I said i'd blog abt X-Files right??? So here you go, all 1 1/2 weeks feelings of X-Files madness.
To sum it all up: in the words of David Duchovny himself when asked the question if he could spill any details about the finale?... he said, "You know, I had trouble understanding most of it, so I�m not sure how much I can help.,"
bravo. even the actors themselves had NO IDEA what the hell was going on.
go fugure! When david duchovny left X-Files in Season 8, he didn't even know what the heck was going on with the whole plot on the mulder/scully baby thingy. In fact no one knew! Not David Duchovny, not even Gillian Anderson! Well, that doesn't matter anyway, since scully in the end so freely and seemingly without much burden really, just gave up the baby for adoption 3 episodes before the end. HELLZ.
You know i was watching the Making Of the Finale episode... the Real Real Finale, that is, and it was all these great feeling of family, bond and pride in NINE years of HARD WORK, it's no joke you know. And you see how the director Kim Manners DID put in tremendous amount of work and then the little minute details that came in post production, and all the farewells and goodbyes among the cast and crew.... you know seeing all that, it made the ending and even BIGGER dissapointment, you know. I mean, i may be obsessed with X-Files right now, but it's not an overstatement if i said that X-Files was a legendary series that marked our 90s generation. The whole thing with the X, and how the truth is out there, trust no one, and I want to believe stuff... You know, this series was the star trek of our time...
And not just that, you know, when it came to cinematic TELEVISION drama, X-Files was the one show that revolutionize the whole "stylish" look and directing for Television series. It really did you know. As much as i don't quite like to watch seasons 3-4, it was the earlier seasons that really revolutionize cinematic television. Hellz, besides the whole sexual tension between Mulder and Scully and the once in a while fun X-Files episode, i think the only other thing that held my brother's interest to the series was the whole directing and cinematography of the series. How those damn people manage to shoot scenes in absolute darkness!!! heh.
Ok now ON TO the whole Mulder and Scully thing which was really the only thing that kept me watching for SIX loooooooooooooong years through all the Alien conspiracy crap that NO ONE, not the fans, not the audience, not the actors and not even the WRITERS themselves knew what "The Truth" was.
So anyways, Mulder and Scully. YES, consumation of a platonic friendship not only ruins the friendship but also well, TV ratings and heaven forbid that should ever happen.
Lemme sum that up with the one brilliant line that Mulder says immediately after Mulder and Scully FINALLY and i do mean FINALLY, no ifs, not buts, no bees, no dream, no fantasy, no kiss on the forehead either that's bullshit, but FINALLY REALLY KISS on the LIP, albiet with quite a lack of passion, damn.... Well, the whole damn thing can be summarized by his line, "The world didn't end, Scully."
EXACTLY CHRIS CARTER!!!!!!!!!!! the world WOULD NOT have ended if you just have let them kiss, oh please!, back in season 5 or even the movie. I mean, ratings??? Dude i think IF they had been closer... i mean a kiss won't END THE WORLD you know, it's not like they've fucked, it's just a kiss man! And there were MANY MANY MANY moments in the series that would have made a kiss on the lips OKAY in the situation... such as like in Amor Fati where mulder practically gets his brains sucked out and he's been through brain surgery for goodness sake! And scully is there and they're saying lines like "at the end of that life my world was upside down, but one thing remained constant in my life: you, Scully. You were my touchstone" and duh she says "As you are mine," EVEN after ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL those lines, and i REALLY thought that a kiss at this moment was wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy more appropriate, would have brought their friendship closer yet not ruining the tension because the moment warranted it, than if they had kissed in the Mellennium episode or even that near kiss in the hallway in the movie. THIS moment in Amor Fati would have been the best.
On that note, apparently, DAMN THE EDITORS, Mulder and Scully DID kiss, WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY back in Season 4 in Momento Mori.
Apparently it was NOT scripted but Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny decided i guess, between themselves, to take a try at it.... WELL IT GOT TAKEN OUT.
