rewatching The X-Files
This year marked the 20th anniversary of the beginning of The X-Files. This was my first online fandom. I think I was like a lot of people who couldn't make it to the bitter end. I can't remember exactly when I dropped out -- I liked Doggett, but I was already burned out on the sloppy mythology and, to be honest, the Mulder/Scully dynamic. And I was burned out on the fandom itself, which became so fractious. Except for a curious rewatch of "Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose" a few years ago, I never looked at re-runs and my DVD sets collected dust on the shelf.
But also this year, Gillian Anderson showed up on Hannibal and she looked pretty good (even if her character and acting style were a bit opaque).
And Breaking Bad ended this year (still processing it*) and there won't be anything new from Vince Gilligan for a while. And I got curious about whether his TXF episodes, which I always remembered as some of the best of the series and which also featured some Walter White precursors, still held up.
My husband was game to watch them, though he'd never seen more than bits and pieces of the show. But for some reason I was like, no, first you need to know who Mulder and Scully are. We should start at the beginning.
Now, a mere few weeks later, we're already closing in on the end of Season 4. What even, I don't know.
I don't really have organized thoughts, but here are the thoughts I do have, in no particular order:
1. Actually, okay, we cheated and skipped a shitload of episodes in the first two seasons. And we absolutely skipped "Teso dos Bichos" and "El Mundo Gira." There's only so much time in one's life, after all.
2. I forgot that Vince's first episode wasn't until "Soft Light," the end of Season 2. It's impressive how he networked into a meeting with Chris Carter, then essentially went from writing a spec script to becoming a co-producer in the space of two years. Brings to mind Ron Moore's trajectory on TNG.
3. I also forgot that Homeland's Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa wrote for the show.
4. I've been enjoying some of the 20th anniversary interviews and reunion specials, like this long Vulture interview with the historically elusive Chris Carter, the San Diego Comic Con 2013 panel, and a couple of long interviews with Vince and Howard.
5. I can still quote lines along with the show. "Just tell me where she is!" "Please explain to me the scientific nature of the whammy." "Taking your little notes!"
6. I also like reading the Wikipedia entries for each episode, specifically the "Production" and "Reception" sections, which help contextualize things for me. Sarah Stegall's reviews get quoted a lot, which is interesting as I primarily thought of her as another fanfic-writing fan.
7. In looks and atmosphere and camera work, the show holds up impressively well. I compare it to other sort of contemporaneous shows like Homicide: Life on the Street and Buffy the Vampire Slayer which were generally stronger on writing than visuals. TXF on the other hand had really high production values which gave the show a polished, cinematic feel. And directors like Rob Bowman and Kim Manners were excellent at building atmosphere and intensity when bringing script to screen. It just makes the show very watchable, despite occasional problems with premise or writing.
8. The episode "Home," for instance. All I remembered was the gross Peacock family. But as a piece of technical film-making (and also the writing as a commentary on American families and aspirations) it's actually a brilliantly done episode, like a slick mini-horror movie. From the unscored, sun-filled baseball field scenes to the brutal murder of the sheriff and his wife, the suspense and dread build so beautifully.
9. So many Canadian accents! Maybe I just know more Canadians now, but I never really noticed before. It's particularly amusing when a Canadian actor guest stars in, say, a US military uniform. Mulder's all, "General, the killer's a US war veteran working out grievances with his superior officers, and you're his next target." The general's all, "I have no idea why." I'm all, "Yeah, because you're actually in the Canadian army."
10. And of course Vancouver, which was so good at doubling for like, all of the US. (And parts surrounding Vancouver -- that one lake I think got a lot of use in Smallville and Supernatural as well.)
11. So many famous guest stars in general! Lucy Liu (looking damn near exactly the same), Jack Black (downright skinny), Ryan Reynolds (still with baby fat), Felicity Huffman, Jewel Staite. These are the ones I hadn't remembered, anyway. And then there's the infamous: Doug Hutchison, eww.
