Note: this review was written after watching all the episodes
"The Jersey" devil is the second monster-of-the-week episode but unlike its predecessor "Squeeze", this one deals with very little paranormal elements and is significantly less scary in tone. It deals with Mulder trying to resolve the case surrounding the mysterious predator in the woods which appears to be human by nature.
Despite the scary opening scene where a father gets snatched by an unseen feral creature, the episode soon loses its horror tone and goes on a more complex and realistic route as the predator slowly starts to unveil its nature as a feral human who lives in the forest and behaves like an animal. And at the same time, the local police is hunting the unseen predator as an animal with intention of shooting it on sight. The main story thread starts to spin around the idea how people have animalistic nature, regardless of how developed and civilized they are, and the creature soon becomes the "protagonist" of the story while the police serves as antagonist.
While this approach to the story is very realistic, the episode lost the suspense in my case as hunting a feral human being was not particularly gripping. The creature itself is not really involved in the story itself and it barely appears on screen, resulting in very little horror atmosphere and scary scenes overall. The only moment when the story seemed to include a bit of a twist and suspense is when Mulder finds out they're hunting a feral woman and that they may have had offspring. The whole story regarding "the Jersey devil" resolves in a way that after Mulder's close encounter with this feral woman the Police hunt down and kill her, having killed a feral man years before, and Mulder is visibly sad by her death. For me personally, turning initially very dangerous creature into something so harmless felt very flat and totally removed a horror element from the story
A significant portion of the story is also focused on Scully's private life, including an attempt of a date, and I personally found this part very distracting and out of place. I get that the writers were trying to flesh out both characters but for a show built on a horror premise, I feel they should stick to the path itself and not wander off with these casual day to day life scenes.
To conclude this, "The Jersey Devil" is one of the weakest S1 episodes for me. The story is very dull and lacks the suspense and horror the previous episodes built up, making it a very uninteresting episode. I get the writers wanted to deliver more deep message with this episode, but for me personally, it felt very flat and so non-TXF-like. So my final verdict for this episode is 6/10.
"The Jersey" devil is the second monster-of-the-week episode but unlike its predecessor "Squeeze", this one deals with very little paranormal elements and is significantly less scary in tone. It deals with Mulder trying to resolve the case surrounding the mysterious predator in the woods which appears to be human by nature.
Despite the scary opening scene where a father gets snatched by an unseen feral creature, the episode soon loses its horror tone and goes on a more complex and realistic route as the predator slowly starts to unveil its nature as a feral human who lives in the forest and behaves like an animal. And at the same time, the local police is hunting the unseen predator as an animal with intention of shooting it on sight. The main story thread starts to spin around the idea how people have animalistic nature, regardless of how developed and civilized they are, and the creature soon becomes the "protagonist" of the story while the police serves as antagonist.
While this approach to the story is very realistic, the episode lost the suspense in my case as hunting a feral human being was not particularly gripping. The creature itself is not really involved in the story itself and it barely appears on screen, resulting in very little horror atmosphere and scary scenes overall. The only moment when the story seemed to include a bit of a twist and suspense is when Mulder finds out they're hunting a feral woman and that they may have had offspring. The whole story regarding "the Jersey devil" resolves in a way that after Mulder's close encounter with this feral woman the Police hunt down and kill her, having killed a feral man years before, and Mulder is visibly sad by her death. For me personally, turning initially very dangerous creature into something so harmless felt very flat and totally removed a horror element from the story
A significant portion of the story is also focused on Scully's private life, including an attempt of a date, and I personally found this part very distracting and out of place. I get that the writers were trying to flesh out both characters but for a show built on a horror premise, I feel they should stick to the path itself and not wander off with these casual day to day life scenes.
To conclude this, "The Jersey Devil" is one of the weakest S1 episodes for me. The story is very dull and lacks the suspense and horror the previous episodes built up, making it a very uninteresting episode. I get the writers wanted to deliver more deep message with this episode, but for me personally, it felt very flat and so non-TXF-like. So my final verdict for this episode is 6/10.