Well... maybe then it would have been too early, i might agree... And ALTHOUGH like in Amor Fati, that moment in Momento Mori actually did have the weight that warranted a kiss, I think the way they did kiss though, was too casual, you know, and if this was their FIRST kiss and DAMN LOT OF FANS were waiting for that moment, i must say that the moment had lacked an Impact. And thus, i guess... in a way, it was okay that it was edited out.... Budden again.... I would say that if they were going to edit out the kiss in Momento Mori, they should have made them kiss in Amor Fati.... because i think that would have progressed the story and the characters more....
BECAUSE APPARENTLY, they decided to totally NOT change the manner of their relationship after the Mellenium episode where they kissed... So it's like, well it really never happened.... on that note i am asking then... WHY THE HELL THEN WAIT SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO long for them to KISS, when in the end ur not gonna utilize it to propel your characters into a different dynamic?! So u might as well made them kiss in earlier or in the movie or whereever because by the looks of it, it changed NOTHING anyway!
Frustration watching X-Files. heh. Volumes of books can be written on that topic! I mean, i'm not all for this whole Mulder and Scully fucking in the bushes hehe, thingy either, actually. Because i DO like the sexual tension between them and there can be tension only when there's no consumation.
But i just don't like the way how dodgy X-Files is with the MOST IMPORTANT ELEMENTS of the series, they just FUCK UP and i mean FUCK UP BIG TIME. i am not talking just the mulder/scully relationship, but also about the whole meaning of The Truth, and ALSO very importantly Mulder's sister Samantha's abduction. I just hate those three CORE and CRUST of X-Files was just basically disposed off simply.
Call me a ranting fan. But it's just sad to see how such hallmark piece of TV series can be fucked up into this unrecognizable, totally ORDINARY and in fact completely MEANINGLESS, end.
I mean, Chris Carter can by all rights stick to his ambiguity with the X-Files if he wanted to for the ending and the conclusion, the closure of these issues, but you know, the ending and conclusion that he gave to the truth, to samantha's abduction, and to mulder/scully's relationship, is NOT ambiguious, but downright DOESN'T MAKE SENSE! It doesn't make sense not only in the sense that well, it doesn't make sense, it doesn't make sense in the way that the ending simply took all these INCREDIBLY INCREDIBLY HUGE myths that it has built up for 9 years in the whole series and then roll it all up into a ball and basically just tossed it away with the simplest, simplest and totally NOT ENCOMPASSING end.
To tell me that Samantha was indeed abducted by aliens who really was not aliens but a government consipracy thingy, SURE i accept that, EVERYTHING in the past 7 years points to that.... THEN, THEN, to end this INCREDIBLY significant plot because THIS IS Mulder's cursade, at least this is what got him started, but to put the end ot this incredibly significant plot, what does the writer tells us? "ouh yeah, she gets abducted by aliens and experiments were done to her and all that and she lived longer but u know what??? She was such a lovely child with such a pure pure heart, so she got REKIDNAPPEd what the hell, by these benovelant beings called Walk-ins, so that she may never live to suffer a painful death and forever live on as starlight"
ONE PHRASE: FUCK THAT SHIT! THAT IS NOT A FUCKING ENDING MAN! fuckers fuckers fuckers.
And don't even get me started on how the hell they capped off the whole "Truth" thing. I can't even understand, except to say that duh, the alien invasion begins on 22 December 2012, duh, even I knew this! since form 4 when i learnt about the Mayan calendar an all! geez! And well there's no way of changing this... And don't even get me started on the whole conversation Mulder and Scully has in the motel room at the VERY LAST scene. GEEZ. WTF? U know, in ESSENCE, it is ESSENTIALLY THE SAME as the conversation they had in the movie's last mulder/scully scene, it's ESSENTIALLY THE SAME as the coversation they had in Amor Fati.... DUDE! geezzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!
