Hi,

I wanted to start a thread about this show...
My opinion about the show is this:

I watched the series when I really was a young kid (I was born in '87, the series aired around '93-'94...) and I loved it. I watched it at night, not always comprehending it, founding it to be scary sometimes, but I really loved it, because I really loved al that horror and science fiction.

When I was 11 or 12 I saw the movie in the movie theatre, found it to be very good to, but afterwards, lost a bit track of the series.

Untill 4 days ago... I suddenly remembered them, and I just ordered the 9 season dvd boxes... Don't know why.
What I remember from the show was that it gave television a higher standard. It had very intelligent writing, good acting and good characters, and filmic cinematography.
But what I liked the most, were just, the stories and how they brought it: they brought it on such a believable level, you REALLY believed all this was true.

Can't wait to watch them all next week, when the dvd's arrive...

Love to hear some other opinions about this show...

Every scene where Mulder's mother appears is great.

I have to say that because my girlfriend's mother is the actress.

I watched the first episode--then skipped the first few in the first season until i heard it described as being like the Night Stalker so I started watching it again--and watched every episode till the end of the run.
The first couple of seasons or so had good cliffhangers(the boxcar full of dead aliens). But eventually the alien storyline ran out of steam for me--as well as Mulder's missing sister plot.

I liked the movie.

I think the best episodes were the single shot ones--those that focused on some weird monster. The final episode was a let down--but I had read that they didnt really know how they were going to end the show so at least they were honest about it.

i really loved the x-files. the stories were always very engaging and direction-wise, the show had plenty of high moments. my favorite director of the lot was rob bowman who never failed to dazzle with his smart camerawork and well-thought out sequences. he went on to direct the film version of the show as well as the christian bale helmed "reign of fire" which i found to be quite entertaining.

perhaps the best aspect of the series was the way it married comedy into its fantastical plotlines. season three really began to see more comedy incorporated into the show and my best memories of the x-files lie in the episodes that exhibited the most humor. frequently hilarious, these episodes never seemed to be detached from the overall "uncanniness" of the show and i marvel at how they made it work. who can forget the episode about the kid vampire who was using fake fangs to tackle his prey? in the opening sequence mulder is chasing some unknown figure deep into a dark forest. convinced that his suspect is a vampire he eventually impales him in the chest. scully catches up with him an in a hilarious twist of events he turns over the body and discovers the "fangs" in the freshly desceased's mouth are fake. he utters an expletive - "fu..." - but is cut off by the famous x-files theme and beginning credits. brilliant.

there were countless other episodes that really stood out but one of my most favorite was the two-part episode where a UFO-related event interferes with space-time and causes mulder and an old-fart fellow agent to exchange bodies (actually, im not entirely sure of the plotline, correct me if im wrong with some details please!) anyways, the storytelling was inventive in that everytime the old-fart agent faced the mirror, you could see mulder as his reflection (and vice versa). we are treated to many scenes where this is so (more for the benefit of the viewer really, to remind us that mulder is actually inhabited by the personality of a different person, and again vice versa). everything from wardrobe mirrors to side mirrors, bar wall mirrors and, in one particularly side-splitting scene, the ceiling mirrors of mulder's bedroom (newly refurnished by the guy inhabiting mulder's body, in the hopes of seducing scully)... it was a riot.

the x-files was great while it lasted. it'd be nice if they did a couple of special reunion episodes, yeah?

dan

I also loved the episode with Mulder and the MIB (played by Michael McKean, I think) exchange bodies.

It's hard to sustain the tension of 'what's the alien conspiracy' over that period of time. So that's why I think the stand alone episodes worked best.

Remember Charles Nelson Reilly as Jose Chung?

Yeah the comedy was really memorable. I can still remember some lines.
When Michael McKean meets the Lone Gunman, reads their conspiracy newspaper and says: do you know how many of these ideas I came up with while sitting on the pot?" and : "There is no Saddam Hussein. We found him doing dinner theatre in Tulsa. Plays good ethnics."

And the episode where we follow "Cancer Man" through his past and at the end he is stitting on the bench with the vagrant who picks a moldy box of chocolates out of the garbage and they do a parody of Forrest Gump(except, you realize that instead of meeting famous people--CM is killing them).

