The X-Files Stars Agree On The Worst Episode
Every single series, no matter how good it may be, has a few bad episodes, but it’s often that the show’s stars will agree on which one is the absolute worst of the worst. That’s what makes The X-Files episode “Teso Dos Bichos” so amazing, as, for decades, both David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson have been using that as their go-to answer whenever fans ask. It’s completely understandable why this Season 3 Monster of the Week episode is hated; after all, how can a normal house cat be scary?
A Monster Of The Week With The Worst Monster Ever
The X-Files Monster of the Week episodes are usually more hit than miss, with some of the show’s best episodes following that format, including “Post-Modern Prometheus” and “Beyond the Sea,” but “Teso Dos Bichos” didn’t get to benefit from a great villain. The episode starts off in South America, where an urn is unearthed in Ecuador, and the archeologist who wants to take it dies from an attack by a mystical jaguar in the dead of the night.
Attack Of The Adorable Apex Predator
Agents Fox Mulder (Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Anderson) get involved when the killings continue in Boston, though they disagree on the cause, and if you’ve seen any episode of The X-Files, the disagreement in “Teso Dos Bichos” won’t surprise you at all. The surviving archaeologist is pegged as the culprit, but then he vanishes from a room with only one door, having been dragged into a grate leading to the sewers. That’s when Mulder and Scully are attacked by adorable house cats, the least convincing sci-fi monsters of all time.
Under attack from the feral cats, Mulder and Scully flee for their lives, barely escaping the Boston sewers before being….adorably licked to death? Forced to endure cute biscuit-making for hours? Unlike most dark and intense Monster of the Week episodes, The X-Files was unable to make the feline performers involved in “Teso Dos Bichos” fearsome, and even while filming, everyone on set knew this was going to be a disaster.
The Director Knew The Mission Was Impossible
In the 1995 book The Truth Is Out There: The Official Guide To The X-Files by Brian Lowry and series creator Chris Carter, it’s noted that Kim Manners, director of “Teso Dos Bichos,” wanted to change the monsters to the jaguar cat spirit from the opening, stating, quite accurately, that “I’m never going to make these cats scary.” In addition, the amount of rewrites resulted in so many color-coded scripts getting handed out that it looped back around to the color salmon again.
Anderosn And Duchovny Hate This Episode
Worst of all, is that Gillian Anderson has a legit allergy to cats, which made filming the final act of the episode very difficult. To commemorate the end of production, David Duchovny had t-shirts made for all of The X-Files cast and crew that read “Teso Dos Bichos Survivor.” The experience was so horrible, and the episode is considered to be so bad that the pair even made fun of it while promoting the revival series.
Still Making Fun Of It Decades Later
On Kumail Nanjhinai’s The X-Files Files podcast, Anderson and Duchovny are still mocking “Teso Dos Bichos” over 20 years after it aired. It’s noted that while the final attack looks ridiculous, it was originally going to be a horde of cats, but as they are, in fact, cats, none wanted to perform on camera. There are other horrible episodes out there, but there’s only the one that both stars are still making fun of today.
