The X-Files (TV Series) Hollywood A.D. (2000) User Reviews

Jehovah's Witness meets Harrison Ford's "Witness"

[Muldernscully · 7/10 · 14 July 2007]

Hollywood A.D., written and directed by David Duchovny is a mixed bag. The episode is really fun to view and you can tell the cast is having a fun time. However, the writing and story is a little uneven and the episode suffers for it.

It's interesting to see Wayne Federman compare Scully to Jodie Foster, since many fans feel that the character of Scully was inspired by Jodie Foster's character from "Silence of the Lambs". Assistant Director Skinner finally receives a nickname in the series, being called 'Skinman' by his college buddy Wayne Federman.

If you are a little young and didn't get the Micah Hoffman reference, I'll explain it to you. The character of Micah Hoffman is based on a real person back in 1980's Utah named Mark Hoffman who was a forger of historic Mormon religious documents and bomb maker. Even though the case is not an x-file, Skinner sends Mulder and Scully to investigate it while Wayne Federman tags along to observe them.

The dancing skeleton that Federman sees is silly and is really out of place. Then, later, Scully has hallucinations of Micah Hoffman on the cross instead of Jesus and on the autopsy table. It is never really explained why she had the hallucinations and how it connects to the story.

After Mulder and Scully apparently resolve the forgery and bombing case, the rest of the episode is spent with them in Los Angeles, seeing the production of the movie "loosely" based on them. The episode is quite funny and enjoyable here as Mulder and Scully meet Garry Shandling and Tea Leoni who are the actors playing them respectively. Of course, Tea Leoni is David Duchovny's real life wife. Garry Shandling bugs me for some inexplicable reason. I think I could see Billy Crystal in that role easily.

The funnest scene is when Mulder, Scully, and Skinner are each taking bubble baths separately and have a humorous conversation with each other over the phone. Also, at the end, after Mulder walks out of the movie, Scully comes to join him on the set and they talk. You get to hear Gillian Anderson's true laugh, a very rare occurrence on the X-Files. It's very cute to hear.

The idea of a movie being made based on Mulder and Scully was very interesting. However, the first 3/4 of the episode involving the case, was a bit convoluted. I wasn't sure whether I should take it serious or if it was supposed to be all funny.

Hollywood A.D. is funny in delving once more into Mulder and Scully's relationship with each other, but had the potential to be more. Anyway, where else can you learn that zombies yearn to do more than just eat people?

A good ghoulish time

[kahurley · 8/10 · 13 January 2007]

With the Syndicate gone and the answer to Mulder's sister's disappearance finally answered, there are many more stand-alone episodes in the series. I've seen a lot of fans dislike Seasons 6 & 7 because of the increase in stand-alones and the increase in the show's humor. Not for me. This episode (directed by Duchovny) is an example of the cast just having a good time. The show doesn't have to be all about aliens, conspiracies, and seriousness all the time. The bubble bath scene alone is priceless! Plus, how many times do we get to see Scully laugh? There are outtakes where they would have to stop shooting for a period of time because Gillian Anderson couldn't stop laughing. All in all, this episode shows the actors in a somewhat different light and it's enjoyable to see.

I am the bearded cow-like sea beast.

[Sanpaco13 · 7/10 · 22 October 2008]

This isn't one of the greatest episodes as far as X-Files go, but if you look at it in more of a David Duchovny "Evolution" sort of a way it works extremely well as a comedy episode. In fact some of my favorite comedic moments of the entire series come from this episode.

The actual story of the episode deals with the "Lazarus Bowl". This is supposedly a bowl which was made in the vicinity of Christ as he told Lazarus to rise from the dead and therefore has in its "element" or something like that the incantation to raise the dead. So I guess the bowl is supposed to have the power to raise the dead? Something like that. I think if I paid really close attention to the actual story in the episode I might actually be able to figure out what is going on but the side story of the producer making of movie of the case is a little too distracting and I get completely lost every time.

The cast obviously has a lot of fun on this one and it is fun to watch some of the novetly scenes and in-joke comments like Tea Leoni thinking Mulder is hot and Richard Gere playing Mulder in the movie, etc. I also love the part where they find out what the "words" are that the bowl is "speaking". "I am the bearded cow-like sea beast." Some of the interaction between the characters and the movie maker are fun and the whole movie itself is pretty fun too. Other than that however the episode is confusing and kind of lame. I give it a 7 out of 10.

