Ice is one of my all-time favorite episodes of television ever. It features some great guest stars in Felicity Huffman, Xander Berkeley, Jeff Kober, and Steve Hytner. Xander Berkeley would later go on to star in 24 with Keifer Sutherland. Felicity Huffman would go on receive an Oscar nomination for Transamerica and star in Desperate Housewives. Jeff Kober had roles on Sons of Anarchy, The Walking Dead, and bit roles on countless other shows.
Series creator Chris Carter drew inspiration for this episode from an article he read about an evacuation in Greenland, and also from the novella Who Goes There? by John W. Campbell. The novella also served as inspiration for The Thing from Another World and John Carpenter’s The Thing. Those same horror and sci-fi elements are very present in this episode. It’s in a remote location. It’s cold. And there is no escape so their survival depends on each other. There is no rescue.
Mulder and Scully travel to a remote scientific facility in Alaska to investigate the mysterious deaths of the crew. They find that the crew found a parasitic lifeform in the ice they were coring. After a storm strands them until it passes, they are in a race against the clock to figure out how the parasite infects humans and which of them are infected. The situation devolves quickly into finger pointing and accusations with trust eroding away even between Mulder and Scully.
When they manage to kill the parasite infecting on of their own group and they are rescued when the storm ends, Mulder is loathed to discover that his own government torched the facility, thus destroying any evidence that the parasite existed. Something that shouldn’t surprise him, but is no less disappointing for the fact that it happened.
This episode not only puts Scully’s scientific and medical education at the forefront of who she is for she needs it to survive the situation, it also shows the worst parts of human nature. The parasite, believed by Mulder to be alien in nature, causes the host to become violent and clouds their judgement so they are unable to think logically or trust those around them. With one infected person among them, it does not take long for the rest of the group do act that way as well. Herd mentality at its worst, exasperated by an inescapable claustrophobic setting.
There was a point in the mid 90s when the show was so wildly popular that Fox released some of the better episodes on VHS, two episodes per tape. During an era when steaming did not yet exist and missing an episode meant hoping it aired in reruns later on, having some of these episodes on tape was a glorious luxury. This was also the first series I remember being available like that. Now, you can just get a whole series on disc or stream it somewhere, but in 1994, having some episodes on VHS without commercials was truly a luxury.
Ice was one of the many episodes I owned. It shared the VHS tape with Darkness Falls which aired later in the season. Two brilliant creature feature type episodes that required surviving in an unforgiving environment that I watched more times than I can count as a teen. True X-Files outside of the larger conspiracies. It was episodes like this that made me love the show.
Until next week, the truth is out there.
Discover more from Becky Tyler Art and Photography
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Becky Tyler Art and Photography 
Ice is one of my all-time favorite episodes of television ever. It features some great guest stars in Felicity Huffman, Xander Berkeley, Jeff Kober, and Steve Hytner. Xander Berkeley would later go on to star in 24 with Keifer Sutherland. Felicity Huffman would go on receive an Oscar nomination for Transamerica and star in Desperate Housewives. Jeff Kober had roles on Sons of Anarchy, The Walking Dead, and bit roles on countless other shows.
Series creator Chris Carter drew inspiration for this episode from an article he read about an evacuation in Greenland, and also from the novella Who Goes There? by John W. Campbell. The novella also served as inspiration for The Thing from Another World and John Carpenter’s The Thing. Those same horror and sci-fi elements are very present in this episode. It’s in a remote location. It’s cold. And there is no escape so their survival depends on each other. There is no rescue.
Mulder and Scully travel to a remote scientific facility in Alaska to investigate the mysterious deaths of the crew. They find that the crew found a parasitic lifeform in the ice they were coring. After a storm strands them until it passes, they are in a race against the clock to figure out how the parasite infects humans and which of them are infected. The situation devolves quickly into finger pointing and accusations with trust eroding away even between Mulder and Scully.
When they manage to kill the parasite infecting on of their own group and they are rescued when the storm ends, Mulder is loathed to discover that his own government torched the facility, thus destroying any evidence that the parasite existed. Something that shouldn’t surprise him, but is no less disappointing for the fact that it happened.
This episode not only puts Scully’s scientific and medical education at the forefront of who she is for she needs it to survive the situation, it also shows the worst parts of human nature. The parasite, believed by Mulder to be alien in nature, causes the host to become violent and clouds their judgement so they are unable to think logically or trust those around them. With one infected person among them, it does not take long for the rest of the group do act that way as well. Herd mentality at its worst, exasperated by an inescapable claustrophobic setting.
There was a point in the mid 90s when the show was so wildly popular that Fox released some of the better episodes on VHS, two episodes per tape. During an era when steaming did not yet exist and missing an episode meant hoping it aired in reruns later on, having some of these episodes on tape was a glorious luxury. This was also the first series I remember being available like that. Now, you can just get a whole series on disc or stream it somewhere, but in 1994, having some episodes on VHS without commercials was truly a luxury.
Ice was one of the many episodes I owned. It shared the VHS tape with Darkness Falls which aired later in the season. Two brilliant creature feature type episodes that required surviving in an unforgiving environment that I watched more times than I can count as a teen. True X-Files outside of the larger conspiracies. It was episodes like this that made me love the show.
Until next week, the truth is out there.
Discover more from Becky Tyler Art and Photography
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Share this: