The X-Files
Australian Conne-X-ion
Episode Guide:
"Badlaa"


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Episode 8ABX12

Title: Badlaa

badlaa First screened in Australia: April 12, 2001
First screened in the USA: January 21, 2001

Credits: Director: Tony Wharmby
Writer: John Shiban Starring: Guest Stars: Plot:
A mystic smuggles himself out of India and plagues two families in suburban Washington DC.
Sofcom
My Rating: 9/10
Hey, I liked this episode. Yes I really did. It was scary, dark, pretty funny (there were quite a few good one-liners, delivered in more-deadpan-than-Mulder fashion by Doggett), a gory autopsy scene and more. Granted there were some plot holes and lots of unexplained action but I can live with that.

It appears that John Shiban has tried to turn around what had been playing out in the previous four or five episode, with Scully as Mulder. She finally breaks down and cries because she has been acting so unScully-like, doing what Mulder would have done or said but really not belieivng it. I've read elsewhere that this scene wasn't believable but I certainly don't agree.

There was finally a spark betwen Doggett and Scully, calling her "Agent Scully" and "Scully", rather than the cold "Agent" as in the last few episodes.

The ep would have gotten 10 out of 10 except for that stupid ending! It would have been much better to have left that out.

Where Have I Seen That Face Before?
Deep Roy (Little Beggar Man) has appeared in the movies "Flash Gordon", "Return Of The Jedi" and "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" plus an episode of "Dr Who". He's also done stunt work on "Hook" and "Poltergeist II".

Michael Welch (Trevor) has been in the movie "Star Trek: Insurrection" and has appeared on TV in episodes of "Malcolm In The Middle", "The Pretender", "Jesse" and "Frasier".

Jordan Blake Warkol (Quinton) has been in the movies "The Shaggy Dog", "The Little Rascals", "Carpool", "Milo", "Thirst" and (voice in) "A Bug's Life". On TV he starred in "Hey Arnold" and appeared in a "Sliders" episode.

Trivia and Research:
The episode title, "Badlaa", means "revenge, retaliation" in Hindi/Urdu.

In an interview, Gillian Anderson described The Beggar in this episode as "The Butt Genie".

Australian Media Review # 1:
Thumbs Up:
The X-Files
Ten, 8:30pm

We don't expect them to go to Mumbai for a few moments of intoductiry film, but the Hollywood depiction of India offered here sets reasonable simulation back 30 years.

That said, The X-Files is in tip-top form with the chilling start to this episode. Talk about smuggling, this is grotesque. "Requires an openness I am just not comfortable with," says Special Agent John Doggett. So he's into jokes.

Here are unauthorised procedures on a corpse, the weight of which is subject to considerable change.

That's enough, but what is really nice is the extra authority Agent Scully (Gillian Anderson) has assumed now her relationship with Doggett (Robert Patrick) has passed the wide-eyes stage.

Do you remember Mutated Indian, a contemporary of Smoking Man? It's just a thought.
Robin Oliver, Sydney Morning Herald, The Guide, April 9, 2001

Australian Media Review # 2:
"Sweetly disgusting"

In tonight's refreshingly disgusting episode of this eerie series, an enormously fat American who has just come waddling home from Bombay is found dead in his hotel with some mysterious wounds and with a kind of trail of gore leading away from his corpse.

Agent Doggett, the sceptic, a poor dolt with an IQ half that of Scully's, is completely baffled but Scully brings her enourmous intellect and her enormous credulous imagination to bear on the matter and wonders if the enourmous deceased has somehow been the vehicle within which somone or something has been a stowaway from Bombay to the USA.

She surmises (I saw her do it but still don't understand the bounding leap of the imagination that enabled it) that the deceased was 33 pounds heavier when he arrived in the USA. Can he, somehow, have lugged a 33-pound thing into the USA? If so, where is it now? Is it harmless or is it a member of the Bush administration?

At every stage, Scully is intellectually streets ahead of her poor thick colleague. She might as well have a spaniel for an offsider.

Our rating: Grisly trivia.
Transcribed by Rachael. Written by Ian Warden, The Canberra Times The Guide, Monday April 9, 2001. Page 12.

Australian Media Review # 3:
Mulder is in the care of aliens which leaves Scully (Gillian Anderson) and her new partner Doggett (Robert Patrick) to investigate all things spooky. Tonight's tale is about a mystic smuggling himself out of India to make life a misery for a couple of Washington families. I never thought I'd get over Mulder's absence, but his departure has brightened up the series.
Herald-Sun



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