Toby Lindala's work on The X-Files continued to revolve around fabricating corpse dummies and other grisly sights. In the season's first episode 'Herrenvolk', Lindala made a grisly dummy head and arms, to represent the corpse of a man stung to death by bees.
For the episode 'Home', prosthetic appliances were made for the three performers portraying the grotesquely inbred Peacock brothers. A lumpy full face appliance was made for Chris Nelson Norris and Adrian Hughes as Edmund and Sherman Peacocks respectively.
A forehead appliance, along with deformed dentures, was made for John Trottier as George Peacock, with more appliances made for extras in the Peacock family's photographs.
Another deformed facial appliance was made for Karin Konoval as Mrs. Peacock, with a set of dummy amputated limbs. Presumably Konoval's real body was hidden under the floor, and mirrors were used to hide the effect.
A forehead appliance was made for Richard Beymer to depict him slicing his skin off in 'Sanginarium', with the appliance having the appearance of bloody tissue underneath the flap of false skin.
'Sanginarium' required other grisly corpse props, such as a dummy head to represent a patient whose face had been dissolved by acid, and the flayed off face of Beymer's murderous doctor.
A Grey body prop was made for 'Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man'. The Grey prop was designed with air bladder mechanisms inside, to make it look like it was 'breathing'.
Several corpse dummies were made for the episode 'El Mundo Giro', along with a set of goat corpse dummies as well. The props wre coated in a mixture to give the appearance of mould.
A set of prosthetic appliances were made for Raymond Cruz as the enzyme-carrying mutant. The first stage appliance consisting of an enlarged cranium and forehead appliance.
The second stage appliance consisted of a bumpier, further enlarged cranium, and was given a pale blue paintjob. A similar prosthetic was made for Jose Yenque.
The episode 'Leonard Betts' also required a heavy makeup effects workload. A torn open chest appliance was made for the performer playing one of Betts' victims, along with a severed neck appliance for Paul McCrane as the titular Betts.
A heavier makeup was applied on on McCrane for the scenes of 'newly born' Leonard Betts. The look was achieved via several thick layers of gelation, with a veiny paintjob.
Several corpse props also were fabricated by Lindala's team, including a severed dummy head, a severed finger, and two charred corpse dummies.
The most complicated effect in the episode was the shot of Leonard Betts 'rebirthing' himself out his own mouth. To achieve this, a lifecast was taken of McCrane and used to fabricate a mechanized puppet. Lindala explained;
'Leonard Betts is one of the most exciting effects we've done this season. What we did was push (the puppet) up and it starts bloating out the chest, and stretching out the entire mouth. We have movement in the (puppet's) eyes and the brow to help keep it alive, and the head tilts back so he watches himself come out of himself!'
A smaller dummy head made of rubber was also made for the shot, and was puppeteered out of shot. It took several takes to force it out the puppet's mouth. The effect was heavily altered in post-production, with footage of McCrane in makeup superimposed over the rubber head.
A frozen dummy head and hands were made in actor Hiro Kanagawa's likeness. Another dummy hand was also made for the shot of his demise, to be digitally blended with Kanagawa's own hand in the shot.
A dessicated corpse prop was made for 'Small Potatoes'.
A frozen Grey alien corpse was also made for the season's final episode 'Gethsemane'. These corpse props were specially designed to be hollow and filled with 'organs' made out of silicon. that could be removed in shots of the bodies being dissected.
These props were reused in the fifth season opener 'Redux', and the Millennium episode 'Somehow, Satan Got Behind Me'.
Sources:
- Assorted 'Behind the Truth' featurettes.
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