The X-Files is one of the greatest shows ever to grace TV screens anywhere in the world, and though the show fizzled out a little towards the end there, its cultural impact just can’t be overstated.

The great thing about the X-Files (and most pre-streaming shows) is that you don’t really have to watch the whole thing. Sure, there’s a long-term overarching plotline that sometimes ties different episodes together, but in general most episodes are self-contained or span maybe two or three episodes to make a small arc. There are well over 200 episodes of the show, but personally I think if you’re going to start anywhere, give these top-tier examples a try.

10

Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose (Season 3, Episode 4)

This is one of the darker, but also funnier, episodes in the X-Files canon. Someone is murdering fortune-tellers who (ironically) didn’t see it coming, and agents Mulder and Scully are roped in to help with the investigation.

However, the fortune-tellers are predictably bogus. Clyde Bruckman, an insurance salesman, however, is actually psychic and has the specific ability to see details of how people will die. He accurately knows things about the murders that only someone who was there (or psychic) would know and Mulder obviously jumps to the supernatural as being the answer.

So, while Scully (as usual) doesn’t believe in Clyde’s powers, they nonetheless join up with him in the hunt for the real killer. I don’t want to spoil how this goes (or ends), but it’s a pretty poignant tragi-comic episode that pulls together what makes The X-Files so good when it hits its stride.

9

Bad Blood (Season 5, Episode 12)

Bad Blood has one of the funniest X-Files cold opens I’ve seen. It opens with Mulder killing a young man with a stake, apparently thinking he’s a vampire. Except Scully quickly extracts the fake vampire teeth, and oh boy Fox, you might be in trouble!

This is one of Vince Gilligan’s best X-Files episodes and gives us a clear taste of his penchant for telling stories from odd and interesting angles. The episode is mainly the official inquiry into the death, with Mulder and Scully both recounting their version of events. What makes this so funny is that you can finally see how differently the two agents see the world, and each other.

As for the whole vampire thing, well, I really don’t want to spoil how this one shakes out, but the episode is pretty much self-contained so you can watch it whenever you feel like it.

8

Jose Chung’s From Outer Space (Season 3, Episode 20)

This episode is one of the most creative, funny, and bonkers in the 218-episode classic series run. Just trying to explain what the hell goes on here is a challenge, but it’s very meta. Almost like Bad Blood, but now with even more unreliable accounts and narrators.

The framing device here is that Scully is being interviewed by a novelist named Jose Chung about a specific UFO abduction case. It starts off with two teenagers apparently being abducted by Grey aliens, only for an even bigger alien to show up and mess with the first set of aliens. Then there’s a whole plotline about those first aliens actually being US military personnel flying a top-secret aircraft made to look like a UFO. But all of this could actually be brainwashing, but we’re getting the information by way of hypnosis.

In the end, Mulder begs Chung not to publish the book, because it will make the UFO movement look even more stupid, so you know that it’s good.

7

“Anasazi”/“The Blessing Way”/“Paper Clip” (Mythology Trilogy – Season 2, Episode 25 & Season 3, Episodes 1–2)

This is a pivotal trilogy in the X-Files mythos and, rather than being a funny or odd set of episodes, it’s known as one of the epic, high-stakes arcs. The arc consists of the Season 2 finale and the first two episodes of Season 3.

This is one of the most important arcs of the show, where Mulder apparently actually finds hidden government evidence that aliens exist, which means getting pulled into a real conspiracy and drawing the attention of shadowy figures. While it doesn’t matter as much now, the season 2 cliffhanger left fans waiting for ages to learn if Mulder was alive or not, and there are plenty of skeletons in the closet to uncover in Mulder’s family history.

This trilogy of episodes brings all the stuff that makes The X-Files iconic together: aliens, the supernatural, government coverups, and mad science.

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6

“Duane Barry”/“Ascension”/“One Breath” (Scully Abduction Arc – Season 2, Episodes 5–6 & 8)

This is known as the “Scully abduction arc” and just as it says on the tin, Scully is disappeared somewhere and we follow Mulder as he desperately tries to find her over the course of a few episodes. The first episode “Duane Barry” got the show its first Emmy nominations.

