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I think the testament to how great Season 8 is remains that you really start to look at a formerly familiar world through Doggett's eyes, to the point where you're saying "Oh Scully, give the guy a break, he's awesome," and you get really mad when Mulder comes back and he's a giant dick to him. Also, the mytharc pretty much just resets with 8, and becomes about finding Mulder, so it's a fresh change from the slow crawl of "Season 7 dealt with Season 6's aftermath for too long." It's such a pity that season 9 takes such a huge, huge nosedive, though. They start to weave the old mytharc back in awkwardly, and it doesn't connect well. It's also like they forgot how to write for Robert Patrick, and he's just there to be a hardnose to Reyes and Scully. 99 CENTS AMIGO fucked around with this message at 23:41 on Mar 8, 2014 |
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Mar 8, 2014 23:39
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Your post just made me decide to watch Season 8. Thanks. Or dammit, what a terrible recommendation. We'll see which way it goes.
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Mar 9, 2014 03:41
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Yeah, let me know what you think. My fiancee's always been an enormous fan of the show, and so she finally sat me down over a few months at an episode or two a night. While there were episodes I really dug in Season 7, I could definitely see a downturn in quality, and I'd heard of 8 and 9 as dirty words for ages. I was very, very pleasantly surprised by 8.
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Mar 9, 2014 04:03
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99 CENTS AMIGO posted:Barring Reyes and two episodes (one of which is just solidly mediocre), I maintain that Season 8 is the strongest season of the show. In my opinion, Season 3 is the strongest and every season thereafter is at least a little weaker than the one preceding it. Season 7 to Season 8 is what I'd consider the most dramatic dropoff, though. Seasons 8 and 9 are the two I'd generally recommend skipping to non-completists. Don't get me wrong, they aren't all bad, but I'm pretty sure my list of top 30, maybe even top 40, X-Files episodes wouldn't include any from the last two seasons.
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Mar 9, 2014 06:46
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Yeah, honestly, if your post wasn't well written and if you didn't elaborate on your point, I would have thought you were screwing with us. It just goes to show how futile the effort is of determining what is the best/worst season of any series, because it really is subjective. This is why I don't begrudge anybody for their tastes in entertainment, whether it's television, music, movies, etc., because I know there is stuff I like that people hate. I would agree that season 3 is the strongest of the series. Despite a couple bad episodes (Tesos Dos Bichos and Hell Money), it is consistently good to great, and I believe the mytharc was at its best during season 3.
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Mar 9, 2014 07:47
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Season 8 resets the mytharc, but it is not like they have any more of a clue about what they are doing then. When they do dig up Mulder they have a whole mini-drama with Krycek with regards to the black oil vaccine... only to learn that good old fashioned "antiviral therapy" kills the super soldier virus. Not to mention the season 8 finale, which is so nonsensical that it led to the worst part of the mytharc for the entire series. After the army of supersoldiers pursue and almost kill Scully a number of times, it turns out they only did all of that to make sure she delivered the baby safely. Of course, this made no sense, which is why in season 9 they introduced the whole "William is alternatively the Christ or the AntiChrist, depending on whether Mulder is alive" to try to explain the season 8 finale.
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Mar 9, 2014 08:09
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'Medusa' is a good episode. It reminds me of early episodes like 'Ice'. Also, do Assistant Directors of the FBI normally go out in the field investigating cases? I'm surprised no one has brought up the fact that Skinner must be doing no administrative work at all, rather he's spending all his time investigating cases which aren't even assigned to him. He'll never get to be Director like this.
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Mar 11, 2014 09:33
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Octy posted:'Medusa' is a good episode. It reminds me of early episodes like 'Ice'. I am pretty sure that dream was gone once he started to activly help Mulder.
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Mar 12, 2014 17:29
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Just watched the episode last night with the Shapechanger guy who impersonates Mulder and tries to bang Scully. I thought it was pretty awesome seeing not-Mulder go about his daily life (phone sex lines) and also holy poo poo the sexual tension on screen was great.