You know... and ok... I guess I HAVE To bitch about how the Mulder/Scully thing was handled....Like i said, the problem i had with the kiss was that they made it NOT change anything with them AT ALL. and I thought that was a TOTAL waste. If they were gonna kiss and not change, and i am not asking them to be lovers right after that, but if there was absolutely going to be NO EFFECT, i say might as well have made them just do that and get it over with. But the seccond problem i have with that is that this kiss right, doesn't change their relationship at all for like 1 1/2 seasons. Doesn't change their relationship after that episode (which was episode 4 of season 7) EVEN WHEN Mulder gets abducted in Episode 22 of that season, doesnt' change anything in the "all things" gillian anderson episode where they MIGHT have actually slept with each other (hmmm maybe THAT'S how mulder might be the father of scully's baby, barreness and alien abduction tests aside) , does change even AFTER mulder comes back from the dead, doesn't change EVEN AFTER we find out that mulder might be the father of the baby...
BUDDEN SUDDENLY... Last ep of season 8, after Scully gives birth to her miricle child whose father MIGHT be Mulder, but like all things in X-Files, we're not really sure.. BUT SUDDENLY out of NOWHERE, Mulder grabs scully and kisses her and MY MY, this time WITH PASSION!
and i am left wondering... Where the F did THAT come from?! Suddenly i felt that u know, if duchovny and anderson had actually played DOWN the kiss and made it more sweet than passionate, THEN it would have made fucking sense for them to be fucking KISSING like that!
Seriously. It's like the whole kiss in Millenium didn't matter at all, nothing changed, they were still.... best friends and partners professionally... Not even when mulder comes back from the dead, not even when mulder and scully are together and she is very much pregnant and they're in the hospital together for her care, not even when scully keep saying "our baby", not ANY of those scenes or episode even REMOTELY suggests ONE BIT that scully and mulder were still ANYTHING beyond being best friends and partners...........
and suddenly they fucking kiss PASSIONATELY. the fuck lah the fuck. i know we all wanted that for the past 8 years, but dudes, creator of the X-Files, u guys are the master at timing, you guys are the master at crafting BRILLIANT moments between scully and mulder... BUT YET, EVERYTIME when it came to the very crucial moments, you fuck it up completely. Well not completely but still pretty much fucked up.
Timing man, Timing! It was good timing but really.... u need to lead up into shit like that... People just don't suddenly "BAM!" and they fucking kiss like that. NOT AFTER EIGHT FUCKING YEARS man no!
and let's not even get me started on the baby thing. Like EVERYTHING else CRUCIAL in the X-Files, this was also fucked up. Here you have SCULLY, who has been trying since season 4 to have this BABY. And she finally DOES. and not just that, it's a baby whose father is her BELOVED and most importantly, now MISSING partner/lover/whatever... And to cap it all off, what does the writers do with this PRECIOUS LITTLE MIRACLE that Scully has been dying to have and have been DESPERATELY trying to protect for the 2 season she has had him? They fucking write him to PUT HIM UP FOR ADOPTION. Yes, adoption is a good thing in this world but C'MON!!!!!!!!!
Well all that being said, it's just sad the series went on after season 7. Reading interview archives, it seemed that Gillian Anderson was ready to quit and David Duchovny was already done and over with X-Files... But I guess Chris Carter had his ways, and Anderson was caught back for not one but TWO seasons for the simple reason that Fox network has been paying her wayyy less than David Duchovny and the only way she can get paid the amount she wanted was to sign a two season contract....
I guess, u know, it's their life and i don't have the rights to say anything about Gillian Anderson for staying on, or David Duchovny for leaving... or shall i say taking the first flight out of this set! at the first chance of the ending of his original contract... You know, when i frist read about Duchovny leaving the series and REFUSED totally, at first, to even step foot in the show again, i thought that it was because of this that the series probably ended up the way it did.... MESSED UP, to say the VERY VERY VERY VERY least. But you know, the more i watch the episodes, and going through season 7, i feel that when Duchovny and Anderson wanted to leave at season 7, they were dead on! They REALLY REALLY should have just dropped X-Files like a bombshell and and by doing so, SAVE it.
