Season 6 Wrap Up: Maybe I did want to be out there with you.

This is one of those seasons in terms of its popularity that gets polar opposite responses depending on which faction of the fandom you ask about it. It’s trying too hard to be funny, it’s not funny, it’s hilarious. Too much MSR, not enough MSR, just the right amount. I miss the Syndicate, I was sick of the Syndicate, what’s with this new mythology?

You can’t please all the people all the time, especially if your name is Chris Carter.

Personally, I adore Season 6. But I can understand why some fans don’t. If Season 5 would throw fans a knowing smile every so often, Season 6 is constantly, flirtatiously winking at us. The X-Files has become not only much more self-conscious and self-referential, it also acknowledges its fan base and fan expectations in a more direct way than before.

Previous episodes like “Small Potatoes” (4×20) have toyed with the ever-present subtext of Mulder and Scully’s burgeoning romantic relationship (MSR). But fast-forward to “The Rain King” (6×7) and it’s not a subtext, it’s the only text, and the characters around Mulder and Scully directly confront them with the feelings fans had been harboring for years.

I mean… you spend every day with Agent Scully, a beautiful, enchanting woman. And you two never, uh…? I… confess I find that shocking. I… I’ve seen how you two gaze at one another.

Not even a kiss?

Sorry, my NoRoMo friends. You’ll have to forgive me for indulging in some MSR talk. It’s a major, major component of Season 6 that can’t be ignored. In fact, I don’t think it’s a reach to say it’s the main component. Not only does it drive many stand-alone episodes, the Mulder-Scully-Fowley love triangle becomes such a major issue that it largely drives the mythology this season. You can’t discuss Season 6 without discussing MSR.

Now, if you don’t mind, I’m about to plagiarize myself since I can think of no more effective way to explain my position.

Back in the not so distant day, a Shipper had to hunt for little romantic gems in an episode. A brief hand-hold here, a golden moment of banter there… it was a game looking for these affirmations of the Shipper faith since it wasn’t as though the writers were putting them there on purpose. We had to take what we could get. Now, however, the game has changed completely and after the events of the movie, Chris Carter & Co. could no longer believably ignore either the mounting anticipation of their audience or the romantic tension that they inadvertently created between their two lead characters. So, what to do, what to do? They had no choice, really, but to officially script the MSR subtext into the series. Now Shippers no longer have to hunt for sustenance like wild animals, it’s being fed to us in golden bowls like house pets.

If that sounds like a complaint, please know that it’s not. As I said, I don’t see how the show could have believably evolved any other way. What could Chris Carter have done? Turned back the clock and pretended that millions of people had never seen that scene outside of Mulder’s apartment? Or worse, should he have taken character development back a few seasons in order to halt the progression of this budding romance between his leads? Never. Looking back it was inevitable that the romantic undertone of the series would become more overt. And however people may complain that it made The X-Files look silly, it would have looked a heck of a lot sillier if they had stubbornly ignored the obvious.

And in the profound words of Mr. Gump, “That’s all I have to say about that.”

The only check mark in the negative column against Season 6 is that while the great majority of episodes, as individual episodes, are great, on the whole it may be slightly unbalanced. Particularly in the beginning of the season, the scales are tipped toward the lighter side of things which is a disappointment, I’m sure, to the fans who prefer grittier Monster of the Week and Mythology episodes. Yet, I can’t help but wonder if episodes like “Tithonus” (6×9) had come along sooner rather than later if Season 6 would still have quite as featherweight a reputation. After all, for the shortest season ever (twenty episodes) Season 5 gave us its fair share of less than super serious material: “Unusual Suspects” (5×1), “The Post-Modern Prometheus” (5×6), “Detour” (5×4), “Bad Blood” (5×12), “Folie a Deux” (5×19). And that’s not even counting Mulder’s hilarious phone calls to Scully in “Chinga” (5×10).

I calculate Season 6 at 40% funny vs. Season 5’s 30%, give or take. Perhaps the team at 1013 wanted to leaven the heavy drama of the mythology episodes this season by giving the fans an emotional break during the stand-alone episodes. I still consider “Arcadia” (6×13) a humble apology for forcing us to watch Mulder and Scully nearly split up for good in “One Son” (6×12). That fight was so bad even the Lone Gunmen had to look away. And while we’re at it, maybe Chris Carter meant “Triangle” (6×3) to be a peace offering after he had Mulder nearly take back in “The Beginning” (6×1) everything he said to Scully in the hallway last summer. You bet your cheap weave Mulder owed Scully more than one “I love you” after that.

Speaking of “I love you’s”, somewhere along the way this season, probably without us even noticing, I believe Mulder and Scully passed the point where a love confession was even necessary.

I can safely say that by the events of “Biogenesis” (6×22) Mulder knows that Scully is in love with him and not just because he can conveniently read minds. I don’t know by what work of the Devil I didn’t talk about this in my “One Son” review, but Mulder knows. Even the first time I saw it, I was certain of it. It’s all in the way he says, “No. Actually, you hide your feelings very well.”

Now, I will often, in the heat of my Fangirl passion, yell things at Mulder and at my television screen and “Stupid” is an adjective I use for him regularly. However, Mulder is not actually stupid. He’s a very intuitive, very perceptive character. He couldn’t have helped but read the not so subtle subtext during Scully’s heated interchange with Fowley in the aforementioned episode. That wasn’t purely righteous indignation on Cassandra’s behalf that Scully was acting out there. And even before that, he was in that hallway too. He knew she was about to kiss him just as sure as he was about to kiss her, though judging by his somewhat nervous confession in “Triangle” I’d say he wasn’t confident as to whether she’d be willing to start a relationship or not.

But, I digress. Mulder knows and I believe that’s part of why Padgett’s “Agent Scully is already in love” pronouncement in “Milagro” (6×18) doesn’t elicit a major response from him. It also doesn’t elicit a response from Scully because she knows too. And, at this point, I think she knows that Mulder knows and that he knows that she knows. I think there’s mutual knowing all around. Mulder certainly didn’t wrap his arms around her in “The Unnatural” (6×20) like a man who thought his attentions might not be desirable.

A question less easy to answer is does Scully know how Mulder feels about her? To that I’d give a qualified “Yes.” She knows he loves her dearly; he did go to Antarctica to rescue her after all. She knows he’s attracted to her since he’s not too subtle with his looks in either “Two Fathers” (6×11) or “One Son”. There’s even something about the look on her face when Mulder tells his tall tale in “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” (6×8) that makes me think she knows she’s supposed to be “Lida”, the brooding yet heroic “Maurice’s” ethereal love. But, ah, that Fowley woman. I don’t think Scully’s going to pick up what Mulder’s puttin’ down as long as Fowley is around. Cue Season 7.

And on a final note, how awesomely amazing is Scully this season? She steals the show pretty much from beginning to end. From being boldly faithful to slapping suspects, from becoming open-minded to learning how to play baseball, my girl has been on fire. If we could say nothing else in favor of having a comedy-heavy season, I’m so glad it affords Scully the opportunity to show us all her different sides.

——————

Assuming your teeth aren’t already aching with sweetness, you tell me:

And the Awards go to….

“How could you do this to me, Chris Carter?”

The Beginning

“You’re forgiven, Chris Carter.”

Triangle

“Most Underrated”

Drive

AND

Trevor

“Most Overrated”

How the Ghosts Stole Christmas

“Not Rated”

Alpha

“Best Use of a Guest Star”

Dreamland/Dreamland II

“Scully for Queen”

Tithonus

“Coulda Been a Contender”

Agua Mala

“Don’t Judge Me”

The Rain King

“David Duchovny, why won’t you love me?”

The Unnatural

Milagro 6×18: I live in my head.

I think therefore she is.

“After having worked on The X-Files for so many years and really spent so much time thinking about these characters of Mulder and Scully, you do fall in love with them a bit, you do obsess about them. You find yourself thinking about them for hours and hours and hours. And that’s what Milagro’s about. It’s about the power of that kind of obsession.”

                                                                                    – Frank Spotnitz

Yeah, me too, Frank. Only I don’t get paid for it.

You’ve heard it all about “Milagro” before. How writers Spotnitz and Shiban came up with the idea for it after commiserating over the trials and tribulations of the creative life. How the character of Padgett is really a stand-in for the writers on The X-Files, right down to his board full of index cards.

I’m going to let smarter, more academically disciplined heads than I grapple with the more intellectual issues that “Milagro” raises – authorial intent, metafiction and the viewer as voyeur. That’s not why I’m here. I have a much more simplistic outlook on the “Milagro” message: Dana Scully is a friend of mine.

“Au contraire,” you say, “Dana Scully doesn’t exist.”

“Au contraire,” I mimic, “Dana Scully exists absolutely.”

“There’s nothing wrong with my state of mental health. I like it here with my childhood friend. Here they come, those feelings again!”

                                                                               -       Men at Work

Dana Scully is real. She lives in my head. She probably lives in yours too. She gets around like that.

You see, an idea is real. It’s an intangible reality that’s as real as any physical manifestation. Faith is real. Hope is real. Love is real. No one outside of Karl Marx would call me crazy for believing that. But if I said to you that I would only believe Faith was real if I saw it standing before me, then I’d have earned my right to a padded cell.

Dana Scully is an idea. She started out in the mind of Chris Carter the Beloved, she was translated into the written word by various scribes, she was interpreted in the body of Gillian Anderson the Sacred, she was relayed through a series of messengers, directors, photographers and editors, and finally, she was accepted by faith into the hearts and minds of many a television addict.

Like a game of Telephone, it’s hardly doubtful that Dana Scully as she began is not the same Dana Scully that viewers know and love. Every hand she passes through shapes and creates her, including the audience that eventually receives her, until she is a recognizable and independent form that even an objective observer can say, “That’s Dana Scully” or “That’s not Dana Scully” the same way they could say “That’s patriotism” or That’s narcissism.” She’s her own entity, moving at her own speed and toward her own destination despite Chris Carter’s original best intentions. At least, that’s what “Milagro” is telling us.

Back when I first started to watch The X-Files I was watching reruns on FX and was way behind the current run of the show. Before I swore off the internet and chatrooms (see the upcoming “The Unnatural” review), I couldn’t resist doing a little investigating into the future of the Mulder/Scully relationship. You can only imagine my 13-year-old horror when I discovered that Chris Carter had sworn on a stack of show bibles that Mulder and Scully would never be a romantic pair. I’m not ashamed to say I felt something akin to panic.

So I did the only thing I could and attempted to console myself by watching more of The X-Files. I watched and was quickly comforted – What I saw didn’t match up with what Chris Carter had so adamantly avowed. It’s then that the rebellious thought occurred to me, “That man doesn’t know what he’s talking about.” Said thought was accompanied by the dismissive facial expression only a 13-year-old can make.

Arrogant? Yes.

How can the viewer claim to know more than the creator? In my defense, I instinctively knew from watching the real Dana Scully what her Pygmalion-like creator may have still been in denial about, that come what may, she was falling in love with Fox Mulder. It didn’t matter what anyone else said, including Chris Carter. Scully told me. It was the gospel truth.

The more cynical among us might say that Carter eventually caved in the MSR department only because of fan pressure and potential ratings, but I’m not of a cynical turn. A Mulder/Scully romance would have happened eventually because their relationship naturally evolved irrespective of original intent or outside expectations. By Season 6, to keep them apart much longer would have been more unrealistic than a man-sized worm. My Philey Sense tells me that Chris Carter realized this and just went with the flow.

