Dana Scully Is Stronger Than Any Other Person On This Earth Bc If I Had To Listen To Mulder's Stupid

watching bridgerton and obviously there were a lot of things wrong with the way socializing has worked in the past, but honestly the idea of a "calling hour" is so appealing. office hours for friendship. you can show up unannounced at my home between 1 and 3pm. you must leave by 3pm. I may give you a pastry. lets bring that back

Not really a fan of Bridgerton, but I am a fan of Nicola Coughlan's response to everyone shitting on her for being "too big" to play a love interest

X-Files S1E1

- that's a pretty cool title screen

- * woman running in the woods at night * yeah this was made in the 90s

- ooooh aliens (so soon?)

- sir, why are you touching a dead body with your bare fingertips??

- sheriff's shady af

- GILLIAN ANDERSON

- the fashion is very very 90s, also she's so tiny

- cigarette man is sus

- Title Card

- so she's being assigned to essentially ruin this man's career/hyperfixation?

- of course he's in the basement (so was the BAU at first but Jason Gideon and David Rossi got em outta there and into a private jet *sigh* I miss Reid)

- that has to be an iconic line right?

- HyperfixationTM

- and thus the ship that invented shipping meets (Spirk are the still forefathers tho)

- sir, sir, you are staring

- wait they did something cool here. Mulder was introduced as a character in a conversation with Scully and Scully was introduced in a conversation with Mulder

- she rewrote Einstein? He read her dissertation?

- he's so excited someone's listening to him. Oh my God, is Mulder a wet cat loser?

- she's a Skeptic

- "the answers are there, you just have to know where to look" they're going to become the FBI's worst fucking nightmare aren't they

- ma'am what was that smile??

- will her airplane phobia come up again? I think her airplane phobia will come up again

- ew sunflower seeds

- how many apple boxes is the tiny doctor sitting on?

- medical examiner's shady af

- the height difference

- what Final Destination bullshit was that?

- that is a whole ass alien body

- loser cat let me work!!! (He's absolutely definitely a cat)

- ma'am that was not funny

- ahhh the days of dynamic camera work and actual colour grading that doesn't make you wanna weep

- prediction time: Peggy did it

- they're doing a good job of establishing that Mulder is actually the experienced agent and Scully's very green

- so the conversation earlier in the office more or less says that the FBI's been trying to shut down the X-Files for a while. Mulder is probably hella jaded and cynical when it comes to partners, he's made it clear he knows Scully's there to spy on him and yet... he's not blaming her for it, he's listening to her, working with her. What is this?

- tell me she did not just pick up dirt from a crime scene and shove it into her pocket

- I fucking knew the sheriff was shady

- why are you just holding out that dirt in his rental car and touching it with your bare hands??!?!?!?!?

- scully don't ruin his eureka moment (Time is a universal invariance is a great line tho)

- mulder looked cute as hell when he opened the door

- THE HUG????

- ar you kidding me?? Are you fucking kidding me???? They've known each other 24 hours and they're already physically (Scully) and metaphorically (Mulder) stripping down in front of each other????? This is the FIRST EPISODE?????????

- ok I've calmed down

- is there actually a conspiracy here? Or is it a bait and switch?

- also he gave her the bed and sat on the floor

- nvm my prediction was wrong

- the watch!

- oh yeah, there's a conspiracy here

- the ME's daughter?

- blood coming out of a hidden tube is very obviously blood coming out of a hidden tube

- it's the sheriff son isn't it?

- if Supernatural has taught me anything (beside soul-numbing grief and mind- breaking psychological torture), it's incredibly hard to dig a grave actually

- he starts to lose hope she's not actually with him and she immediately tells about the watch. If I'm already looking for a void to scream into during the first episode, I'm gonna be dead by the end of this show aren't I?

