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I don't think anyone understands the show less than Chris Carter, with the exception of whoever wrote that episode about the hospital with the cultist doctors who sacrifice patients.
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Apr 4, 2024 10:38
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Death of the Author, right? If Carter was clueless, then who was the creative driving force behind the show?
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Apr 4, 2024 13:18
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redshirt posted:Death of the Author, right? BBS fan fiction writers.
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Apr 4, 2024 13:23
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Disco Pope posted:I don't think anyone understands the show less than Chris Carter, with the exception of whoever wrote that episode about the hospital with the cultist doctors who sacrifice patients. His contributions to the revival season were the worst episodes of those seasons and maybe even the worst episodes of the entire series. He tried to make a right-wing TV host the good guy, I dunno what the gently caress he was on. The series finale was a giant wet fart, too. bagmonkey posted:OP IMO the worst episode is the Scully religious crisis episode because it sucked every bit of rear end possible and then got ignored The doll episode is fun enough, but both the X-Files and King could have done better. It's still great to get some Stephen King tropes in X-Files, though, like a guy from Maine going "ayuh". I'm a huge Stephen King fan so I appreciate it for what it is. Bad Blood loving kicks rear end, a top 10 episode for me. The gag where Scully remembers the sheriff as a brilliant hunk and Mulder seems him as a buck-toothed moron is so good. "Ya'll from the gubbermint?!?"
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Apr 4, 2024 13:30
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Diet Poison posted:Someone on Reddit suggested that she come back as the Director of the FBI, since Mulder(?) once said he expected to see her in the role one day. Plus then she could show up as much or as little as she liked, given how important her job would be. I like that, and hope to see it. Seems strange for a medical doctor who also left the FBI to practise privately. At least in the that horrible 2nd movie.
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Apr 4, 2024 13:32
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bagmonkey posted:OP IMO the worst episode is the Scully religious crisis episode because it sucked every bit of rear end possible and then got ignored We haven’t got to most of those yet. What’s Cerulean Blue? Is that from Pusher? Some other thoughts… Kids loved the cockroach episode. I still found it pretty enjoyable. I can now (as an adult) appreciate the episode with the Satanic teachers. Just the opening scene where they’re arguing about the content of a potential school play before their black mass was pretty great.
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Apr 4, 2024 13:51
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A Fancy Hat posted:The doll episode is fun enough, but both the X-Files and King could have done better. It's still great to get some Stephen King tropes in X-Files, though, like a guy from Maine going "ayuh". I'm a huge Stephen King fan so I appreciate it for what it is. the bit where Mulder remembers vampires are OCD, so he throws the bag of sunflower seeds at the kid lol newts posted:We haven’t got to most of those yet. What’s Cerulean Blue? Is that from Pusher? yes!!! Robert Patrick Modell. He's one of my absolute favorite characters in the series. If I ever get an X-Files tattoo, it's gonna be cerulean blue of some sort
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Apr 4, 2024 14:42
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bagmonkey posted:yes!!! Robert Patrick Modell. He's one of my absolute favorite characters in the series. If I ever get an X-Files tattoo, it's gonna be cerulean blue of some sort The earliest pop-cultural depiction of a weeaboo I can think of.
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Apr 4, 2024 14:45
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I AM GRANDO posted:The earliest pop-cultural depiction of a weeaboo I can think of. I liked when he talked the fat cop into a stroke.
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Apr 4, 2024 14:46
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I'm Sheriff Andy Taylor ....really?
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Apr 4, 2024 15:08
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Diet Poison posted:Someone on Reddit suggested that she come back as the Director of the FBI, since Mulder(?) once said he expected to see her in the role one day. Plus then she could show up as much or as little as she liked, given how important her job would be. I like that, and hope to see it. Those would be big tightly whities to fill but would be a good progression for her character, who tends to get the poo poo end of the stick throughout the show.
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Apr 4, 2024 15:44
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Disco Pope posted:I don't think anyone understands the show less than Chris Carter, with the exception of whoever wrote that episode about the hospital with the cultist doctors who sacrifice patients. This is the only episode I skip every time now. There are some bad fuckin episodes but this one just makes me ill. In other news I finally learned that The Lone Gunmen is all up on Youtube so I'm watching that for the first time. Not great, not terrible. Has its moments. Worth watching if you go into it expecting solidly mid-tier XF-ish content. I'm only about halfway through.
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Apr 4, 2024 17:20
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I was a big fan of The Lone Gunmen but yeah I honestly couldn't call it any better than "decent". Had some fun stuff and predicted 9/11 though
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Apr 4, 2024 17:25
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Diet Poison posted:This is the only episode I skip every time now. There are some bad fuckin episodes but this one just makes me ill. I can’t remember where I read it, but I saw a post once that said the problem with the Lone Gunmen series is that it took characters loved for bringing comedy into a serious show and for being clever saviors of the serious main characters there and it made them straight men who need help from other characters. Adding the dumb millionaire guy and the sexy spy lady was exactly the wrong decision—the lone gunmen needed like a boring cop or some other set of fbi agents who were even less fun than Mulder and Scully to play off of. When the only conflict is between the three of them and they need help, they become incompetent clowns. The timeline wouldn’t have worked, but they should have been joined by their old police contact from Baltimore, John Munch.
