For the uninitiated, the Lone Gunmen are a set of three hackers who have appeared sporadically throughout the X-Files. Friends of Mulder's, the Lone Gunmen have provided Mulder with evidence from time to time and have provided the show with a kind of comic relief. Last year, the announcement was made that the Lone Gunmen would have their own spin-off show. The results may vary. For those who haven't seen the show, be warned: this review contains an overview of the episode (read: spoilers).

The episode "Pilot" begins with the three infiltrating the "E-Com-Con" Corporation, in pursuit of a new computer processor. Named, the Octium (*cough cough*pentium*cough cough*), the chip is apparently the fastest out there. The Gunmen want it so that they can prove that keeps information on the users of the processor which it sends back to the headquarters. While Langley distracts security, Byers lowers Frohike down into the test room in a scene directly lifted from Mission Impossible. Of course, these are the Lone Gunmen and their work is never easy. Byers' computer is hacked into and Frohike is left dangling on a wire. A bearded man comes in and takes the chip. The man then leaves the room and dodges into the bathroom as the security enters. The Gunmen are seemingly caught red handed, as the real thief discards her disguise and leaves.

Daunted by their loss, the Gunmen return to their office/home, only to find out that Byers' father has died. After the funeral, Byers learns that his father was in fact murdered. This information was given by a man claiming to be a fellow worker in the government. The group spends the episode chasing after why and how Byers' father was murdered, finding out that Byers' father was apparently opposed to a government project known only as "scenario-12-d".

The interesting thing is that Byers learns that his father isn't really dead. It turns out that the man who came to Byers was a government evil do-er, and the body in the car crash that supposedly killed Byers' father was in fact the assassin sent to kill him. Scenario-12-d is a plan to crash a plane into the World Trade Center in order to cause unrest between America and other countries in order to increase arms sales. *whew* Byers and his father board the plane looking for the bomb on the plane, but only after they are in midair do they realize that the plane is being controlled remotely by the baddies. Of course, the Gunmen manage to save the day at the last minute when the female hacker (Yves Adele Harlow) who stole the Octium chip lets them use it's processing power to decrypt the signal and return control of the plane to the pilots. And in the end, Byers' father is proud of him.

My opinion on the show seemed almost bi-polar at times. The characters used some computer "terminology" that was laughable, but in the same way annoying. People talk about "gigaflops" and at one point the Gunmen have their "cookie compromised." I'm sure Chris Carter is going to get a thousand letters on computer terminology. Here's hoping he reads a few of them. Other than that, the show was good. Occasionally the acting goes over into the hokey side, but that is understandable due to the content. If it wasn't hokey, it'd be realistic and by that I mean that it would be mind-numbingly boring. The show is entertaining in a "it's so far off" kind of way, much like the movie Hackers. Hopefully the few next episodes will get better and the show will hook viewers before it moves to the friday-night-of-doom timeslot.