Season 10 Underwhelms This X-Phile...So Far

As a huge X-Files fan I was elated at the announcement of a tenth season being created for comics. IDW has a decent track record with licensed properties and I had a lot of confidence in what they would produce based, primarily, on the X-Files/30 Days of Night cross-over book they published a couple of years ago. Hearing that Chris Carter was going to be involved, on any level, was more well than I could have imagined for an X-Files book. To have an 'official' continuation of the series that was being shepherded by its creator was the best thing that anybody who loved the show could hope for.

So, why am I not loving this series five issues in?

The story takes place post-I Want to Believe and does a decent job reintroducing the characters to the reader and setting the stage for the next chapter in the life of Mulder and Scully. The story quickly stops making much sense, however, when Joe Harris, the series' writer, tries to explain the motivations of the story's antagonists and clumsily brings back some characters from the show's past. Despite having five issues to flesh things out and ease the reader into this new scenario, things jump around endlessly from location to location and character to character, and I never quite glommed on to what the heck was going on other than the fact that Mulder and Scully were trying to stop The Acolytes from finding something while simultaneously trying to figure out what the big picture was.

Even at their worst and most convoluted, a mythology episode worked as a story that you were watching; self-contained with a beginning, middle, and end. Where it tended to get confusing was where it fit in the big picture, how it tied in to the web of conspiracies and lies that had been established on the show and what it possibly meant for the future. This story, "The Believers", has all of those elements except I'm not feeling it working as a self-contained thing. Sitting down and reading all five issues this afternoon I didn't feel the flow, and I'm still muddled on what the purpose of the whole caper was.

I am looking forward to the next few issues which, I'm told, will be creature-of-the-week stories. Maybe just having a simple case to solve and creature or weird happening to figure out will get my X-Files juices flowing. I'm also not giving up hope that later stories will shed more light on the events of "The Believers" but, for now, I'm not shouting from the rooftops about how much I'm loving this new iteration.

Also, for the record, I'm enjoying the poop out of Michael Walsh's artwork on the series whatever I may be saying about my level of enjoyment. He's doing some really good work on this book and I'm excited to see where he goes from here as he's only going to get better as time goes on and he becomes more and more familiar with this world and these characters.

So, on that note, carry on and the truth is out there!

"Would it have changed some of the ways we looked at one another? "

As my previous post should have made clear, I am on a bit of an X-Files kick at the moment. While I was surfing the 'net earlier and listening to the 4 CD Mark SNow soundtrack collection, I ran across the track, "Dim Memories", and it reminded me of one of my favourite teasers from the whole nine seasons of the show. It's from an episode titled, "The Field Where I Died" and was directed, I think, by Rob Bowman, my a-number one X-Files director.

I liked revisiting it on YouTube so much, that I thought I would make a post out of it, so without further ado...



Later!

mike

Belated Anniversary Wishes

As I am wont to do, I forgot to commemorate the anniversary (18th, to be exact) of one of my absolute favourite television shows of all-time. On September 10th, 1993, a little show about aliens, ghosts and mutants came into our homes courtesy of the Fox network. Nobody expected it to last more than a season, if they were lucky. Some didn't think it would even go past the pilot stage (we're looking at you, Duchovny). But it ended up being the show that could, gaining many fans, lasting for nine years, and changing just about everything on television. More than that, it was the show that came into its own just as another cultural phenomenon was gaining ground with the masses. Fans would discuss the show online in chat rooms and message boards, and the creators would get instant feedback on what they produced, for good or ill. Fan-sites also started popping up, tracking episode titles, the show's mythology, and just connecting with other fans 'out there'.

I joined the show in its second season. I remember hearing some of my father's workmates, who were visiting one day, talking about how they had to get home to see if Scully would return after being abducted. We asked what they were talking about and they replied, "You mean you've never seen The X-Files?" I brushed it off (not trusting them to have overly discerning tastes in their television viewing) and didn't start watching the show until I stumbled across the pilot being broadcast out of its timeslot as a special presentation and it blew me away. I was totally bowled over by it. After that it was a short trip to becoming a full-on X-Phile, collecting the VHS tapes, recording the show on my own, reading the books, getting the soundtracks, and watching out for black helicopters.

It was also the first show to be released on DVD as complete season sets, which I think is pretty cool, particularly since I remember hitting my local Future Shop to grab the first one. I think I paid $105-$110 for each of the nine seasons. Yeah, do the math on that one.

Anyway, I'm posting a clip of one of my favourite moments from the series. It's the tail end of a Duchovny written and directed episode called "The Unnatural". I was going to post a clip from season 3 episode 17 entitled "Pusher" where Scully asks Mulder to explain the scientific principle of the whammy, but I couldn't find it online and didn't feel like pulling out the DVDs and doing the video stuff myself. So, without further ado:



I may take another trip through the X-Files time machine if I can find the materials for it. I did a special issue of Meanwhile... back in the summer of 1998, I believe, to tie-in with the release of The X-Files: Fight the Future. I had a couple of interviews which might be cool to unearth. Stay tuned, I guess, if that's your thing.

Keep watching the skies and, most importantly, trust no one!

mike

Decoding "Gethsemane" et al

I'm not sure what the catalyst was, but a little while ago I decided to start re-watching my X-Files sets from season one up with the intention of experiencing the entire mythology, now armed with 20/20 hindsight. As big a fan of the show as I was during its run, by the time things started changing in some of the later seasons (somewhere around 7-9, I'd guess) I could no longer keep track of the most basic threads of the mythology. Not only that, but I didn't quite feel the "Holy Christ!" impact I was supposed to during some of the series' major turning points, and I felt a little bit cheated by that.

