodes of "Stargate SG1" (2), "First Wave" and "Dark Angel".

Dee Jay Jackson (Demo Man) has appeared in episodes of "Millennium", "Dark Angel" and "Sliders". Movie roles include "Look Who's Talking", "Needful Things", "Ernest Rides Again", "Happy Gilmore", "Disturbing Behavior" and "Sole Survivor".

David Kaye (Pilot) has been seen in The X-Files episodes "Firewalker" and "Apocrypha" plus an episode of "Sliders". His movie roles include "Happy Gilmore", "Carpool" and "Excess Baggage". He's probably best known for his voice, doing roles in "GI Joe", "Sanctuary", "Princess Mackaroo", "The Jungle Book", "Beast Wars", "Transformers", "X-Men" and DragonBallZ".

Trivia:
The air scene of the plane approaching the World Trade Center was actually shot by the aerial photographer from a helicopter, so the skyline and approach you see is real. The airliner was CGI'd on top of it. This scene was played out in real-life, with the tragic terrorist attacks on the building in New York just two weeks after the episode aired in Australia.

The secret location of The Lone Gunmen's HQ is finally given. Their warehouse is in Takoma Park, Maryland, essentially an industrial suburb of Washington DC.

"Scenario 12-D" could possibly be a reference to D-12, or Dirty Dozen, a Detroit area rap group which contributed to Eminem's last album.

As pointed out on the show, the name Yves Adele Harlow is an anagram for Lee Harvey Oswald, who allegedly assassinated President John F. Kennedy. Byers was named after this president, born the day of the assassination.

Kimmy/Jimmy the Geek is a play on famous Las Vegas gambler Jimmy the Greek.

Ray Helm is also known as Overlord. Operation Overlord was the secret code name for the World War II invasion of Europe by the Allied forces on June 6, 1944 (D-Day). Also, Richard Helms served in the Central Intelligence Agency as deputy director in charge of covert operations, including assassinations (1962-1965), and as director (1966-1973). He was the CIA liaison with the Warren Commission and came under heavy fire from many Kennedy assassination researchers who charge that he did everything within his power to hinder the investigation.

The company name E-Com-Con is also the name of the secret project in the movie "7 Days in May", about a government coup.

From TV Tome

Media Story # 1:
The Dean of Gunmen
'Keep it simple' is Haglund's TV mantra No, it's not your imagination, swamp gas or mass hysteria. The X Files really does suck lately.

Those masters of unravelled conspiracies, the Lone Gunmen can confirm it.

"The thing we want to avoid is an (X Files-like) story arc that's so complicated that nobody can remember what's what anymore," says Dean Haglund, the Canadian comic who plays Langley in the X Files spinoff The Lone Gunmen.

He says the seriocomic series -- about the further adventures of X Files supergeeks Langly, Frohike and Byers -- will be sticking to single-episode tales.

"Do you remember the fat-sucking vampire (X Files) episode? That's when I realized there was too much going on.

"No offence to Chris Carter, but Mulder has oil in his eyes. What happened to that? One episode he's infected by intelligent alien oil, and the next he's chasing a fat-suckin' vampire. I'm like, 'But you have oil in your eyes! What do you care about fat-suckin' vampires if you got oil in your eyes?'"

And what kind of Lone Gunmen plot-twists can Haglund divulge? "Superintelligent military chimps and cars that run on water. It's, y'know, yer slice-of-life show. Hacking into online accounts, international terrorists. It'll be a little more spylike, a little more Mission Impossible than the X Files."

The X Files and The Lone Gunmen are still joined at the hip, of course. The new show debuts Sunday in the other's timeslot. The X Files will go on hiatus for the month, leaving us with the frozen image of Mulder, apparently killed by alien abductors.

In April, The Lone Gunmen moves again. "There's talk we're going to Chris Carter's original X Files slot Fridays at 9."

There wasn't much in his background to indicate that Haglund would one day be part of a triumvirate of heroes for geeks all over the world. Raised in Winnipeg, he moved to Vancouver to study theatre at Simon Fraser U.