Philip Padgett, Scully’s creepy admirer, is a not so subtle, if far less socially adept, substitute for Carter himself as the writer whose character has escaped his control long enough to writer her own script while he wasn’t looking. Like I said, intangible ≠ unreal. Scully is so much her own person, such a fully fleshed idea, that Padgett can no longer predict her choices. The question is then, did he ever really? Where does the writer’s intention end and the real Dana Scully begin?

I don’t know the answer to that exactly but I know that it’s not just the writer who creates her. According to that same game of Telephone I mentioned above, the idea of Dana Scully is communicated to a series of people through a series of mediums and the method of communication is in part what shapes her.

In a lot of ways, I bet life is easier for a novelist than a television writer. A novelist creates and idea and shapes it with words, communicating directly with his audience. A television writer sees his vision revised by several sets of minds and hands until what the viewers at home see may or may not be recognizable to him. But that’s just tough cookies.

Is it a wonder fans sometimes act like they own Scully? We’re partially responsible for creating her. Not that any of us can take credit for the original brilliance of idea that she is, but we’ve taken that idea and obsessed over it until it’s taken a concrete form in our own minds; she’s a shared idea. 10 Philes from 10 different countries with 10 different perspectives could sit around and talk about her like they all know her… because they all do. Great fiction tends to work like that. (For instance, I recognized Hogwarts the instant I saw it on the big screen. I had already seen it in my mind’s eye, after all. Funny, but my best friend whose mind’s eye doesn’t belong to me recognized it too.) And great characters live on long after you stop reading or watching them.

And I suppose that’s why The X-Files was/is a benchmark of fanfiction. It created characters whose adventures its audience couldn’t help but chronicle offscreen because they existed, waiting to be chronicled. After all, how could a TV show hold them anymore than it could hold you or me? In fanfiction, the viewer becomes the writer, flipping the natural order on its head but at the same time drawing even more attention to the heart of the process of characterization.

The milagro, the real miracle here is the mysterious power of the obsessive mind to create life where there was none. No, these earthly creators can’t breathe the physical breath of life into Dana Scully, but they can do pretty much everything shy of it, to the point where I sometimes find myself wondering how it could be possible that Dana Scully isn’t standing in front of me with eyebrow raised in inquisition the way Naciamento appears before Padgett…. though I suppose she’d come for Chris Carter first. But I’m next.

Right at this moment “Milagro” is playing in the background. And if Dana Scully were to plant her fingers on the bottom of my television screen and pull herself out, only mild surprise would register on my face.

She already exists in my head, why shouldn’t she exist in my room?

No, I’m not done yet:

The great thing about “Milagro” is that there are so many intellectual and emotional questions raised on various levels that like any good work of fiction, there are many ways to read it. There isn’t another episode quite like it and it’s certainly more meta, and more overtly artistic, than The X-Files is usually comfortable with. That’s probably why it feels so personal.

While Shiban and Spotnitz rough drafted the idea of “Milagro”, it was Carter, the creator himself who wrote it up which is so fitting you’d thing someone had scripted it. What? You didn’t recognize his legendary purple prose? I swear, he must’ve been holding the thesaurus open with one hand for this one. All these years and I never realized he was actually holding back most episodes. Here he lets it all hang out, using his skills in flowery verbiage to purposeful effect by making it difficult to distinguish between the actual goings on of the Scully mind and the writer’s fantasy, for those are two separate things both in the world of “Milagro” and in this one.

Fortunately for all of us, the well-rounded Chris Carter is no Philip Padgett, though it’s possible he identifies with him all too well in some ways. Padgett is the worst kind of stereotype of a writer; awkward socialization, barren existence, overuse of highbrow language. And in his youthful arrogance he believes that as the author he actually has authority over his characters. Ha! He learns that lesson.

Padgett is wonderfully played by 1013 repeat offender John Hawkes, who previously guest starred on Millennium and auditioned for the role of Pinker Rawls in “Trevor” (6×17). The part of Padgett was actually written with him in mind so it’s not surprising that he fills it well. Somehow, despite his gratingly calm assurance and his Creepy McCreepy vibe Padgett manages to be an empathetic character. We start to glimpse his humanity when he first confronts Scully before the painting of the Sacred Heart, a scene that quietly reveals the root of this episode that’s all about the relationship between creator and created.

It’s the God-given desire to share love.

That’s what Padgett tries to explain to Scully through the story of Jesus and St. Margaret Mary. That’s why any creator creates, to share their heart, good, bad or indifferent. That’s what humans are designed to do is share the love in their hearts. Maybe for the writer that love is easier to express in writing. Maybe for the fan the writer’s love is easier to share in because it takes place in an alternate reality of fiction.

I’m going to shamelessly take Pagett’s story of Jesus’ Sacred Heart even further and say that in the same way the Creator speaks into existence fully formed personalities and then gives them free will, a human creator is at his best when he, through his love, forms an idea so powerful that it has a life of its own.

Why does the writer write? To share his heart. Why does the reader read or the watcher watch? To share the heart of the writer. Who is Dana Scully? She’s the collective beating hearts of the writers and the watchers. She’s the idea they all love.

“Imagine that.”

            – Philip Padgett

A

The Middle C of Consciousness:

Since when do 16-year-olds take out personal ads?

You want to stop the killings, Padgett? Here’s an idea, stop writing this drivel. You’re not Stephen King.

If I were Scully, no way I would have kept drinking Padgett’s coffee. Freaks like that drug people.

“I think you know me better than that, Mulder.” Scully isn’t good at lying to Mulder. She should stop trying, but she won’t – “En Ami” (7×15).

Scully’s spent so long trying avoid becoming the object of inappropriate or demeaning sexual desire on the job that she’s thrown out the baby with the bath water. She’s forgotten how flattering it can be to be admired. Well, the camera makes up for that because it takes its time admiring her here.

You’ll notice Scully’s top button stays unbuttoned this entire episode. Or at least when she’s wearing buttons.

I love that Mulder’s biggest argument against Pagett being able to imagine the truth before it occurs is that he can’t be accurate in what he wrote about Scully.

It’s interesting that Padgett realizes Scully’s already in love at a moment where, on the surface, she’s protecting Padgett. But really she’s protecting Mulder from himself.

Hegelian Self-Justification:

My favorite part about Padgett’s “Agent Scully is already in love” pronouncement… well, besides the smug satisfaction of knowing Chris Carter wrote that line himself, is how neither Mulder nor Scully are flustered by it. There isn’t a, “What??” reaction. It’s more like, “Hmm… where does this guy get his intel?” Neither of them are taken aback at all.

After that, somewhere in my imagination I used to think that Scully’s eyes followed Padgett while Mulder’s eyes followed Scully. However, I watched very, very closely this time. Several times. Mulder glances down at Scully, briefly, one time. But it’s a very telling time.

This is one of Mark Snow’s best scores.

According to Chris Carter, this is Sean Penn’s favorite episode.

I have to admit that it wasn’t till about half-way through my first viewing of this episode that I started enjoying it. It’s highly stylized so the tone and intent isn’t easy (for some of us) to lock onto. It took repeated viewings… and a college education… before the meta message of the author (Chris Carter) losing control of his characters (Mulder and Scully) sunk in. I still can’t say I adore it the way some fans do, but it does make me think.

That “Titian hair” line makes me smile because it recalls to mind my first obsession: Anne of Green Gables. What is it with me and redheads?

Real? Not real? The conversation continues… Who Really Writes the Stories?

Best Quotes:

Scully: Loneliness is a choice.
Padgett: So how about a cup of coffee?

——————

Padgett: By their nature words are imprecise and layered with meaning – the signs of things, not the things themselves. It’s difficult to say who’s in charge.

——————
Padgett: Big mistake. I misjudged her character, her interest in me.
Naciamento: Now we’re on to something.
Padgett: She’s only trying to get his attention but doesn’t know it.

——————

Naciamento: Why do I want their hearts?
Padgett: You tell me. Why do you do it?
Naciamento: I’m your character. You tell me. My reason is your reason.
Padgett: I want to feel love.
Naciamento: No. No. You had it right up to there. You were a tool of the truth. And when it finally arrives — when I arrive — you don’t want to see it.
Padgett: But what is the truth?
Naciamento: Man imagines that he, too, can open up his heart and expose the burning passion — the flames of charity — like the creator himself but… this is not in his power.

——————-

Padgett: I made a mistake myself.
Mulder: What’s that, Mr Padgett?
Padgett: In my book, I’d written that Agent Scully falls in love, but that’s obviously impossible. Agent Scully is already in love.

Tithonus 6×9: You’re a lucky man.

The gift that keeps on giving.

Oh, Vince Gilligan. Why you make me love you so???

I watched an interview not long ago where Gilligan (humbly) admitted that when it came to writing X-Files episodes, he edited other people’s stories – no one edited his. Watch “Tithonus” and understand why.

It’s been so long since the days of “Paper Hearts” (4×8) and “Unruhe” (4×2) that I’d almost forgotten Gilligan writes serious tales too, and writes them well. Similarly to “Elegy” (4×22), this is one of the few episodes in a show populated week after week by gruesome deaths that is actually about death. Or, more accurately, about life and at what point death could be preferable.

Like “Unruhe” and another previous episode, “Oubliette” (3×8), the action in “Tithonus” revolves around that unnerving staple of modernity, that casual bit of creepiness that hides in plain sight: Photography. There’s something so much more… invasive about an old-fashioned camera like the one Alfred Felig uses, something that’s been lost with the advent of the pocket digital camera, something that is fundamental to the success of stories like this where the camera is a villain in its own right – an uninvited violation, a soulless enemy. We say the lens “captures” an image and it’s a subtle way of acknowledging an unspoken discomfort. Between the blinding flash and the disorienting sound, the subject of the photograph is momentarily vulnerable. A part of them has been “possessed” by the camera whether they were willing participants in the event or not.

And who is more vulnerable than those who are already half dead? That’s where Alfred Felig comes in. The man that time forgot. In echoes Clyde Bruckman before him, this is a man saddled with a curse that anyone on the outside looking in would think is a gift, and it’s taken all the joy out of living.

Unlike the mythological Tithonus, the eponymous source of this episode’s title, who lives forever but shrivels up with age until he turns into a cricket, Felig doesn’t physically grow old and withered. But he is cursed to live forever without the heart of youth, the heart that desires, as Scully says, to learn and experience and love. Tithonus’ immortality becomes a curse because his goddess lover forgot to add eternal youth to the gift of eternal life and, abandoned by his love, he longs for death. Felig has the opposite problem in that he has a form of eternal youth without the substance of it; he’s been dead a long time, he just can’t convince his body to follow. As Agent Ritter says, “He’s always been a geezer.” He scoffs at Scully’s suggestion that love is worth living for. What use is love to him?

But what if Felig hadn’t forgotten the name of his long deceased wife? If Mrs. Felig could have lived eternally with her husband in wedded bliss, would he still have hunted death so relentlessly? Would invincibility still feel so cold a curse?

I submit that someone who merely possessed immortality would be cursed, but someone imbued with eternal youth may feel differently. Either way, who would want to live forever in this world? Perhaps one of the greatest acts of mercy God ever bestowed on mankind was to curse them with death in the Garden of Eden; they wouldn’t spend eternity in a world corrupted by evil. Even if, like Felig, death refused to touch you, you’d live to watch generations of others suffer. No, only the disturbed are in a hurry to leave but no one in their right mind wants to stay indefinitely either. Well, except for me. But then, no one said I was in my right mind.

