I Want To Believe - The X Files Alien Watch through

[Ghost Whistler]

Been many moons since I watched the X Files. I only saw a couple of episodes of the resurrected series which didn't sit well. So I don't care about that.

Herein I shall be watching only the conspiracy episodes as listed here. I reserve the right to give up if it turns out to become the depressing mess I remember it becoming. However the early episodes were actually really good, and Deep Throat remains my favourite episode of the entire show at the point of writing.

In many ways it is a victim of its own success, and it hasn't aged terribly well. that said, SFX aside, it was incredibly well made. The music is obviously synthetic but uniquely evocative (mostly). Duchovny isn't the greatest actor, but his performance of Mulder is uniquely sympathetic, driven and iconic. The two were great together even when Scully's scepticism was forced

Sincerely, MF Luder.

PS - I forgot to watch the pilot episode (I didn't I just couldn't be arsed, I much prefer Deep Throat - and you can quote me on that ). Nothing terribly interesting happens in this episode other than Scully showing a bit of skin and the dynamic duo meeting up. Nobody cares.

Deep Throat: this is the archetypal Area 51 episode, though curiously not actually set in or around Area 51. An army wife, on an army base, calls the FBI because her husband got weird. Turns out he flies super experimental aircraft for the super secret base. No one knows what, but he's not the first casualty. The community keeps quiet and after super advanced brain surgery, they get returned - just with their memories of flying missing. Mulder is approached by the first of his mysterious highly connected patrons, codename 'Deep Throat'. We know not who he is but he warns off Mulder. So Mulder, dragging Scully along, decides to investigate. They see some weird lights in the sky, with the help of a pair of stoners who go watching the ufo's regularly. Hilarity ensues, Mulder decides it would be best, given the brick wall they'rehitting in their investigations (a wall of men in black), to break into the base. He does, they wipe his memory. Deep Throat visits him again and says he can help in the future because he too is interested in..."the truth". Oh well, anything to get him out of the office. Four lights in the sky out of five.

Fallen Angel: you got 24 hours Agent Mulder, warns Deep Throat. A downed UFO must be detoxified before the public discovers. Mulder is on the case but so is the Army. Unfortunately the alien pilot seems to be intent on inflicting catastrophic burns to the foolish humans. Serves them right I say. Fight the power. There's a twist though, a guy called Max is in the area. A UFO nut with a deeper connection and a history of implants and abduction. In the end he, and the alien (whom we never see), vanish... I don't think it's as good, but it has an urgency to it. The effects are, of course, rubbish. Implants and abductions are the tropes de jeur. Two and a half Anal Probes Out of Five.

 

[Ghost Whistler]

EBE - Deep Throat leads Mulder on a wild goose chase. What to believe? How do they constantly keep bugging the agents so easily? This quaint 90's spy tech is amusing. A UFO is shot down in Iraq and US forces bring the body back to America where a truck drives it to a base so it can be exterminated by Deep Throat. At least that's the story he tells Mulder. However he has his doubts when the man himself throws red herrings his way. It's not entirely clear why this is ultimately but DT explains that the major powers have a secret pact to exterminate Extraterrestrial Biological Entities that crash land on earth. Or at least that's the story he gives.... Actually I remember thinking this episode was better than it actually is. The reason is that it makes the mistake the X Files mythology makes time and again: it risks relying too much on being a conspiracy without providing substance. We don't know what the truth is and we are never shown an alien. So in the end it kinda goes nowhere. That said it is an enjoyable enough ride. It's also the first appearance of the Lone Gunmen: Frohike the dwarf, Legolas on crack, and the smart dressed guy. It's clear that, at this point, the show aspires to a mix of tones and that it wants to be a bit more of a fun ride than the later festival of misery that it becomes when it all starts to collapse in on itself (Scully's cancer for instance). The scene where Deep Throat and Mulder meet outside the shark aquarium is a little on the nose though. Three hours of missing time out of five.

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Erlenmeyer Flask - At this point it should be clear there are spoilers.

