Entertainment
The Best X-Files Episode Completely Changed The Show
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Every X-Files fan has a favorite episode, from darkly whimsical one-offs like “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose” to iconic mythology stories such as the Anasazi trilogy. Personally, my favorite has always been “One Breath,” which returns the abducted Scully to Mulder, deepening their relationship and giving the show a heretofore unseen spiritual side. It turns out that was completely intentional: the episode writers had feared that The X-Files was becoming overly bleak, so they went out of their way to create a story in which the paranormal served as a source of comfort and strength.
Like many of the best early X-Files episodes, “One Breath” was scripted by the writing duo of Glen Morgan and James Wong, and Morgan was quoted in X-Files Confidential as believing that the show had become too dark: “The show had been so dark and bleak, and Jim and I feel that there is a side to the paranormal that’s very hopeful,” he said. With “One Breath,” the writers “wanted to do that side of it.”
The Softer Side Of The Supernatural
How did the episode portray the softer side of the supernatural? Previously, Agent Scully had been kidnapped, first by a mentally ill man named Duane Barry and second by, seemingly, aliens. In “One Breath,” she suddenly reappears in a hospital, with Cigarette Smoking Man later taking the credit for returning Scully to Mulder because he likes them both. But it’s unclear if Scully will ever wake up from her coma, and she (as a medical doctor) left in her will very specific instructions to remove her from life support if she ever ended up in such a condition.
Mulder and Scully’s family (her mother and sister) are understandably worried about Scully because it looks like she might never wake up, and the doctors will soon be legally forced to pull the plug. This evokes very different reactions among her loved ones: Mulder becomes obsessed with finding and killing the people who abducted his partner, while Scully’s hippie sister (she’s into all things mystical) thinks he just needs to spend time with Scully. This culminates in a scene where she encourages him to visit a seemingly dying Scully, but Mulder is in the midst of an active plan to ambush and kill Scully’s kidnappers.
Mulder Vs. Mysticism
In an effort to convince him to go see Scully, she drops some very New Age wisdom: she tells him that “I don’t have to be psychic to see you’re in a very dark place…willingly walking deeper into darkness cannot help her at all.” She starts to say “Only the light” before Mulder interrupts, telling her, “Enough with the harmonic convergence crap…you’re not saying anything to me.”
That’s when Melissa Scully gets fairly blunt, telling Mulder to “drop your cynicism and your paranoia and your defeat.” After this, she tells him something that writer Glen Morgan considered the most important line in the episode. “Just because the belief is positive and good doesn’t make it silly or trite.”
The Woman Who Taught Hope To Mulder
After these and a few choice other words (“I expect more from you…Dana expects more”), she leaves, and Mulder ultimately abandons his revenge plan in order to visit Scully in the hospital. This was always an emotionally moving scene, but knowing that the writers fully endorsed Scully’s New Age sister changes everything. After all, X-Files writers typically script most of the show from Mulder’s perspective, and he has embraced cynical paranoia as a way of simply surviving in a world where shadowy government forces can and often do try to kill him whenever his crusade to uncover the truth becomes inconvenient.
This paranoia is so baked into Mulder’s personality (and, accordingly, the show’s DNA) that it is part of arguably The X-Files’ most famous catchphrase: “trust no one.” Notably, “One Breath” writers Glen Morgan and James Wong played a major role in the show’s bleak paranoia by writing seminal early episodes like “E.B.E.” (where Mulder’s government ally Deep Throat lies to him to protect a major coverup involving a hunt for an alien) and “Little Green Men” (in which a senator sends Mulder to a Puerto Rican SETI station, where he is nearly killed by both an alien presence and a military artworks squad).
Mulder Gives Scully A Hand
That bleakness never truly went away, either, as they later wrote the controversial Season 4 masterpiece “Home,” where inbred hillbillies with a mommy fixation terrorize small-town America. But for one brief, shining moment in Season 2, they presented a different perspective: that paranormal phenomena could be a force for good and that the only way to cure depressive paranoia is earnest and unshamed love. Mulder chooses love over revenge, holding Scully’s hand and talking to her throughout the night. She miraculously wakes up the next day, with medical science unable to explain how she managed such an inexplicable recovery.
Admittedly, Beatles-like message (all you need is love!) is very different from the rest of the series, and one that wouldn’t really survive past this episode. But iconic X-Files scribes Glen Morgan and James Wong used “One Breath” to teach Mulder a very necessary lesson: the truth he is relentlessly seeking has been right in front of him the entire time. That truth is his love for Scully, something that would always be enough to save both of them, even when (especially when) all hope seems lost.
Entertainment
Super Bowl LX performers: Who is singing the anthems
The Super Bowl LX halftime show featuring Bad Bunny and the Super Bowl pre-show featuring Green Day may be taking up all the attention when it comes to Super Bowl performances — and rightfully so! Everyone is looking forward to what the internationally known artists will do or say regarding President Trump and ICE.
However, other musical artists are performing at this year’s Super Bowl as well.
