the x-files s/d

My wife and I had been watching straight through since October. I threw in the towel last week as we ground our way through season 7 (there were definitely some fun standalone episodes, but the lows were abysmal).

Going into this watch, I had only seen a handful of episodes back in the '90s. I had remembered the alien conspiracy stuff fondly - oooh, the cigarette-smoking man, sneaking into military bases, mulder's father, that creepy ol' alien guy who could assume other people's identities. I didn't pay enough attention to know what was going on, but it was still pretty fun.

This time, watching in order and taking it all in, it started off fine, but by the time I checked out, it had just absolutely curdled.

Overall, my realization is that this was a very uneven show, and I might even say (from a modern perspective) that it was mostly middling-to-bad. But the best episodes are really, really good.

on recent rewatch I kind of agree with that conclusion, but also I find Mulder and Scully's interactions consistently delightful even when there's not much else going on around them. And usually also Skinner's. Next time I'm unemployed I'm going to devote myself to making a supercut of every time Skinner says something like 'my ass is on the line', ending with him saying that he'd been 'getting my ass chewed'.

On the next rewatch (probly sooner than yer think) I'm going to keep track of my top ten favourite eps list.

The Lone Gunmen origin story will certainly be in there

xxp: I had an idea to do a supercut of every time Skully says something like "Mulder, it just doesn't work that way" or "Mulder, you are making critical assumptions without any facts."

Scully, that is.

I know the current take is that "the standalones are the best ones" but, at the time, the ongoing storyline was *really* exciting. As a teenager I always hoped it was going to be an alien episode, not a monster-of-the-week storyline. Once the alien stuff started spinning in circles, maybe the season after the movie, I think I stopped watching (although I remember being really into Ally McBeal, my quality control was probably not great).

Definitely. Even on a re-watch, I still enjoyed the early alien mythology stuff, for all the same reasons I love those ’70s post-Watergate paranoia films that inspired the show. Although I soured on those episodes earlier than I remember: the alien bounty hunter may be a fan favorite but that’s where I start losing interest. I prefer when the aliens were more mysterious and unknowable—why are they coming here? What do they want? The bounty hunter seemed like a Sci-Fi Channel antagonist, and it made the aliens too mundane, knowing that they had very explicable motivations/plans. The black oil was cool for a bit, though.

As I probably posted upthread during my last rewatch, my preferred route would have been that aliens were perhaps confirmed but little explained, and more a springboard to exploring how the U.S.’s governments sins during the Cold War, ala the "Paper Clip" episode. Shade it a bit more Lovecraftian—there’s this force out there, visiting earth and taking people, and maybe the government thinks it can deal with them but really knows little about what “they" want.

Interesting to compare to DS9 which I'm watching for the first time now. You get that similar excitement at the start when you're wondering, "is it gonna be a standalone, or part of the big story". And the twist episodes are especially fun, when the latter comes in disguise as the former

In terms of things you can't get back -- I miss that "hey, I didn't know TV could do this!" feeling that blew my nerdy teenage mind multiple times in the 90s

Mid-way through S3 and - with some exceptions - I'm generally finding the arc stories more compelling than the standalones at present. Maybe it's just a function of how very little prestige TV does 24-episode seasons these days, but when you watch on a compressed ("binge") schedule you do realise just how much dreary filler there is. Maybe in the 90s this stuff felt more like a world that you could check into for an hour a week half the year, vs a tightly drawn narrative.

When seasons were longer, it was just par for the course for every show, as a I remember. Every show was patchy. Even a good seasons of Cheers is patchy If there were three bad episodes of Magnum PI in a row, that was just the way it was, nobody (I knew) got angry about it. Often the hangout was enough.

The alien bounty hunter story in S2 is really good, but it does feel like the point when they went straight-up "sci-fi" instead of taking inspiration from UFO mythology/folklore

my mom refuses to watch the x files because david duchovny was her ta for a class and he apparently “lounged about in a whorish manner”

— Ivy (@tomfordblues) December 2, 2023

the vampire ep in season 2 is so bad/goofy, but i wonder if it influenced blade down the line b/c they both have nightclub scenes... i suppose 'people who can only go out at night' and 'people who go to nightclubs' is an easy connection to make maybe there is a long history of nightclubs/vampirism i am not very familiar with the vampire mythos?

the clock tower ep is pretty corny but i like it as a riff on THEY LIVE

Season 6 is such a riot, so many great episodes

Just watching Arcadia now

Into Season 7, and starts heavy with the alien story with a three parter. Also, wondered how long it would be before they needed an excuse to show Mimi Rogers's cleavage.