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Mar 12, 2014 18:09
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They did the same scene in season 6 (Dreamland) and it's even funnier there.
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Mar 12, 2014 18:12
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haveblue posted:They did the same scene in season 6 (Dreamland) and it's even funnier there. Is that the one in which he goes to Mulder's apartment and he gets disgusted at Mulder's life? That he has no bed and all his friends are giant nerds?
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Mar 12, 2014 18:15
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Yeah. He starts listening to Mulder's answering machine, and hears this sexy voice - "hey, I miss you", and he starts writing down the number, only for it to turn out to be an automated phone sex advertisement.
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Mar 12, 2014 19:14
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'Dreamland' hasn't gotten enough love in this thread. Fletcher (in Mulder's body): "There is no Saddam Hussein. This guy's name is John Gillnitz. We found him doing dinner theatre in Tulsa. He did a mean King and I, plays good ethnics." Langly: "Are you trying to say Saddam Hussein is a government plant?" Fletcher: "I'm saying I invented the guy. We set him up in 79. He rattles his saber whenever we need a good distraction. Ah, if you boys only knew how many of your stories I dreamed up while on the pot." I love when the X-Files does revisionist history.
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Mar 13, 2014 03:55
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I just watched that one and yeah it's great, so that's twice now the X-files got have-to-look-away-awkward.
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Mar 13, 2014 05:26
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Heh. 'Can I ask you something? When you went to Antarctica, to save Scully being taken by that spaceship, and you ran out of gas in your snowcab, how did you get back?' *Scully and Mulder argue about it being a spaceship or not.* 'Alone' is another good episode from season 8. It's nice to see Mulder recognising Doggett as being a good agent.
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Mar 14, 2014 09:34
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Payndz posted:I'd completely forgotten that 'Red Museum' was part of the mytharc. Cultists and slaughterhouses and creepy voyeurs, then suddenly BAM! Purity Control out of nowhere! It also makes reference to a certain date which is not mentioned again until the series finale. 
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Mar 16, 2014 20:55
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Krycek!, no! At least Adam Baldwin is still around.
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Mar 17, 2014 09:07
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Octy posted:Krycek!, no! How many times have that been said on the show?
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Mar 17, 2014 14:51
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bobkatt013 posted:How many times have that been said on the show? He truly is gone this time. Well, until he comes back as a ghost. I'm going away with a friend next week and in between the beach and drinking I want to introduce her to the show. She has in fact watched one episode with another friend which I've managed to identify as 'Lazarus'. She found it predictable and not that enjoyable, which is about my memory of it too. I was thinking of lining up three episodes. One of them is definitely going to be 'Jose Chung's From Outer Space' and the second probably 'The Host' for a nice gross out episode, but I don't know about a third. I'd like to limit it to either the first three seasons or seasons 2 to 4, just so I'm not lugging around a bunch of DVD cases. Despite rewatching the show over the last two months my memory is terrible for which are good episodes.
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Mar 19, 2014 10:46
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Pusher should be the third.
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Mar 19, 2014 10:49
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Octy posted:He truly is gone this time. Well, until he comes back as a ghost. You should also watch the sequel to Jose Chung's From Outer Space. Its a great Millennium episode that is a parody of Scientology.
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Mar 19, 2014 15:43
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Octy posted:He truly is gone this time. Well, until he comes back as a ghost. Season 1: Squeeze, Ice, or Darkness Falls Season 2: Fresh Bones, Irresistible, Humbug Season 3: Clyde Bruckman, The List, Pusher Season 4: Leonard Betts, Small Potatoes If I had to pick one I'd go with "Humbug", I think that was the first episode of the show I ever saw and it got me hooked.
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Mar 19, 2014 16:21
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Do people really not like the Pilot episode? I never see it recommended as an entry point to the show.