But Chris Carter, albiet as brilliant as he was and well, still is.... I feel that, if Anderson and Duchovny was ready to bail out to finish, it should have been that way... I feel that Chris Carter should have just let it be and ended the series in season 7 while the story was still amazing than to have prolonged it's life till the bitter, and dude it was fucking bitter, end.
Because really, the brilliance, I felt, would have come, if they had not tried to drag this series longer than it should have been and ended it right there and then, in Season 7, while the star still shone and the sun still bright, and dude, when fans who really gave a damn abt the series still thought that the series was brilliant and wasn�t crap. Cause really, you know, I stopped watching, but A LOT of fans continued, but you know, those most critical of the series, a lot of them kept watching, but a lot of them also saw how not really real X-Files the series became�
Ok to give the cast and crews of Season 8 and 9 a benefit of all their talent, brilliance and hardwork, Season 8 and 9 was NOT crap at all in the sense that when it came to the new characters, they played it REALLY well and wrote it really well. But EVERYTIME whenever they TRIED to make even the simplest connection and continuity into the previous seasons, into anything that is remotely related to Mulder��. It really FELL FLAT.
It just didn�t make sense! It just didn�t make sense when they TRIED to make the connection, when they try to make AS IF, season 8-9 were part of seasons 1-7, when essentially, it is NOT. I�m sorry but if a series is made up of 2 people that has been the backbone and strength and in fact, the WHOLE series to begin with, it�s just not gonna work if you take one away and then the other one just hang around! I mean kudos! to Gillian Anderson who managed to carry the series on, but REALLY, she was also absent in quite many of the episodes!
After all, you know... Season 6 was a brilliant BRILLIANT run, Season 7, with amazing episodes like The Sixth Extinction episodes, or the half-baked but well at least they wrote a "closure" to Samantha Mulder in Closure (ouh man, btw, the "i am free" shit by Mulder at the end of the episode did NOT fly with me), and the brilliant episodes of All Things, Hollywood AD, and even the simple ending in Je Souhaite, would have been enough for me�
I don�t even mind if they capped it off with Mulder and Scully kissing with baby William between them in the end of the 8th Season as the ENDING FINALE of the series� I don�t even mind that cause damn, it was happy! At least we have THAT!
I just feel so.... Cheated, not cheated, i don't want to take this personally or selfishly, but in the lights of X-Files as a whole... I felt that if it had ended in season 7, that would have been the best because everything, from the writing, to the acting, to the chemistry, to the characters, the directing down to the tone and weight of everything in season 7 was just great. I love love love loved Season 6 and i would have called that season the pinnacle of X-Files storytelling brilliance... But Seaon 7 carried in it a maturity, you know, a maturity that came with 7 long years of being together offscreen as well as onscreen that just translated itself so very well into the stories, the pace, the voices and the weight and dynamics of every episode in this season to make it whole. Everything was consistent. There was no ultimate finale that the whole season gave, but what it had, that i feel no other season had, not even season six or five, was that every episode in this season played together as a whole to give the entire season and equilibrum.
If X-Files had ended here in this space and character as in the personality the whole season itself in season 7, in my opinion, albeit a little premature, but it would have been SUFFICIENT and BRILLIANT while still actually being FAITHFUL to it�s original premise (and not make the fans feel like they�ve been cheated the hell out of) if they had ended it in Season 7.
The whole THREE part episode of Biogenesis, The Sixth Extinction, Amor Fati, would have been able to cap off and explained while not explaining much of The Truth- still make people feel incomplete to draw their own conclusions.
But even if the had ended the three parter with how they ended it with that scene with Mulder and Scully where I said, warranted for a kiss, and even if they DID let them kiss there� I think that would have been brilliant.