I thought the Charles Nelson Reilly guest spot on Millennium was funny too--with its spoof of L Ron Hubbard--and Lance Henricksen comes into the scene of a homicide dressed in a bright blue suit and laughing: "lighten up fella! its a murder, not a funeral!"


Hardly watched the show but remember that episode.

Why, Jose Chung was nothing but a 'beep', 'beep', 'blankety blank'.

hi matt,

hopefully you purchased the season sets@good prices. it just came down to $25/season recently on amazon.com (at time of this post).

meanwhile, notice the landscape of TV before and after XF. before XF, it was easy to spot a TV show, the sets, the look of it. after XF, you had shows like Lost, Alias, Desperate Housewives, Sopranos, and so on that looked like films themselves.

coincidence? technology? that's a part of it, but i think XF revolutionized TV by making it closer to film because they utilized many of the same techniques. in fact regardless of what you thought about early vs. later seasons, each episode is shot like a 45min film.

plus, nearly every element of the show is extremely well done:
-writing
-acting
-directing/cinematography
-fx
-music
-set
-costume
-etc.

the only negative i can think of is they made the mythology on the fly from 1-5 and then dispersed it by fight the future film. if you watched the series finale, "The Truth" people didn't like it cause they finally revealed ALL of the plotlines to fans. i thought, "that's it?" yup, that's it. you can summarize the alien mythology with a few sentences.

well, regardless of that. imho, it's the best TV show ever made in history. nothing else comes close. i really can't think of another that comes to the caliber of what it achieved.

The series was very good but there was no resolution and then it was yanked, or whatever. A couple of my friends acted in it several times (small parts). Too bad "they" stopped making it (or whatever).

hi matt,

hopefully you purchased the season sets@good prices. it just came down to $25/season recently on amazon.com (at time of this post).

meanwhile, notice the landscape of TV before and after XF. before XF, it was easy to spot a TV show, the sets, the look of it. after XF, you had shows like Lost, Alias, Desperate
the only negative i can think of is they made the mythology on the fly from 1-5 and then dispersed it by fight the future film. if you watched the series finale, "The Truth" people didn't like it cause they finally revealed ALL of the plotlines to fans. i thought, "that's it?" yup, that's it. you can summarize the alien mythology with a few sentences.

Hi Yi,

Yes I bought them on the internet at a fair price, 29 euros for the OLD DIGIPACKS :-D.
They are very hard to find, and now even that website is almost through their stock with those old beautiful digipacks. As a matter of fact, I'll be getting the boxes - finally - in a couple of days.

It's nice, what you say about the level of TV shows, I heard many people citing that about the XF.
Can't wait to rewatch them, and watch all the episodes I never saw.

but Frank,

the "resolution" was *all revealed*. the fans just didn't agree with it. the mythos is actually *very light* compared to somn like Lost. it's not as BIG as fans make it out to be. that's why they're all disappointed.

go watch the series finale, "The Truth" and it's all in there.

PS matthie, i'm about to do the same =). s1-9. i know i've seen every ep since s5, but s1-4 i was a bit spotty. i'm glad i'm going to enjoy some of the *best* parts of XF =).

It doesnt help when there are the rumors of another movie--so they cant end the series with an alien invasion.

Sopranos could end that way if they are planning a movie(I havent enjoyed it much in the last 3 seasons--the first 2 were great-maybe the novelty has worn off for me, but I think they are all getting soft).
I thought Babylon 5 was a show where they had planned its story arc out well from the start-unlike Star Trek-- I think the finale episode was filmed a year before the final season! And still they left threads hanging. The episode where the first season main character encounters a 2001 spacesuited figure in blue who we learn, 2 years later, is Bruce Boxleitner who then goes into the Future and there is all that stuff about his son--and that parasite creature trap--great stuff. I watched seasons 1-4 over a few months so it really felt like a consistent storyline.

that'd be another thread (B5) altogether =). but... *in short* JMS thought the shows was really going to be cancelled after s4, so he wrote in the civil wars stuff planned for 5 into 4. that's why 5 feels stretched out/made up. that's why series finale was filmed a year before.

the "resolution" was *all revealed*.What was the resolution? The show just ended with those new actors and that was that.

"When I was 11 or 12 I saw the movie in the movie theatre, found it to be very good to, but afterwards, lost a bit track of the series."

My roommate refused to believe me that they kept shooting the series after the movie came out in 1998. I had to show him the imdb.com details to convince him it ran until 2002.

