The X-files
Sanguinarium
Episode: 4X06
First aired:11/10/96
Written by:Vivian Mayhew and Valerie Mayhew
Directed by:Kim Manners
This is a
creepy episode about plastic surgery gone bad...
At the Aesthetic Surgery Unit of
Chicago's Greenwood, one patient
thought to be undergoing a
scalp-reduction dies a
grisly death, when Dr. Lloyd
goes
insane during
surgery and performs a violent
liposuction instead...and literally
sucks the life
blood out of the man.
Scully and
Mulder are called in to investigate the doctor's unusual defense:
demonic
possession. Scully logically assumes the doctor's
sleeping pill addiction caused a
psychotic break. When Mulder discovers evidence of a
pentagram--an occult symbol of
protection-- on the floor of the operating room, he concludes that some kind of magic is
at work. Scully is
dubious. Another surgeon goes into an
uncontrollable
frenzy, using a laser to burn through the flesh of a patient's face . Mulder discovers the
mark of the pentagram on this body as well -- placed there by Nurse Waite, a
practicing
witch.
Dr. Franklyn admits that Nurse Waite worked at the
clinic ten years earlier when similar
deaths had occurred. Scully and Mulder search her house, finding a
spooky den of
candles,
incense, herbs and witchy objects. But Nurse Waite is gone. She's lying in wait
for Dr. Franklin; submerged in a tub full of gore in his bathroom. Her sneak knife attack
fails, and she's
arrested.
Before Nurse Waite can explain herself to Mulder, she dies
horribly, in what Mulder
recognizes from Nurse Waite's occult books as a classic case of death by
hex.
Mulder believes that Waite was trying to protect the patients. We see Dr. Franklyn
levitate a few feet above his bed.
Putting all the clues together, Mulder deduces that Franklyn is a
black magician. Cursed
with the sin of
vanity, Franklyn transforms his looks beyond the limits of surgery: using
sorcery and
human sacrifice. Ten years ago, he had escaped suspicion. Today, he
manages to escape even Mulder. Mulder is too late to stop the final sacrifice that
completes the spell. Dr. Franklyn slices off his own face, to
disappear again.
Franklyn, now Dr. Hartman is welcomed aboard at a
Los Angeles cosmetic surgery clinic.
Important quotes:
Scully -- "Well, if it’s that simple, why don’t you put out an
APB for someone riding a broom and wearing a tall black hat?"
Mulder -- "You
jest, Scully, but there’s a good chance that this hex or ritual or whatever it is, may not be finished."
Mulder -- "
Probable cause."
Scully -- "On the suspicion of being a witch?"
Scully -- "What could she have been doing in here?"
Mulder -- "Probably not
tax returns."
Mulder -- "Well, according to this book people throughout history have coughed up all kinds of things from
cue balls to
butcher’s knives without any explanation of how they got there."
Mulder -- "
Everybody wants to be beautiful, Scully."
Back to The X-files: Season 4