And then they can still keep that whole crap closure they came up with for the Samantha storyline-
And then u know, the whole Mulder/Scully relationship thing, I would have been satisfied with them kissing at Amor Fati, and then never see it again and have everything the same as it is now in the rest of the episodes in season 7. Because I think it�s very well written. The way mulder and scully interacts and their playful conversation in Hollywood AD, with them walking out hand in hand nevertheless. And then the whole thing with �All Thing� where we don�t know if Mulder and Scully really slept together or not, but that�s just brilliantly VERY typical of X-Files so it�s good cause it�s left up to the interpretation of the fans� But the most important thing in that episode that would have just been statisfying and very appropriate to illustrate their relationship here now so near at the end of the series is that, yeah, the choices that they made in life had brought them here together and perhaps this was meant to be.
And after the whole weight of All Things and the kiss (which I wish would have been in Amor Fati) and all that 7 years of being together, it would have actually been a satisfying yet very open ended closure to the whole mulder/scully relationship in the last scene of Mulder/Scully in Je Souhaite- because u see them comfortableness between the both of them, the famillairity, the difference, the playfulness, and the closeness, all wrapped up in a simple conversation over a movie, popcorn and a drink.
And then Chris Carter could have done whatever the hell he wanted for the last last last episode�he could have deepen the mystery even more, make the cigarette smoking man do some shit, etc�. anything you know� anything he wanted with the last episode, make the conspiracy bigger, make mulder and scully take another wild goose chase to find that they can�t stop the alien invasion in the end anyway, man Chris Carter could have even ended the series HERE as he did in Season 9 with mulder and scully lying in a motel room with the world against them and all they have is each other�s blind faith to hold onto�. THAT could have been a great ending! Two people fighting against the inevitable, with only each other�s blind faith to keep them fighting on, now wouldn�t that be a great tragedy in itself??? I�m sure you would have loved that Chris! Geez. Elaine�s alternate endings, I wish I had those in my bonus DVD feature! Hellz.
Season 8 and then season 9 just TOTALLY knocked it out of whack! to begin with, dude, Mulder's gone man! Carter should have just ended it, and then started it off with a different X-Files with new characters if he had wanted to continue with it. You just don't go and fuck something brilliant up within two episodes man, you just don't fucking do shit like that. To destroy something so beautiful and then now start try to build something new while trying very very hard and being unsuccessful in tying this WHOLE new shit, with the old.
Cause you know, when something has reached it's utmost best that it can be, there's just no way to stretch it futher without breaking it.
I'm not saying that Season 8 and 9 was not brilliant in its own ways. It was, it was. But Carter should have just let Mulder die. He should have just burried Scully along with him.
But he didn't.
And i think it's that feeling of "it's such a waste" that they were so increadibly amazing at the end of Season 7, as its best that would have been a good end to a legendary series, could be fucked up within a single episode and made into this....
I don't know what to say. But that, while season 8 and 9 were great seasons for the new characters, it was just an incredibly sad sad sad sad sad way and cruel at times, to crush the brilliance of ALL and i mean ALL that the previous 7 episodes had worked so hard to achieve and HAD ACHIEVED.
It's like, it's just not something you do to a series that is so brilliant, that could have had an amazing and heart chewing ending, but it was all shreds to bits, torn down, burnt and betrayed, and made shit, you know... i just feel so sad.
Carter really should have terminated the X-Files there in season 7. And started off with a new one in season 8 and 9 and wherever beyond... but i guess... money still speaks louder than the instinct of storytelling.
You know, there�s this quote from TS Eliot that the X-Files keeps messing up� (david duchovny should have recognized it, since he DOES have a masters in English Literature) Mulder said it and even the director Kim Manners said it during the Making Of the last episode documentary� They said �this is how it ends, not with a whimper but with a bang,�
And that�s what made this claw towards the end of X-Files not quite hit the X mark, was that the creators tried too damn hard to end with a bang they think would be befitting for the career of such a brilliant series, not realizing that it is this pursuit for that bang that really blew it all to pieces�
For afterall, the TS Eliot line actually went:
�This is how the world ends, this is how the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper.�
All that being said�. And if you have REALLY READ this Far, KUDOS to you because I probably should have stopped ranting PAGES ago!