I think a HUGE problem with the series was the lack of reveal. They just wouldn't get on with the alien conspiracy. They took so long to start showing what was going on behind the scenes that people lost interest. I watched many, many episodes and I still don't know what "Cancer Man" and "The Well-Manicured Man" and their crew were really doing. I really liked those characters, but they started to seem pointless. I know there was some sort of war between the faceless "rebels" and the black oil beings, but what was the resolution?

People lost interest not because David Duchovny reduced his appearances on the show, but because the producers wouldn't get on with it. I kept hearing the crew of Monty Python shout "Get on with it!" while I was watching the X-files.

SPOILER AHEAD! don't read if you don't wanna be spoiled silly!







i believe chris carter has already admitted (in interviews) that they didn't have an entire mythology planned out from beginning to end in s1.

they started the show with the premise to scare people (like Kolchak) and that was pretty much it. when people started digging the show and after s1, they felt they had a hit on their hands, THEN S2 chris+writing team started to fabricate the mythology based on the loose alien mythology in s1, which is pretty lean still compared to the scary episodes from s1-s3.

s4 is when a great # of mythology started to take over and you can see the effects of it beginning to build by late s3. they only made enough mythology (like pixie dust) to last through s5 or so. the mythology was essentially "explained" via Fight the Future film in '97 the season preceding the film s5. season6 (post film) pretty much finished and wrapped up the mythology (colonization) since s1.

in another words, XF DID tie up as much of the loose ends as possibly from season5-6 including the film. it's 2bad the fans didn't like it because it is very much what it is, a simple mythology/mystery that is literally explained and revealed to fans, but they hated it. they all think it's too simple, too much of a "copout". in fact, most fans didn't even KNOW the mythology had all but been unraveled.

ok. what IS the mythology? marcus, you already pointed out. that IS the mythology. it's pretty simple and can be summed up in a few sentences. what IS the resolution? in the film, remember the UFO that took off in the end? well, that was the colonization aliens and its black oil leaving for good. thus, closing black oil+colonization story arc. see here for MORE details:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_oil
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonists_%28The_X-Files%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syndicate_%28The_X-Files%29

what IS the resolution for syndicate? i believe one of the few last episodes was the one where the syndicate and their families all burned up. it was literal and figurative "reboot" of the franchise (that also coincided with bringing the 2 new leads into the show and lead to david exiting for the last 2 seasons). that concludes the syndicate thread. that's why s6-9 was much more loose and comedic in nature. less dark and more happy. millennium picked up the dark side =).

w/7-9, the XF team tried to do something with super soldiers as the mythology but i don't think that that went anywhere as well as the original alien colonization storyline did. what IS the resolution, Frank? it is that the super soldiers are preparing the way for the colonist aliens to come back in 2010 or somn (whatever Mulder's last few dialogue were). that's why mulder was so distraught in the end because he couldn't do anything about the oncoming alien invasion. prepping the way for the XF2 sequel =). unfortunately, XF2 is gonna' be a monster of the movie episode.

anyway, "The Truth" (the 2 parter series finale) is the most explicit. all of what i wrote above is pretty much culled from the truth. it went through the entire series and gave you a huge summary of the mythos (hence "The Truth"). reason why people don't like it? XF wasn't all about those 2 total mythological story arcs to begin with and they started to make stuff up by s4 onwards =).

i mean the characters in the finale explicitly stated, "the black oil+gray aliens", etc. all of it sounds absurd and ridiculous. but that's "The Truth". you may not like it, but that's ALL there is to it =).

the point is, it's the question that drives us (as Trinity said). it's the mystery of the unknown that keeps us watching. remember desperate housewives? after s1's season finale, the mystery was revealed, thus deflation of quality in the beginning of s2 despite NEW mystery. and s2's NEW mystery was already revealed halfway through leaving the latter half pure butter.

how about Lost. if they reveal the mystery of what's behind the island a great # of viewers will tune out. you never answer it and it'll be endlessly debated.

Yeah. No resolution. THAT's what I hated about the show. Otherwise, it was fun to watch.

By the way, the cancer man has had an acting school for years in downtown Vancouver. That's were the Kiwi, Zena, got her training. It was in the paper some years back.

William B. Davis something school for Actor's Study.

so you hate Lost because it has no resolution?

Lost has resolution, little by little---unlike the X-files. In fact, Lost has a plot and a through line.

