The X-Files Episode Inspired By Charlie Chaplin's Autobiography

There's an episode of the X-Files that is so disturbing Fox promised they'd never show it again, and yet this dark and dangerous episode actually has an interesting origin- Charlie Chaplin's My Autobiography.

The standalone episode is called "Home" and finds Mulder and Scully investigating the murder of an infant, which leads them to the home of three deformed brothers who are keeping a dark secret.

It's later revealed that their quadruple amputee mother, who supposedly died years ago, is alive and had given birth to the murdered infant, making an already dark episode even more cringe inducing.

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Co-writer of the episode Glen Morgan says the episode was inspired by a peculiar section of Charlie Chaplin's My Autobiography, in which Chaplin describes an incident that took place while staying at a miner's house in a British town called Ebbw Vale.

The miner invited him into the kitchen to see something spectacular, and to Chaplin's surprise a man with no legs crawled out of the cupboard where he'd been sleeping.

The miner then convinced the legless man to dance and do some tricks:

A half man with no legs, an oversized, blond, flat-shaped head, a sickening white face, a sunken nose, a large mouth and powerful muscular shoulders and arms, crawled from underneath the dresser … "Hey, Gilbert, jump!" said the father and the wretched man lowered himself slowly, then shot up by his arms almost to the height of my head. 

"How do you think he’d fit in with a circus? The human frog!"

I was so horrified I could hardly answer. However, I suggested the names of several circuses that he might write to.

Read How Charlie Chaplin Influenced The Most Disturbing Episode Of 'The X-Files' here