"I thought standup would pay for university. Of course the flaw in my plan is you don't make much money in standup."

He still keeps his hand in standup comedy, and was part of a West Coast improv team that won the national title at the Canadian Improv Championships during the Montreal Just For Laughs fest. "You need to get in front of a live audience. Teamsters on the set aren't the most appreciative audience."

The Lone Gunmen, the trio of conspiracy nuts who carried on much of Fox Mulder's toughest legwork, was originally supposed to be an X Files one-off, inspired by Chris Carter's discovery of an unusually enthusastic Newsgroup online.

"There was a newsgroup called alt.tv.xfiles, and the writers kind of focused on it for immediate fan feedback without influencing what the fans would say," Haglund says. "Anyway, when the Lone Gunmen debuted, somebody wrote, 'This is proof that Chris Carter and the writers are lurking here, because they've written three characters that represent our culture here.' And of course, that was actually the case."

Since then, the Gunmen have become Internet heroes ("I try not to look at the Web sites, 'cause it's kind of embarrassing frankly"). And the transition from occasional comic relief to star performers seemed inevitable.

"I gotta say, I didn't expect it to be as much work as it has been. I don't know what I was thinking. We're working 14-hour days; whereas, before, we'd work one day and have a month off."

X-philes are apprised of X Files cameos in Gunmen -- including one by FBI Assistant Director Skinner (Mitch Pileggi).

"Others will show up," Haglund says. "The problem is we're actually more in the dark with our own show. We're so busy we don't have time to get on the phone and dig up gossip like we did when we were on The X Files."

By Jim Slotek, Toronto Sun, Wednesday, February 28, 2001.

Media Story # 1:
Lone Gunmen go solo
X-Files spinoff a slick, snappy send-up

It's gotta be a conspiracy. X-Files creator Chris Carter -- abandoning aliens for computer nerds? Sinister paranoia for a lighthearted Mission: Impossible spoof?

Yet here he is, debuting his latest effort, The Lone Gunmen, which gives the hugely-popular X-Files nerds their own slickly-produced adventure series.

And, whatdayaknow, it's not nearly as bad as you might expect.

The X-Files -- as longtime viewers know -- has taken a nosedive in quality in recent seasons, mostly because its alien-conspiracy "mythology" became so unwieldly and convoluted that even faithful fans couldn't follow it.

The Lone Gunmen, which airs tomorrow in The X-Files timeslot at 10 p.m. on HC and c has no such ambitions. The premiere, directed by X-Files veteran Rob Bowman, is a slick, snappy spy send-up.

It finds the trio of hapless renegade hackers -- Byers (Bruce Harwood), Frohike (Tom Braidwood) and Langly (Dean Haglund) -- investigating the death of Byers' father, who was a government official and perhaps involved in a high-level Pentagon plot involving terrorism and arms dealing.

Admittedly, the series gets a little too silly for its own good -- from the prologue that finds Frohike dangling from an acrobatic contraption a la Tom Cruise to snap up a much-prized computer chip, to the inclusion of a beautiful mystery woman (Zuleikha Robinson) who shares more than a little DNA with cyber-babes like Lara Croft.

(Of course it's a canny move to up the show's sex appeal for guys in the audience while, at the same time, making the male-oriented series more female-friendly with a strong-willed woman onboard.)

In the second episode, another new cast member is added: "Jimmy Bond" (Stephen Snedden) -- the affable benefactor who bankrolls their missions.

Of course, two entertaining outings does not an entire series make -- and it's hard to judge whether the show can sustain itself.

Like all great supporting characters, the gunmen worked so well on The X-Files because they were rarely -- but effectively -- used.

(And the past history of sidekicks who have gone solo is dubious at best: just ask Michael Richards.)

For now though, The Lone Gunmen is on target.

By Kevin Williamson, Calgary Sun, Saturday, March 3, 2001.


Back to the top of the page