12. I never thought of Season 1 as being the height of M/S's attractiveness, but they were both so very pretty during that season. Gillian Anderson in particular. How was she only 24?? By Season 4 she looks like she's aged ten years, and it isn't cancer makeup. Maybe it was the increasing severity of her hairstyle?
13. During Season 2's "Colony"/"End Game," my husband remarked, "What is the deal with Mulder? He should have been fired 19 times already."
14. Every time Skinner shows up, one of us ends up saying, "Skinner...he's such a man."
15. No, seriously. Fifteen years later (I started watching the show during Season 5), and now Skinner is the one who does it for me. I think he actually does it for my husband, too. So I have
notreallyjordan's old fanfic page open in another tab....
16. So many times, I found myself telling my husband, "That's actually not the worst thing that's going to happen to Scully this season."
17. I still can't quite get over the fact that Mulder and Scully get together romantically. MSR was what brought me into the fandom, but despite some adorable partnership moments, I never needed to see them in love onscreen. I also didn't need it to happen to Scully the way it did. It's basically that I wanted more for her. I'm biased in her favor, yes. But given that she's the character I care most about, it's not a love story to me, not after all of her suffering and loss. It's like she's stuck with Mulder because he ends up being all she has left, when he and his quest are actually the root of her problems. (Also wtf not telling her about her ova!!!) Being with him is not completely a choice for her. It's an inevitability. And that's not sexy or romantic at all, in my mind. I feel this even more now than I did then.
18. I had to read Wikipedia to refresh my memory on how the mytharc was supposed to work. I think they took "show, don't tell" to the wrong extreme. Even two seasons was too long to drag out the full story.
19. Those monologues are still so fucking ridiculous.
20. Scully had sex with Ed Jerse. Fact.
21. Isn't there an official montage of all the times Scully said, "Mulder, are you suggesting...?" I tried to Google for it, but all I found was a few seconds on the Season 2 blooper reel and the one I'm thinking of seems like it was longer.
[* I also never talked about the end of Friday Night Lights. If this post on TXF is anything to go by, I may just need years to finish reacting to my favorites.]
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But also this year, Gillian Anderson showed up on Hannibal and she looked pretty good (even if her character and acting style were a bit opaque).
And Breaking Bad ended this year (still processing it*) and there won't be anything new from Vince Gilligan for a while. And I got curious about whether his TXF episodes, which I always remembered as some of the best of the series and which also featured some Walter White precursors, still held up.
My husband was game to watch them, though he'd never seen more than bits and pieces of the show. But for some reason I was like, no, first you need to know who Mulder and Scully are. We should start at the beginning.
Now, a mere few weeks later, we're already closing in on the end of Season 4. What even, I don't know.
I don't really have organized thoughts, but here are the thoughts I do have, in no particular order:
1. Actually, okay, we cheated and skipped a shitload of episodes in the first two seasons. And we absolutely skipped "Teso dos Bichos" and "El Mundo Gira." There's only so much time in one's life, after all.
2. I forgot that Vince's first episode wasn't until "Soft Light," the end of Season 2. It's impressive how he networked into a meeting with Chris Carter, then essentially went from writing a spec script to becoming a co-producer in the space of two years. Brings to mind Ron Moore's trajectory on TNG.
3. I also forgot that Homeland's Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa wrote for the show.
4. I've been enjoying some of the 20th anniversary interviews and reunion specials, like this long Vulture interview with the historically elusive Chris Carter, the San Diego Comic Con 2013 panel, and a couple of long interviews with Vince and Howard.
5. I can still quote lines along with the show. "Just tell me where she is!" "Please explain to me the scientific nature of the whammy." "Taking your little notes!"
6. I also like reading the Wikipedia entries for each episode, specifically the "Production" and "Reception" sections, which help contextualize things for me. Sarah Stegall's reviews get quoted a lot, which is interesting as I primarily thought of her as another fanfic-writing fan.
