Case 05, File 14: The Red and the Black

AKA: Is The Title A Chessboard Reference, I Don't Get It

I mentioned this earlier, and I'm sure I will mention this again but at a certain point the Myth Arc episodes begin to get a little...frustrating. Not because the episodes themselves are bad or unengaging, but because you know that huge chunks of the plots of them will either be undone or just will never pay off. I brought this up at the beginning of the season because the big plot twists and status quo shakeups from Redux were destined to be undone, and now here we are.

Case 05, File 13: Patient X

AKA: I Have No Mouth But I've Got A Good Reason

As ongoing mystery stories get more dense and complex, it is inevitable that the authors have to begin making up stuff on the spot to keep the plot going, or more importantly to keep the audience coming back. Once you have established grand new revelations as your primary audience engagement, you have to keep coming up with new ones, which can lead to Mystery Inflation which is, to put it lightly, where the fun train stops. It happened to Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Attack on Titan and it was inevitable that it would happen to The X-Files.

Case 05, File 12: Bad Blood

AKA: What We Do In The Texas Shadows

After Darin Morgan stopped writing for The X-Files, there was a desire to recreate some of the stuff he did for the show. Of course a lot of the later attempts (especially in Season 6 onwards) would forget that part of what made Morgan great was his shocking insight into his characters. But without that, the least they could do, is make the episode absolutely, screamingly, hilarious.

Case 05, File 11: Kill Switch

AKA: Their Only Crime Was Curiosity

90s understanding of hacking and computers was uh....quaint. Not to say that modern day understanding is any better, there's a lot of silly stuff out there. And sure there were a handful of pieces of media that got it right-ish, but those are not the ones that stick in people's minds, the ones that stick in people's minds are the ones that got it hilariously wrong, like Lawnmower Man or the ones that were profound like Neuromancer. So if you wanted to bring hacking to The X-Files, you should probably look into hiring the writer of Neuromancer. Especially if you already hired the author of Lawnmower Man.

Case 05, File 10: Chinga

AKA: Child's Play...God What Number Are They Up To?

So here's a question I was musing upon as I left the theater after seeing A Star Is Born: Is letting your external knowledge of a piece of media's creation affect your opinion a valid avenue of criticism? Would I feel less like A Star Is Born is fawning over the male lead to the detriment of the woman if I didn't know that the actor playing the male lead and the director were the same person? Would I be less generous to Clerks if I didn't know it was made on a shoestring budget by a man who had never directed a movie before? And would this episode feel less like a grab bag of Stephen King cliches if I didn't know Stephen King co-wrote it?

Case 05, File 09: Schizogeny

AKA: There Is Unrest In The Forest, There Is Trouble With The Trees

One of the greatest temptations when it comes to reviewing these episodes is when an episode doesn't work, I get the temptation to talk about rewriting it, and that's not what this blog is about. It's usually not that much of a temptation, since much of the lesser episodes would require a complete teardown and reworking, but sometimes, sometimes, you can see how just a few small shuffling around of elements could make an episode so much better and you just want to rewrite it.

Case 05, File 08: Kitsunegari

AKA: I Blue Myself Before Dinner

The X-Files doesn't really do sequel episodes. Oh it loves to end its episodes on cliffhangers, implying the monster is still out there, lurking just around the corner, but that's not something it wants to follow up on, it's just a nice creepy way to end an episode. There are a couple of exceptions to this, episodes which demanded follow ups. We already hit one (way back in Tooms) but that still left two ahead of us.

Case 05, File 07: Emily

AKA: Has The Murmuring Sounds Of May

The X-Files is not a show that's set up to have the lead characters have children (and yes, I know about William, we'll get there when we get there). The characters work long hours, travel constantly and are in dangerous fields, and that's before we even get into how much danger they are of being abducted by aliens or killed by faceless bounty hunters. So even when I first saw this episode, I was under very little illusion that Emily was gonna stick around.

Case 05, File 06: Christmas Carol

AKA: The Ghost Of Plots Past

So as you may be aware, this season ends on a cliffhanger that needed to be resolved in a big expensive movie (we'll get to it, don't worry). What that means, unfortunately, is that throughout the season there were episodes where either Gillian Anderson or David Duchovny wouldn't be available, because they'd be off shooting their movie scenes (and at least one episode where neither of them could be available). The affects the way they write the episodes, since there are multiple episodes this season which have to be centered around either Mulder or Scully, to give them time to be off set, and writing an episode to suit an actor's availability first and to tell a good story second is always a backward way to write it.

