Reception
"Unusual Suspects" premiered on the Fox network on November 16, 1997. This episode earned a Nielsen rating of 13.0, with a 19 share, meaning that roughly 13.0 percent of all television-equipped households, and 19 percent of households watching television, were tuned in to the episode. It was viewed by 21.72 million viewers.
The episode received mixed to moderately positive reviews from critics. The A.V. Club reviewer Todd VanDerWerff gave "Unusual Suspects" an A-, and wrote that the episode "is a love letter to the very idea of paranoia". Furthermore, VanDerWerff argued that "as the episode moved its way to its climax, when Mr. X improbably lets the Gunmen live after seeing as much as they did it struck me that what we’re seeing here may not entirely be meant to be taken seriously, just as 'Memoirs Of A Cigarette Smoking Man' is more about who the CSM wished he might have been than the person he actually was. This isn’t a true story; it’s a manifesto." Critical Myth's John Keegan gave the episode 6/10, and, while calling the entry "an interesting diversion from the normal format of the series", he noted that "there are still some issues with the plausibility of the story, and ultimately, the questions surrounding Mulder overshadow the character development of the Gunmen themselves."
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 three stars out of five. The two compared the episode to "Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man", but called it "throw away and charming". Shearman and Pearson criticized the most the fact that the episode "largely concerned in suggesting to the audience that the government is being conspiratorial… five seasons into a hit series which has turned that argument into a cliche." Paula Vitaris from Cinefantastique gave the episode a positive review and awarded it three stars out of four. She wrote that, "'Unusual Suspects' is filler–but amusing filler". Vitaris further complimented the performance of Signy Coleman as Susanne Modeski, and called the return of "not-yet-dead" X as "welcome".
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