Another great thing about the X Files is when you could watch the show on a sunday, then go into Vancouver on a wednesday and see Scully and Mulder doing there thing on the steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery. Kind of surreal in itself. :)



BUT i was actually glad it moved to California. If you have UFOs and Area 51 you have to have a desert.
That reminds me, their COPS episode was another interesting variation.

i loved their bermuda triangle thing =). very cinematic (as usual).

Kelly, BC has deserts.

Sandy duney deserts?

DVD boxes arrived... gosh those digipacks are beatiful, I'm glad I didn't went for those plastic M-lock things.

Watched an episode from season 1 today, episode "Eve"...
Really great, I felt 10 years old again, enthousiasm of the scripts and mood... LOVE IT!

you'll get so sick of high quality content that when you finish XF you will feel depressed nothing else on TV comes close. trust me... or... no 1.

Sandy duney deserts?Oh, that would be Richmond, BC---part of Greater Vancouver. They used that for Mission to Mars, though they spray painted the sand. :-)

I concur with all the positive comments about this show,
Rob Bowman and Kim Manners IMO were centrepoint players in the series survival. It was from Xiles that i took on a renewed interest of Star Trek TNG, and it turns out that many guest characters from TNG made their way onto XFiles itself (like Deepthroat).

Aside from the direction and cinematography, the stories, particularly the Mythology stories, really made the series one of those "must watch" type of shows.
With regard to the mythology, i feel that if they focused a lil more on that, it would have been even more intriguing and less dissapointing at its conclusion.
In addition, i feel that the series could have survived with Robert Patrick taking on the lead male role as his own persona was considerably stronger that Duchovny's making the show a lil more watchable as Patrick just had a better screen presence IMO
As for produciton values, i believe it was one of the first modern productions to implement cinematic techniques and tools, which is why many directors were more than happy to work with Carter. Total creative freedom with an almost limitless budget (produciton wise)

Yes, i sat through all 56 discs... all 9 seasons... every episode back to back LOL
If your an editor and youre lookign for company while you work, TV shows are the best solution IMO... LOL
From Xfiles to Star Trek TNG and Voyager i keep them playing and replaying as i edit my work...

I liked DS9 better than Voyager, though Voyager was okay. My favourite trek stuff are the movies.

Seriously? In Richmond? I want a pic!
I have read that we have sand dunes in BC
but where? Ttell river? I cant find a pic.
Saskatchewan has some.
I actually learned that just a little bit ago.
:)

Seriously? In Richmond? I want a pic!A friend of mine took pics on the Richond set. It think it's near a dike---enough for a movie set like Mission to Mars.
I have read that we have sand dunes in BC
but where? Ttell river? I cant find a pic.Where ever it's been clear cut. :-)Saskatchewan has some. I actually learned that just a little bit ago.
:)Manitoba has lots! On the east side of Lake Manitoba and Lake Winnipeg plus in the Manitoba desert with Camp Shilo near the middle.

going back to XFiles and Star trek.. what ive noticed is that many series' success, such as Pretender, Voyager, Xfiles, etc succeeded with their continuity by involving a Mythos, in the case of Xfiles, youve got the "truth" with Voyager, the mythology was inadvertantly created by the arrival of 7 of 9, then the ongoing storylines involvng Borg, Species 8472 and of course 7of9, and with Pretender weve got the secrets of the centre and another "search for the truth" kinda theme..

thing is with these, having an ongoing mythos allows for not only an ongoing story, but a character driven exploration into these stories, which IMO allow for deeper understanding of the story itself.

Thats jstu me, but i feel that an ongoing stories make for better viewing

The Pretender used to hang out in Kits Coffee. Man, is he short.

I am going to investigate that dike.

Back to the Xfiles--or rather a digression within the Xfiles--
I liked the original Star Trek and alot of shows that had single episodes--where you could interchange them. The mythos or soap opera variety only works if they have a clear idea of where they are going.The new Star Trek didnt do that with the Species 8472 plot thread. And it may detract in terms of repeat viewing(though i cant say for sure as I havent rewatched Star Trek, X Files, Voyager etc after the initial run). On the other hand--I can watch the Simpsons anytime without continuity problems.
:)

Oh i agree.. with XFiles, the single epiosodicals were hour long features... LOL some of tehm were outstanding while others were just average, however i persoanlly always found the mythos type shows to last a little longer. As for species 8472 it was more the Borg storyline which intrigued me...