Case 05, File 05: The Post-Modern Prometheus

AKA: Ceci N'est Pas Une Frankenstein

While I like to think I have a pretty unique way of approaching The X-Files, I don't think most of my opinions would cause an uproar among fans. Yes, I have episodes I like or dislike for personal reasons, but you usually won't catch me calling Space an underappreciated masterpiece or saying that Home is overrated. There are exceptions to this rule however, and we have hit one of the big ones.

Case 05, File 04: Detour

AKA: Mulder and Scully vs. Florida Man

The X-Files was, for the first 5 years of its existence, shot in British Columbia, which is where a lot of stuff is shot (more than you might expect, frankly). And that makes sense: British Columbia already looks like (broadly speaking) a lot of different locations around the United States, and with the right shot choice and editing, it can look enough like many more. But there are limits to its powers and one of the places it absolutely cannot play is Florida.

Case 05, File 03: Unusual Suspects

AKA: The Frohike, Langly & Beyers Happy Funtime Hour

For such relatively minor parts of the series (they only show up 3 or 4 times a season), The Lone Gunmen cast a huge shadow. If you ask any fan who some of their favorite characters are, you're almost certain to hear the Lone Gunmen in there, and they were the characters tapped to hold up a spin-off during those heady days when they thought the series could support a spin-off (it couldn't). And yet, we know so little about them, outside of their relationship with Mulder. At least, till now.

Case 05, File 02: Redux Part 2

AKA: The Assassination Of The Cigarette Smoking Man By The Coward Quiet Willy

Keeping a series fresh and exciting is a high stakes game. You need to keep coming up with new and interesting ideas to keep the audience invested, keep coming up with new places for the story to go, new characters for our heroes to interact with, new challenges for them to overcome. If you fuck it up, you can end up collapsing into ridiculousness, no matter how good your series is. And while some of the pressure is taken off when you're largely a Monster of the Week series, like The X-Files, it doesn't mean that they don't occasionally chase plot twists down rabbit holes.

Case 05, File 01: Redux Part 1

AKA: There Is Water At The Bottom Of The Pentagon

Season 5 is the last truly great season of The X-Files. That's not to say that the later seasons don't have great episodes, just that is the end of the Golden Age. And while Season 3 was the experimental and 4 was the dark one, Season 5 was defined by being BIG. Big budgets, big names (both in front of, and behind the camera). Season 5 was, to my mind, the season where they started to see if Fox would balk at the size of check they were being asked to write, and they basically never did.

Case 04, File 24: Gethesemane

AKA: Old Alien and the Mountain

End of season cliffhangers are a risky business, not least because they require a degree of certainty that the series is coming back. You want to give the audience a desire to return without making them feel like they're being manipulated. It's a fine line to walk, but if you do it right, you can keep your audience always coming back. There's a reason why I'm writing this review while watching Orange is the New Black. Fumble it thought and the audience can feel they're being manipulated for cheap effect.

Case 04, File 23: Demons

AKA: Cucked By The Cigarette Smoking Man

Mulder makes bad decisions. This is not a complaint or an insult, this is a fact of his character, one that other characters are aware of. There is a moment in the second movie where Skinner insists that Mulder wouldn't do anything rash and Scully just looks at him in disbelief. As much as I love Mulder, the fact that he can do some stupid stuff is basically just something we all have to live with. But still, even among his many odd choices, there a handful that stand out.

Case 04, File 22: Elegy

AKA: Fuck It Dude, Let's Go Bowling

It's pretty safe to say that non-neurotypical people didn't get great media representation during the 90s but one of the ones who had it worst was...actually, I have no idea how to even rank that, but people with autism certainly didn't have the best, usually portraying them as people with no ability to talk or even act normally but with some sort of number or memory related super power. And while The X-Files dipped its toe in that pool before, it almost feels inevitable that they'd return to it.

