The Rain King

"The Rain King"
The X-Files episode
Daryl Mootz, the self-proclaimed "Rain King", attaches a prosthetic leg. The harness, which pulled Clayton Rohner's actual leg out of the camera's sight, was later described as "painful".
Episode no.	Season 6 Episode 8
Directed by	Kim Manners
Written by	Jeffrey Bell
Production code	6ABX07
Original air date	January 10, 1999
Guest stars
Clayton Rohner as Daryl Mootz David Manis as Holman Hardt Victoria Jackson as Sheila Fontaine Dirk Blocker as Mayor Gilmore Francesca Ingrassia as Cindy Culpepper Sharon Madden as Motel Manager Tom McFadden as Doctor Dan Gifford as Local News Anchor Brian D. Johnson as Chainsaw Man
Episode chronology
← Previous "Terms of Endearment" Next → "S.R. 819"
List of season 6 episodes List of The X-Files episodes

"The Rain King" is the eighth episode of the sixth season of the American science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered on the Fox network on January 10, 1999. "The Rain King" was written by Jeffrey Bell and directed by Kim Manners. The episode is a "Monster-of-the-Week" story, unconnected to the series' wider mythology. "The Rain King" earned a Nielsen household rating of 12.5, being watched by 21.2 million people in its initial broadcast.

In this episode, FBI special agent Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) are asked to investigate the strange weather phenomena occurring in a small town. They find a man, Daryl Mootz, who claims to produce the rain.

"The Rain King" was written by Jeffrey Bell, his first script for the show. The episode was originally purchased as a freelance script, but Bell was later hired on as a full-time writer. Grapevine, Piru, and Culver City, California stood in for the fictional town of Kroner, Kansas during filming.

Plot

On Valentine's Day in Kroner, Kansas, Sheila Fontaine and Daryl Mootz get into an argument. Fontaine had put their engagement news in the paper, but Mootz had wanted to keep it a secret for as long as the drought makes business poor. After the argument, Mootz goes for a drunken drive but crashes after heart-shaped hailstones wreck his car.

Six months later, Mulder and Scully arrive in Kroner by request of the mayor. For several months a terrible drought has plagued the region. However, Mootz, now styling himself as "The Rain King", seems to have the power to control the weather. For a hefty sum, he is able to make it rain. Mulder and Scully obtain a client list and head to the local television station to talk to the weatherman, Holman Hardt. Hardt admits that while Mootz's talents are odd, he appears to truly have the power to control the weather. Mulder and Scully, both skeptical, attend one of Mootz's rituals. Despite their preconceived notions, Mulder and Scully witness Mootz bring rain to a dry farm.

Mulder and Scully check into a motel, where a cow crashes through the roof of Mulder's room. After the incident, a tearful Sheila confesses that the cow might have been her fault. She admits that she's experienced a strange history of weather-related phenomena, and believes that she can unconsciously control the weather. Mulder assures her otherwise. During the conversation, Hardt over-hears that Mootz was drunk the night of the accident, and is relieved. Immediately, Mootz's rain powers seem to disappear.

It is revealed that Holman Hardt is actually the one controlling the weather. All of the bizarre weather was the side-effect of his long-silent love for Sheila. He felt guilty that his weather-related problem caused Mootz to crash his car, so he would cause it to rain for Mootz. Once he realized Mootz was drunk during the accident, however, he stopped. Unfortunately, Mulder begins to unintentionally attract Sheila, resulting in a massive thunderstorm that came out of the meteorologist's brain. At the town's high school reunion, however, Hardt admits his love for Sheila, who accepts him. The rain stops and Hardt and Sheila live happily ever after.

Production

Writing

"The Rain King" was the first episode written by then-new X-Files writer Jeffrey Bell. Bell, who never had the intention to work in television, sent the production staff three script ideas because he was a fan of the show. The staff agreed to buy one—which eventually became "The Rain King"—as a freelance script. Bell worked with Frank Spotnitz, John Shiban, and Vince Gilligan to edit the script by "boarding" it, a process where note cards are used to flesh out the story. The group of men pitched the story idea to series creator Chris Carter in August, and Bell was later hired as a show writer.

The script went through considerable changes. Bell was unaware that his character of Daryl Mootz would "steal the show". In addition, the relationship between Holman and the FBI agents grew stronger in subsequent drafts. In the final draft, Bell attempted to parallel the emotional state of Mulder and Scully with Hardt. He said, "Here you have a guy who's affecting the weather because he's repressing his emotions [...] and who better to help him than two people whose emotions are repressed and never express their feelings for each other?"