For her part, Scully doesn’t understand Felig because she’s still so full of energy and curiosity. You can tell from her reaction that she finds his, shall we say, unappreciative view of life a little depressing.  She hasn’t grown tired yet the way the aged do. I remember how my 90-odd-years-old grandmother used to tell me that being old was exhausting, not because she wasn’t happy to live a long life, but because at some point, living takes effort. Felig is just tired. And when he’s eventually allowed to stop, to be at peace, you can see the relief on his face. Felig’s dying moments, when he’s reunited with death, are like a master class in acting from guest star Geoffrey Lewis.

But I know what many long time fans are wondering, will Scully ever even know what that feels like? Way back when, X-Files legend Darin Morgan penned this oft discussed exchange between Scully and psychic Clyde Bruckman for “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose” (3×4):

Scully: All right. So how do I die?
Clyde Bruckman: You don’t.

Does this mean that “Tithonus” confirmation of the long held speculation that Scully is immortal? By looking at death in Scully’s place, does Felig cause Scully to take his place in the land of the perpetually living?

While Vince Gilligan is famous for throwing clever references to earlier episodes in his scripts and so it wouldn’t be beyond him to do something like this, the clear message of this episode is that too much life is no life at all and I suspect Gilligan loves Scully too much to make her immortal. And I can’t find the interview, but I know he’s said that wasn’t what he was implying. Besides, he would have already known that Darin Morgan never intended to hint that she was either:

“Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose” contained several lines of dialogue that sent fans into a frenzy pondering their meaning. The first came when Bruckman told Scully she wouldn’t die. “Some people took it to mean that Scully was immortal, but the meaning was that Clyde knows how Scully’s going to die, but he likes her so much he’s not going to tell her, because telling her would ruin her life, whether she believed it or not. Telling someone they’re not going to die is one of the nicest things you can say. That’s why he says it to her. It had nothing to do with whether she was immortal or was going to be hurt in the show.”

http://web.archive.org/web/20020220130917/http://www.morganandwongonline.com/darin2.html

Though I admit that if it were true it’d be some kind of poetic justice considering everything Scully’s been through in recent years. And that’s why it makes emotional sense that this X-File was handed to Scully and not to Mulder. Scully and Felig’s interaction is all the more poignant because Scully is very aware of her own mortality, because she’s someone who wants to live and not too long ago fought desperately against the violating evil of her own cancer. Only someone who has fought so hard for life would be a fitting foil for someone fighting just as hard for death.

Verdict:

I won’t lie to you. For all that philosophizing, my favorite part of this episode is watching Mulder pout with envy. But it’s his own fault – he created a monster.

Scully, while she will ever be Scully, is far more open than she used to be. No, she’s not the instant believer that Mulder is, but after considering all the evidence she’s surprisingly willing to admit that something supernatural is at work here.  She already proved she could handle an X-File on her own back in “Chinga” (5×10), but she’s less unsure of herself in “Tithonus”. She’s so sure of herself that it’s a joy, I repeat, a joy to watch her stand up to Agent Ritter, the Anti-Mulder.

Mulder needn’t have worried. If anything, pairing Scully with Ritter only highlights the weaknesses of any other partnership but Scully and Mulder. When Scully trades places in the car with a by-the-book Ritter, I can’t help but take my mind back to “Tooms” (1×20) when her less orthodox stakeout with Mulder was far more entertaining. I also can’t help but think back to “Squeeze” (1×2) when Mulder and Scully first discover a man who has lived way beyond his years and how they similarly trace his history through low-tech means. Ritter is smart enough to realize there’s a case here, but not as brilliant… or as accepting… as Mulder and so can’t get past the surface of Felig’s situation to the real truth. Even his haircut is square. He’s like vanilla ice cream to Mulder’s Rocky Road. I mean, good grief, his name is Payton.

This is one of the rare Scully-centric episodes that I actually love. In fact, it might be the only one. Yeah, I’ll say it – This is a more well-rounded episode than “Never Again” (4×13).

A

P.S. I can’t leave without mentioning Mulder’s not so veiled threat to Ritter, ‘cause y’all know Mulder would’ve literally killed him if Scully had died, right? He says it so calmly, he’s like Michael Corleone in The Godfather. That’s how you know he means it. Ritter knows it too.

P.P.S. Mulder and Scully and the thumb war. That is all.

Background Checks:

From Cherish the Past: Undoubtedly, the biggest line item for visual effects producer Bill Millar was the postproduction transformation into black-and-white instead of color of the individuals, including Scully, whom Felig sees as doomed. “We used a technique very similar to the one used to wreck all those old movies by colorizing them,” said Millar. “In fact, it’s basically the same, only in reverse.” …Millar, who first used this method on an episode of the short-lived NBC series, Nightmare Cafe in 1992, noted that the hit movie Pleasantville, released within a week or two of the night “Tithonus” first aired, was much praised for its innovative use of decolorization, while its employment on “Tithonus” passed virtually without notice. “Interesting, don’t you think?” Millar said wryly.

If you have the DVDs, this is one of those rare episodes with deleted scenes to watch to help you extend the magic. Go ahead. Live a little.

Did you see that scene where Scully saves the hooker? Did you see it? I’m going to start thinking of her as “Slap-a-Pimp Scully” from now on.

The way the room is lit during the interrogation of Alfred Felig is absolutely stunning. It’s like something out of a Film Noir handbook.

What does Agent Ritter shoot an unarmed Felig for anyway? It’s not like you could mistake that bulky camera for a gun when the light is behind you.

Scully has a rather sentimental look in her eye when she asks Felig about love and her disappointment at his answer is obvious – don’t make me say it.

Between this and “Unruhe”, methinks Vince Gilligan has a not so secret fascination with photography.

Best Quotes:

Scully: [Answers cell] Scully.
Mulder: [In affected voice] Hi, my name is Fox Mulder. We used to sit next to each other at the F.B.I.

——————–

Agent Ritter: You know, Kersh warned me about you.
Scully: Uh, he did?
Agent Ritter: Yeah, you and your partner. God knows his reputation precedes him so I guess I should have seen this coming. You muck up my case, and Kersh’ll hear about it. Are we clear, Dana?
Scully: Scully. And we’re done with this conversation. {Editor’s Note: Bam! My girl.}

——————–

Mulder: Now we’re talking about a guy for whom the phrase “life in prison” carries some seriously weighty connotations.

How the Ghosts Stole Christmas 6×8: I just gave myself chills.

The romance is the first thing to go.

I have had a revelation. It only took thirteen years and several cups of coffee.

“How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” is essentially the story of what happens when Mulder tries to romance Scully in his own strange, Mulderish way. Back in the day, I used to think he’s merely lonely and wanting for company, but he plans this evening. This isn’t a spur of the moment outing brought on by boredom. And then he tries to impress Scully with the spooky atmosphere of his story the way that normal men take their dates to scary movies in hopes that their ready arms will look more masculine and appealing when their date has no place else to run to. Why else take her on a scary Christmas Eve rendezvous traditionally taken by lovers?

Notice the way writer and director Chris Carter chooses to shoot both characters from the back as Mulder weaves his winter’s tale in the dark car. No sooner does he start discussing the story of Maurice and Lyda than Mulder and Scully are framed in a rather romantic looking portrait. Oh, yes. Brooding hero Maurice is Mulder and Lyda of the sublime beauty is Scully. Perhaps as a Christmas present to the fans, Chris Carter doesn’t even attempt to be subtle about it. Thank you, Chris.

Mulder: His name was Maurice. He was a… a brooding but heroic young man beloved of Lyda, a sublime beauty with a light that seemed to follow her wherever she went. They were likened to two angels descended from heaven whom the gods could not protect from the horrors being visited upon this cold, grey earth.

Yeah, methinks Mulder was trying to get his mack on. Well, sorta. I’m not trying to say that Mulder was about to put the moves on Scully. But does he know what he’s saying when he tells her the story of Maurice and Lyda? Oh yeah. He’s acting the teenage boy here, no doubt about it, and that’s the backdrop for our story at hand. Any excuse to bring television legends Ed Asner and Lily Tomlin into The X-Files family is just fine. They’re supposed to steal the show here and indeed they do.

Actually, Ed Asner was originally intended for the role of Clyde Bruckman in “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose” (3×4), but glory be, Peter Boyle owned that character and we still get to relish Ed Asner’s charm in the role of Maurice. See? Everyone wins.

Already Season 6 has set itself apart with an impressive list of guest stars. Bryan Cranston before he was famous in “Drive” (6×1), Michael McKean and Nora Dunn in “Dreamland” (6×4) and “Dreamland II” (6×5), Ed Asner and Lily Tomlin here, next up will be Bruce Campbell in “Terms of Endearment” (6×6) closely followed by Victoria Jackson in “Rain King” (6×7), and it won’t end there.

To what do we owe the pleasure? It has to be the move to L.A. Now there are all sorts of actors willing to share screen time with Mulder and Scully who wouldn’t have been available for the trek to Vancouver. And I suppose it doesn’t hurt that Season 6 was the heyday of a television phenomenon. Who doesn’t want to be a part of history? It’d be like turning down a guest spot on Star Trek.

Whatever the sentimental loss over the built-in atmosphere of Vancouver and the original production crew that turned The X-Files into the legend it became, we can’t deny that the move to L.A. has not only brought great side benefits like impressive actors, the production quality hasn’t suffered in the least. The set of “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” is absolutely stunning; it’s a character unto itself. This is especially important because ninety percent of the action happens in this one place with only four actors involved, the smallest cast of any episode of the series. The cast is so small and the action so relegated to one spot that it feels very much like a stage play. And if going off with the family to watch a staged performance isn’t Christmas, I don’t know what is.

If I’m to be honest (there’s no need to be but it’s Christmas so why not?), I never much cared for this episode before this rewatch. Not to say that I didn’t like it, but I always felt that something was missing, that it was a little soulless, perhaps. I didn’t see that it had a point. And it doesn’t, really. It’s a festive frolic, a Christmas card to the fans, and that’s all it’s meant to be. And why not? Episodes previously had acknowledged the Christmas season, “Beyond the Sea” (1×12), “Christmas Carol” (5×5), but neither of those had ever acknowledged the audience on the other side of the television screen. Now The X-Files has reached its zenith and is understandably a little self-conscious about its legion of fans, enough that rather than scare them it deems it better to send a little Christmas spirit their way. An episode like this couldn’t have been attempted in any season previous except possibly Season 5; it’s too meta for a show that doesn’t know its own power.

There’s another element of this episode that The X-Files never would have attempted before it was an official piece of pop culture history. Back in the not so distant day, a Shipper had to hunt for little romantic gems in an episode. A brief hand-hold here, a golden moment of banter there… it was a game looking for these affirmations of the Shipper faith since it wasn’t as though the writers were putting them there on purpose. We had to take what we could get. Now, however, the game has changed completely and after the events of the movie, Chris Carter & Co. could no longer believably ignore either the mounting anticipation of their audience or the romantic tension that they inadvertently created between their two lead characters. So, what to do, what to do? They had no choice, really, but to officially script the MSR* subtext into the series. Now Shippers no longer have to hunt for sustenance like wild animals, it’s being fed to us in golden bowls like house pets.

