At one point a character comments that it’s been seven years since the last smallpox outbreak. In fact, at the time this episode aired, smallpox had been eradicated for 20 years. There it is: the one time I’m going to be bugged by a factual error on the X-Files.
Releasing smallpox at an elementary school may be the Conspiracy’s biggest dick move in the entire series. And now there are probably hippie parents out here in Berkeley trying to do the exact same thing.
Want the original art for this strip?
Are you sure it’s not “entomologist” ?
Mulder is referring to ANTONIO SMITH, FORENSIC LINGUIST!
Apparently this ep was filmed 13 years before it aired.
Like many of the Conspiracy’s double blind agents, those bees truly did need a dose of SKINNER’S FIST.
Hi Shaenon,
I’d love to buy this strip, but the ‘buy now’ button doesn’t seem to link anywhere. Is this a bug, or am I too late? 🙂
It’s fulla bees, of *course* it’s a bug.
Or someone else already beat you to it?
Woo! Skinner is fully prepared to beat up that whole swarm!
One at a time, BEE BY BEE.
Hooray for Eddie Izzard references!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hx2NCday924
why…is that YOU…MISS COVARRUBIAS….?!?!? 😉
Oh… bee-hive yourself!!
I love the Simpsons reference -> Mulders stolen ID 🙂 hilarious!
I was just about to comment on that! That episode also remains one of the greatest Simpsons parody moments EVER.
Smug Cancer Man is seriously making my day.
One of the people in my online X-Files watching club is a bee expert. Watching this episode with her was great!
Damn that handsome bastard!
Loved everything about Skinner in this strip…punching every bee in the face! Also how often can you say “awesome bee murder”?
Love this strip but you left out the best part-Skinner undressed!!!!!!
You get to draw swarms of bees pretty often… I wonder if *this* swarm has a Plan Bee?
Now, now. Unless they are in the habit of breaking into CDC labs, the hippies will only be unleashing measles, whooping cough, influenza, etc.
I can’t remember, is Mulder’s entomologist friend the same lady from the weird cockroaches episode?
Also: Is it just me, or are there a lot of weird bug episodes? Weird cockroaches. Weird bees. Different weird bees. Just watched one about weird tobacco beetles the other day. Bugs, fungus and unusual bodily substance vampires.
You forgot MIIIIIIIITES!
I think that probably just lots of people think insects are creepy, so it’s kind of a go-to thing for a horror-tinged TV series. Sort of like how the new Dr Who keeps going back to the ‘little kids are creepy’ well.
In ‘War of the Coprophages’, the entomologist is Dr. Bambi Berenbaum, but I think you might have been thinking of the roboticist who makes insect-like robots. The Internet informs me that that character was named Dr. Alexander Ivanov and was played by Ken Kramer. The guy in Zero Sum episode is named Dr. Peter Valdespino and is played by Allan Gray, so it’s two different people.
I was going to say that it would have been nice to have a little cameo for Dr. Bambi in this episode, but then I realized that that was tantamount to wishing that she would get stung to death by bees, so never mind.
heh, I initially read that as “Dr. Peter Valdespino and is played by Alien Grey“
The thing I remembered most from this episode was the beginning where the bees attack the woman in the restroom while she was having a smoke break. It was almost like a PSA- “Don’t smoke or the killer bees will get you!”
That aside, this comic made much more sense than the episode did (I thought). Probably thanks to handy cross-referencing. I forgot that Marita and Skinner basically teamed up, but now I have to rewatch it to jog my memory…
That’s a nice ID photo Skinner’s got. Heh.
Oh, and I forgot to say I was always annoyed that the smallpox bees in this episode turned into alien virus bees later on. Were they the same bees and just retconned or what?
No, they had smallpox before, but then they got enough bee experience to level up and unlock the alien virus upgrade.
Bees who are just starting out only get to spread irritable bowl syndrome.
Beekeepers use tobacco smoke to calm the bees, she obviously wasn’t smoking nearly enough cigarettes at once.