I blamed myself, of course. Since I followed the behind the scenes stuff as closely as I followed the on-air show, I always heard or read interviews where the writers all seemed to see how all the little bits of connective tissue were working together. Being in the writer's room would give you that advantage, I suppose. Still, I had to ask myself, could I have paid closer attention? Have I forgotten some precious detail that would act as the Rosetta Stone to all of this hybrid/cloning/invasion/super-soldier gobbledeygook? It's possible, but I know I'm not the only fan who started getting lost when one lie would overlap another lie which would eventually lead to a truth that seemed innocuous but was really a major revelation that you didn't realize was one until much later in the show. The relationship between Mulder and Scully was always tracking fine for me but when we got something like the info dump that was Fight the Future or when the secret cabal was eventually destroyed by the other aliens with the melty faces, so much had led up to those moments by that point that my reaction was very much a surface one and the connective tissue that you knew the writers had in their heads appeared to be missing from a fan's perspective.

So far, 20/20 hindsight viewing has proven to me that knowing the ending, or just the broad strokes, really does help with the earlier bits that eventually lead you there. Watching the mythology track has been really fun and I've finally been able to just sit back and enjoy the episodes rather than trying to put the puzzle pieces together week after week. Knowing what's coming has also left me with a lot of questions about plot points that I'm waiting to see play out, but that's the whole point of the exercise, isn't it?

I have hit one speed bump so far in the form of the episodes "Gethsemane", "Redux" and "Redux II". The season 4 ender and the season 5 opener serves as a restatement of the mythology and attempts to send it off in a direction that will drive it headlong into the first feature film, Fight the Future, but I'm just totally derailed right now. It could be because I've watched it in interrupted bits and pieces, but this real alien/fake alien-Scully Cancer-Kritschgau snitching-Mulder dead-lying to the sub-committee plot is driving me a little bananas. It doesn't feel like it runs together too smoothly and that is actually surprising me a bit because, especially coming off the amazing season 4, I remember these episodes as being huge landmark events for the show and loving them the first time around. There are some beautiful character moments, and thematically there is some interesting things happening, but at this stage, I'm thinking the writers may have dropped the ball as early as this rather than much later on as I'd guessed.

I'll try them again when I have some time on my hands but do it in all one sitting this time. Maybe I'll have a better opinion of it then.

Cheers!

mike

Meanwhile... Birthday Shout-Out

I was cruising over at The Comics Reporter earlier this evening when I noticed that the 27th of January was the birth date of one Stefan Petrucha. Stefan has always been a favourite writer of mine from way back in the day. I still have a lot of fondness for Meta-4, his X-Files comic book work (which still stands as one of the best licensed comics I've ever seen and introduced an unknowing public to the artwork of Charles "Walking Dead" Adlard), Squalor (which lives again as Petrucha's Time Tripper book series) and the only Nexus story not done by Baron and the Dude that holds up for me, Nexus: The Liberator.

He's also done a lot of prose and YA work and his most recent novel, The Rule of Won is out there and getting great reviews from all over. I'm looking forward to checking it out.

So, a very happy Meanwhile... 50th birthday shout-out to Stefan. For many years of good reading and many more to come!

Cheers!

mike

Kim Manners (1950-2009)

This feels so weird, especially since I had an X-Files post just yesterday, but apparently Kim Manners, known for his time as a director on The X-Files and his current gig on Supernatural, passed away on Sunday from lung cancer. I was double checking Frank Spotnitz' Big Light blog today and saw the post there, then checked a few other sites online to get the whole story.

Man, I used to love watching he and Rob Bowman try to one-up each other week after week on The X-Files. I'll never forget episodes like "Home", "Humbug", "War of the Coprophages", "Closure" and many others whose scenes are permanently etched in my mind. I was thrilled a few years ago when I saw that he had become a regular on Supernatural along with X-Files alum, John Shiban. It was always fun following the old gang to their new digs and seeing what they were cooking up post Scully and Mulder.

For more tributes, Aint-It-Cool has a bit on Kim here and BuddyTV has a piece here. That's just a couple of the many that are floating around out there.

Manners was well-regarded in the industry and was a great director. My heartfelt condolences to his friends and loved ones. He will be missed.

The X-Files 3 D2DVD?

I caught this rumour over on Screen Rant the other day regarding the future of the X-Files film franchise. D2DVD was never how I hoped the series would conclude, but after the pergormance of I Want to Believe this past summer I, and I'm sure many X-Philes, would take a puppet show if it meant the series could continue in some form. Recently, executive producer and writer, Frank Spotnitz, debunked the rumour stating there is no truth to it whatsoever, but conspicuously left out any info on what may or may not be happening with Fox right now.

Oh, well, at least we have the comic book for a few more months.

mike

Favourite X-FIles Moments #4

Finally, a non-shipper post!

This next clip is from an episode I just watched called "The Field Where I Died". It's from season 4 and this opening clip is one of the more powerful moments in an episode filled with many. The direction of Rob Bowman is unmistakable with the lighting and the movement, and Duchovny, without doing much, gives a performance full of pathos.

Judge for yourself...



Believe again!

mike

Favourite X-FIles Moments #3

For someone who is most definitely not a 'shipper' (someone who desired a love/sex relationship between Mulder and Scully on the show) I'm kind of posting a lot of relationship type scenes here, aren't I? That may be a result of the availability of cool non 'shipper' scenes on YouTube, though. I'll keep looking until the 25th.

This particular scene is a nice quiet one between the main characters after Scully has a rather poignant solo adventure (written and directed by Gillian herself) where she is forced to examine her life and the choices she has made over the course of it. I like these quiet scenes between these two actors because they have so much chemistry and play off of each other so well. It helps when they're well written, too.



I'll try and step up the posts leading up to the film's release.

As always, I'm curious which episodes/moments are perhaps your favourites. Don't be shy. Feel free to share.

Believe again!

mike