If that sounds like a complaint, please know that it’s not. As I said, I don’t see how the show could have believably evolved any other way. What could Chris Carter have done? Turned back the clock and pretended that millions of people had never seen that scene outside of Mulder’s apartment? Or worse, should he have taken character development back a few seasons in order to halt the progression of this budding romance between his leads? Never. Looking back it was inevitable that the romantic undertone of the series would become more overt. And however people may complain that it made The X-Files look silly, it would have looked a heck of a lot sillier if they had stubbornly ignored the obvious. As it is I believe the writers did an excellent job of utilizing the MSR subtext without relying on it. “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” works because it’s funny. If you happen to understand the layer of meaning just beneath the surface then so much the better.

I must admit, though, that watching this episode when it originally aired was my first “Danger, Will Robinson” moment. Why? I’m glad you asked.

First there was “Triangle” (6×3), a lighthearted tale meant to cleanse the palette after the high emotional tension of “The Beginning” (6×2) and to reward the fans whose hopes were thwarted during that infamous hallway scene in Fight the Future. It was incredibly well done and almost universally praised. Do you see a problem there? No? I didn’t think so.

Directly after that was “Dreamland”. Sure, two lighthearted episodes in a row is unheard of on The X-Files but production order gets switched around sometimes and besides, “Triangle” wasn’t really a comedy. Ah, but then we have “Dreamland II” which of course must follow part 1. We can’t find fault with that, can we? It just so happens that having three of these episodes in a row is the way things played out.

But now we’re at “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” and a disturbing pattern begins to emerge. Yes, I’ve already said that I appreciate that the show was willing and able to do something fun for Christmas for once. I’m all for it. And yet… part of me is starting to worry. No, nothing has been bad by any means. This string of episodes has been fabulous! Still, my spidey sense is atingle: where are the X-Files? At what point does the show become too self-conscious?

Verdict:

A quick word of caution about this episode: the whole thing is tongue-in-cheek. Yes, that seems obvious and why would I warn you about that? But I fear that the pop psychology invoked here, the witty observations of Maurice and Lyda that Chris Carter never intended to be taken as gospel truth, has been accepted a little too literally over the years. Read the fanfic, don’t let it corrupt you.

Yes, Mulder is prone to a self-centered form of tunnel vision. But a narcissist? Hardly that. And while Scully may enjoy a good intellectual tête-à-tête with Mulder, who would believe that she’s spent so many years with him risking life and limb merely for the right to say “I told you so?” Part of the point of this episode is that Maurice and Lyda misread Mulder and Scully, assuming that they’re much lonelier and less balanced than they actually are.

However, if you want to take away anything about the psychology of the characters please note that Scully does admit she really wanted to be out there hunting things she doesn’t even believe in with Mulder. Yet again Chris Carter sets up the tension between Scully’s overt desire for normality and her unacknowledged desire to travel a bumpier road with Mulder. For some reason, Scully has a hard time understanding herself and why she’d rather suffer with Mulder than live out her life in peace with anyone else.

A-

P.S. Speaking of Christmas, I suppose you already know what day it is. So allow me to wish a very Merry Christmas to you and yours! A huge thank you to all of you who follow along because you make this a blast. See you in the new year!

Armchair Psychology:

How can Mulder possibly be surprised that Scully doesn’t believe in ghosts? Wasn’t he there for the events of “Shadows” (1×5)?

Did anyone else catch the moment where Mulder pauses during the telling of his gothic tale to wiggle his eyebrows?

I love that telltale heart moment.

The shot where you can see Scully’s face through that hole in Maurice’s head still impresses me. I wonder how much that cost…

So, Chris Carter knows exactly what Mulder and Scully gave each other for Christmas and he refuses to tell. Scrooge.

*MSR – Mulder/Scully Romance

Best Quotes:

Scully: I see. The dark, gothic manor the, uh, omnipresent low fog hugging the thicket of overgrowth… Wait… is that a hound I hear baying out on the moors?
Mulder: No. Actually that was a left cheek sneak. {Editor’s Note: I JUST got that. Sometimes I wonder about myself.}

———————-

Maurice: You drink? Take drugs?
Mulder: No.
Maurice: Get high?
Mulder: No.
Maurice: Are you overcome by the impulse to make everyone believe you?

———————-

Maurice: My specialty is in what I call soul prospectors, a cross axial classification I’ve codified by extensive interaction with visitors like yourself. I’ve found you all tend to fall into pretty much the same category.
Mulder: And what category is that?
Maurice: Narcissistic, overzealous, self-righteous egomaniac.
Mulder: Wow, that’s a category?
Maurice: You kindly think of yourself as single-minded but you’re prone to obsessive compulsiveness, workaholism, antisocialism. Fertile fields for the descent into… total wacko breakdown.
Mulder: I don’t think that pegs me exactly.
Maurice: Oh, really? Waving a gun around my house? Huh? Raving like a lunatic about some imaginary brick wall? You’ve probably convinced yourself you’ve seen aliens. You know why you think you see the things you do?
Mulder: Because I have seen them?
Maurice: ‘Cause you’re a lonely man. A lonely man, chasing paramasturbatory illusions that you believe will give your life meaning and significance and which your pathetic social maladjustment makes impossible for you to find elsewhere. You probably consider yourself passionate, serious, misunderstood. Am I right?
Mulder: Paramasturbatory?
Maurice: Most people would rather stick their fingers in a wall socket than spend a minute with you.
Mulder: All right, now just, uh… Just back off for a second.
Maurice: You spend every Christmas this way? Alone?
Mulder: I’m not alone.
Maurice: More self-delusion.
Mulder: No, I came here with my partner. She’s somewhere in the house.
Maurice: Behind a brick wall? How’d you get her to come with you? Steal her car keys?
Mulder: [Guilty silence]

——————–

Scully: Not that, uh, my only joy in life is proving you wrong.
Mulder: When have you proved me wrong?
Scully: Well… Why else would you want me out there with you?
Mulder: You didn’t want to be there? Oh, that’s, um… That’s self-righteous and… narcissistic of me to say, isn’t it?
Scully: No, I mean… Maybe I did want to be out there with you.

Dreamland II 6×5: I’d kiss you if you weren’t so damn ugly.

Okay, I’m sure you know by now that I’m highly allergic to The X-Files’ opening monologues. They have a tendency to be, how shall I say it? Purple.

While some I tolerate better than others, there are only three in the history of the show that I can honestly say I don’t merely tolerate. No, I rather enjoy them. “Dreamland II” marks the first of the three and it’s also the first monologue not delivered by Mulder or Scully. Interestingly, the character of Morris Fletcher delivers two of the three monologues I actually rewind for fun. Yes, in one of the best breaks The X-Files ever got, actor Michael McKean was available to play Morris Fletcher in two more guest spots after “Dreamland” (6×4) and “Dreamland II”, that’s not including when he shows up in the short-lived spin off The Lone Gunmen. But I’ve digressed.

The jaunty music Mark Snow chooses to characterize the piece, The Wonder Years style family videos as background… it’s just genius and I have no choice but to give it its due:

Morris as Mulder: [voiceover] Once upon a time, there was a guy with the improbable name of Fox Mulder. He started out life happily enough, as these things go. He had parents who loved him, a cute kid sister. He had a roof over his head, got all his flu shots, had all his fingers and toes and aside from being stuck with the name “’Fox” which probably taught him how to fight… or not… he pretty much led a normal life. But the worst thing by far, the biggest kick in the slats this kid Fox ever got, was what happened to his sister. One day, she just disappeared. Now, Fox buckled down and worked his butt off, graduated top of his class at Oxford, then top of his class at the FBI academy. None of that hard work made up for his sister, though. It was just a way of putting her out of his mind. Finally, the way I figure it, he went out of his mind and he’s been that way ever since. Fox Mulder pissed away a brilliant career, lost the respect of supervisors and friends and now lives his life shaking his fist at the sky and muttering about conspiracies to anyone who will listen. If you ask me, he’s one step away from pushing a baby carriage filled with tin cans down the street. But now, all that’s gonna change.

Moving on to the actual plot, Scully finally listens to that voice in the back of her head telling her that either Mulder has inexplicably and without cause lost his mind or Mulder is not Mulder. The subsequent scenes between Scully and the man she now knows is not Fox Mulder are the stuff of legend. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it so many times again I’ll annoy myself: I love Scully this season. She’s kicking butt and taking names and first on her hit list is one Morris Fletcher. Does she confront him in Nevada? At the F.B.I.? Does she surprise him while he’s indisposed? Oh no. She waits until he thinks he has her where he wants her and then springs a checkmate on him. (Aside: Why does Scully keep getting hit on by Mulders who aren’t Mulder?)

Speaking of my favorite scene of the episode, that writers Frank Spotnitz, Vince Gilligan and John Shiban choose to give Mulder a bed, but not just any bed, a waterbed, and not just a waterbed, a mirrored waterbed, I could grovel at the feet of all three of them. And to keep giving credit where credit is due, that scene is shot oh so cleverly by first time director for the show Michael Watkins. I don’t know whose idea it was to give us glimpses of the real Mulder lounging on that ridiculous bed with Scully, but whoever it was deserves an Emmy just for that. Hi-larious.

Come to think of it, why didn’t this episode win an Emmy? It certainly deserves one. You don’t even need to be a fan of The X-Files to enjoy it. Heck, there’s an explanatory monologue built in! I know I’ve used it myself early on in the process of X-Phile brainwashing and it’s quite effective. Kids, try this at home.

I would try to list all of my favorite moments in “Dreamland II”, but that would involve essentially quoting the entire episode and I’m too lazy for that. But I can’t close and fail to mention the memorable screen time that Morris Fletcher shares with the Lone Gunmen. Their brief moments together are so good that they eventually set the tone for the entire series of The Lone Gunmen and create an opportunity for the writers to keep using Morris Fletcher as a recurring character in both series… thank God.

Verdict:

I confess I don’t have much to say about “Dreamland II” because like all the great comedies of The X-Files it defies talk. It’s meant to be experienced and enjoyed. Frankly, I’m too busy laughing over it to do much thinking about it.

But is there anything deeper holding up this episode than bellyfuls of laughter? I think so. I think the ultimate take home message is that Mulder isn’t suited to the normal life that Scully whines after at the beginning of “Dreamland”. A desk job, a wife and two kids? Had it continued Mulder really would have lost his mind. And for her part, for all she longs to be normal, Scully doesn’t seem too put out in the end for having wasted time on another fruitless road trip with Mulder. She’s rather pleased with herself in fact.

You’ll notice that before the space-time continuum corrects itself and Scully is fired from the F.B.I. she isn’t at all interested in getting her job back. And why would she be? What’s the point without Mulder? Scully will admit as much further into the season, but she’s only in the F.B.I. and this whole X-Files gig for Mulder. We saw it back in the movie as well; without her relationship with Mulder, she has nothing invested in this job. That’s why the complaints the writers sometimes put in her mouth ring hollow. She could leave any time she really wanted to, she just doesn’t want to. Not really. She wants to be out there with Mulder. But, ah, I’m getting ahead of myself. That’s next episode…

A+

I am Tiger Woods:

There’s still a little niggle in the back of my mind saying that the events of this episode are a bit too serious for a comedy. Mulder’s life as he knew it is gone; you’d think there’d be weeping and gnashing of teeth. But, hey, at least he makes his panic face.

Again, as in “Small Potatoes” (4×20), someone who looks like Mulder but isn’t Mulder puts the moves on Scully. Why everyone but the man himself? At least she’s onto the game this time.