This is the last episode of the first season and thus the tone ramps it up and we get the first glimpse of how dark the storyline can get. A man is chased by police. He evades them with seemingly superhuman talents. Mulder and Scully get involved and discover a web of intrigue involving genetic research into the impossible. Here we get the first look at the properties of human alien hybrids, their bodily fluids are toxic and green. Mulder is compromised and so Scully has to venture into the lion's den to steal an alien foetus (how she remains sceptical after all this is beyond me) in order to have a bargaining chip for Mulder's life. But this deal comes at the cost of Deep Throat's life. As a coda to the events, the X Files is shut down and the agents are reassigned. This is a good episode. The story, like many of the alien stories, doesn't really advance the storyline much and of course the agents don't come away with solid proof to change the world. It's not as compelling as Deep Throat, but that's a personal preference; i found the ufo aspect of that episode more compelling. Three and a half human hybrids out of five.

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Little green Men - first episode of season two, picking up after the events of the Erlenmeyer Flask. Scully has been reassigned to weird camera angle duty. That's cuz Gillian's preggers! Ha! Meanwhile Fox Mulder is down in the dumps. No longer for him the footloose and carefree days of unexplained mystery, conspiracy danger and mindbending terror. No, he's on surveillance duty and existential crisis. Meanwhile in Skinner's office, whom we get to meet at last, there's some creepy old man with a serious nicotine habit, whom we get to meet at last.
Fortunately a senator with a passion for Mulder's work is on hand to refocus his energies. Mulder is sent to a radio satellite station in Arecibo because it's started picking up a signal. Of course the men in black (or at least tan) are 24 hours behind him. just enough time to have a strange encounter with some lights, meet a frightened native, and have a flashback to his sister's disappearance. Scully does her best to run interference while not looking pregnant at all.
In the end Prince Adam retrieves the sword and with the help of his friends Teela, Man At Arms, and Optimus Prime, we all learn a little something about road safety. Mulder doesn't lose his job, the office stinks of tobacco, and NOTHING HAPPENED IN PUERTA RICO. NOTHING AT ALL....I give this three voyagers out of five.

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Duane Barry - before he became famous as a wrestler, former FBI agent and man-who-speaks-in-the-third-person spent his nights getting his teeth drilled aboard alien spaceships. What a shame then that he ends up in an asylum. But wait, he's escaped having kidnapped his therapist. Now he wants a ticket to...oh, if only Duane Barry could remember. Call for Mulder. He's got a new parter, sort of, it's Alex Krycek. A dynamic young buck looking to make a name for himself. We'll learn more about him later. For now, because Duane Barry believes himself an abductee Mulder is required to conduct the hostage negotiation. It's all going swimmingly until Mulder gets himself made a hostage. Scully appears with some news - Duane Barry took a gunshot to the noggin and is prone to psychosis. It all goes horribly wrong and Duane gets shot by the feds before waking up and escaping hospital only to kidnap Scully. Presumably to take her to maternity class. To be continued...
What is curious is that I never realised just how much the X Files showed. For a series famously coy about it's conspiracy we see aliens and UFO's quite openly. I think that's a mistake. Chris Carter obviously didn't. Many people say this is one of the best episodes of the entire run. I don't agree, but it gets points for its importance to the arc taking Scully out of play for a few episodes. Three therapists out of five.

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Ascension - a dying planet, a fight for life, the search for Spock. No, wait, that's not right. You will believe a man can fly. Nope that's not it either. Oh well. With Scully missing the race is on to find Duane Dibley before he sacrifices her to the mountain gods that abudcted him in the past. But something is working against Mulder. Could it be Henry the mid mannered Janitor? No, it's obviously that creepy old guy who just sits in on ALL the briefings and smokes all the livelong day. Maybe crippling emphysema will be his comeuppance. Here's hoping! Alex Krycek is along for the ride, but it transpires he has...other motivations. Mulder is too late, Scully is taken by the forces that conspire with the extraterrestrials. Embedded deep within the government there is little else he can do but trust no one.
So this is probably, so far, with the exception of Deep Throat, the best episode of the series. It finally reveals the central conspiratorial premise of the show: shadowy government forces acting with impunity aligned with or manipulating aliens. Mulder begins to learn what he's up against and so Director Skinner, in a moment of teeth clenching solidarity, agrees to re open the X Files because that's the only way to fight them (or poison the old bastard's fags, punch him in the stomach and watch him wheeze to death, challenge him to a sprinting contest, shoot him in the face). Will Scully return? Yes obviously, they filmed 9 more season ffs. 4 secret meetings out of 5

 