Skipped a few to get to 'Die Hand Die Verletzt'

But two more details from the Duane Barry two parter I enjoyed were the OTT and perhaps CSI-inspiring use of Enhance on the footage showing Scully in Barry's trunk.

And what with the aliens being kids in suits, as they observe Barry being tortured with unanaesthetized laser-precise dentistry one of them is doing a delightful bobbling of their head looking around the set as tho understandably bored of this nonsense already.

Far less good ofc Scully's 'welp I remember nothing so back to the bureau for me shalala'. Having the abduction so early in the season and be moved on from so abruptly always jarred in what is otherwise a show that's hit its stride by this point.

scully's abduction is because gillian anderson was pregnant irl iirc

S4 Ep23 “Blood” is really great (Mulder wakes up in hotel covered in blood & no memory of the past couple of days) … kind of a combined mulder-aliens + mixed with some monster-of-the-week psychological phenomena … kept me guessing almost the whole time

Oh yeah - “Demons” I think? Wild episode - I don’t think it’s ever explained how Mulder ended up with other people’s blood on him, he’s just cleared of killing anyone and they leave it there? Also amazing that Scully is like “yeah you blacked out and woke up covered in blood because you got a doctor to give you ketamine and drill a hole in your skull” and Mulder’s immediate reaction is “I need to do that again ASAP.”

Watching 'End Game' and suddenly wondering if a prequel series about a younger 'Mr X' might be a blast.

xp also amazing that "Demons" is the second episode that season where a killer gets Mulder's gun while he's asleep/hallucinating, and he still has his job.

gotta say, it bothers me when there's nothing in the episode that establishes why the FBI has jurisdiction over the case

latest offender: D.P.O.!

Well, Mulder, it looks like this turned out to be a local matter. Let's head back to Washington.

I dunno, Scully. I kinda like it here. I might stick around for a few days.

Mulder, don't tell me you still think there's something to that theory of yours!

the way mr veg and i groaned when his “sister” shows up again for the thousandth time in S5 ep2 and we just yell at the tv MULDER YOU N00B

yeah at some point the villains figured out that mentioning his sister was the equivalent of jangling keys in front of a baby.

i think the season 5 opener was one of the first mythology ones i saw as a kid after catching random MOTW episodes and it was so baffling and dreary - I'm sure I've watched it since then but I just think of it as the one with nothing but Mulder wandering through warehouses and Scully giving a monologue while dying of cancer.

the Lone Gunmen backstory ep is pretty fun

I just watched an episode of MacGyver featuring a young Lone Gunman (Byers)!

The actor Bruce Harwood I mean, it was not the coolest crossover episode in the history of television

byers always looks like a kid pretending to be a grownup

even with a beard he looks like a 15 year old lol

it was not the coolest crossover episode in the history of television

He was playing his Lone Gunman character?

Was Richard Belzer there too?

til People on Youtube make trailer for old tv episodes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuEnNqrR8q4

gotta say, it bothers me when there's nothing in the episode that establishes why the FBI has jurisdiction over the case

For as much as Mulder complains about being straitjacketed by the Bureau, surely no other agent gets to just cherry pick the cases they're interested in like he does. Especially since so often they originate from random news articles he read, not something that has been referred to the FBI.

The show should have devoted one of their occasional comedic episodes to showing the aftermath of an X-File, as government lawyers hopelessly attempt to prosecute one of Mulder and Scully's cases based on their absurd theories and shoddy evidence, perhaps in a mock Law & Order format.

that trailer is about 1000x more exciting than the episode was

The S5 opener Redux truly is the nadir of the mythology. It's been a while since I watched it, but I remember finding it hilarious when Mulder dramatically announces the true culprit of whatever they're talking about is... some FBI director we might have seen once or twice before in the series. OK then.

I remember there was a very mixed reaction to the blank-faced torch guys (who turn up later in S5) at the time, but I liked them. On one hand, it's yet another element added to the confusion; but it felt like they actually brought a sense of urgency and horror back to the Mythology, which was sorely needed by that point.