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Apr 4, 2024 17:49
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The satanic teacher episode is pretty solid. Gets darker than expected when the escaped demon has the kid suicide herself and gotta love MOTWs where the monster wins
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Apr 4, 2024 17:50
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I AM GRANDO posted:Adding the dumb millionaire guy and the sexy spy lady was exactly the wrong decision—the lone gunmen needed like a boring cop or some other set of fbi agents who were even less fun than Mulder and Scully to play off of. I really want to know if these characters were network-mandated, because yeah, they kinda suck and I'd like to know who to blame. I can easily see Eve being shared blame: the network saying "you gotta add a woman main character" and the writers coming up with a femme fatale instead of a dorkier version of Invisigoth, but I can also see the network mandating she be sexy, lord knows thanks to the algorithm we've all seen about 90 articles all saying the same poo poo about Fox wanting someone sexier to be Scully, yeah? Dunno what the gently caress the point of Jimmy is, though. Did the network think we needed an "audience insert" character who doesn't know anything about hacking and conspiracies? Now that I've typed that out I think Eve and Jimmy are supposed to be two facets of Scully - Eye candy + Serious and competent, and audience insert who needs things explained to them.
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Apr 4, 2024 18:00
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actually thats a good point. they should've had a story 2-3 episodes into the first season that reveals Invisigoth didn't die but rather escaped and has been living in secret for years. It's absolutely in line with the whacky over-the-top Lone Gunmen vibes too
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Apr 4, 2024 18:11
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It's not an all-time great episode but I enjoy the one where Bruce Campbell is a demon who's trying to have a baby but just so happened to marry another demon who wants to have a demonic offspring.
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Apr 4, 2024 18:23
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A Fancy Hat posted:It's not an all-time great episode but I enjoy the one where Bruce Campbell is a demon who's trying to have a baby but just so happened to marry another demon who wants to have a demonic offspring. I don't think I've seen that one, that sounds like a hoot.
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Apr 4, 2024 20:46
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A Fancy Hat posted:It's not an all-time great episode but I enjoy the one where Bruce Campbell is a demon who's trying to have a baby but just so happened to marry another demon who wants to have a demonic offspring. The ending reveal was good. Bruce Campbell, honestly, wasn't great for a show featuring Bruce Campbell. Which is a real shame. He should have been totally ham the entire episode. 
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Apr 4, 2024 21:12
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How the hell did the Kathy Griffin episode get through second draft at the writing table. It was worse than the mars ghost face episode, since at least that one had tons of camp.
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Apr 4, 2024 22:50
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The absolute worst episode I've seen is in the first revivial season (10?) about psychically connecting with the muslim suicide bomber. Yes, I rate First Person Shooter above that one. I haven't watched the second revival season and I probably won't considering how awful the first was. Duchovny and Anderson were half-asleep for the entire thing. And fair enough, they probably got decent money out of it but outside of that Darin Morgan episode it was the worst the series ever got.
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Apr 5, 2024 00:26
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Space is the worst episode but most people forget about it since it's early in season 1.
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Apr 5, 2024 00:35
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my worst episode changes from time to time. currently i hate the scully religion one the most because ugh
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Apr 5, 2024 01:16
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i also don't think first person shooter is in the top 5 worst. top 10 maybe but i also love it because its so loving stupid
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Apr 5, 2024 01:17
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X-Files is extraordinarily ableist, even by 90s standards. So that messes with worst episode rankings for me.
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Apr 5, 2024 01:23
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bagmonkey posted:my worst episode changes from time to time. currently i hate the scully religion one the most because ugh Is that the one where there is that Moby track playing for half the episode? Because that sucks a lot too, but I still hate it less than most of S10. I think that was Gillian Anderson's directorial debut too which makes me feel bad for hating it but it really was bad.
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Apr 5, 2024 01:28
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Zesty posted:X-Files is extraordinarily ableist, even by 90s standards. So that messes with worst episode rankings for me. Could you give a few examples?
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Apr 5, 2024 01:34
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Quote-Unquote posted:The absolute worst episode I've seen is in the first revivial season (10?) about psychically connecting with the muslim suicide bomber. Haha, I have seasons 7-10 downloaded because the blurays got too expensive and the file name for this one is "S10E5 - TERRIBLE, NEVER WATCH AGAIN" because if I outright deleted it I'm sure I'd eventually forget that that was intentional. FWIW, season 11 is way better than 10. I mean sure, everything Carter wrote is bad. But episodes 4 and 7 are fantastic, and honestly I'd call episodes 2 through 8 better than pretty much anything from seasons 7 through 10.