Every good story needs an enemy i guess.. well not always but u get what i mean

The thing is, it was actually keeping with the original Star Trek to have the "villains" become sympathetic--like the Gorn wiping out an entire Earth Colony but Kirk vowing to use negotiation (after he uses a scratchbuilt bazooka against him :)

So I am not opposed to it--I just think the newer shows blew it in some respects by throwing in the towel early. NG introduced "Hugh" the nice Borg not too long after the famous 1990 cliffhanger.

The intro to Species 8472 was great--and interesting way to up the ante in terms of the Borg storyline--but then they had chakotay become romantic with one.
And that reminds me--didnt Chakotay and half the Voyager crew start off as a Federation rebels? They threw that out after a few episodes. Lost dramatic potential.

X Files. X Files. X Files.

I just added that to keep it relevant to the topic.
:)

Some of your criticisms about the latter Star Treks I think were heard by Ron Moore. His "Battlestar Galactica" remake really bulldozes the theme of "who is the enemy" with both external and internal conflicts.

regarding sand dunes in canada, don't you guys have google earth? i believe you can "zoom in" and check it out for yourselves.

re: Mythology. B5's the best example of a very well thought out plan (a "5" year mission no less).

I dont have google earth in my default page setting. Or I just cant keep up with all the modern technology.

I havent watched the new Battlestar Galactica. I thought the original cylons were way cool(it helped that Ralph Macquarrie-from BC I think--designed both the look of BG and Star Wars). I did see Dirk Benedict's online critique though. I gather he wasnt pleased that they turned his character into a woman and now the show has lasted a couple years longer than the original, it threatens to eclipse memory of his original. I read about Richard Hatch's planned remake a few years back.

Havent watched Stargate either.
funny considering their local production base.

For me it was mainly X Files and Simpsons, now just the Simpsons.

I watched the newer Star Treks religiously until i caught Babylon 5 in reruns then Star Trek Voyager just didnt compare, so I skipped several episodes until the finale. And I only watched the first couple of Enterprise.

I really think they should drydock for a while.

Then again-Doctor Who keeps going and going.

I predict we will see a new X Files within 5 years. :)

I havent watched the new Battlestar Galactica. I thought the original cylons were way cool(it helped that Ralph Macquarrie-from BC I think--designed both the look of BG and Star Wars). I did see Dirk Benedict's online critique though. I gather he wasnt pleased that they turned his character into a woman and now the show has lasted a couple years longer than the original, it threatens to eclipse memory of his original. I read about Richard Hatch's planned remake a few years back.
I also read Benedict's rant and IMO it was serious sour grapes with an ounce of chauvinistic crotchety old fella shaking a stick at those young 'uns. The only point I somewhat agreed with was his desire that studios stop remaking things and put their investment toward new ideas. But seriously the new BSG is very good.

BTW Hatch is in the remake - just not as Apollo.

Do the new Cylons talk?
The originals had a cool voice
http://hybrid.ualr.edu/~hudson/sounds/waves.htm

The new Cylons do talk and also strip naked.

I'm afraid to ask if Lucifer is in it--you might tell me they turned him into a Mac Daddy.

There's no Lucifer but there is Lucy Lawless.

kelly,

you should just try it out. take it for a spin. imho, and for many SF fans, BSG the new series marks the 2nd coming of the SF renaissance era. it's that good. just trust them and try it.

Shallow as it is-I liked the old show only because of the cylons, and as a cheap Star Wars rip-off.
I think the idea of making them more sympathetic would work in a single shot episode like a Star Trek or even the episode of Galactica 1980 where Starbuck revives one(the only good episode of that show).

Maybe once the show ends I can watch them all in a row.
:)

You can rent the season 1 DVD and the opening 3-part miniseries.

i've seen every single episode of the original BSG '77-78 and '80 and honestly, both of those weren't anything to write home about. 'The Return of Starbuck' was OK, but wasn't groundbreaking.

the new BSG is really nothing like it =).

Yes, having seen both, the new BSG is far and away better. The new cylons are smarter, more sinister, more evil, more inisdious, sexier, better looking, cooler...I want one for myself. I really can't blame the weak, cowardly Doctor for succumbing to their charms.

lol, that's only one of the "models".