Beyond swell episode that will keep you up late, thinking.

[lastcathar · 10/10 · 22 August 2010]

This episode will sort of sneak up on you. On its surface, it's just another stand-alone with nary a Morley cigarette in sight. But beneath its soft exterior, the script is an autopsy of the New Testament, carving it open, re-enacting and re-animating the Good Book. The plot is a mirror: we start in a church where faith in life eternal has become just an empty show, and end on the other side of America, on a Hollywood set where, in the closing scene, the dead really are resurrected. Duchovny's sure-handed balancing act as writer and director is impressive. The bubble bath scene, with Skinner, Mulder and Scully, (Father, Son and Holy Spirit?)each soaking in a cloud of bubbles and talking to each other on telephones, is just plain brilliant, and the ghosts arising to dance and (presumably) make love on a Hollywood set after the cameras are gone and the lights are out, just gave me chills. God I wish I could write like that! (I wish I had a bigger flashlight, too!)

Example of my biggest concern for the X-Files

[jzap2288 · 20 July 2013]

This is what i hate about the x files and i love x files but why don't they ever remember relevant memories? They never talk about prior episode memories. You see in Hollywood A.D. when Scully sais "you do know that there aren't real dead people right?" WHAT THE HECK is she talking about? they just dealt with dead people in the 'Millenium' episode this same season 7. SHE WAS ATTACKED by dead people, now shes saying they aren't real, WHY ??? This happens all the time in x files and it pisses me off. Oh and this is all I had to say, but regardless this was a decent episode. I don't mind humorous episodes here and there, i just didn't like Fight club, the very next one which was also a comedy, i felt this show was taking a turn and becoming an unserious, comedy show. It's like they just stopped taking this season seriously and wanted it over with. But it goes out with a bang in the last season 7 episode

The Funniest Moment

[tindalllisa · 7/10 · 11 July 2023]

I honestly laughed out loud at the "running" gag. Yes, pun intended.

When the women stepped away for the running-in-heels workshop, I refocused my attention downstage on the men, who presently got upstaged!

At the first CLOP of the shoes I looked up, and saw "Scully" running left. Noticed the "observing actor" on the phone. Refocused downstage. CLOP CLOP CLOP ... looked back. WTH? Saw her running back. Smiled to myself. (Well, she had to get back somehow.) Refocus. The guys were truly doing Nothing!

Then I heard it again. A second run. All out. The observer still oblivious. I laughed so hard. I think there was still another lap. This was played up for full effect and it worked for me!

Plenty of fun.

[Sleepin_Dragon · 8/10 · 25 September 2022]

Mulder and Scully are investigating an explosion at a Church, but their task is made more complicated by Skinner, who insists that his old college friend, screenwriter Wayne Federman, accompanies them.

It's an absolute riot this one, Hollywood A D. Is a madcap, light hearted, strange, fun episode. Don't expect anything too serious, and I'd suggest not to expect the most cohesive of crimes.

I get the impression that some fun was had in the writing of this episode, plenty of references to pick up on, some from the good book itself, others from more up to date, pop culture.

The guest appearances were great fun, the look on Duchovny's face is a picture throughout. I really did enjoy the presence of Wayne Federman, I wish I knew what hold he had over The Skin Man.

After some horror themed and thriller episodes, this one came as a nice change, I loved the use of humour throughout, the scene of Mulder, Scully and Skinner chatting away in their baths was comedy gold.

So, there are lots of unexplained events, such as the autopsy and appearance at The Church, but who cares.

Great visuals, the film set was nice, but that Church was incredible.

I absolutely loved the final scenes, those Zombies were so cool.

8/10.

"You want my advice? You're both crazy!"

[classicsoncall · 8/10 · 9 August 2017]

So I don't know what's scarier - the fact that Mulder watched "Plan 9 From Outer Space" forty two times, or that Scully recognized the film from the brief clip shown on screen! David Duchovny, who wrote this episode, actually had a field day with the cultural references made throughout the story, with mentions of not only Plan 9, but also Jodie Foster in "Silence of the Lambs", Harrison Ford's "Witness", 'Star Trek' and even "The Greatest Story Ever Told". The best though was when he was introduced to then wife Tea Leoni stating "Nice to meet you. Big fan." You could see the grin on his face when he said it. Obviously he wasn't thinking about future ex-wife Tea Leoni.