What shall I take away from X-Files? What can I take away from the episodes to well, cover up this� this void and disappointment and frustration and denial I feel towards what X-Files had became?
I guess, like everything in X-Files, it�s all up to the viewer�s interpretation. And I guess, it�s up to me to choose for my own, where I really want X-Files to end.
I like the whole mulder and scully FINALLY getting it on, but that would require me to watch seasons 8 and the last episode of season 9 and actually believe that these characters are CONSISTENT and therefore the ACTUAL Mulder and Scully. And most of all, that would require me to believe and to accept that Season 8 and 9 are part of and the continuing of the X-Files and builds on the previous seaons.
But that is bullshit.
Even from the mouth of David Duchovny when he returned for that 6 episodes in season 8, he said it did not feel like the X-Files anymore� and really, it is not.
The Real X-Files ended the moment that Fade Out: was played in season 7. That was when X-Files ended.
And therefore, I go on, watching classic wonderfully made and brilliantly written and executed episodes like How the Ghost Stole Christmas, Bad Blood, The Unnatural, Hollywood AD, Field Trip, Detour, Post-Modern Prometheus, Folie A Deux, All Things, Dreamland I and II, Triangle� and all these classic and brilliantly written, made and executed episodes, because to me, these episodes are the X-Files, these episodes are the testimony and you know, they are the concrete proof of how amazing brilliant X-Files can be and is and have achieved.
And to me, these are the endings that I choose for the X-Files series because in these episodes� end, although it was but a whimper compared to the grandure of the mytharc episodes that had indeed been blown out of proportion, with these, these simplistic, wonderfully crafted, brilliantly made episodes, X-Files ends with the brilliance that outshines even the that when it first began.
To end not with a bang, but a whimper.
I�ll end with a very very great idea of USAToday to conduct an interview of David Duchovny not by a journalist, but by Gillian Anderson herself� and in her question and his answer shall be my final thoughts on the X-Files (for now ler for now ;))
Anderson: Any thoughts on the end of the show?
Duchovny: We'll do another movie, at least, so I don't think it'll actually end. There'll be an ending image, but by the sheer fact that it's a self-conscious ending image, I think it'll be overloaded and won't work. My favorite image of the show's seven years is the end of the black-and-white episode, where they had us slow-motion dancing. However it ends, to me, that's my favorite.
And you know what, that�s very hard to argue, but in many ways, that�s one of my favourite too�
That and of course, Mulder�s confession �Scully� I love you,� and Scully rolling her eyes and walking away muffles out, �oh brother!� in Triangle.
Brilliant.
And that, Chris Charter, was a great ending. Inconclusive, just the way you want it, brilliant, just the way you would expect your series to end, but yet poignant, right to the core of it, with impact and an umph! Except, that wasn�t exactly delievered at the actual end of the series.
The sheer fact that it�s a self-conscious ending image, I think it�ll be overloaded, DEFINITELY, and won�t work�and it most certainly, didn�t.
How the Ghost Stole Christmas, The Unnatural, Hollywood AD, Field Trip, Folie A Deux, All Things, Dreamland II, Triangle, and yes David Duchovny�s choice of Post-Modern Prometheus, any day I�ll choose as my X-Files ending over the rather� just-not-10/10� episode finale �The Truth�.
ahhh then again, i am naive. Money has its ways in showbiz, more than one, more than one... and as much as we think that everything is pure, money has its dirty little hands sticking around everywhere.
Nothing is showbiz, is entirely, well, pure....
I learnt that from Hollywood AD episode ;)
wuahahaha.
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