It was written by series creator Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz, directed by Kim Manners and aired in the United States on March 1, 1998, on the Fox network.

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.

Seconds later, they witness a man being burned alive, and one of the boys is killed by an Alien Rebel who has his eyes and mouth sewn shut.

Meanwhile, Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) attends a lecture at MIT, where the testimony of Cassandra Spender (Veronica Cartwright), an alien abductee, is being presented.

Mulder argues against other members of the lecture over the existence of alien life, claiming that it is a lie created to cover up a program of medical experimentation on civilians run by the military industrial complex.

In Russia, Krycek, working against the orders of his superiors, kidnaps the infected Dmitri and flees to the U.S., sewing shut the boy's eyes, nose, and mouth to keep the black oil from leaving his body.

At FBI headquarters, Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) meets Agent Jeffrey Spender (Chris Owens), Cassandra's son, who fears the damage to his reputation if his colleagues learn about his mother.

At that moment Cassandra is with a group of abductees, including Scully and Dmitri, at the Ruskin Dam, brought there by Syndicate assassin Quiet Willy.

One day, however, he ran into series creator Chris Carter at a bar, who humorously told him, "I didn't know they served guys with two faces here", a reference to his portrayal of The Great Mutato.

[5] Carter explained that David Duchovny had "taken careful notice" of Owens' acting abilities and requested that he return to the series in some capacity.

Rick Millikan, the series' casting director, was very pleased with Cartwright's performance, noting, "She's got a voice that adds a little creepiness and a little mystery that I thought played really well.

He worked 12–14 hours a day, much of which was spent applying the elaborate make-up effect that gave the appearance that his eyes and mouth had been sewed up.

Show tunes come to mind, but I also remember this one time my dialect coach had me call a Russian friend of his on his cell phone to see if he could understand me.

[7] Filming the scene with the burning camp was "tricky", according to Kim Manners, as the production crew was forced to follow a number of limiting safety precautions.

[7] For the scene in which the alien rebels incinerate people, the production crew used a "very dangerous" stunt known as a "full burn", in which a person is set on fire with the aid of a special suit.

Since very little movement occurs during these scenes, the director tried to make things visually interesting by mixing wide shots with unique camera angles.

[11] Veronica Cartwright was nominated in the category "Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series" in the 1998 Emmy Awards for her performance in this episode and its follow-up, "The Red and the Black".

[14] The article noted that "If The X-Files has taught us anything, it’s that if a G-Man asks us if we know anything about anything and we foolishly say yes, our mouths and eyelids will be sewn shut and we will be brainwashed to kill on demand.

"[15] Robert Shearman and Lars Pearson, in their book Wanting to Believe: A Critical Guide to The X-Files, Millennium & The Lone Gunmen, rated the episode four stars out of five.

Furthermore, Shearman and Pearson praised the episode for "shift[ing] the goalposts" and allowing Mulder and Scully to switch roles as the believer and skeptic.

[17] However, she was critical of the episode's reliance on shock value, noting that the "camera seems to take a perverse delight in death, pain, and mutilation, with the distressing effect of numbing the viewer to the horror.