Case 04, File 21: Zero Sum

AKA: DIY Cover Ups With Walter Skinner

Skinner is a difficult character for the series to handle. He's unquestionably one of the most important characters, appearing in more episodes than any other non-Mulder/Scully character, but the first attempt to center an episode around him failed miserably. So, I suppose the thought process went, since one of the more interesting aspects of him is his combative relationship with the Conspiracy and his sparring with the Cigarette Smoking Man, why not center an episode around that?

Case 04, File 20: Small Potatoes

AKA: The Ballad of Eddie van Blundht

After Darin Morgan stopped writing episodes for the show, the series would make several attempts to recreate what he did for the show, to varying degrees of success. It would lean heavier on the funny episodes as the series wore on and it started to get stretched for content, but even in the golden age, it would bring back come comedic episodes, some good, some bad, some involving Mulder singing the Shaft theme song and therefore amazing. But for my money, I think that the smartest decision one could make is, if you can't have Darin Morgan writing, have him acting.

Case 04, File 19: Synchrony

AKA: This Villain Is A Dumb Name Away From Being A Batman Villain

One of the reasons I wanted to do this project was to interrogate my own opinions, something I do a lot. The X-Files is my favorite show, yes, and that is very unlikely to change, but I wanted to examine that feeling. What is it about The X-Files that I love, what episodes speak the most to me and, perhaps just as importantly, what episodes don't work for me and why. And while the answer to that question is usually pretty straightforward, sometimes it can be more complex.

Case 04, File 18: Max

AKA: He's The Man Who's Name You'd Love To Touch

Each individual X-Files episode is, ultimately, futile in the grand scheme of things. Mulder and Scully can't prove the existence of aliens, capture a supernatural being or otherwise accomplish their goals, or else the series would be over, or at least the dynamic would change a lot. It's part of the contract with the audience, and how well we agree to take that futility depends on how well the episode presents it.

Case 04, File 17: Tempus Fugit

AKA: The Return of Max

The X-Files is simultaneously a continuity heavy and continuity light show. It has its building plotlines yes, but they are fluid and often getting changed or retconned on the fly and there tend to be long gaps between plot movements because of the monster of the week episodes. As such as plot that, in a more plot focused show like Battlestar Galactica might take a season and a half, takes 5 seasons to play out. And as a result, I think it's awfully presumptuous for The X-Files to expect it's audience to remember a character who appeared in one episode, nearly 4 years ago.

Case 04, File 16: Unrequited

AKA: America Has A Blind Spot For Veterans, Oh Yeah, Send Tweet

When I think about The X-Files and political issues, I tend to think of silly things like the belief that the government is hiding aliens or things that make me wince in hindsight, like when I see stuff similar to what inspired the anti-vaxxer movement. But The X-Files is political, and not just because all media is political. Its a show about government coverups and conspiracies attempts to cover political issues are going to worm their way into the show.

Case 04, File 15: Kaddish

AKA: So Much For The Tolerant Left

If you had told me 17 years ago when I first watched this episode that today Neo-Nazis would not only not have died out but would be back on the rise and entering into mainstream relevance. Not 48 hours ago as of this writing, there was a Neo-Nazi rally in Georgia, complete with a burning swastika. All of which makes an episode where a literal figure out of Jewish mythology murders Neo-Nazis super super satisfying.

Case 04, File 14: Memento Mori

AKA: Scully's Embarrassing Livejournal

I am emotionally attached to Mulder and Scully, and based on my discussions with other fans, I don't think I'm alone in that. The X-Files is aware that we're all very attached to Mulder and Scully, but I feel like it doesn't totally know what to do with that information. It wants to craft emotionally complex engaging stories about Mulder, Scully and their relationship, but it also wants to make X-Files episodes.

Case 04, File 13: Never Again

AKA: The First Men's Rights Activist

Mulder and Scully are a team. I feel like I don't need to elaborate on that, it's a fact of The X-Files' existence. The series would not have lasted a single season, much less a full 11 and 2 movies, if Mulder and Scully weren't one of the all time best teams to ever grace television. But that doesn't mean we can't find an interesting story by splitting them up. Okay, so the first time they tried (Three) didn't work out great, but that doesn't mean it can't work.