There’s a slight pothole in the plot. The stoner witnesses his friends’… predicament, but because he wasn’t in the path of the wave when it snaps back he remembers perfectly what happened to them. Meanwhile, in Washington D.C., Kersh isn’t in the path of the wave either but doesn’t remember any of the events of the past three days. I would say that because the causal event never happened that explains why Kersh remembers nothing, there’s nothing to remember. However, then shouldn’t the stoner forget to since his friends where never glued together? This is why one should never think too hard about any story involving a “space-time continuum.”

When Mulder and Morris were scheming together in the bathroom, why did they unlock the door after their conversation so that anyone could get in? At least the intruder turned out to be on their side.

How fitting is it that Mulder’s parting gift to Scully is sunflower seeds?

Not to ruin lives with spoilers or anything, but in a sad turn of events caused by a reversal of the space-time continuum, Morris Fletcher forgets that he remembered that he loves his wife.

Best Quotes:

Special Tramp Dana Scully: Do you know what would really be fun?
Morris as Mulder: What?
Special Tramp Dana Scully: [Pulls out handcuffs]
Morris as Mulder: Oh, yeah. Me first?
Special Tramp Dana Scully: You first.
Morris as Mulder: First time. [Handcuffs himself to the bed] Now what?
Special Tramp Dana Scully: [With gun trained on him] You’re not Mulder.
Morris as Mulder: What?! [champagne cork pops] Baby!
Special Tramp Dana Scully: “Baby” me and you’ll be peeing through a catheter. Your name is Morris Fletcher. It was Mulder who was arrested in the desert. He was telling the truth about you. Now, how do we get things back to normal?
Morris as Mulder: How should I know? I wouldn’t do it even if I could. You saw my wife. You think I want to go back to that? Two kids who’d probably kill me in my sleep for the insurance money. A $400,000 mortgage on a house that just appraised at $226,000. And my job… Ye gods! You think being a Man In Black is all voodoo mind control? You should see the paperwork.
Special Tramp Dana Scully: Are you through?
Morris as Mulder: As far as I’m concerned this thing is a gift from heaven. Besides, no one is ever going to believe you so you might as well just get used to me being here.
Special Tramp Dana Scully: Or I just shoot you… Baby.

———————-

Mulder as Morris: So you’re the guy that wants my life. I assume that includes all the ass kickings. [Locks the bathroom door]

———————-

Morris as Mulder: Well, see that’s what’s so great about you monkeys. Not only do you believe this horse pucky that we create, you broadcast it as well. I mean, look at this. [Headline: “Saddam testing Mandroid Army in Army Iraqi Desert”] There is no Saddam Hussein! This guy’s name is John Gillnitz. We found him doing dinner theatre in Tulsa. Did a mean King and I. Plays good ethnics.
Langly: You’re trying to say that Saddam Hussein’s a government plant?
Morris as Mulder: I’m saying I invented the guy. We set him up in 79. He rattles his sabre whenever we need a good distraction. Ah… If you boys only knew how many of your stories I dreamed up while sitting on the pot.

Triangle 6×3: I would’ve never seen you again, but you believed me.

And it's Skinner for the win.

This is the first of, well, quite a few episodes in Season 6 that strike me as officially stamped productions of fanfic. Brilliant fanfic, mind you, but fanfic nonetheless. And I mean this as the best possible sort of compliment.

If there’s one common complaint about Season 6 is that it’s largely dominated by “X-Files Light” episodes, episodes in the vein of “Small Potatoes” (4×20) and “War of the Coprophages” (3×12) that are more fluff pieces than hardcore Monster of the Week scare fests. These episodes aren’t always necessarily overt comedies, but they purposefully lack depth in an effort to give the audience a break both from mythology angst and MOTW seriousness.

It’s a far cry from the types of episodes that dominated Season 1 and Season 2, but if you look at the direction The X-Files has taken since Season 3 I don’t see much cause for indignant surprise. And considering the show has just come back after the climax of a hit feature film, a little self-conscious indulgence has been well earned. How could The X-Files pretend that it’s not iconic? That Mulder and Scully aren’t beloved stereotypes? If the show didn’t start poking fun at itself on the regular or throw out knowing winks and nods to its bulging audience it would implode in unvaried solemnity.

“Triangle” is one such wink and nod and it’s quite possibly the best of them. The whole adventure feels like a reward, a thank you card if you will, to a long-suffering audience; as if Chris Carter knows that we love these characters and decided to treat us to a fantasy. Like Mulder we’re having a really cool dream where all our favorite people are transplanted into unusual circumstances, but that’s exactly its charm.

This is why I say it feels like fanfic because it’s usually fanfic that fans have to resort to in order to see their favorite characters loosen up or imagine how they’d behave outside of their usual context. Now, this way of consciously acknowledging the audience and of lovingly nudging itself in the ribs can be a trap for any show, especially for one with such a serious and dramatic premise as The X-Files. But “Triangle” is so well done that I think we can ignore those fears for now and just enjoy the gift.

I can’t get over how gorgeous this episode is, it is absolutely lush. The colors saturate the screen. When I think of how far The X-Files’ production quality… and budget… has evolved from Season 1, I shake my head in amazement.

“Triangle” was shot in a series of especially long takes, which gives it a very fluid, very urgent feel. It forced the Carter & Crew to use some creative staging in order to avoid revealing production details that are normally disguised by cuts, and also to disguise the cuts themselves with creative editing. Visually, I adore this method as I love those moments where the camera conveniently looks away to avoid revealing trade secrets and I particularly I love the smoothness of the camera movement throughout.

But my favorite aspect of this episode has nothing to do with technique. My favorite part of this episode is Scully. In fact, this is my favorite episode of all for Scully’s character. Why? Because she’s so much fun! And how often does Scully get to be fun? You know I love her, but our girl is generally a stick-in-the-mud. Every so often she’s allowed to crack a joke or suppress a smirk and if we’re really lucky, she’ll tell off a madman or two in that impressively authoritative voice of hers.

What a joy it must have been for Gillian Anderson to play a different sort of Scully. Not that she’s out of character here, but how often does Scully get to show us such a huge range of facial expressions in one episode? How often is she flustered? Or angry? On top of that, 1939 Scully is Rosie the Riveter rather than a medical doctor which means she’s allowed to be even more feisty. My favorite part is the entire second act where we follow Scully up and down the halls of the F.B.I. as she tries, yet again, to save her incurably foolish partner.

And, of course, she’s ultimately successful both in the past and present. Scully saves Mulder, literally, in the past and in the present she saves him metaphorically because of the same reason: she believes him. Scully has to believe Mulder; the woman can’t help herself, it’s a compulsion. Whether in an alternate universe, alternate dimension or alternate time stream, it’s in her job description and on her business card: Mulder Believer.

That’s the ultimate beauty of this episode and the reward that I think Chris Carter was trying to give fans, validation of their belief in the Mulder/Scully partnership that at this point beats as the heart of the series. There’s a certain amount of destiny involved in all of Mulder’s relationships as presented because Mulder can’t avoid the people in his life, good or bad but they follow him even in unconsciousness. But when it comes to Scully in particular, her believe in him is instinctive rather than rational which again lends itself to the idea that these are two people with a God-given understanding of each other that was foreordained. This mystery of the unexplained is probably unsolvable, but it’s also worth more than all the other truth Mulder so stubbornly seeks and it’s nice to know he finally realizes that too.

And the Verdict is…

It would have been too much to expect that Chris Carter would allow his characters to kiss at this stage of the game, and I can’t blame him for refusing to indulge his needy audience (of which I was one) quite that far. But I’ll take a kiss between Mulder and “Scully” in shadow any day. The truth is that I’m glad the kiss happens mostly in the dark because I love that romantic air of mystery and I’m even gladder that Mulder and Scully didn’t become a television couple yet. Else what would I have had to look forward to? Besides, Mulder kissed her like a man who had thought long and hard about doing this before. That’s more than enough for me. And with a love confession on top of it? I remember nearly collapsing in shock and joy – I do believe there was screaming.

So does any of what we see on the 1939 version of the Queen Anne actually happen? The split screen moment between the two Scullys and Mulder’s ginger touch to his cheek would certainly have us believe so. Though the references to The Wizard of Oz sprinkled all through the episode and the fact that we see our hero conked out at the beginning would indicate that this is all a very realistic fantasy inside Mulder’s head, or maybe a world that is real but is only real because he created it.

I don’t care, really. I just want this episode to come out in HD so that my life can be complete.

A+

P.S. You know she punched him because she enjoyed that kiss a little too much, right?

Puddin Tame:

Mark Snow’s score is like another character in this episode.

For that matter, so is the camera.

I hadn’t noticed before that the guy who plays Thor’s Hammer in 1939 is the same Agent who overhears part of Scully’s conversation with the Lone Gunmen in 1998.

I can’t figure out how Kersh’s character winds up in the bowels of the ship in 1939. How does that represent his position in Mulder’s life? Well, I suppose no one would have believed he was a Nazi…

I have ransacked my brain and I can only think of two episodes where Scully ever wears a dress, this one and “En Ami” (7×15).

Agent Fowley is absent from this whole play. Interesting. Perhaps that brewing love triangle would have distracted too much from the action. I tend to think so.

I had hoped that Chris Carter’s experimental episodes, you know, the ones he helmed from beginning to end, would be a once-a-year occurrence, but alas. We get a similarly experimental if not quite as ambitious episode later in the season in “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” (6×8) but the next time Chris Carter gives us a distinctly “Chris Carteresque” episode will be Season 9’s “Improbable” (9×14), so you might want to unbuckle your seatbelt for that wait.

No Germans were harmed in the making of this episode.

Best Quotes:

Mulder: Well, you… you can relax. There’s no war going on. The world is at peace. There’s a little trouble over at our White House, but that’ll blow over… so to speak.

———————-

Scully: I want you to do me a favor. It’s not negotiable. Either you do it or I kill you, you understand?
Spender: You okay, Agent Scully?
Scully: No. I’m not. I’m a gun ready to go off so don’t test me, Spender. Don’t even think about trying to weasel me.

———————–

Kersh’s Secretary: I was sent to come get you.
Scully: Yeah, I was waiting for Agent Spender, he was, uh… I’m supposed to pick up a delivery from him.
Kersh’s Secretary: Agent Spender is with Assistant Director Kersh.
Scully: That rat bastard!

———————–
Mulder: Hey, Scully.
Scully: Yes?
Mulder: I love you.
Scully: Oh, brother.

Guest Post – Yes… but, what about Mulder? Part 1

{Editor’s Note: A passionate fan of The X-Files and cranberry juice, in that order, the internet femme fatale known as DanaKMulderScully has graciously agreed to stop by the site and drop some knowledge on a not-so-subtly biased fandom. If after a taste of her reasoning you’d like some more, feel free to tune in for more of her thoughts (Twitter), vids (Youtube), and words (Fanfic) at the conveniently listed sites above. Last but not least, her Tumblr is where you can read rants on the realness of Fox Mulder on a fairly regular basis. Stay tuned for Part 2 and comment below while you wait!}

I heart Fox Mulder.

