| "2Shy" | |||
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| The X-Files episode | |||
Virgil Incanto following his imprisoning. |
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| Episode no. | Season 3 Episode 6 |
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| Directed by | David Nutter | ||
| Written by | Jeff Vlaming | ||
| Production code | 3X06 | ||
| Original air date | November 3, 1995 | ||
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| List of season 3 episodes List of The X-Files episodes |
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"2Shy" is the sixth episode of the third season of the American science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered on the Fox network on November 3, 1995. It was written by Jeff Vlaming, directed by David Nutter, and featured guest appearances by Timothy Carhart and James Handy. The episode is a "Monster-of-the-Week" story, a stand-alone plot which is unconnected to the series' wider mythology.
A spate of "lonely hearts" murders targeting overweight women leads FBI Special Agents Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) and Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) to discover a mutant killer who is extracting the body fat from his victims after seducing them over online chat rooms.
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The killer, Virgil Incanto, is a freelance writer who translates between Italian and English and is extremely knowledgeable in classical Italian literature. In addition to meeting victims through the internet, he also kills his landlady (whose blind daughter is able to sense this and report to 911), a prostitute after a failed date, one of the local policemen, and attempts to kill Scully. Mulder and Scully determine these killings are far from ordinary by the presence of a strange substance coating the victims, a substance which seems to digest most body tissue other than fats.
"2Shy" was written by Jeff Vlaming, who had previously worked for the series Weird Science. Vlaming's only other writing credits for the series was the later third season episode "Hell Money".[1] He had initially pitched the idea of a mutant who fed on body oils, which was eventually changed to body fats. The presentation of the character Virgil Incanto also went through several permutations, initially conceived as a creepy Phantom of the Opera-like recluse, and as a butcher who would be able to cut the fat from his victims, before the final "fairly normal-looking" version was decided upon.[2]
Director David Nutter made sure that the episode contained several visceral moments, after the popularity of the "Flukeman" character in the earlier episode "The Host".[2] Frank Spotnitz, the series' story editor, was initially wary of the concept as he felt it might be seen as offensive, but changed his mind when series creator Chris Carter convinced him the episode told "a good story", and was a "fun, old-fashioned sort of X-File".[3]
The episode was primarily filmed in Vancouver's Quebec Street, with two nearby apartment buildings used for interior shots. "2Shy" marked the début of Steve Kiziak as Duchovny's new body double, and while filming a scene in which their character, Mulder, bursts through a door, Kiziak and the other body doubles mistakenly burst through the wrong apartment's door, interrupting the tenant's dinner party.[4]
"2Shy" premiered on the Fox network on November 3, 1995, and was first broadcast in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on February 27, 1997.[5] The episode earned a Nielsen household rating of 10.1 with a 17 share, meaning that roughly 10.1 percent of all television-equipped households, and 17 percent of households watching TV, were tuned in to the episode.[6]
Zack Handlen, writing for The A.V. Club, had mixed feelings about the episode, ultimately rating it a B-. He felt that the character of Virgil Incanto was "wonderfully gross", although he "lacks the universal creepiness" of first season villain Eugene Tooms. Handlen also felt that the episode was let down by the fact that it "takes it as a given that single women are targets", failing to give any real depth to its female characters.[7] An overview of the third season in Entertainment Weekly also rated the episode a B-, and called Incanto a "fine example" of the series' "unassuming" villains, comparing him to Tooms and to the second season villain Donnie Pfaster.[8]
TV Guide listed Incanto among the scariest X-Files monsters,[9] whilst UGO Networks listed the character as one of their best "Monster-of-the-Week" in the series, saying Scully's "pure revulsion at Incanto's instinctual need makes for one of The X-Files' finest final scenes".[10]