[Ghost Whistler]

One Breath - Don't give up, sang Peter Gabriel, before his untimely death at the hands of a secret government cabal working to prevent an alien invasion. Mulder's at home watching porn (not a joke!) when he gets the call - Scully's back! Turns out she's got weird dna going on and it's going to kill her. No one can help. Not even Mr X, about whom we learn a little more. He "used to be like Mulder", but now he's on the edge killing people in hospital lundry rooms. Subtle. Somehow Skinner knows where Cancerman lives (worst super power ever) and Mulder goes to confront him. Everyone coughs. Time's ticking, Scully's dying, but there's hope. Mr X tells Mulder that some operatives are going to break in and search his apartment, so he's at home waiting. But Scully's sister persuades him to come and pay what might be his last respects. Amid the wreckage of his apartment he get's the call...Scully made it. With help, it seems....
A desperately moody piece. Twists and turns, who can you trust? What is this world that Mulder is stepping in to and what wilit cost him? The only real problem is that no credible reason was given for Scully's abduction (in character that is). However, MIA is Krycek. Where did he go? He left town last episode. Will he return? Yes, yes he will. The man's a giant pain in the arse. Four breaths out of five, although it's a pretty heavy watch tonally speaking.

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Red Museum - a small town in spooky rural america (the same place they always use probably) has problems with a religious cult. Their deep seated vegan beliefs seem fiercely at odds with the thriving beef business at the heart of the local economy. When kids start going missing, only to return exhibiting extreme fear and bearing "he is the one" scrawled on their bodies, the cult naturally gets the blame. However things take an unexpcted turn when the feds discover purity control (the contents of the Erlenmeyer Flask) was used by a local doctor as a vaccine for all the kids. Then Scully makes a horrible discovery: the operative sent to kill Deep Throat (again, the Erlenmeyer Flask) is in town cleaning up the mess...this means the kids.
This is a very good episode. It is only tangentially related to the conspiracy storyline, but is included. Fortunately it's also a good story. Of course they don't take the operative alive. That would be too easy. The vegans make for a decent if perhaps a little obvious red herring, but that doesn't matter because the viewer is distracted by the bigger picture. Four spare ribs out of five

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Colony + Endgame - here's where the storyline starts to lose it. This two parter is also part written by David Duchovny. Although I feel he'd have been better of polishing his acting skills personally! Ouch! So, essentially there's these clones. Actual clones that are a bit alien, or something. They've been living on earth because the aliens want to colonise or claim ownership if we continue to fuck up the planet, or seomthing. Now an alien bounty hunter (not Boba Fett unfortunately) is after them. One of them (or several of them, depending on your perspective) pretends to be Mulder's sister. She explains that she's been living with aliens and wants his help getting rid of the bounty hunter. He can also change shape. Because of course he can. It's all delightfully bonkers. They do explain what's going on, it's just that it went over my head a bit.
This two parter is ok, but a little underwhelming all things considered. However we do get to meet Bill Mulder (and Mrs Mulder), though we learn nothing of his past just yet. We do see him smoking though so.... Three clones out of five

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Anasazi - back in the day this was probably the last part of the show I took super seriously. I kept watching it, but I don't think I ever watched the story as intensely. Weird. Not as weird as Mulder's behaviour though. He's punching his boss and running a fever. Is it related to the hacked DoJ data he's just received, courtesy of the Lone Gunmen? Yes, obviously. Cigarette Man is concerned so he's on the phone to his mates around the world; all the cancermen of different nations. Apparently this data is quite incriminating - if it weren't written in Navaho. Oh by the way Bill Mulder's involved. Oopsie! Turns out him and cancer man are friends/not friends (delete as appropriate). Scully fixes Mulder by a) turning off the weird gas that's been pumped into his building and b) shooting him the arm. Trust me, it makes sense. That leaves Mulder free to investigate something that, coincidentally, just got discovered on a Navaho reservation: a buried boxcar full of alien corpses.
Three point Nine ancient aliens out of Five
So the second season comes to a close with a pretty interesting story. Some family revelations. Some dead family members. The return of Alex Krycek. No Mr X though; can't quite remember how they phased him out. Perhaps he became Mr Y and moved on with his life. Season 2 ends on a cliffhanger that gets resolved (relatively speaking) over the course of the next two episodes. But I seem to recall it not being satisfactory back in the day. It's kinda weird watching this 25 years later. I have not seen any of this since it aired. Of course back then the X Files had that fin de siecle millennial bug vibe. That doesn't exist now. Yet watching Mulder and Scully interact via their primitive mobile phones and watching the Lone Gunmen talk about hacking on DOS systems is really rather quaint. It's a curio from another time, but also interesting, often quite dark, stories with a great deal of loss and horror. No wonder they introduced humour to the show (which shouldn't have worked but did). From this point forward the show changed. And yet remained the same.
Or maybe you don't agree.
Yes YOU.
I can see you.
I know where you live.
You call me paranoid?
You aren't paranoid enough...