- it is the sheriff's son

- *takes fortifying breath* now Scully's convinced it's the son but Mulder's asking her to be cautious because she's gonna have to write all this down in a report. And she's so taken aback by this caution for her sake, she actually takes a minute

- immediately comes up with a scientific way to make it make sense. Worst Fucking Nightmare

- sheriff knew and was covering for him, bastard

- Scully conveniently and continuously missing the proof is gonna be a Thing isn't it

- he got decent proof aliens exist and he ran to check on Scully

- ok smolder holder

- they're looking at each other across a two-way mirror

- that implant is Checkov's gun

- see even she knows the cigarette man is sus

- he called her because he couldn't sleep??? They met 48 HOURS AGO (I don't actually know how many days have passed in total but my point STILL SATNDS)

- the Pentagon? Definitely a conspiracy

I kind of hate even asking this question but I’m going to ask it anyway.

Why do you think CC decided to totally retcon the mythology in the revival? Do you think he was bored of it? Did he think it didn’t fit in with “modern times”?

I know the mythology was kind of a mess at the end but I don’t think it was so bad that it was beyond saving.

It’s just, when you watch the struggles and accept the retcon it makes the Orginal Series feel like a waste of time. I’ve also heard theories that the Struggle episodes are told by an “unreliable narrator” for example CSM is an unreliable narrator in MSIII, Jackson is unreliable in MSIV. That just sounds like a cop out. It all just gives me a headache honestly. 🙁

tl;dr: CC is interested in new ideas; and will always be willing to cast off old ones in pursuit of fresher perspectives. His passion for the latter mythology was born from Dr. Simon's and Dr. Fearon's last-minute theory; but when it got fan backlash, he pivoted the focus from his revitalized mythology to the abandoned William arc. However: because he was chasing tantalizing ideas rather than a focused conclusion, Carter completely fumbled in his attempts to close up old threads in order to start afresh.

A couple reasons:

CC and Spotnitz wrapped up the original mythology in Season 6 (One Son), deciding that it had both blossomed out of control and somehow come together. Mythology wrapped up, they then finished off the Samantha arc in Season 7 and began a new mytharc in Season 8. Season 8's Existence, according to Spotnitz, functioned as the end of the original X-Files as a whole--

Spotnitz: "And the series will be different, whoever comes back for it [Season 9]-if there is another year. We’re still working out what that final story is, but there are a couple of elements that we know are going to be in there. And those two elements close the chapter.”

and,

Spotnitz: Whatever I said, what I mean to say is that 8 years of the series will come to a close this May, regardless of whether there is an X-Files next season. I actually believe most of the important questions about the mythology have already been answered, believe it or not, and you will see some new ones asked in upcoming shows.

--leaving room for Season 9 to begin a new chapter for the show (one no longer centered on Mulder and Scully's evolving story, since it had been concluded.)

That... didn't work. So, IWTB's focus, years later, was on a MOTW instead, with the hope that it would succeed and become a stepping stone to a movie-mythology franchise series.

That didn't work, either. But CC never gave up hope for a 3rd movie.

Then 2015 rolled around and FOX approached him for a revival.

Carter: I had one question thrown out to me at a meeting. [Fox Television CEO] Dana Walden asked, “If there were another series, when do you think you could begin work on it?” It wasn’t an overture, more of a practical issue. That was before the show ever aired and they knew what the ratings would be. There’s been no conversation about doing more of these. With the ratings news, it’s hard to imagine that they wouldn’t come back to us.

I would love to do another movie. Especially coming off that second movie, which had such a heavy weight upon it: A summer-release, low-budget movie, with no promotion, in a crowded field of tentpole fare. I was asked to do so much with so little. And I tried! If we were to do another movie, it would need to be akin to the first movie, which I thought was a story worthy of the big screen. That said, I can’t imagine they won’t want to somehow figure out how to do this on TV.

