Walter Skinner

An ex-Marine with a stern sense of duty, the Bureau's Assistant Director Walter Skinner (Mitch Pileggi) has little patience with Fox Mulder's unorthodox methods of investigation. More than once he has warned Mulder and Scully that their inquiries were crossing into dangerous territory, and once he shut down the X-Files entirely. But when Dana Scully was kidnapped, he reopened them, telling Mulder, "That's what they fear the most" -- without clarifying who "they" are. It's never clear whose side Skinner is on, or whose orders he takes, but his efforts on behalf of Mulder and Scully "through unofficial channels" have made it plain that he is deeply concerned about his independent-minded agents and their work.