Charlie Puth to sing national anthem
Kicking the show off with the U.S. national anthem “The Star-Spangled Banner” is the Grammy-nominated singer Charlie Puth. Puth’s debut single, “Marvin Gaye,” featuring Meghan Trainor, was a Billboard chart hit upon its 2015 release. Puth has since had other hits, including “We Don’t Talk Anymore (feat. Selena Gomez),” “Attention,” and “Nothing But Trouble.”
Mashable Top Stories
Brandi Carlile to perform patriotic song
Next up, singing “America the Beautiful” is singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile. Carlile has a whopping 11 Grammys and two Emmy awards. Her biggest hit was 2007’s “The Story,” but she is also known for songs like “Broken Horses” and “The Joke.”
Coco Jones to sing Black national anthem
Grammy Award-winning R&B artist Coco Jones will sing “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” also known as the Black national anthem. “Lift Every Voice and Sing” has become a Super Bowl staple since 2021, when Alicia Keys performed it at the event. Singer and actress Ledisi performed the song at last year’s game.
Entertainment
How A Star Wars Set Malfunction Caused A Cast Member To Meet Jesus
By Chris Snellgrove
| Updated
Would you believe that arguably the most recognizable figure in the entire Star Wars franchise once ran into Jesus? This was no Jedi, although it’s admittedly fun to imagine what the Son of God might have had to say to someone else who could come back from the dead as a powerful ghost. No, the Star Wars character in question was R2-D2, and he had an accidental meeting with the divine when a remote control malfunction sent him to the set of Franco Zeffirelli’s Jesus of Nazareth tv movie!
A long time ago (1977, to be precise), in a desert far, far away (Tunisia), two very different filmmakers were working on two very different projects. Franco Zeffirelli (best known for his Oscar-nominated Romeo and Juliet) was working on Jesus of Nazareth, which blended the four Gospels of the biblical New Testament into a single TV movie. Meanwhile, fresh off the success of American Graffiti, rebel filmmaker George Lucas was working on Star Wars, a movie that would effectively define his life while reshaping pop culture history as we know it.
Meeting The Maker
Aside from the involvement of James Earl Jones, these projects didn’t have much in common, and Lucas and Zeffirelli generally stayed out of each other’s way despite their sets neighboring one another. That all changed thanks to a scene requiring R2-D2 to be piloted using a remote control. While actor Kenny Baker was often inside the droid for scenes where R2 had to stay relatively still, there were some scenes in which George Lucas simply needed to move the little astromech from Point A to Point B.
In this case, Lucas intended for R2-D2 to exit a scene by rolling out from behind a sand dune. To do this, they intended to use a remote control, but the unit malfunctioned. Therefore, instead of stopping where the filmmakers intended, R2 just kept going until (as if guided by a higher power) he ended up on the set of Zeffirelli’s Jesus of Nazareth.
Fortunately, the runaway astromech didn’t cause any damage to the set of the Jesus TV movie, something that we can only assume would be some kind of sin. These days, the whole incident has become a bit of amusing trivia for Star Wars fans to share among themselves. At the time, though, R2 encountering a savior from heaven was just one more reason that filming this sci-fi blockbuster had become a living hell.
When Droids Move In Mysterious Ways
Reportedly, this is one of many incidents in which the droids weren’t doing exactly what the filmmakers needed them to do. On top of that, the droids were powered by exotic batteries that were hard to replace, and those batteries were soon drained in the hot Tunisian sun. Making matters worse, the truck storing R2-D2 and other droids once caught fire, damaging valuable props and costing George Lucas money he couldn’t really afford to spend.
Fortunately, it all worked out: after all these onset issues, Star Wars became one of the most successful films ever made. There are many reasons for this, including its perfect cast, killer effects, and charming story. However, we can’t discount the possibility that the movie’s success is a product of divine intervention; after all, his excursion to meet Jesus proves R2-D2 is a droid with friends in very high places!
Entertainment
Who is the Super Bowls Black national anthem singer Coco Jones?
“Lift Every Voice and Sing,” also known as the Black national anthem, has been sung at every Super Bowl since 2021, when Alicia Keys performed the song.
This year, at Super Bowl LX, Coco Jones will perform “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”
So, who is Coco Jones?
Mashable Top Stories
Coco Jones is a Grammy Award-winning R&B artist. In 2024, she was nominated for 5 Grammys and won one award for Best R&B Performance for her platinum-certified song “ICU.” She earned two more Grammy nominations in 2025 and was nominated for Best R&B Album at this year’s award show.
The artist’s father, Mike Jones, is a former pro football player. Jones was an NFL linebacker who played for the New England Patriots, St. Louis Rams, and Tennessee Titans.
If you’re not familiar with Coco Jones as an R&B artist, she might look familiar to you if you watched the Peacock series Bel-Air. Jones is the actor who played Hillary Banks on the drama that reimagined the Will Smith sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. As a child actor, she was also a well-known Disney Channel star, appearing in So Random!, Good Luck Charlie, and the Disney Channel Original Movie Let It Shine.
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Super Bowl LX performers: Who is singing the anthems