Case 04, File 12: Leonard Betts

AKA: This Episode Is Better Than Its One Sentence Summary

There are some X-Files premises that become legendary. Some of them because the episodes surrounding them were so mind bogglingly good that they just stick into the brain. Some of them however got stuck in the brain because the idea is just so freaking weird that you can't help but spend days thinking "What the hell even was that?" But hey, if The X-Files is a show known for its weird concepts, even the episodes that make you think that can be good, right?

Case 04, File 11: El Mundo Gira

AKA: This Episode Is Named After A Soap Opera

Part of what makes The X-Files unique is its ability to come up with bizarre new concepts and ideas. Even when it indulges in existing concepts or folktalkes, it usually manages to find a unique spin on them. Sometimes this can be good, like when one episode decided to spend a Loch Ness Monster episode working on Mulder and Scully's relationship. Sometimes it's bad, like when they decided to make the Jersey Devil a goddamn caveman. But overall, it's definitely exciting to get to see where the writers take a concept.

Case 04, File 10.5: The Springfield Files

AKA: Remember When This Show Was Good?

At this point in its history, The X-Files was an unstoppable juggernaut, the kind of which hadn't been seen in a horror show since The Twilight Zone, if even then. Between a massive devoted fanbase, huge ratings and rolling in critical acclaim, the series was riding on the kind of high most series would die for. At its peak there was frankly only one show that could even come close to matching it.

Okay two, if you count Seinfeld.

Case 04, File 10: Paper Hearts

AKA: The Hearts Are Made Of Cloth Dude

I think it's a bit of a false dichotomy to assume that, in an episodic series like The X-Files we have to keep our plot and character furthering stuff separate from the Monster of the Week episodes. Some of Buffy's best character work was done in what amounted to Monster of the Week episodes, so we know it's possible. Still, the series usually keeps the overarching stuff from touching the Monster of the Week stuff.  Usually

Case 04, File 09: Terma

AKA: Gulags Are Known For Being Easy To Break Out Of

The difficulty in doing a two part episode, especially in the pre-Netflix era, is that you want to have each episode have a complete narrative while tying into each other, since you can't be sure that your audience will get to see both episodes. And The X-Files...is not the best at this. Yes there's the Duane Barry trilogy, but a lot of times the dual episodes either have a weak opening or fails to stick the landing. But there have to be some exceptions. Sometimes they have to get both episodes right.

Case 04, File 08: Tunguska

AKA: Not Approved By The Russian Tourism Bureau

For the longest time, whenever someone asked me what my favorite Myth arc episodes are, once we discounted the Duane Barry trilogy (which is more about Mulder and Scully's relationship than the overarching plot), I would answer the Tunguska/Terma duo. Partially because it felt nice to have an answer (and prove I'm not totally anti-myth arc) and partially because it sticks out in my brain pretty strongly. And since part of the point of this project is to interrogate my memories of my favorite show, this is one review I've been looking forward to.

Case 04, File 07: Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man

AKA: The Most Evil Thing You Can Do Is Write Tom Clancy Knockoffs

The X-Files is, on the whole, not overly interested in the people who make up its villainous conspiracy. They exist, they live and they die, but they're not generally explored beyond that. The exception is, of course, the Cigarette Smoking Man, the longest running and most well known member of the conspiracy. The desire to flesh him out, to make him less of a force of nature and more of a person, had to be handled carefully, lest they risk making him less interesting or less of a threat.

Case 04, File 06: Sanguinarium

AKA: The Gritty Scrubs Crossover We've All Been Waiting For

There's a lot to be said about episodes like The Field Where I Died or the next episode Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man. Episodes like that take the show in new, interesting directions, expanding the types of stories the series can tell, flesh out the world and characters and are just generally incredibly healthy for the show. But there's also a hell of a lot to be said about episodes that are just right in The X-Files' wheelhouse.

Case 04, File 05: The Field Where I Died

AKA: Ripped From Last Centuries Headlines

One of the side effects of being a concept heavy show is that its very rarely on the actors to carry the episode. Oh there have been some really great individual performances such as Brad Dourif in Beyond the Sea or Tony Todd in Sleepless, but that's the actor carrying the concept rather than the actor carrying the episode. So it's pretty interesting to see an episode with a pretty light concept being held up by the acting, especially when the heavy acting is coming from one of our two leads.