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Mar 19, 2014 16:39
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Slate Action posted:Do people really not like the Pilot episode? I never see it recommended as an entry point to the show. Depends on what you're looking for in an entry point. If you plan on skipping the aliens storyline than you can skip it along with five or six other episodes in season 1. I think the reason why its not essential for most people is because the really solid chemistry between Mulder and Scully doesn't develop until at least mid-season, or even season 2.
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Mar 19, 2014 17:11
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Basebf555 posted:Depends on what you're looking for in an entry point. If you plan on skipping the aliens storyline than you can skip it along with five or six other episodes in season 1. I think the reason why its not essential for most people is because the really solid chemistry between Mulder and Scully doesn't develop until at least mid-season, or even season 2. The best thing that ever happened to the show was Gillian Anderson getting pregnant.
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Mar 19, 2014 17:47
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colonel_korn posted:Assuming you're avoiding the mytharc type episodes, my choices would be any of Yeah, while those are good season 1 episodes, I'm cautious that it might be better to show the chemistry between Mulder and Scully which I also feel developed much more in season 2. 'Irresistible' is good, I can't believe I forgot it. Might go with that instead of 'The Host', and obviously 'Pusher'. I have the most terrible memory.
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Mar 20, 2014 00:05
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Hopefully I'm not necroing the thread too badly... One thing I've found on my recent X-Files kick is how little I care about the Main Arc, as others have expressed. Thing is, the whole notion of an alien-abduction-gubmit-conspiracy is a bit mundane and played-out. There's the thing: is it played out because of the X-Files, or has time/culture gone by enough that it's just innately played out?
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Mar 30, 2014 23:19
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quote:Thank you Mulder, but the [incontrovertible proof] is in another [secret government installation]. The alien-government conspiracy angle being hopelessly dated post 9/11 is one thing, but the X-files problem was that they never dared to go beyond their success formula; as soon as Mulder gets the proof he's looking for since episode 1 and exposes the conspiracy and the existence of aliens, it can't go on being a show about two underdog FBI agents solving mysteries of the week. So every mytharc storyline ends with a return to the status quo; they lose what proof they had, and next episode is back to normal. And frankly, the alien baby messiah story we ultimately got out of it just plain sucked.
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Mar 30, 2014 23:43
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MisterBibs posted:Hopefully I'm not necroing the thread too badly... It's kind of weird: X-Files has its origin in a mix of 70s pop-culture sci-fi dystopian paranoia (The Conversation, Futureworld, Kolchak) and real-life, Clinton-era right-wing insanity (FEMA death camps, one-world government). I'd say like the poster above that paranoia has become a lot more widespread and mainstream since the start of the decade, but it's far less way more amorphous and wide-ranging. It seems kind of quaint to think of the government as a single entity controlling everything when the kinds of stories you get now are about high-ranking senators calling Obamacare a Stalinist plot while a presidential candidate from the same party gets recorded telling his high-end donors that he plans to gently caress over the middle class to make them all richer. There's this kind of fenzy now where anyone can get exposed doing anything at any time and even the nutters have quit trying to construct a single narrative to explain it all. Since 9/11, we've become terrified of everything and a single conspiracy can't capture our flavor of paranoia any more.
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Mar 31, 2014 00:34
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So my friend ended up enjoying the show. We watched 'The Host', 'D.P.O.', 'Pusher' and 'Jose Chung's From Outer Space'. Not enough to be an 'X-phile' as I asked her, but at least she didn't complain about its predictability. I'm about 2/3rds of the way through season 9. I can't bring myself to finish it. It was funny seeing Burt Reynolds in 'Improbable', though.
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Mar 31, 2014 01:41
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Jack Gladney posted:Since 9/11, we've become terrified of everything and a single conspiracy can't capture our flavor of paranoia any more. I never thought about it from the 9/11 angle, but I think it has less to do with a single conspiracy than it is about our belief in the competency of the government. In the optimistic 90s, people could accept (if not believe) that the government was capable of pulling off something like the X-Files depicted. After 9/11, when our government was shown to be vulnerable to outside threats, that notion was shattered. Fake Edit: Watching Season 6's Monday, and goddamned Lorien / Sebastian is in an FBI meeting, in a This-Is-Supposed-To-Be-Boring voice! 
