Gillian Anderson Plays The X-Files Trivia Game with Jimmy Kimmel

Gillian Anderson was on Jimmy Kimmel Live! to promote her turn as Margaret Thatcher in Season 4 of The Crown, written by her partner Peter Morgan. But after playing a clip of the late Alex Trebek from an episode of The X-Files and discussing actors who appeared on the show before they were famous (Jack Black, Bryan Cranston), Kimmel got her to play a trivia game about the show that made her a star.

Kimmel read her a plot synopsis, and Anderson had to guess whether it was a real X-Files episode or something Kimmel's writing staff just made up. Considering that there were 209 episodes and two feature films, that's a lot to for anyone to remember — including, apparently, Anderson herself.

She got the first three right, but she was tripped up by the Season 9 episode "The Lord of the Flies," in which "a teenager who controls insects realizes he's half-insect just like his mom." She did not remember that at all, even though it starred Aaron Paul. (To be fair, most people would probably like to forget Season 9.) 

That must have rattled her confidence, because when she was given "Mulder and Scully think they've traveled back in time, only to find out they woke up drunk in an Amish community," she answered yes, which was also wrong. She did recall "going to Amish-land," though. She was perhaps remembering the Season 1 episode "Gender Bender," which featured an Amish-like community called the Kindred.

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Andy Hunsaker has a head full of sitcom gags and nerd-genre lore, and can be followed @AndyHunsaker if you're into that sort of thing.