CC didn't know where to take the show, and only signed on after being told the season would be short (and might give him a movie, which is what he really wanted.) It was Dr. Anne Simon that actually got him excited about the mytharc again: as she tells it,

"What was the Conspiracy? This [Struggle I and II] is the conspiracy. Now, did Chris know that this was the conspiracy [since the original show]? Obviously not-- because I told him what the conspiracy was. But he knew that there was a Conspiracy-- he just didn’t know what it was. But when I told him, when I gave him this idea [plot for MSI/II], he was just, ‘This is amazing’-- I mean, he was so happy. ‘I want more, I want more, I want more!’ And every time I sent him these pages, typed pages, he was just, he was extremely happy. I could tell how happy he was.”

(Dr. Anne Simon's an interesting rabbit hole to go down, btw. Gonna do a post on her contributions in the future.)

He redid the focus of the show in Season 10; and his writers and collaborators and even his actors-- David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson, both-- thought it was a well-written season (I know....) But the fans did not.

So, CC made a statement after FOX confirmed S11: shippers had been heard-- there would be more MSR and William. So much so, he brought William back purposefully to give his arc a resolution.

And when that didn't work out-- when CC's 'perfect' ending was hated by fans (and famously, Gillian) for feeling more like a cop out than an address-and-move-forward conclusion, he felt slighted and misunderstood.

In short, Carter wasn't invested in his series anymore-- and, to be fair, neither were David and Gillian: all three (and Spotnitz) wanted to do movies instead. FOX said no; so, they took on Season 8 and 9. When the middling traction from S8 flopped in S9, CC deviated from the mytharc and did IWTB. That flubbed; and he let the matter rest for a few years (still hoping for more movies.) When FOX only agreed to do another series, he didn't know what to do with the mytharc. Then Dr. Anne Simon and Margaret Fearon gave him a direction-- and, yes, both worked on (and cosigned) the mytharc episodes-- and got him excited to do something new; and more of it. And we all saw what happened thereafter.

(Dr. Anne Simon also worked on the OG mytharc episodes, and has nothing but good things to say about them and the Revival. Again, a future rabbit hole.)

In conclusion: once CC's interest is engaged, he loses track of all else and devotes his aspirations to that one thing-- to the detriment of not only the whole picture (i.e. mythology) but also other equally important moving parts (i.e. Gillian's desire to move on.)

I could go on, but I think that's it for now.

I have a head canon that Mulder and Scully would have gotten married if only to have a legal claim to each other when hospitalized. Absolutely nothing romantic involved. They are separated on the grounds that they are not married in way too many medical situations and especially post his fake death, I think they would have wanted legal assurances

Spooky Mulder? More like Pookie Mulder AMIRIGHT???

Funniest x files moment is the jersey devil episode when scully goes on a date and it doesn't go well and she has a character development moment about weighing how much she wants a normal life and relationship vs being dedicated to her career and the x files. And then it cuts to mulder looking intently at a drawing of a bigfoot with boobs

she took his hand in hers and put it under her cheek :((((((

Imagine having been born in 1905... And all your life it doesn't fucking stop. The Great War, the Spanish Flu, and then you go out of your mind for 7 years. Everyone is traumatised and nothing matters. Then another crash. And then the rise of fascism, and the War to end all Wars didn't and it's 1945 and you're just about still there. You may have fought or ferried the boys from Dunkirk or sabotaged the Nazi occupiers or worked in the factories and put out fires during the Blitz and you're lucky to be alive, because not all your friends made it. But you are and finally, fucking finally, it stops. It stops. You are tough as nails and you can put that strength to work into building something and you do, and people have cars and can buy icecream and you have a pension fund and the kids have money of their own and no nightmares.

I want that for us. I so want that for us. I want to be the generation that has seen fucking everything and is like a MRSA bug and unfazed and when that Cheeto finally dies, I want us to. Plant the gardens and clean the seas because we can and we want to and we remember some joy, some time of trust even when it got broken and we can say to the 20 somethings "let us show you what we can build, how it can feel."

And maybe Gen beta will take it all for granted like the boomers did, but we can give Gen Z and Alpha some peace because we, and Gen Z and Alpha have seen the Dark Times and fuck that noise.