 

[Ghost Whistler]

So far I've been watching this digitally.

Just found the local shitty second hand media emporium (CEX for those living in the UK - and I'm sorry!) has the complete seasons 1-9 plus both movies (i'm only really interested in the first, which i enjoyed in the cinema) for £cheap.

So i bought it. All of it. All of the X Files. Everything from aliens to Tooms to Doggett to the very end (except not the end).

 

[Ghost Whistler]

The Blessing Way - season three episode one. Mulder's missing presumed dead. Last seen in an exploding boxcar. His inevitable escape is not explained, ironically. He's near death for some reason, despite having no injuries. The Navajo code talkers help him recover by means of the eponmous ritual. It's very cheesy (as these things often are represented in fiction). In his dreamlike fever state he sees Deep Throat and his father. Clearly we are meant to wonder if this is both real or imagined. It doesn't really work. Fortunately the Scully storyline is better as she chases the data disk (tape!) that cancerman wants back. The one Mulder was trying to translate. Skinner appears helpful, but at the same time she's been suspended from the bureau. Skinner's proximity to the Marlboro Man compromises his integriy and a tense standoff throughout the episode exists between her and he. Scully also learns that she bears a strange implant. Removed it appears to be a microchip of some kind. Oh and her sister gets murdered. Happy days!
It's a very average episode really and doesn't take us anywhere good. As a whole it's ok, but the Mulder storyline is conspicuously weak here. 2.5 visionquests out of coyote

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Paper Clip - Again, I prefer Deep Throat (oh dear), but this episode is a pure concentrated super intense shot of everything about the X Files mythology storyline. It more than makes up for the previous episode. It starts on a high, pushes the dynamic duo deep out of their comfort zone. They are out of work and very nearly out of lives. All they have is a photo of Bill Mulder and questions about his involvement in this shadowy cabal whom we meet for the first time. Baron Munchasuen makes his appearance as a sometime ally to Mulder. Following taut clues they discover a hidden cache of abductees leading to the work of expat nazis bought over during operation paperclip. But we don't yet know what they were working on. The dance continues. The Smoking Man is played for a sucker by both Krycek and Skinner and we see that even within his spooky syndicate, he's an outlier. There are so many dynamics within this episode, and so much drama. Scully loses her sister sealing a darks ymmetry with her partner. But with questions of her own answereed the journey into the heart of UFO darkness continues.
Oh and a UFO appears halfway through the episode!
Four point Five paperclips out of Five

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Now for a couple of weaker episodes. Another two hander: Nisei and 751. I can't remember the order.

Mulder's gotten hold of an alien atuposy clip (remember those?). Turns out it was real as the guy who hacked the footage from inside a train.is dead and some Japanese fella's running away from the crime scene. From there we learn that the autopsy team are Japanese scientists who, like the Nazi in Paper Clip are working on horrific human experimentation. Seems all the rage.
Meanwhile Scully goes to meet with a UFO group to interview a lead. She doesn't bargain on them recognising her as a fellow abductee. All of them have had similar implants, and all are convinced they, like the lead, are dying of cancer. Happy days! Scully also recognises one of the Japanese scientists from a memory of her abduction.
Off she goes to an abandoned lab in the country where survivors of these experiments are routinely shot and buried in a big pit. A few have survived in hiding (well, until she arrived). Meanwhile Mulder is on the train itself which is currently holding what he believes to be a human alien hybrid.
Scully encounters a member of the syndicate after getting captured at the facility who tells her that they are on the wrong trail and that the Japanese are rogue scientists just simply pursuing unpleasant work. It is, deliberately of course, unclear whether this is a red herring. However there is a bomb on the train along with a guy killing off the scientists...