Funny, but I watched the episode this morning and it seems the caper out in Hollywood almost had me forget about the business with Micah Hoffman (Paul Lieber), Cardinal O'Fallon (Harris Yulin) and the heretical religious texts. I guess it proves in my case that I have a soft spot for the humorous episodes of The X-Files, or at least those parts of the stories that contain humor. I thought casting additional real life actors to play Scully and Mulder was tactically brilliant, and it's too bad Richard Gere didn't show up to play Skinner. Actually, Mulder was pretty perceptive picking Gere to portray himself. Mentally comparing the two, Gere would have been a good double for Duchovny's character.

And even though there wasn't a whole lot of connection to the story with the zombie dance at the end, I thought that was a pretty nifty touch to end it with. I see a number of reviewers on this board didn't care much for the way this one was handled, but I enjoyed it well enough. The Hollywood portion of the story brought to mind the third season episode 'Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space'', so again, another cultural reference in which the episode wound up referring to the X-Files itself if you think about it. The one scene I'm still struggling with is the bubble bath scene which I know I've seen in another flick, but I just can't seem to recall the name of it. On that, I'll have to get back to you.

"One more pun and I'll pull out my gun"

[Meven_Stoffat · 1/10 · 9 October 2014]

It was Jon Pertwee, the actor who played the third incarnation of The Doctor who coined the popular saying "It's easy to be silly, but it's difficult to actually be funny". And I cannot think of a show where this phrase applies better to than The X-Files. As great as the show is, comedy and The X-Files has very seldom worked well. One of my favourite pieces of TV of all time is the season 5 episode "Bad Blood", a pitch-black comedy episode with tons of post-absurdist humour and off the wall hilarity mainly due to the episode's "he said she said" nature. But that was a one time deal. Watching Mulder and Scully pratfall their way through this episode was about as painful to watch as you'd expect, and not in the good way. Thank god this was the last comedy episode ever in the series, especially seeing as the dreaded "c" word and The X-Files go together like black oil and vodka

I remember it just as clear as day when the advert for the episode aired on ITV. The plot was threadbare enough and the idea of a satire of Hollywood may have seemed like a good idea on paper, but it was wasted with cheap and tasteless gags that simply just did not work at all. In tact, the bath tub phone call scene is without a doubt one of the worst moments in The X Files history and a testament to just how far the show had fallen in the 2000s. And to top it all off we get a painfully unfunny zombie dance sequence at the very end. In a way I guess this episode was to be expected as much of the episodes surrounding it were just dreadful but back then this made my then-7 year old self feel embarrassed to be a fan of the show. And years later it's still painful to watch, maybe even more so than the first time

Why

[treborbasset · 1/10 · 16 June 2021]

The move from Vancouver to LA went very badly for the X-Files. The quality noticeably dropped, the overarching story was mostly forgotten and there very few good episodes. It seems that they ran out of ideas and just keep going for gimmicks.

But every time I think the show has jumped the shark, it just gets worse. First Person Shooter was an embarrassingly bad episode, but the decision to let David Duchovny write a comedy/musical episode, which doesn't have a proper X-Files plot and just features Mulder and Scully messing around, talking in the bath with Skinner, who has seemingly had a personality transplant.

It's astounding how the actors who have played these characters for 7 seasons do not know them, as we saw in the episode Gillian Anderson wrote, but this was even worse. It embarrassingly bad. Utterly shameful that they even made it. Dancing zombies?

Plan 9 From Hollywood

[andyetris · 3/10 · 25 October 2006]

When a '60s radical turns up dead in the crypt of a prominent Catholic it looks like a great basis for a movie to Deputy Director Skinner's old college pal, writer/producer Wayne Federman (as himself.) It's inexplicable weirdness on screen and off as Mulder and Scully try to handle Hollywood and a case that involves a Da-Vinci-coded soup bowl and the dancing dead.

I guess it had to happen - the show about show business. And it is just as awful as you might expect, combining both a self-parodical X-File AND a parody of a Hollywood treatment of the X-Files! Where does this leave viewers? Near the bottom of the unbrakeable slide in quality that is season 7. Once we were on a search for answers, then we were on a search for questions. Now we're just looking for laughs.

In the finale scene, keep your eye peeled for the Chris Carter zombie - the one with tongue THROUGH cheek and skewered in place with a blue pencil. Oh wait, that's not visible on-screen...