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Apr 1, 2014 05:35
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MisterBibs posted:After 9/11, when our government was shown to be vulnerable to outside threats, that notion was shattered. On the other hand, I've read one or two reviews which suggest that the "rally around the flag" effect that 9/11 provoked (or even just a desire to feel that someone had a steady hand on the tiller) briefly made government conspiracies, especially those enacted to pull the wool over the eyes of their citizens, seem less patalable (although this trend was reversed as the 2000s wore on).
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Apr 1, 2014 10:02
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I powered through to the end and just finished the show. I'd forgotten that they reworked the Seinfeld finale. Still, it's been an enjoyable two and a half months since I started my rewatch. The second half of season 9 is pretty decent too. 'Audrey Pauley', 'Improbable', 'Scary Monsters', 'Jump the Shark', 'Sunshine Days', maybe even 'Release'. The only memorable episode from the first half for me is 'Lord of the Flies'. Should I continue on with I Want to Believe? I prefer to see it as non-canonical. A half-decent MotW at best. I feel so embarrassed now that I asked my mum to let me take the day off school when it came out so we could go see it together. I tried for a long time to convince myself and her that it was a good movie. Haven't seen it since.
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Apr 1, 2014 11:37
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I Want To Believe was okay. Billy Connolly was cool and it has a rad end credits sequence.
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Apr 1, 2014 19:46
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I really enjoyed I Want to Believe and I thought it was pretty drat creepy. I know that's a minority opinion though.
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Apr 1, 2014 20:26
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There was nothing wrong with I want to believe. I think a lot of fans just hyped it up in their heads as being some kind of epic grand finale dealing with the alien invasion, and so were disappointed to see a monster of the week type story. And a Scully religion story.
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Apr 1, 2014 20:35
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Metal Loaf posted:On the other hand, I've read one or two reviews which suggest that the "rally around the flag" effect that 9/11 provoked (or even just a desire to feel that someone had a steady hand on the tiller) briefly made government conspiracies, especially those enacted to pull the wool over the eyes of their citizens, seem less patalable (although this trend was reversed as the 2000s wore on). Another good point; I'm not sure if it couldn't be varying degrees of both depending on the time. Starts off with "The government wouldn't do that" in prominence right after 9/11, but as time goes on (Iraq not having WMDs, for example), "The government couldn't do that" became dominant. On the other topic, I think going MOTW for the second movie was a misstep. In general, a movie version of an existing TV show should have bigger stakes to its story. Regardless of your opinion on the show's myth arc, MOTW episodes were great because they prevent Threat To All Creep. If you're going to movies, you don't need them.
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Apr 1, 2014 22:04
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I think the idea for the second movie was to ease back into the setting and set the stage for a third movie that would get back to the conspiracy plotline, maybe address some of the complaints fans had about the ending of the series. Of course, the second movie bombed so we're never actually getting a third.
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Apr 1, 2014 22:07
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Slate Action posted:I think the idea for the second movie was to ease back into the setting and set the stage for a third movie that would get back to the conspiracy plotline, maybe address some of the complaints fans had about the ending of the series. Of course, the second movie bombed so we're never actually getting a third. The problem with that is that it makes no sense. We ended the show with a definitive date for the end of the world as we know it, and with the FBI not only knowing that, but so much a part of the conspiracy that they sentence Mulder to death. And then with the literal end of the world hanging over their heads, both the conspirators and Mulder decide to call a truth to check out if a pedophile priest is telling the truth over visions that may or may not be related to a serial killer. It's like making "ewoks:the battle for endor" instead of return of the jedi as the sequel to empire. joepinetree fucked around with this message at 22:23 on Apr 1, 2014 |
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Apr 1, 2014 22:20
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My main problem with I Want to Believe was the fact that Mulder and Scully felt like guest stars in their own movie. I think Amanda Peet got more screen time than Gillian Anderson did.
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Apr 2, 2014 19:49
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