The eponymous Mr. Barry is a former FBI agent and alien abductee. He takes hostages and Mulder heads the hostage negotiations. Barry later kidnaps Scully as an offering to the aliens so they’ll leave him alone. One thing leads to another, and Scully is finally returned—but in a coma. In the real world, actress Gillian Anderson had recently given birth, which is probably why she spent most of the episode lying in a hospital bed.

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5

Pusher (Season 3, Episode 17)

This is another Vince Gilligan episode, and, wouldn’t you know it, it’s about a guy with cancer who turns to crime and finds out he likes being powerful instead of the small man he was before. Sound familiar?

Superficial similarities to Breaking Bad aside, Pusher is about a man who has the psychic ability to convince other people to do anything. He uses this to become a hitman that kills his victims by convincing them to commit suicide. Mulder and Scully are brought in when Robert (that’s his name) escapes police custody by making the driver of the police car pull in front of a truck.

A cat-and-mouse game starts between Robert and the dynamic FBI duo, culminating in a tense game of russian roulette that would end in tragedy for Mulder or Robert if not for intervention by Scully. The twist at the end is maybe a little predictable, but Pusher is one of the most thrilling X-Files episodes of all and definitely worth a watch if you just want to dip back in after all these years.

4

Home (Season 4, Episode 2)

Home pours on the horror in thick layers. It’s almost like the X-Files version of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre with inbred, monstrous family members and horrible, horrible secrets.

This is a gory one, so be warned, and it starts with a group of kids playing baseball stumbling across the corpse of a deformed baby—and it goes downhill from there. This is the perfect episode to watch on Halloween, or Friday the 13th, I guess.

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3

Beyond the Sea (Season 1, Episode 13)

Beyond the Sea is one of the best episodes from the first season, and the show as a whole. This is one of the episodes where the skeptical Scully has to face up to some inexplicable experiences. Specifically, she sees visions of her deceased father, but doesn’t disclose this to anyone, presumably thinking she’s hallucinating. This tragic backdrop intertwines with a kidnapping and a death row inmate who claims to have psychic powers and will “help” the agents find the victims in exchange for a commutation.

Scully seems to be internally convinced of the supernatural by the end of the episode, but refuses to admit it. This episode has been lauded for its dark and personal tone, and it seems to be one that’s stuck with fans.

2

Ice (Season 1, Episode 8)

When you watch Ice you might think it bears a striking resemblance in plot to John Carpenter’s The Thing, and The Thing From Another World—and you’d be right! The showrunners have stated that the episode was party influenced the same short story those two films were adapted from, but apart from the basic premise they do diverge in important ways.

Mulder, Scully, a pilot, and two scientists investigate an Alaskan research facility only to find all the occupants, besides a dog, dead. The dog attacks and infects their pilot, and slowly more people fall prey to a parasite that had been frozen in the ice. Telling who’s been infected or not leads to paranoia and distrust.

While this does feel like a budget TV version of The Thing, it’s a great episode in its own right and one of the strongest first-season showings.

1

Humbug (Season 2, Episode 20)

I love Humbug because it toys with your preconceptions. The episode is centered around a community of sideshow performers. So you have geeks, illustrated men, conjoined twins, and the whole tropey collection. Now, the 90s were still a time when the media was unkind to people with conditions or proclivities like these, and I’m not saying this episode is perfect, but I do like how it shows they are just normal human beings who live normal family lives.

That is, other than the fact that someone is going around and murdering them, which is why the FBI is involved. Now, I definitely don’t want to spoil the mystery here, but let’s just say this has one of the best endings of any X-Files episode.

With so many episodes (and a revival, which I did not consider for this list) it’s hard to pick out just a short list of good ones, and to be honest there aren’t that many episodes of The X-Files that I’d consider bad.

It’s a miracle the show had so many hits and so few misses, but then again it had some of the best writers in the business, and they are creating hit TV shows to this very day.