What was this?

[bwgmbrfby · 2/10 · 9 March 2024]

It feels a bit silly writing a review for something which aired well over a decade ago but oh well.

This is probably the weakest episode of the X-files in my opinion, I wasn't born when the show originally aired so I've been watching it through with friends and have enjoyed pretty much all of it, even the later seasons, even the comedy episodes and the episodes in LA which were not well received by hardcore fans at the time ect. I didn't really find it offensive to Catholics or anything as some other people have said, I just disliked it for other reasons.

This episode is incomprehensible, maybe it's just "of it's time" but I just did not enjoy it. It begins with Mulder and Scully investigating a bombing at a church while an irritating writer/producer follows them around to gather material, but soon the culprit/victim turns out to be alive and claiming to be Jesus and that plot thread just...fizzles out. They decide to head off to LA to watch the filming of the movie the writer was working on, there's a few cameos of various 90s actors and then it just ends.

I guess if you live or work in Hollywood maybe this is really hilarious, maybe this was one which was more for the actors to enjoy, maybe they were getting sick of the show (which would be understandable) but I just didn't Get It. A few times we had to pause to figure out what was actually happening. Events just seemed to occur for no reason. It was like Monty Python but without the laughs. Just not for me.

Allergy Warning: This episode contains large amounts of cheese

[semorebel · 4/10 · 24 September 2022]

This episode was so cheesy I want to know why it didn't contain a warning for people who are lactose intolerant.

I mean come on dancing bones. Dancing ghosts at the end. This episode reminds me of the B rated horror/ sci-fi movies from the 1950's. Didn't really have anything to do with the rest of the series.

Reminds me of those cheesy musical episodes or clip shows that TV shows do. I almost feel dumber for having watched it.

Skinner didn't really even seem like himself. I would have thought that he would have been more understanding about the corpse being misidentified not suspend them for a month.

hated this episode

[olinville · 1/10 · 31 October 2014]

David duchvony recently said to Gillan Anderson at comic con that he didn't invite her on CAlifornication as it would be a betrayal to the Sculley and Mulder relationship well....this episode was a total betrayal

For 7 seasons we have watched the Sculley and milder relationship and last episode saw them kiss for first time well along comes Tea Leoni n tho episode in a red wig playing Scully

at this point tea leoni his girlfriend at the time was responsible for getting David to move XFILES to LA from Vancouver i think seeing David's girlfriend and all the inside jokes really distracted from what we had been watching for 7 seasons its hard to get into their on screen relationship after seeing his real girlfriend

also having the real Sculley laughing about tea leoni ----laughing at Tea leoni having a crush on Mulder was too inside joke jokey esp as Sculley has laws been jealous of his girlfriends on the files but now seems to be laughing at tea leoni ---breaking the illusion you know

But the end of my love of files has been coming in season 7 David duchvony has one foot out the door..its too jokey and now losing the spooky somberness of Vancouver was the last nail in the coffin why do shows always ruin things when they become successful

this all appears to be duchvonys fault as he will drop out of the show next season for Tea Leoni ironic in that now they are divorced ...see David should have chosen Gillan Anderson :)

i had been looking forward to a possible files 3 movie but now i am not too sure.....

If i want to see a musical...

[pjaguilar-43498 · 1/10 · 24 May 2017]

I really don't get the "much lighter side" of the reviews... If i want to see the cast in a musical, or a funny show, i'd probably go to a musical (well, probably not)...

All in all, awful episode, barely qualifies as an X-Files episode at all. (remember, this is X-Files, not A Chorus Line)

PS: Reading somewhere that this episode was supposed to be the farewell to the show, and that they kept doing it because they didn't have anything to replace it with, maybe you can understand the episode, but still..

Appalling

[voyager-46056 · 2/10 · 15 September 2023]

Duchovny must have been over-medicated when he scribbled this script. His ignorance of Catholic Church and its rites is hard to take assuming he did at least some research. Some of it goes beyond parody into anti-Catholicism. The humour is forced while the third lead player is a ham who must have been recuited straight off the street, Skinner simply rants. Not a good debut as a script writer. For this reviewer a fan of the X Files, this episode is by far the worst. The props do not save it. A mediocre episode at best, a bit if old-fashioned Mick bashing at its worst. The outrage if Duchovny had paradied another Faith?