The X-Files season 11 episode 2 preview: This

A very strange call from an old friend rattles Mulder and Scully on this week’s episode of The X-Files, This, airing Wednesday on FOX.

This week on The X-Files, intrepid FBI Agents Dana Scully and Fox Mulder are set to receive a strange call from a friend.

There’s no official word on who this old friend is, but a quick glance at the episode’s cast listing practically contains a big, flashing signpost of a clue.

A little bit of research reveals that Dean Haglund will return as Richard Langly.

Who? Langly is one of the three members of The Lone Gunmen. They’re a trio of conspiracy nuts who were allies to the X-Files. As much as the show liked to make fun of the nerdy, ultra-paranoid Lone Gunmen, they were right at least as often as they were wrong.

The Lone Gunmen

This reappearance, if true, is plenty weird even for The X-Files. Langly, along with Melvin Frohike (Tom Braidwood) and John Fitzgerald Byers (Bruce Harwood), seemingly perished in season 9’s “Jump the Shark.”

Sure, they returned as ghosts of a sort in the season 9 then-series finale, “The Truth.” But we may not be ready to accept the existence of spirits and phantoms just yet in these new episodes. Chances are that The X-Files isn’t ready to let go of its nascent technophobia just yet.

This episode was written and directed by Glen Morgan, one of the best writers on the 1990s run of The X-Files. With fellow writer James Wong, Morgan developed some of the best episodes of the series, including “Squeeze” and “Little Green Men.” On his own, Morgan wrote “Home,” one of the most controversial and menacing episodes of the original run.

Also, Morgan wrote season 4’s “Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man,” focusing on everyone’s favorite nihilistic secret government agent. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that we’ll revisit the devilish CSM this Wednesday. If last week’s episode, “My Struggle III,” predicts anything, the CSM has plenty more musing to do.

Speaking of the CSM, it looks like Assistant Director Walter Skinner may still be at odds with Mulder and Scully. If nothing else, the three appear to be meeting in another parking garage. That points the way to some serious conspiracy talk and the possibility of bodily peril (never trust a parking garage on The X-Files).

Next: The X-Files season 11: Chris Carter’s missed opportunities

So, what’s Langly’s deal? Maybe he is a ghost. However, it’s hard to believe that Glen Morgan would indulge in such a lazy plot twist.

Or perhaps it could be that those brave and sometimes annoying nerds, The Lone Gunmen, aren’t entirely gone. It almost seems like too much to hope for. Still, as always, there might be something even stranger waiting for us in “This”.

“This” airs Wednesday on FOX, at 8:00 p.m. ET.