Filming

The scene where Daryl Mootz crashes his car after being hit with heart-shaped hail was filmed on a "lonely road" near Grapevine, California. The road was so seldom used that the Caltrans highway officials reportedly had no problem shutting down the entire road for the crew to film the scene. Director Kim Manners was very happy with the way the filming turned out, although he did note that the hardest shot to get was of the car crashing into the pole, because the car kept correcting itself and crashing at an undesired angle.

Ilt Jones, the series' location manager, decided to use Piru, California as a stand-in for the Kroner, Kansas—a fictitious city named after Bell's college roommate. "How the Ghosts Stole Christmas" would later be filmed in the same town. The climactic scenes in Kroner's High School were actually filmed at an abandoned high school in Culver City, California. Corey Kaplan and her art team were tasked with turning the derelict gym into a believable reunion set.

Effects

I stepped onto the stage just in time to see a brown cow falling through the roof of the set. It was a spectacularly good shot, but it had nothing to do with the script, which said a black and white cow falls through the ceiling. [...] All I knew was that I had to go back and re-render my own [cow] into a brown one. And in a hurry.

—Bill Millar on the color of the cow

Property master Tom Day and costume designer Christine Peters were tasked with making a one-legged version of Clayton Rohner, who portrayed Mootz. Day constructed a fake prosthetic leg and Peters created a harness that pulled Rohner's actual leg out of the camera's sight. The harness was later described as "painful".

The scene that featured a cow crashing through Mulder's roof was orchestrated elaborately. Initially, Jones approached the owner of a motel called the Sierra Palona Motel and requested that it be used in the episode. A deal was made that stated that the production staff could cut a hole in the roof for the episode in exchange for a brand-new roof after the episode was filmed. Duke Tomasick, The X-Files construction coordinator, later said that the "fun part" was "calling local roofers and explaining just what kind of damage they'd be repairing for us".

Special effects producer Bill Millar hired several cows, put them in a field, and photographed them for reference. Using digital technology he animated one of the cows to create the effect of it being sucked upwards. Finally, a "cow puppet" was dropped on a re-creation of Mulder's motel room at Fox Studios. Millar noticed that the cow puppet's color was different than his computer generated cow, forcing him to quickly change the color. Kim Manners later stated that his biggest regret with the episode is that he did not have David Duchovny respond "Got milk?" after the cow crashed through his roof.

Broadcast and reception

"The Rain King" premiered on the Fox network on January 10, 1999. Following its initial American broadcast, the episode earned a Nielsen household rating of 12.5, with an 18 share—meaning that roughly 12.5 percent of all television-equipped households, and 18 percent of households watching television, were tuned in to the episode. It was viewed by 21.20 million viewers. "The Rain King" was both the highest rated episode of Season 6 and the last episode of The X-Files to be viewed by more than 20 million viewers. The episode aired in the United Kingdom and Ireland on Sky1 on April 25, 1999 and received 0.75 million viewers, making it the third most watched episode that week.

Critical reception was mostly mixed, with results ranging from negative to positive. In a review of the seventh season episode "Brand X", Sarah Kendzior from 11th Hour Magazine cited "The Rain King" as one of the worst episodes of The X-Files. Critical Myth's John Keegan gave the episode 4/10. He wrote that, "Overall, this episode is often considered one of the worst of the series, and on a number of levels, there are specific reasons for that reputation. With little or no connection to character development thus far, or the specific circumstances of the agents themselves, this is an episode designed to appeal to those with a desire for Mulder and Scully to admit their feelings. The result is an episode that brings very little to the table". Andy Meisler, in The End and the Beginning noted that the episode was poorly received by fans on the internet.

Not all reviews were negative. Starpulse named "The Rain King" as the ninth best X-Files episode and praised the lighter approach to the paranormal, saying that the episode was an "ingenious way to use the paranormal motif of the show for something other than thrills". Kathleen Diehl from Culture Cartel gave the episode a neutral review, and said that while "The Rain King" was not "horrible", it was npt "particularly memorable, either".

Footnotes

References

• Meisler, Andy (2000). The End and the Beginning: The Official Guide to the X-Files Season 6. HarperCollins. ISBN 0061075957. 

External links

• "The Rain King" on The X-Files, an external wiki
• "The Rain King" at the Internet Movie Database
• "The Rain King" at TV.com