Investigating the murder of someone who has been skinned alive, Reyes finds she has a personal connection to the case and is determined to find and stop the killer.

There are some nice ideas in Hellbound and they do help broaden the character of Reyes a little. The concept of someone being reborn to fill a similar role was admittedly done better back in season four's The Field Where I Died, but I quite like the thought of the same things happening to the same group of people over and over again and Reyes having to stop it where she's failed every time before. Admittedly her seeming psychic openness is a little hard to swallow, but it serves the plot and adds a little more mystery to her.

I've always hated the concept of people being skinned alive; hell, I've panicked doing potatoes with a peeler before now and the Robbie Williams Rock DJ video made me feel ill/ Therefore, seeing people from under the flesh thanks to some excellent make-up effects really doesn't do much for me. And the guy that's been skinned and is still alive, now that's seriously vile. I'm still a little puzzled at the end about why way back in the 1800s a bunch of miners apparently took it upon themselves to skin someone; I probably just missed a bit of dialogue, but there seems to be a lot of hurried exposition towards the end that doesn't work.

Overall, there's good and bad mixed here and the atmosphere and creepiness do edge it into passable territory, but why is Scully still sidelined? And why in a story with this premise was Skinner not used? Come on guys, think irony. Would have made me laugh.

***

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