7. In looks and atmosphere and camera work, the show holds up impressively well. I compare it to other sort of contemporaneous shows like Homicide: Life on the Street and Buffy the Vampire Slayer which were generally stronger on writing than visuals. TXF on the other hand had really high production values which gave the show a polished, cinematic feel. And directors like Rob Bowman and Kim Manners were excellent at building atmosphere and intensity when bringing script to screen. It just makes the show very watchable, despite occasional problems with premise or writing.
8. The episode "Home," for instance. All I remembered was the gross Peacock family. But as a piece of technical film-making (and also the writing as a commentary on American families and aspirations) it's actually a brilliantly done episode, like a slick mini-horror movie. From the unscored, sun-filled baseball field scenes to the brutal murder of the sheriff and his wife, the suspense and dread build so beautifully.
9. So many Canadian accents! Maybe I just know more Canadians now, but I never really noticed before. It's particularly amusing when a Canadian actor guest stars in, say, a US military uniform. Mulder's all, "General, the killer's a US war veteran working out grievances with his superior officers, and you're his next target." The general's all, "I have no idea why." I'm all, "Yeah, because you're actually in the Canadian army."
10. And of course Vancouver, which was so good at doubling for like, all of the US. (And parts surrounding Vancouver -- that one lake I think got a lot of use in Smallville and Supernatural as well.)
11. So many famous guest stars in general! Lucy Liu (looking damn near exactly the same), Jack Black (downright skinny), Ryan Reynolds (still with baby fat), Felicity Huffman, Jewel Staite. These are the ones I hadn't remembered, anyway. And then there's the infamous: Doug Hutchison, eww.
12. I never thought of Season 1 as being the height of M/S's attractiveness, but they were both so very pretty during that season. Gillian Anderson in particular. How was she only 24?? By Season 4 she looks like she's aged ten years, and it isn't cancer makeup. Maybe it was the increasing severity of her hairstyle?
13. During Season 2's "Colony"/"End Game," my husband remarked, "What is the deal with Mulder? He should have been fired 19 times already."
14. Every time Skinner shows up, one of us ends up saying, "Skinner...he's such a man."
15. No, seriously. Fifteen years later (I started watching the show during Season 5), and now Skinner is the one who does it for me. I think he actually does it for my husband, too. So I have
notreallyjordan's old fanfic page open in another tab....
16. So many times, I found myself telling my husband, "That's actually not the worst thing that's going to happen to Scully this season."
17. I still can't quite get over the fact that Mulder and Scully get together romantically. MSR was what brought me into the fandom, but despite some adorable partnership moments, I never needed to see them in love onscreen. I also didn't need it to happen to Scully the way it did. It's basically that I wanted more for her. I'm biased in her favor, yes. But given that she's the character I care most about, it's not a love story to me, not after all of her suffering and loss. It's like she's stuck with Mulder because he ends up being all she has left, when he and his quest are actually the root of her problems. (Also wtf not telling her about her ova!!!) Being with him is not completely a choice for her. It's an inevitability. And that's not sexy or romantic at all, in my mind. I feel this even more now than I did then.
18. I had to read Wikipedia to refresh my memory on how the mytharc was supposed to work. I think they took "show, don't tell" to the wrong extreme. Even two seasons was too long to drag out the full story.
19. Those monologues are still so fucking ridiculous.
20. Scully had sex with Ed Jerse. Fact.
21. Isn't there an official montage of all the times Scully said, "Mulder, are you suggesting...?" I tried to Google for it, but all I found was a few seconds on the Season 2 blooper reel and the one I'm thinking of seems like it was longer.
[* I also never talked about the end of Friday Night Lights. If this post on TXF is anything to go by, I may just need years to finish reacting to my favorites.]
This post has
comments at its original location at http://hesychasm.dreamwidth.org/263478.html. Please comment there or here.