I get SO IRRITATED every time I see people that disdain Mulder’s actions while making Scully seem like utter perfection…As much as I LOVE Scully’s character, I get irritated when people describe her as ‘perfect’; Because she is not. Scully’s strength comes from her weaknesses, from her determination to rise from the most horrible conditions to face everything and anything. She was not ‘born perfect’. She strived to be come the best she is.People forget that Scully is in fact Scully, BECAUSE of Mulder. Scully was not the same witty little agent that walked in to  ’ Agnt. Spooky’s ’ office that one fated morning.This is also inversely proportional. Mulder is Mulder BECAUSE of Scully. Mulder changes, evolved even at Scully’s side just like she did with him.The Truth is, you can’t talk about Scully without talking about Mulder and vice versa.And I don’t mean this in a misogynistic way, I please ask you to understand; this has nothing to do with gender and more of the personalities and characteristics of the 2.I loathe the fact that people describe Mulder as needy and whiny. Why?Because he had a horrible childhood past? Because his parents never gave him support? Because we never really see as much as bits and pieces of his past and those in themselves are already horrible?Why is it that when Scully talked about her non-present ability to carry a child, to have a bout with cancer, her unending emotional trauma from season 7-9, all of this, is taken as an amazing trait in a woman…BUT when Mulder still lingers about his sister’s disappearance or his own self hatred, everyone just calls him  annoying and whiny?I see double standard.

If I were to say that what Mulder is doing is whiny and needy, then in theory, I would have to say the same thing about Scully’s actions and problems.

And I don’t. YES Scully’s struggles were hard, but so were Mulder’s and there is no reason to justify one as more important than the other.

{Editor’s Note: Preach.}

The Beginning 6×1: I see your renowned arrogance has been left quite intact.

Puh Puh Puh Poker Face.

Fox Mulder is having a poopy day.

His boss sides against him, his former lover steals his job, and Scully… yes, Scully… leaves him blowing in the wind.

Don’t adjust your T.V. sets. That bright sunlight you see is meant to be there and you are still watching The X-Files. The crew at 1013 is taking advantage of their new filming environment by setting the first episode produced in L.A. in the bright desert of Arizona. If they can’t rely on the built-in atmosphere provided by the Vancouver weather, then they might as well make things interesting by taking the audience to places The X-Files couldn’t really go before, bright places.

Thankfully, the story isn’t any less dark than usual and we pick up right where we left off at the end of the movie, with the Syndicate running experiments on a pre-historic cache of the Black Oil, a version that turns humans into incubators. Unfortunately for one of their scientists, he has been infected with the Black Oil virus and accidentally turned himself into a one-man nursery for a very large, very dangerous alien baby.

But this is television we’ve returned to, not the big screen any longer, and the budget that the movie had for rubber alien suits has dried up. It’s a good thing then that The X-Files’ special talent is scaring its audience to death by showing them… nothing. And the alien attack scenes work all the better for us not being able to see the creature.

Death-by-alien moments aside, the best parts of this episode belong to the recently returned Gibson Praise, particularly when he protects Mulder and Scully from Cigarette-Smoking Man by luring him away from the scene of the alien attack and when he dramatically takes sanctuary in the back of Mulder and Scully’s car while they’re distracted. Although I must say he’s become a little too much the prophet for my taste, revealing to the people the truth of their sins. I’m not sure where he got the idea that countering everything someone says to you by telling them what they’re really thinking is a good way to win friends and influence people, but while he’s at it he should really pass a few chastisements Fox Mulder’s way.

Not that I blindly begrudge Mulder his attitude this episode since his world is falling apart like so many pieces of a burnt X-File.

First, Mulder gets spanked at the O.P.R. panel, a plot device recycled from the movie for the purposes of recycling the movie plot; summer was a long time ago and who knows what the audience doesn’t remember? While it makes for a convenient plot device as far as exposition goes and it also serves to push Mulder and Scully into the proverbial corner, the problem is that the seriousness of the panel belies the inherent silliness of the plot.

Everyone at the F.B.I. knows how crazy Mulder’s theories are and in the context of his working on the X-Files, it’s easier to believe that Mulder could go to Skinner, more his friend than his boss, with a working government conspiracy theory that involves corn, spaceships and bees without being laughed out of his office. But in front of a panel of humorless faces made up of strangers and superiors, it makes both Mulder and the plot of the entire mythology look foolish – more foolish than he’s already supposed to look. It’s hard to believe the F.B.I. would actually cut this man a paycheck.

If that wasn’t enough trouble, Scully has professionally bailed on him. Scully doesn’t remember most of what happened to her in Antarctica other than that Mulder saved the day, and the proof of the alien virus that was supposed to be inside the bee that stung Scully isn’t materializing. And you know Scully, she won’t believe anything until the lab results come in.

That’s who Scully is and she’s not about to change, but after everything they’ve been through Mulder is finally fed up with her denial and his frustration isn’t completely unmerited. He just bared his soul and begged this woman to stay by his side, trekked the frozen North to bring her back from the brink of death, and carried her away from danger as alien monsters snapped their spiky teeth at his heels. No doubt he feels a little entitled to some blind faith from her whether she actually witnessed anything or no. And after he’s finally seen the alien life he’s sought for so long with his own eyes, coming home to the same old act from Scully has to be grating.

Still, that’s no excuse for this:

Mulder: Agent Fowley took me to that plant at great risk to herself, where I saw something that you refuse to believe in, saw it again, Scully. And though it may not say it in her report, Diana saw it too. And no matter what you think, she’s certainly not going to go around saying that just because science can’t prove it, it isn’t true.

Or this:

Mulder: What does it take? For this thing to come up and bite you on the ass? I saw these creatures. I saw them burst to life. You would’ve seen them too, but you were infected with that virus. You were passed out over my shoulder.
Scully: Mulder, I know what you did. I know what happened to me, but without ignoring the science, I can’t… Listen, Mulder… [Grabs his hand] You told me that my science kept you honest, that it made you question your assumptions, that by it, I’d made you a whole person. If I change now… it wouldn’t be right… or honest.
Mulder: I’m talking about extraterrestrial life alive on this planet in our lifetime, forces that dwarf and precede all human history. I’m sorry, Scully, but this time your science is wrong. [Walks away]

Tell me, can you hear me dying from where you are?

Poor Scully. She’s so desperate to make Mulder understand that underneath her skepticism beats the heart of a wannabe believer that she tries to recreate “The Moment”… and Mulder shoots her down.

Coming from the high of the movie where Mulder and Scully were joined in an almost poetic unity a la the greats like Kirk and Spock, to this… Well, it’s like a splash of ice water to the face. I’d almost go back and rewatch Fight the Future to see if what I saw was really what I saw but I just watched it multiple times and I’m quite sure that what I saw was what I saw. I swear, if the events of the film hadn’t happened this would be less painful.

I know that for the sake of television drama Chris Carter couldn’t have Mulder and Scully continue on in such carefree, like-minded bliss. But I’m a closet sap and it’s not even the Shipper in me that this bothers so much, I just hate division between close characters of any kind. I love it when I see teamwork and unselfish love and idealism come through my television set in waves of red, green and blue light. Watching the trust between my favorite team of all wane cold, even temporarily, is like a knife through this grown geek’s heart. And for Mulder to compare Scully unfavorably with Fowley… Thrust the blade in deep and get it over with why don’t you, Chris Carter?

The only benefit to this painful rift I can see is how impressive Scully is throughout it. She behaves as a true friend, giving Mulder not what he asks for or what he wants, but what he truly needs. All along she works behind the scenes to get Mulder the proof that would validate his theories, and his very existence, really. That she does so despite Mulder’s coldness is a testament to her integrity.

I can safely say that Scully is in love with Mulder because if she wasn’t before Antarctica, she is now. You can call me “Mulder” but I don’t need scientific proof of that. It’s understood, woman to non-existent woman. But I love that she compartmentalizes that fact so well, even in the face of Mulder’s emotional rebuffs. It looks like the confidence she gained in their relationship through the events of the movie is still carrying her through, enough that she knows Mulder needs her even when he doesn’t realize it.

Meanwhile, Diana blindly accepts every word that proceeds out of Mulder’s mouth. What does that tell you?

I do like the fact that her character has become more of an enigma. Is Mulder right and she’s a closeted ally? Or is Scully wise to be suspicious of her loyalties? Last we saw her she was shot protecting Gibson, a fact that lends itself to Mulder’s point of view since if she were playing for the other team she would have handed them over. No need for a near death experience. But her coming onto the scene just as Gibson the Boy Wonder is revealed… you’d be crazy not to question her motives.

Her new partner on the X-Files, Agent Spender, is also becoming more interesting. He’s sold his soul to the devil, his own father, CSM. For doing his bidding and making Fox Mulder’s life miserable he probably expects to advance up the ranks in the F.B.I. However, he doesn’t appreciate daddy hovering over him and we can wonder at what point he’ll turn on CSM, career or no career. Meanwhile, Mulder’s greatest antagonist at the F.B.I. now has charge over his precious files.

Or maybe his greatest antagonist is his unsympathetic looking new boss, A.D. Kersh.

And the Verdict is…

I’ve been trying hard to understand why it is I don’t care for this episode even though it gives us so much information and so much drama and, no, it’s not because of anything to do with the Fowley-Mulder-Scully love triangle. Somehow, it’s all a little lackluster. In fact, it’s slow in parts and bogged down by (probably essential) exposition. The climactic hunt in the nuclear plant lacks urgency. Maybe if Mulder and Diana had any real chemistry or if they had done more than watch the alien through a window. Mulder is on the verge of finding all the answers he’s sought. Heck, he actually has tangible proof for once! And yet I find myself not particularly invested. Scully hands Mulder test results confirming alien life and still I find no reason for my butt to leave its comfortable spot on my chair, whereas the best episodes have me squirming in nerdy excitement.

In particular, the big reveal, that the alien monsters from the film and the little green men we’ve seen doubtful glimpses of before are one in the same, is disappointing. Clever, but disappointing. The alien monster is merely a gestational stage; probably its lethality is an evolutionary form of protection while the more vulnerable adult form continues to develop on the inside.  Me, I prefer the scary monster. Can you imagine if the earth were repopulated with those? But that’s a pipe dream. We’ll never see those well-manicured claws again.

I understand why this episode is titled “The Beginning” because there are a slew of changes here and with the pace that new revelations are coming at, it’s clear this is the beginning of the end as well. How Mulder copes with it all remains to be seen, but let’s hope he does what Scully asks and starts trusting her again because that’s not just the foundation of their partnership, it’s the foundation of the X-Files.

His boss secretly aids and abets him, his former lover takes him on a field trip to see an alien, and Scully… yes, Scully… gives him the proof he’s been searching for all these years.

Maybe things aren’t quite so bad after all.

B

Mind Reading:

Why do Mulder and Scully walk away from Gibson to talk as though he can’t read their minds from across the room?

This episode could be subtitled: How Scully Got Her Groove Back Only to Have Mulder Strip it Away Again

Whatever happened to Scully being assigned to Salt Lake City Utah? When she took back her resignation did that plot point just disappear? Did Skinner pull some strings?

Pardon me, but didn’t Scully confirm the existence of alien life in the form of bacteria back in “The Erlenmeyer Flask” (1×23)? Purity Control, anyone? Does switching it to a virus radically change anything?

What exactly did Mulder plan to do once he found the alien? Lasso it?

You know, the joy of having favorite fictional characters like Fox Mulder is that they live on in your mind and memory, timeless. But then there are moments like this, where Mulder openly compares Scully to Diana and finds Scully wanting, that indeed I wish he were real so that I could end his existence.

Even if the DNA from the virus, and from the claw and from Gibson all match normal, junk DNA, does that really prove that DNA is alien? Couldn’t it all just be perfectly human? What if the “aliens” came from us rather than the other way around?

In “The End” (5×20), Chris Carter was moving around his pieces, now he’s called checkmate on Mulder.

