Sense and Antisense

[Who Am I?]

I wasn't a big fan of this episode, for reasons that don't really need to be explained. I honestly though that it wasn't an offshoot of the Group, but that it was the government trying to screw around... figuratively of course. However, man is neither inherently evil, nor is he really inherently good. Its a combination of nature and nurture, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if they tweaked with the chromosomes of someone who was a violent psychopath, he or she would have become America's Top Homemaker.

[IHaveGoodInstincts]

Ah I see. Allow me to elucidate a little. It isn't an accusation as such more a case of a fan memory (aka received wisdom). When you're been around a fandom a while you tend to pick up nuggets here and there and I'm always cautious of asserting that these are fact and acknowledge that in many cases they are conspiracies as enticing as any seen on the screen but I am sure this has some origins in an interview Chip gave some time ago. Again my memory is hazy but it goes something like this:

Chip submitted a number of speculative scripts for the X-Files that Chris Carter liked but he felt his style was more suited to the show he was working on which ultimately became Millennium. It was said (can't remember by who) that one of the episodes that Chip wrote was a reworking of an earlier script he had submitted that lent itself well to Millennium.

It's probably a case of Chinese Whispers and certainly no great shakes in the scheme of things but somewhere in the back of my mind I have stored it away that "Sense and Antisense" was the script in question.

Probably a load of old baloney when all is said and done. I don't recall Chip mentioning anything of this kind when I interviewed him last year.

Eth

Sorry about that. It wasn't the best choice of words on my part, as well as the limited information I had on the subject.

I like this episode as part of Millennium, but if I had a second choice, I could see this as being a cool Doggett and Reyes episode in season 9, when they could have really used Chip for "New Blood."

[IHaveGoodInstincts]

In viewing this episode again, it appears as though at least one member of the production crew is visible in Frank's computer screen, when he returns home when Rodecker calls him and tells him to turn on a switch on the LMU-83 (sounds like a bomber jet impervious to radar!) Franks turns on the computer after the telepone call.

I know it's not the main plot, but there is so much in this episode that is creepy and ominous, including the mysterious paycheck with no visible deliverer. It's not a "mythology" episode, but it almost has that feel to it. Being that this is a "giftless" episode, it could be said that it makes it that much darker for Frank, who has financial troubles weighing him down now too. I think someone else has already commented on the spookiness of the Mark Snow music.

It's not the highlight of season 2, but I still like it!

[ethsnafu]

That's a super point actually. It would have made a wonderful Doggett and Reyes episode, a pairing I have grown immensely fond of of late.

We ended up discussing this episode briefly in our Skype chat the other night and something was pointed out to me that I certainly hadn't considered before. In many ways this episode is much more akin to the stories in season one that is initially perceived. I know Chip tended to write even his speculative episode with one foot firmly grounded in the possible and the real. He certainly tried to stay true to the mandate of 'evil is real and it's out there' than some of the more fanciful excursions of season two. Whilst it does indeed have the feel of an X-Files mythology episode it is still grounded very much in real events. Before jump head first into cults and angels and demons, we get a story entrenched in the the Tuskegee syphilis experiments and ideas of human experimentation and whilst it's open to debate if secret cults do indeed rule the world it's without contradiction that the basis for this story does and will continue to take place.

It's definite speculative, as was Force Majeure, but still very much grounded in reality which cannot be said for the bulk of stories that come after it.

I guess in some ways it's the transition episode between the old season and the new.

Eth

[IHaveGoodInstincts]

It could have easily fit into season 1 of the X-Files too, when there was no clear mythology.

To give credit to your "Gift Arc," I do recall a head shot of Frank where he was shown thinking about something in the episode. The scene really felt like there should have been a internal point of view flash, but there was none, hence Frank's issues at that time. Doing so seemed to make the episode darker for Frank (and me!).

[ethsnafu]

Darker indeed. I think those episodes served to demonstrate to the character how much he relied on his facility and how emancipated he would feel without it. If you are going to depict Frank as desiring to penetrate the mysteries of both the Millennium Group and his gift you have to address his uneasy relationship with who he is and what he can do.

I wonder if the intention was originally to have had Frank without his gift for a much longer period of time than we got. I know Glen Morgan went on record to say that he hated the Frank would stare at a coffee cup and be able to conclude that the murderer was a coffee drinker (his example not mine) and Kay Reindl stated that she was responsible for persuading him to resurrect the gift for "A Single Blade of Grass". I wonder if Glen Morgan would have preferred a longer run of stories without what he perceived to be a 'get out of jail free' card.

Eth

[IHaveGoodInstincts]

I got the feeling that Frank was even more alone without his gift. I realize all investigations have to start somewhere, but unlike other episodes where Frank can figure things out pretty early on, he started out thinking that Zero had schizophrenia. It just seems like this assumpton would not have been made in a "gift" episode. But, alas, sometimes we have to feel around in the dark before we find the light switch!

This episode was one that was solved and not solved at the same time, which I think led to a frustrated Frank at the end. With bodies disappearing, prank callers calling, taxi drivers and street people dying, and no money to pay two rents and a mortgage, Frank is stuck in this episode with limited money, limited family (in discussion), and no gift to guide him on this particular case. Even if the "gift" is perceived as a "fair weather friend," I could see where Frank having his "gift" in this circumstance would be a comfort for him, It also seemed like before the Millennium group took the case, Frank and Giebelhouse were at a dead stop with it. It was Watts who was able to point out the DNA nucleotides from what Frank wrote from a quick transcrpition.

In hindsight, this did seem like a good episode arc-wise, in that it pulled Frank closer to the group, as they did not "Walk away."

I did always wonder if $10,000 was the average consulting fee, or if the Group gave Frank more after he told Peter about his financial woes. Maybe Frank took offense to the possible overpayment when he ripped up the check?

[ethsnafu]

Now my take on the cheque is something entirely different. I always felt he simply felt sullied but the case and rejected the cheque as he didn't want to gain from what had transpired. The end of the episode is very inclusive. Despite Peter stating that no-one was walking away they didn't actually achieve a great deal of closure as a gift-less Frank is evidently none the wiser as to what the bigger picture was and there were definite hints that the conspiracy, whatever it may be, would continue. I guess it was a sense that there were no victories won in that battle that made Frank question whether to receive payment for his involvement in it. I always assumed it was a rejection of payment on moral grounds.

Eth

[IHaveGoodInstincts]

Yes, I do like your "cheque theory" better, though I'm still curious if that's and average Millennium Group consultation fee!

Frank is definitely a "high road" guy!

Frank was even physically alone at the end after Peter walked away to leave.

That last crank call was quite the "stinger," combined with the lack of resolution and that wonderfully creepy Mark Snow music!

[ethsnafu]

You sure like that smiley don't you. https://www.millennium-thisiswhoweare.net/tiwwa/uploads/emoticons/default_whistling.gif' alt=':whistling:'> <- then again I rather like this one.

With "Sense and Antisense", I have always found it to be a very enjoyable episode I just wish it had meshed with the rest of the show a little better. I think it was a missed opportunity to not imply in the episode or in the season's resolution that what was occurring here was somehow tied into Marburg. In my fan-fiction-musings I make that connection as it seems logical but the show itself does not.

The sense that there is a conspiracy here without actually elaborating who is responsible for the conspiracy or why is the only short-comings of the episode that I can see.

Eth