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

In this episode, Mulder and Scully investigate a series of ritualistic killings by somebody seemingly capable of squeezing his body through impossibly narrow gaps.

The production of "Squeeze" was problematic; creative differences between Longstreet and the crew led to him being replaced as director, while some missing scenes needed to be shot after the initial filming.

[1] Academics have examined "Squeeze" for its portrayal of the politics of law enforcement, highlighting the tension—evident throughout the series—between the agents' desire to find the truth and their duty to secure criminal convictions.

He is watched from a storm drain by someone who then infiltrates the building by climbing through the elevator shaft into the ventilation system, kills Usher, and removes his liver.

Usher's murder, the latest of three, is assigned to careerist FBI agent Tom Colton (Donal Logue), who turns to Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) for help.

To prove his assertion to Scully, Mulder digitally elongates and narrows Tooms' fingerprints, showing that they match the prints at the crime scene.

There, Mulder and Scully find a "nest" constructed out of newspaper and bile in the building's crawl space, as well as several trophy items taken from past victims.

Scully informs Mulder that medical tests on Tooms show an abnormal skeletal and muscle system, and a rapidly declining metabolism.

[4] Co-writers Glen Morgan and James Wong were inspired to write the episode when they looked at a ventilation shaft outside of their office and thought about whether someone could crawl inside it.

Although the episode has parallels with the second Kolchak film, The Night Strangler (1973), which featured a man who commits murders every 21 years, Morgan and Wong have stated they were inspired by the serial killers Jack the Ripper and Richard Ramirez.

However, to avoid a costly tenting operation to simulate night-time, a replica of the necessary parts of the ventilation system was built in a lower level of the parking garage.

However, this location's use was later discontinued owing to the limited range of shots it afforded; most reverse angles would show a large parking lot across the street.

[16] These developments with Colton "[tether] another thread between her career and the rest of the FBI",[17] highlighting a sense of "exasperation and derision" from her colleagues,[18] whose mindsets represent "institutionally acceptable" models of reality.

[19] This hostility suggests that the series' problems are "not epistemological; they are political"—the agents, Scully in particular, have to balance a search for "the truth" with the need to secure criminal convictions in their cases.

[18] This balancing act "between investigating to discover the truth and gathering evidence to support a court case" has been compared to the perceived stance of the FBI during the series' tenure.

[25][26] Hutchison wrote a prequel to "Squeeze" titled "Dark He Was and Golden-Eyed" and sent it to Carter, but the script was returned unread for legal reasons.

[30] In Entertainment Weekly's 1996 retrospective of the first season, "Squeeze" was rated B+; it was called "an important episode", and Hutchison's portrayal of Tooms was described as "profoundly creepy".

[17] Robert Shearman, in his book Wanting to Believe: A Critical Guide to The X-Files, Millennium & The Lone Gunmen, notes that the episode's premise is the first in the series "not to rely upon accepted urban legends".

[34] However, Shearman found the monologue likening the crimes committed by Tooms to the Holocaust, given by the retired detective Briggs, to be "not only unnecessary but tasteless to boot".

[34] Mumtaj Begum, writing for Malaysia's The Star in 2008, described "Squeeze" as "the episode that really sold The X-Files idea to the masses", and called it "simply brilliant".

[36] Also in 2008, IGN's Christine Seghers listed Hutchison as the fourth-best guest star of the series in a top-ten countdown, complimented his "brilliantly perverse" performance, and wrote: "Even when he doesn't appear to be doing anything, Hutchinson [sic] can still make your skin crawl with his dead, shark-like stare".