Paper Hearts

It was written by Vince Gilligan, directed by Rob Bowman, and featured guest appearances by Tom Noonan, Rebecca Toolan and Vanessa Morley.

"Paper Hearts" was viewed by 16.59 million people in its initial broadcast, and received positive reviews, with critics praising Noonan's guest role.

The show centers on FBI special agents Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson), who work on cases linked to the paranormal, called X-Files.

Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) dreams of a red light that leads him to the corpse of a young girl buried in a park in Manassas, Virginia.

Dana Scully's (Gillian Anderson) autopsy of the skeleton finds that the victim died in 1975, suggesting that Roche's killing spree started much earlier than the FBI had previously thought.

After convincing Walter Skinner to grant them further access to Roche, the agents question the killer and are told the location of one of his remaining victims.

"[2] Writer Vince Gilligan came up with the concept for the episode when thinking about the series' longest running storyline, the abduction of Samantha Mulder.

[4] Episode writer Vince Gilligan and director Rob Bowman assert that Duchovny's successful basketball shot in this scene was filmed in just one take, without special effects.

[6] Website IGN named "Paper Hearts" their sixth favorite standalone episode of the show, calling it "creepy and unsettling", and claiming Noonan's character was "one of the most disturbing villains to make an appearance in the series".

[11] Noonan's acting has also been praised by Vince Gilligan, who says the "understated" manner in which Roche is portrayed "sends chills down [his] spine every time".

She felt that Noonan's performance was "terrific", noting that the actor "makes Roche into one of the series' great human monsters"; and believed that the episode's premise was important to developing the character of Mulder further.

[12] The website later named the episode the sixth best example of a television dream sequence, noting that it "suggest[s] how this methodical man [Mulder] might puzzle over cold cases in his subconscious".

[13] The article also complimented the entry's metaphor that laser pointers were Mulder's mind that pointed "out bits of evidence his conscious brain missed all those many years ago.