“Jump the Shark” is episode fifteen of season nine of The X-Files.
The episode starts with Morris Fletcher narrating about how, once upon a time, there were three geeks, unlikely heroes. The Lone Gunmen. They hooked up with an FBI agent – Mulder – and began publishing a rag that pointed figures at powerful evil forces. And some not so evil – Fletcher. They fought the good fight and, for a brief time, it looked like they might actually make a difference. They had an intern who believed in them – Morris has moved onto The Lone Gunmen series – a powerful and beautiful nemesis who became an ally. The world is not always kind to idealists and those who fight the good fight don’t always win.
Morris is on a boat in the Bahamas with a young woman who isn’t wearing much. Morris is claiming he named the Bermuda Triangle in his former life, before he went private. There’s a lot he can’t talk about; national security and all that. Then another boat arrives. Men with guns take the woman, pour petrol on Morris’s boat and one tells Morris that he’s fired. They leave, throwing a flare, and Morris jumps overboard as his boat explodes. A paper showing a classic flying saucer floats on the water.
Doggett and Reyes arrive at the US Coast Guard Base in Miami Beach and meet Morris. He requested them by name. Morris wants to offer them something. He used to work at Area 51; he was a Man in Black (the movie contains many inaccuracies). They heard about his boat; his female companion told them. Morris says they didn’t kill… Reyes tells him Brittany. Morris wants to share secrets. Reyes asks if the UFO plans are indicative of the secrets. Because it’s the Jupiter 2 from Lost in Space. Morris admits those are rubbish; he wanted a free cruise to the Bahamas and told his employer he knew where a UFO went down. They start to leave. Then Morris mentions super soldiers. He knows where they can find one. Not he; she.
Doggett and Reyes arrive at The Lone Gunmen’s rather sparse-looking place; most of their stuff is gone. They want help tracking a super soldier. A woman. They know who she is; Yves Adele Harlow. A fellow hacker who disappeared a year ago. They don’t believe she’s a super soldier. Morris says this is pointless. He’s recognised, from “All About Yves”, and Frohike goes for him. Morris is a scam artist and he abducted Yves.
At Hartwell College in New Jersey, Yves enters the office of a Professor Houghton. She shoots him with something. A colleague comes in later, and sees the window open and Yves running off. Houghton has had his chest carved open.
The Lone Gunmen are trying to find Yves and Morris is being unhelpful. He finally suggests that it would be easier if they used her real name, Lois Runce. There’s a knock and Byers says that’s their secret door. Nobody knows about that door. It’s their intern, Jimmy. He’s been all over the world. Most recently, New Jersey.
Jimmy knows Yves’ real name is Lois Runce. Morris is happy he was proved right. Then surprised that Jimmy was following her all over the world.; he’s lucky to be alive and why did the others send him? They didn’t; they tried to talk Jimmy out of going. Jimmy also wishes they had. He traced Lois to a college and thinks she murdered someone.
Yves – Lois – is at a furnace. She puts a respirator on before taking out a plastic bag containing something she presumably carved out of Houghton. It almost looks to be glowing. She throws it into the furnace. And says that’s one down.
Evidently, Houghton had something inside him that Yves believes to be dangerous. And there’s more than one of it. The Lone Gunmen need to find her, and find out what’s going on.
Just as “Millennium” worked as a finale for the cancelled Millennium, this works as the finale for the also-cancelled The Lone Gunmen, though it does a better job. It isn’t impossible to watch this without having seen The Lone Gunmen, but it would certainly help to have seen that series.