The X-Files: 9 Totally Terrifying Monsters-of-the-Week

I was a kid when I started watching The X-Files, a really too-young-to-be-watching this ten-year-old, with trusting parents and an adventurous mind. Even then, I wanted to be a writer, and I was prone to believing extraordinary, paranormal things.

It’s no wonder, then, that I spent the following ten years checking the toilet for the Flukeman and being too scared to get out of the bed in the morning, lest the red eyes were waiting to drag me under.

Of course, I’m grown up now. I don’t check for those monsters anymore, but I also don’t watch scary movies. Or TV shows. You might say I’ve learned my lesson, but I like to think of it as The X-Files spoiling me. They scared me first. They scared me good. No one else compares.

So, here are my 9 scariest Monsters-of-the-Week from The X-Files:

1. The Flukeman (“The Host” Season 2 Episode 2)

Monster that lives on the sewers of New Jersey was always going to get one of the top spots on this list, because, even as a grown-up, your first reaction to the word sewers is ugh.

But this particular monster was born in the radioactive sewers of Chernobyl. And, it’s like a big human/tapeworm hybrid that kills people and feeds on them.  If all of that wasn’t enough, there’s also the fact that HE COMES OUT OF TOILETS when you’re not looking. I cannot stress this enough. Like, you could be sitting down, and bam, there comes the Flukeman.

No wonder this dude gave me literal nightmares for years.

2. Robert Patrick Modell (“Pusher” Season 3 Episode 17, “Kitsunegari” Season 5 Episode 8)

 

From literal monster to just a man with a life-threatening tumor, Robert Patrick Modell was, nonetheless, one of the scariest “monsters” this show ever came up with.

I can’t think of anything more twisted than a man who can literally push his will onto others, and who does it with so much…eh…originality? Modell killed a lot of people (made them kill themselves, whatever), and each and every one of the murders was horrendous, grotesque and terrifying.  If there’s one lesson I learned from The X-Files is that, sometimes, people are scarier than monsters.

3. Eugene Victor Tooms (“Squeeze” Season 1 Episode 2, “Tooms” Season 1 Episode 21)

Maybe it’s nostalgia talking. Tooms was, after all the very first monster-of-the-week, and one of the few to re-appear. Perhaps it’s the awful notion that no matter how safe you think you are, if there’s a little space for air to enter, Tooms can stretch and contort himself into wherever you are.

Or it could be because he eats livers. Or because I was only ten when I first met Tooms. Or all of those things combined. Point is, to this day the idea still scares me. Oh, and the name. That scares me too.

4. Donnie Pfaster (“Irresistible” Season 2 Episode 13, “Orison” Season 7 Episode 7)

This guy was evil. There were some serial killers among the aforementioned monsters-of-the-week, but there were also some pretty misunderstood creatures.  

And then there was Donnie Pfaster, a death fetishist who developed a sort of crush on Scully. Though we mostly see him digging up graves, the hints at murders and possibly, perhaps, using corpses to fulfill his sexual needs are enough for this guy’s creep factor to shoot up into outer space.

Plus, he just looks so…normal. And that, if possible, ups the creep factor even more.

5. Leonard (“Humbug” Season 2 Episode 20)

The dead twin who isn’t really dead after all, Leonard is actually an underdeveloped fetus who, eh….lives inside his twin, Lanny.

At first, all you feel is a little bit of pity. Then, the Florida community where Lanny lives, filled with circus people and sideshow performers starts to get to you.

Because the circus is creepy in its own way, and clowns, yeah …we don’t like clowns. Although, if we had to pick, we’d say we like them more than we like Leonard looking for a new brother to burrow inside all while leading Mulder and Scully in a chase through a creepy funhouse.

6. The doll (“Chinga” Season 5 Episode 10)

Creepy dolls are more common these days, what with countless scary movies dedicated to seemingly inanimate objects.

But when this episode first aired, the idea that the things I played with could possibly go on a rampage and compel me to hurt myself was enough to banish every one of the dolls to my sister’s room.

My dolls were probably innocent, but, to these days, I’m not really fond of the big Annabelle-like ones. No, thank you. I learned my lesson.

7. Leonard Betts (“Leonard Betts” Season 4 Episode 12)

When you get an episode named after you, that’s when you know things are going to get ugly in a hurry. And ugly in a hurry The X-Files style means not only a creepy cancer-eating mutant who can regenerate severed body parts, no, it means that the aforementioned mutant will be going after Scully.

Who, you know, doesn’t have cancer. Or you think she doesn’t. You hope she doesn’t. And, then, by the end of the episode, you find out she does.

If only for that, I hate you, Leonard Betts. We liked our denial.

8. Virgil Incanto (“2Shy” Season 3 Episode 6)

The name is scary enough, as it is, and the fact that he lures his victims through online dating sites just adds a level of creepiness to the whole, who am I talking to on the computer thing.

But what really, really bothers me about Virgil is the regurgitating a suffocating smile that digests your body fat thing. Yeah, that does it for me. That’s where I draw the line. I mean, we’ve all dreamed about lipo, and all that, but not this way. Not. This. Way.

9. Mrs. Paddock (“Die Hand Die Verletzt” Season 2 Episode 14)

“Die Hand Die Verletzt” is german for “the hand that wounds,” so take that into account before we discuss creepy substitute teacher Mrs. Paddock, who keeps human eyes in her desk drawers, worships the devil and compels fellow black magic practitioners in the town to kill themselves.

All of this while taking care of children! And if that’s not enough to make you reconsider the whole idea of school, there’s also the goodbye message she leaves for Mulder and Scully on the classroom blackboard. “Goodbye. It’s been nice working with you.”

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Agree? Disagree? Have any other scary Monster-of-the-Week from The X-Files to add to our list? Share with us in the comments!

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