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Apr 5, 2024 01:59
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I think we’ll watch the good Season 5 episodes and then maybe some recommended from the later seasons and stop there. Also, I know I’ve seen the 2nd movie, but I have zero recollection of anything about it except that either Mulder or Scully wasn’t really in it (I can’t remember which one).
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Apr 5, 2024 02:30
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Nigmaetcetera posted:Could you give a few examples? Yeah let me throw a dart here. Season 3, Episode 14: Bad guy is a mentally ill man (Mostow) who claims a demon is making him kill others. Red Foreman is so obsessed with catching the killer, he unknowingly becomes mentally ill himself by empathizing with him and starts performing murders. Random number generator'd that one. Honestly, first hit. It's really supremely easy to notice this though. How many times is the bad guy mentally ill, or deformed in some way, or someone dealing with trauma? If they're actually trying to portray a specific disability, notice how they dial it up to 11 and sprinkle on as many other unrelated disabilities as possible, such as Roland's Autism. How often is someone with a disability only there to be pitied? Every single instance where they're not the bad guy. "Mulder also believes that Harold formed some kind of profound connection to the victims but was unable to express his feelings due to his Autism so a psychic connection formed between him and the murdered women." -Elegy, Season 4, Episode 22 Magical Disabled Trope, an offshoot of the Magical Negro trope. Any amount of googling will show umteen instances of disability being portrayed poorly. They're not rare at all. It's a theme. Disability is used as inspiration for X-Files episodes. Here's an article about disability stereotypes. It might help you pin specific tropes to the episodes you watch. Zesty fucked around with this message at 02:40 on Apr 5, 2024 |
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Apr 5, 2024 02:34
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the Rhys Darby episode of the revival is great but the rest of it is dire
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Apr 5, 2024 02:35
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Bonzo posted:Space is the worst episode but most people forget about it since it's early in season 1. Disagree, space is slow and pondering but doesn't do anything insultingly bad and at least the monster is kinda neat. Bad episodes are painful. Like FPS is legitimately painful to watch.
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Apr 5, 2024 09:17
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newts posted:I’m watching the show (again) with my kids. I watched it originally when it aired and my sister and I were obsessed with it back then. We’re on Season 4 right now, somewhere in the middle. Random thoughts so far: I am surprised you let them watch Home, and that it wasn't the one that scared the kids the most. Milo and POTUS posted:I remember the "fat" ladies were like 90s fat. Oh come on, they weren't THAT big...oh, you said 90'S fat. I read it as 90 percent fat.
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Apr 5, 2024 09:18
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Zesty posted:Yeah let me throw a dart here. It's weird they kept doing that because the sideshow episode is the antithesis of that and humanizes "freaks" as a point in the narrative. E: as for reboot, scully as the director but instead of an alien conspiracy it's just the bad guys from evangelion.
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Apr 5, 2024 09:19
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Right? I posted a great bit of that episode earlier. Just different writers. Zesty posted:This was a good bit.
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Apr 5, 2024 09:21
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Zesty posted:Yeah let me throw a dart here. Yeah, and I think its more apparent because the show peddles in outcasts more than most. I do like the read that Mulder himself is autistic that some modern viewers take, though.
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Apr 5, 2024 09:46
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Zesty posted:Yeah let me throw a dart here. I forget the episode (it might be the psychic bowling alley pinsetter guy one in your post), but there’s a scene where Mulder and Scully interview residents of a group home for people with developmental disabilities, and it has some gags that would probably not have been ok at the time because they’re about how wacky and weird the people in the boarding house are.
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Apr 5, 2024 12:50
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Disco Pope posted:Yeah, and I think its more apparent because the show peddles in outcasts more than most. I do like the read that Mulder himself is autistic that some modern viewers take, though. Also Skully is a redhead so it's pretty progressive for the time
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Apr 5, 2024 13:18
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My personal picks for worst episodes, based solely on how much I enjoyed them: 1) My Struggle IV: The final episode of the revival seasons and, presumably, the final episode of the show. Skinner dies (I think!?) in the most unsatisfying way possible, nothing is actually resolved, and Mulder and Scully STILL don't get a reunion with their kid, which has been a huge driving force of this entire season. Completely terrible. 2) Fight Club - The Kathy Griffin one. It was goofy but not in the X-Files way, it felt more like an episode of a paranormal sitcom or something. It's just a slog to get through this one. 3) My Struggle III - Chris Carter wrote himself into a corner at the end of the first revival season, this reveals that a large portion of it was JUST A DREAM. ONe of those pointless "Gotta reset the status quo fast!" episodes that also ends up being confusing and insults the audience's intelligence. 4) Babylon - The suicide bomber one. Weird tone shifts and a concept that probably shouldn't be handled on the X-Files and was handled in the worst way possible. 5) Teso Dos Bichos - Evil jaguar spirit possesses people to kill. It's executed as poorly as possible, like someone writing an X-Files episode without ever having seen the show or any TV at all. And sorry, but First Person Shooter can't be bad when it includes this: 
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Apr 5, 2024 13:25
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