Best Quotes:

Assistant Director Bart: These spacelings, Agent Mulder, they weren’t something I saw in Men in Black?
Mulder: …I didn’t see Men in Black.
Assistant Director Bart: Well, a damn good movie.

———————–

Smoking Man: You can kill a man. But you can’t kill what he stands for… Not unless you first break his spirit. That’s a beautiful thing to see.

———————–

Mulder: It’d help if you’d shut the door. It would make it harder for them to see that I’m totally disregarding everything I was told.

The X-Files Movie Part 2: I had you big time.

Scully: [Jiggles door handle] Oh! Now what?
Mulder: It’s locked?
Scully: [Jiggles handle again] So much for anticipating the unforeseen.
Mulder: [Tries the door in panic and it opens easily]
Scully: [Smirks widely] I had you.
Mulder: No you didn’t.
Scully: Oh yeah. I had you big time.
Mulder: You had nothing. Come on, I saw you jiggle the handle.

Before we can talk about the infamous hallway scene, we have to discuss how well Chris Carter set it up for us.

I mentioned in Part 1 how effective the introduction of Mulder and Scully is on the rooftop in Dallas. Not only does the movie establish, in a funny and memorable way, the personality of these two individuals, it also perfectly illustrates the dynamics of their relationship and, more importantly, it waves a magic wand and turns the entire audience into lifelong Shippers.

I kid, but not really. It’s important that the connection and affection between these two is such that you want them to kiss by the time we make it to the hallway, or else the moment has no power. For long time fans of the show, we’re already there – well, the sane among us, anyway.

Don’t think I exaggerate when I say that the success of the whole film rests on this two-minute scene. If the dynamics here don’t work, then the audience sure as heck won’t understand why Mulder later braves a frozen wilderness to bring this woman home. Emotionally, the rest of the movie won’t make sense.

Scully: Are you drunk, Mulder?
Mulder: I was until about 20 minutes ago, yeah.
Scully: Was that before or after you decided to come here?
Mulder: …What exactly are you implying?

That’s a good question. I certainly didn’t understand what she was implying till, oh, about this time last year. That’s twelve years of ignorance.

Why would Scully think that Mulder would drop by her place drunk and stupid to say or do something he shouldn’t say or do? Well, her threat to quit is weighing heavily on her sleepless mind and she knows it must be weighing on Mulder’s as well. Perhaps she thinks he might put the moves on her with alcohol clouding his judgment, which would mean she already knows there’s something between them. If she does, this is the first she’s ever indicated it. Or perhaps she’s afraid he’ll make an embarrassing scene by begging her not to leave. But he’s not ready to do that quite yet.

I personally lean toward the latter based on their history, but then the dialogue implies that Scully thinks Mulder is there to hit on her like a drunken frat boy. Maybe in another twelve years I’ll get it.

Mulder: What are my choices?
Scully: About a hundred miles of nothing in both directions.
Mulder: Well, which way do you think they went?
Scully: Well, you got two choices. One of them’s wrong.
Mulder: I think they went left.
Scully: I don’t know why, I think they went right.
Mulder: [After a moment’s mental deliberation, speeds off straight ahead into the desert, avoiding both choices] Five years together, Scully. How many times I been wrong?
Scully: [Silence]
Mulder: Never!
Scully: [Silence]
Mulder: Not driving, anyway.

Thanks to a significant hint from the movie itself, (Actually, it’s less like a hint and more like a neon sign when Strughold discusses the thing that Mulder can’t live without and looks up meaningfully right before we cut to a screen full of Scully), the audience now knows that Mulder and Scully aren’t merely partners and friends, Scully is the most important thing in Mulder’s life.

This is another one of those moments with double benefits. Those new to The X-Files can now be sure of the depth of Mulder and Scully’s relationship, something they need to understand before the intensity of the hallway scene shocks them. And for us regulars, we finally get to hear it since neither Mulder nor Scully have ever openly admitted it. Everything about their relationship is implied and understood, it’s never been explicit… until now.

We jump from that gleeful revelation to another scene that’s symbolic, indicative of Mulder and Scully’s entire partnership. Do we go left? Do we go right? No. We split the difference and that’s how we arrive at the truth. Alone, neither Mulder nor Scully would get anywhere. Yet another moment to illustrate the fact that Mulder really can’t succeed in his quest without Scully. Without her, he would have turned left and missed the evidence he was looking for.

So now we’re sure Mulder is both emotionally and practically dependent on Scully. Cue the bee.

Mulder: What’s wrong?
Scully: Salt Lake City, Utah. Transfer effective immediately. I already gave Skinner my letter of resignation.
Mulder: You can’t quit now, Scully.
Scully: I can, Mulder. I debated whether or not even to tell you in person, because I knew…
Mulder: We are close to something here! We’re on the verge!
Scully: You’re on the verge, Mulder. Please don’t do this to me.
Mulder: After what you saw last night, after all you’ve seen, you can just walk away?
Scully: I have. I did, it’s done.
Mulder: I need you on this, Scully.
Scully: You don’t need me, Mulder. You never have. I’ve just held you back.
Mulder: [Stunned silence]
Scully: I got to go. [Walks out]
Mulder: [Chases her down the hallway] You want to tell yourself that so you can quit with a clear conscience, you can, but you’re wrong!
Scully: Why did they assign me to you in the first place, Mulder? To debunk your work, to rein you in, to shut you down…
Mulder: But you saved me! As difficult and as frustrating as it’s been sometimes, your G-d-d strict rationalism and science have saved me a thousand times over! You’ve kept me honest! You’ve made me a whole person! I owe you everything, Scully, and you owe me nothing. I don’t know if I want to do this alone. I don’t even know if I can. And if I quit now, they win.

Oh, where to start?

Let’s start back at the end of Season 5. Remember, even though the plot of this movie is meant to be such that a new viewer can follow along it doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Yes, you can absolutely understand and enjoy what’s going on here without the backstory, but to fully appreciate the depth of it you have to have been watching for a while, long enough to know what a breakthrough this moment is for these characters, long enough to consider the emotional context.

When we left Mulder and Scully in “The End” (5×20), they were not only dealing with the trauma of the X-Files being burnt to a crisp, but an emotional monkey wrench was thrown into their relationship with the arrival of Diana Fowley, Mulder’s one-time partner and lover. Fowley, like Mulder, is a true believer and Mulder for once gets to enjoy having someone accept his theories at face value rather than pick them apart. To his credit, though, when Fowley hints that her Yes Man services would have been more useful to him than Scully’s science he straightens out that misunderstanding right quick.

The problem is, he forgot to straighten out that same misunderstanding with Scully herself. See, Scully has always prided herself on two things: Being the person that Mulder trusts (an issue that will be addressed in the Season 6 premier) and being the person that Mulder needs. However unscientific Mulder himself may be, nary a case goes by that he doesn’t coerce Scully into some all important autopsy or beg her to run tests on some barely tangible evidence. Rather than Scully’s science debunking Mulder’s work as the conspirators originally intended in sending her to him, Scully’s science has been the one thing that’s given the X-Files legitimacy.

Why then would Scully say something as silly as, “You don’t need me, Mulder. You never have. I’ve just been holding you back?” Well, the shorthand that Mulder has with Fowley and their obvious meeting of the minds has eroded Scully’s confidence in her relationship with Mulder and this is really where this statement of hers comes from, not from anything that’s happened over the course of the film, which is evidence that she’s been indulging in a pity party long before the hallway. It’s not that she’s so juvenile as to think he doesn’t value her at all, her behavior up to this point doesn’t indicate that. But the idea has entered her mind that Mulder needed and preferred a type of Diana Fowley all along, someone who understands and believes in what he does. Scully doesn’t believe in what Mulder does, she believes in Mulder.

It’s a good thing that her faith in him is precisely what Mulder wants. For his part, Mulder responds to this seemingly random admission the only way he can, stunned silence. After her statements earlier in the film it doesn’t come as a surprise to Mulder that Scully wants to quit, what stuns him is why she’s ready to go and that it has nothing to do with Dallas. He can’t possibly have known what Scully was feeling and you can watch realization and the emotions it brings cross his face once she tells him. I could play indignant and try to blame Mulder for never telling his partner how much he appreciates her, but it’s not his fault. This is how Mulder and Scully’s relationship works; it’s like an iceberg where the bulk of their emotions are kept down below with just the tip visible, and that only in good weather.

Yes, their relationship is mainly built on what they don’t say, but that doesn’t mean they don’t communicate their feelings, quite the contrary. They do it all the time! They just do it silently in a mix of intense In fact, most of Mulder and Scully’s best moments involve little to no dialogue. They don’t need it and it would be superfluous. For instance, even in this scene most of the intensity builds after Mulder stops talking. You can read every emotion that crosses their faces as if they were written words. But I digress.

Normally, the understanding between them is rock solid because their eyes and actions perform a more efficient service than their words could ever do. But the recent erosion of Scully’s confidence means that, for once, Mulder is going to have to be explicit. He has one shot to convince Scully of how much she means to him because if she makes it to the elevator, she’s gone.

A touching speech ensues where Mulder lays his neediness out for Scully’s inspection. Never one to resist Mulder’s puppy dog face, Scully silently caves in. Now the two of them are basking in the shared glow of mutual adoration and those still watching are either silently holding their breath or squealing in anticipation. Finally, all those years of pent up attraction are about to be rewarded – is that what’s really happening here?

A passionate kiss is on the verge of taking place, but I don’t believe it’s passionate because their lust boileth over, it’s an overflow of mutual admiration. It’s not that Mulder and Scully aren’t attracted to each other as people, it’s just that I don’t think typical boy-girl attraction is what ignites this moment or their relationship in general. These sentimental emotions of theirs in regards to each other have reached the point where they are so powerful that they have no way to express themselves except in the physical. Once you love someone that much how can you merely say it? Mulder and Scully keep a sharp leash on their emotions, so once they finally boil over keeping them in check is impossible and the kiss is inevitable.

That is, it would be if evil didn’t run rampant in the earth.

Before these two can consummate their long-simmering feelings, before the audience can experience the sweet release of the butterflies in their tummies, a bee buzzes in and takes it all away.

It’s sadism. Pure and simple.

I can’t say I expected any different from Chris Carter, although every time I see this part of me thinks he gets a special sort of pleasure from torturing his audience. No, we all knew it wasn’t really going to happen. For myself, I knew I wanted it but I also knew I didn’t really want it. If they had actually gone through with the kiss us fans wouldn’t have had as much to look forward to. Worse, if they had, for the sake of drama there would have been nothing for the writers to do but split them up again. And God forbid that the Mulder/Scully relationship had turned into an on again off again soap opera.

This is still a point of no return because even if Mulder and Scully don’t kiss, it’s obvious that they wanted to, and both of them know that the other wanted to, which is even more significant. The question is, how long can they feign ignorance and ignore that fact? As I said, they’re experts at keeping silent.

Mulder: [Performing CPR] Geez, breathe! Breathe, breathe, breathe!
Scully: [Coughs]
Mulder: Breathe in, breathe in, breathe!
Scully: [Mouths something]
Mulder: [Leans in to hear]
Scully: I had you big time.
Mulder: [Chuckles]

The kiss is a no go, so 1013 compromises and gives us a mouth-to-mouth resuscitation scene. And it’s not just a physical resolution to the earlier hallway scene; it’s emotional as well with Mulder stroking her face and her teasing him. For a moment they smile at each other in a room full of ravenous aliens as if they have all the time in the world.