Unfortunately that deliberate vagueness is the weakness with the story and the mythology in general. It could work if handled properly, but it is introduced too late into the story to make it work. We invest in the agents as they pursue the latest round of evidence of alien conspiracies only to find that it may be a bluff. So at this point it's all a game of politics which is less fun than the aliens themselves. Meanwhile the Scully storyline is jst depressing. She's doomed to a life of cancer and abduction, yay!

It always feels as if Mulder never really learns anything. Obviously this is to string out the storyline, but there's no sense of movement. It isn't a bad episode, just oddly paced and dour. The first episode is a decent setup but the pay off is kinda wonky. I give it two and a half boxcars out of five.

One thing that is very weird about the x files is when returning bit part actors reappear in different roles. So the mother from Red Museum last season is now a UFO abductee here. Weirdly apposite for the show!

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Piper Maru + Apocrypha - a much better outing. First appearance of the black oil. The return of Krycek. A french diving team encounters a ww2 bomber at the bottom of the sea, the diver is infected. Ship returns to shore and he's nuked the rest of the crew. They're al dying of massive radiation burns in hospital. God the X Files likes cancer! Mulder's on the case of course. He finds Krycek with an associate trying to sell the stolen data tape from Anasazi. Along the way Krycek gets infected with the oil and ends up locked inside an underground bunker with a ufo having sperwed out the oil into it. Also Skinner is shot by the man who killed Melissa Scully after being warned to stop investigating her murder. They catch the guy but of course he's killed in prison awaiting trial.
A vast improvement on the previous two parter. No less oblique of course. No explanation of what the black oil is, we just see it affect people who can then spew out massive amounts of radiation in a flash of light. Skinner survives of course, but the surgeons had to prise his teeth apart to save his life. It was touch and go. Three point five ships named after Gillian Anderson's kid out of Five.

 

[Ghost Whistler]

Talitha Cumi + Herrenvolk - transitioning from season 3 into 4. An interesting but frustrating story that hints but doesn't resolve (does it ever), furthermore the writing is a little poor: Mulder makes a couple of unjustified leaps of logic that seem to be intended to relieve the confusing mythology presumably the showrunner was sensing in the fanbase.
A gunman opens fire at a burger joint but is sensationally stopped by a mysterious stranger who heals the injured before vanishing. Meanwhile Mulder's mother has a devastating meeting with a certain cigarette smoking man at the family beachhouse. One that ends up leaving her in hospital. What is the connection between these events and can Mulder save Mulder before it's too late?
We learn there is a program, a scheme of 'colonisation'. The mysterious stranger, Jeremiah Smith, is another clone, but seemingly a force for good. He turns himself in to the FBI and yet also appears to be a prisoner of the Smoking Man in a facility controlled by his syndicate. There the two have a revealing conversation. We learn that cancerman really does have cancer (haha) and that there is a date in the future where something is going to happen (about as revealing as the show ever gets). Meanwhile an alien bounty hunter, identical to the being from Colony, appears, ready to kill Jeremiah.
Mulder helps him escape hoping Jeremiah can heal his mother. Jeremiah leads him instead to a mysterious bee farm where clone workers, one of whom is a clone of his sister aged not a day, are working on.... well whatever it is it's killed a poor cable guy who happened to be fixing the local cable line the day before.
Cancerman learns that he has a leak, and not just the black shit in his lungs. Mr X is compromised. He is fed false information and is killed, but not before revealing another cryptic clue. Jeremiah is killed, but Mulder is allowed to survive. Despondent he returns with nothing to heal his mother, yet it is cancerman - through the bounty hunter - who heals her. Mulder, and thus his mother, is required it seems.
Mr X is dead, but Mulder makes a new ally, a government lady whose name eludes me. There is hope after all. So that's ok then.
In a convoluted resolution, a personal story and one about relationships struggles. Ultimately interesting and well made, like the show in general. I give it 3 Jeremiah Smiths out of 5 (there may be more...)

That's all for now, I'm taking a break

 

[TheGoldenGod]

Im the opposite. I prefer rewatching the monster of the week episodes. Felt like the alien conspiracy storyline got too convoluted and after a certain point contradictory. One of my favorite shows of all time and even enjoyed the reboot.