[Imbecilic Grin]

The entire sequence where Mulder (mostly) carries a barely conscious Scully through the spaceship and out to safety… Mulder’s finest hour. I willingly ignore how impossible it all is, the climbing, the falling, the survival, because the whole thing makes me teary eyed and, dang it, that’s a rarity. I can almost hear what Scully’s thinking after they’ve made it to safety and she cradles an exhausted Mulder in her arms, “This precious, precious man.”

So they (inexplicably) make it home and life returns to normal, no evidence and no honor. Mulder is acutely aware of that fact but Scully… she’s holding her head a little higher. Could it be because someone in this world could sing “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” to her and actually mean it?

Is this what causes Scully’s newfound confidence at the O.P.R. panel? Well, I can tell you what doesn’t. It’s not that Scully has seen anything more to convince her of the truth of what she’s saying. She was knocked out after that virus hit her and she has no real knowledge of what went down in Antarctica. No, I think Scully is more certain than ever that her place is at Mulder’s side and if that means that along with him she’ll be a martyr before the panel or the entire F.B.I., so be it. She’s needed.

Mulder: No. No. How many times have we been here before, Scully? Right here. So close to the truth. And now with what we’ve seen and what we know to be right back at the beginning with nothing.
Scully: This is different, Mulder.
Mulder: No it isn’t! You were right to want to quit! You’re right to want to leave me! You should get as far away from me as you can! I’m not going to watch you die, Scully, because of some hollow personal cause of mine. Go be a doctor. Go be a doctor while you still can. {Editor’s Note: ::noisy sniff::}
Scully: I can’t. I won’t. Mulder, I’ll be a doctor but my work is here with you now. And that virus that I was exposed to, whatever it is, it has a cure. You held it in your hand. How many other lives can we save? Look… if I quit now, they win. {Editor’s Note: She’ll forget every word of this speech in 5, 4, 3, 2…}

Verdict:

Lovely Reader, if you had any idea how much mental energy I expended on this movie this weekend you would be ashamed for me. I am ashamed for me, but it had to be done. This is my Once and For All.

What else can I say that I haven’t already exclaimed over in detail? I could nitpick editorial goofs, or run through a play-by-play of every emotion on Mulder and Scully’s face during the hallway scene, but all things must end and this is as good a place as any.

I merely add that the only OTP is this OTP. All others will try and fail.

A+++

Bee Pollen:

After having deep, heartfelt discussions with myself about this movie and this scene all weekend and coming to the conclusions above, I watched it yet again with both the 2008 and 1998 commentaries and was rewarded not only by hearing Chris Carter confirm that the mouth-to-mouth scene was indeed meant to bring the hallway scene full circle physically, but by Rob Bowman beautifully explaining that the kiss Mulder and Scully verge on completing comes not out of lust but out of overwhelming respect. I feel so justified and self-complacent right now that I have, quite literally, patted myself on the back with both hands.

The near kiss is preceded by the first kiss of any sort they’ve ever shared that was initiated by Scully. Mulder kissed her forehead in “Memento Mori” (4×15) and Mulder kissed her hand in “Redux II” (5×3). Maybe it was the fact that Scully showed some blatant affection this time that made Mulder think he could take it a step further since we know that some romantic notions were already a-twinge in the man’s soul.

That “I have no allergy” line may be one of the most foolish lines The X-Files ever gave us, since a preexisting allergy isn’t in the least a prerequisite for an allergic reaction. You can eat sunflower seeds all your life and then one day, boom. Scully, being a doctor, would be aware of that, bee sting or no bee sting. But, hey, I guess they had to establish for the audience that what was happening to Scully was diabolical and not routine.

When Scully says, “Please don’t do this to me,” it gets me every time.

Who else thinks Mulder and Scully disturbed the neighbors?

I don’t believe I’ve ever made it the whole way through the hallway with two eyes wide open. I have to squint like a schoolgirl or watch through my fingers.

“That’s the theme of the movie: Mulder needs Scully. And never before has he come to that understanding quite so strongly as he does in this story.” – Rob Bowman

It’s a not-so-well-kept secret that Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny asked to film a version of the hallway scene where they went through with the kiss. This version, different than the gag reel one, is now loose on the internet. Search at your own risk.

“I’m not gonna watch you die, Scully, because of some hollow, personal cause of mine.” I’m sorry, what was that, Mulder? Please repeat.

To show you how observant I am, I have seen this film exactly 1,976 times and I only just realized that while Mulder is wearing a t-shirt up on that Dallas rooftop, Scully has on a full suit under her F.B.I. jacket.

The End 5×20: So you two know each other.

"Why, Mulder? Why did they have to bring in The Fowl One?"

I know this show isn’t real. I’m cognizant that I’m having a fictional adventure when I watch it. But I tell you, when that Fowley woman comes on screen I have a visceral reaction. There are unnatural noises and convulsions intermittently mixed with weeping and gnashing of teeth. I’m keenly aware of my irrationality, of the pseudo-inappropriate nature of my response. But it is what it is.

I hate to do it to you, but I’m going to have to Ship here for a moment.

Last episode, we had this sweet, glorious moment where Mulder declares his need for Scully, pronounces her the only person he can depend on, and begs her to be his friend with the puppiest of puppy dog eyes. To take an MSR hungry audience from that kind of a high to such a FOWL low amounts to pop culture cruelty. Chris Carter, thou art guilty.

I still haven’t fully forgiven that man.

Scully has been the woman in Mulder’s life for a good long time now. His sister has been taken from him. He and his mother’s relationship, though loving, is distant. He has no love, no friend, no one who would or could challenge Scully’s place in the hierarchy of his relationships. And based on Mulder’s famous “one in five billion” declaration last episode, Scully feels reasonably secure in her position.

But what if she wasn’t the only “Scully” he ever had? I’m sure the question never occurred to Scully before Diana Fowley came along. Sure, there was Phoebe Green in Mulder’s past, but that relationship was hardly more than misplaced puppy love, and he never trusted her, he only lusted after her. This… this Diana Fowley situation, is much more dangerous.

Even now, after the show has long since ended, we know very little of the history of their relationship except that there was one. Whether it began before or after Diana Fowley helped Mulder uncover the X-Files, we don’t know. Did she walk out of Mulder’s life against his will? With his blessing? No one can say. But what’s painfully obvious is that he trusted her and trusts her still.

Maybe I’m projecting, but I suspect what disturbs Scully most is how secretive Mulder’s being about his past relationship with Diana. There is precious little Mulder holds back from Scully, and it generally either involves the minutiae of a case they’re working on or something relating to her ova. (Alarmingly, I speak the truth here.) So not only does he trust someone else, but he doesn’t trust Scully enough to explain who that someone else is.

Well, he probably doesn’t tell Scully because he’s embarrassed and uncomfortable, but she doesn’t know that.

I’ve said before that Scully senses very early on in Season 1 that Mulder needs her. She validates him, justifies him, humanizes him. David Duchovny once aptly called her Mulder’s “human credential.” And long before Scully was personally invested in the mythology of the X-Files, it was her refusal to abandon a friend who needed her that kept her in the game

More than even knowing she’s needed, Scully likes being needed. Who doesn’t, right? And Mulder’s appreciation of her talents, skill and intelligence validate her and his admiration is about all she has considering the trajectory of her career. But it’s not until Scully begins to consider that Mulder may not need her, or even want her, as much as she thought he did that she seriously contemplates leaving. But now I’m delving into Fight the Future territory.

Despite her ties to the conspiracy that will come to (a very murky) light later on, Diana Fowley never plays a significant role in the mythology at large which I consider a waste. But watching “The End” back again, I begin to believe that she was never meant to. She’s a foil for Scully and merely a tool/weapon to cause tension in a relationship that had already survived the likes of abduction, cancer, and Morgan & Wong. After all, why should they be happy together?

Verdict:

It’s tough for me to admit that I’m not sure how useful this episode really is.  Gibson Praise is presented as the Key to Everything, but how? How would his telepathic abilities unlock all the mysteries of the X-Files? What does he have to do with, say, spontaneous human combustion? Mutant worms? Vampires? Jeffrey Spender’s “Luke, I am your father” moment with Cigarette-Smoking Man is a little anti-climactic since we knew about that already. Worst of all, though I have a low tolerance for love triangles to begin with, Archie, Betty and Veronica not withstanding, this one moves the mythology and the greater plot forward not at all. Not for now, anyway. It does shake Scully’s head out of the sand, however, for which a small and begrudging part of me is grateful.

The plot development that bodes best for the rest of the series is the return of Cigarette-Smoking Man. The mutual uneasy dislike between him and all the other members of the Syndicate is a treat that I wish had been explored further. Though why these men who secretly control the world are incapable of ridding themselves of a 12-year-old without him begs credulity.

There’s a lot to dress up these faults, however, and “The End” grabs your attention if it’s ultimately not very meaningful, thanks in no large part to Mark Snow’s evocative score, parts of which were clearly harvested from the upcoming movie’s soundtrack. It’s exciting if not fulfilling so I can’t be too mad at it.

Like Gibson, Chris Carter is merely moving chess pieces into place with this episode, putting them into position for what would hopefully be a summer blockbuster and a hit season of television beyond. It remains to be seen what kind of play he’s planning to make.

B+

P.S. Stay tuned for the Season Wrap Up where we can’t help but figure out where Mulder and Scully currently stand before the movie comes along and USTs us to death.

Queen’s Gambit Accepted:

This was The X-Files’ last episode shot in Vancouver with the crew that had been their since the beginning. As it was also R.W. Goodwin’s last episode on the show, it was only fitting that he should direct it. All those extras in the chess tournament scene? Yeah. Those were real fans. Philes fill stadiums.

Somehow, this game has been rigged from the beginning by Cigarette-Smoking Man. He’s edging out Mulder and his precious X-Files to make room for his precious Jeffrey. But why does Mulder have to suffer in order for Spender to make a name for himself? And why, even with scientific proof that something’s afoot, is the wunderkind Mulder’s downfall? Surely the powers that be have heard stranger tales from him. Why they’d balk at Gibson Praise of all things is beyond me. You’d think they’d gleefully subject him to further testing.

Fowley isn’t the only one creating tension. If Spender was at odds with Mulder before, now he’s downright antagonistic. And it’s not like Mulder’s attitude is going to help bring them together.

Why does Gibson keep referring to Scully and The Fowl One as “girls?”

Anyone notice that Mulder can’t so much as look Scully in the face when he says, “You know what to do, Diana?” Coward. Traitor. Bastard.

He lets her call him Fox. – There are no words.

For an ever so brief second in the car there, it looks as though Scully might cry.

I spent much of my first viewing of this episode alternately screaming and whining at my television screen. Not much has changed.

Clearly, sadly, frustratingly, the one thinking about Mulder is Diana. And judging by their secret glances during the car ride earlier, she’s the one he’s thinking about too. My only consolation is that Mulder was loath for Gibson to let the truth be known. Is he afraid of Scully’s reaction because he knows she’d be justifiably discomfited to know about he and Diana Fowley’s past relationship? Or does he not want to give Diana the satisfaction of knowing her presence has affected him since he’s too proud to fall back into a relationship with her just because she’s decided to come back after all these years? Either way, I’m slightly comforted by his discomfort.

Best Quotes:

Gibson Praise: I know what’s on your mind. I know you’re thinking about one of the girls you brought.
Mulder: Oh?
Gibson Praise: And one of them is thinking about you.
Fowley: Which one?
Gibson Praise: He doesn’t want me to say.

——————–

Mulder: You’re insulting me when you should be taking notes.