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Archive for December, 2017

Social media archive: 2017 (part 10)

Archived from the Eat The Corn Facebook page.


Dec 21, 2017 9:49

#46DaysOfMythX D-13 7X15: En Ami

Carter & Spotnitz surely rewrote this William B. Davis script to position this episode as the last character study we will have of the Cigarette-Smoking Man, this being the last season and all. On the verge of death and with his plans destroyed, the CSM contemplates his own post-apocalyptic landscape with contempt for mankind. Also, a last opportunity for director Rob Bowman’s talents to shine on #TheXFiles.

7X15: En Ami

 


Dec 21, 2017 15:25

#46DaysOfMythX D-13 and Happy Solstice to all! 7X22: Requiem

The series finale where the closing of the book on character arcs is most clearly defined: Mulder gets to experience firsthand the “truth” he’s been seeking, Scully gets an unexpected miraculous gift that makes her life more than just work in XF, Skinner becomes a believer, CSM meets his fate at the hands of the next generation Syndicate, Krycek & Marita, the existential threat of alien colonization always looms overhead. If there is some novelistic beauty and coherence to be found in #TheXFiles, it is with ending it with this season — and with an episode, although imperfect, written, shot and delivered for broadcast as if it were the last one.

7X22: Requiem


Dec 22, 2017 16:05

#46DaysOfMythX D-12 8X01: Within / 8X02: Without

…and at the last minute #TheXFiles is renewed! We begin a season that is tightly plotted and serialized, much darker than the previous two L.A. seasons, greatly acted by Anderson & Patrick, leaving behind the human conspiracy for an impersonal alien replicant invasion storyline. The biggest issue with this season is…its mere existence, like a final chapter in a book that is completely different from what came before! In this opening, we feel Scully’s loneliness and isolation, we see Gibson again, but we also have 1 1/2 eps worth of plot extended to 2 episodes, Mulder’s 1-episode brain illness, and an Alien Bounty Hunter morphing clothes and killed by gunshot.

8X01: Within / 8X02: Without


Dec 23, 2017 16:58

#46DaysOfMythX D-11 8X08: Per Manum

As could be expected from #TheXFiles, we wonder whether Scully’s baby is normal! Season 8 continues to fill with happenings the rather empty season 7, after Mulder’s brain disease, here with IVF attempts also resurrecting Scully’s frozen ova story thread from season 4. Season 8 tightly planned plotting: Scully & Doggett’s partnership progresses while we meet Doggett’s Deep Throat character.

8X08: Per Manum


Dec 24, 2017 2:53

#TheXFiles season 11: it’s a wrap! Series finale? Anderson’s last? Cliffhanger? Movie lead-in? Open-ended?…


Dec 24, 2017 22:24

#46DaysOfX D-10 8X14: This Is Not Happening / 8X15: DeadAlive

The best and the worst of season 8 together! An incredibly powerful and sensational first episode – Jeremiah Smith, Reyes introduced, epic search for Mulder – followed by a strong second episode but plagued by very controversial decisions – far-fetched replicant creation procedure, Mulder without autopsy and not dead after 3 months, hardly justifiable healing, obscure Krycek machinations. We do get an alien replicant that changes skin similar to how the clawed alien matures into the grey and a red vaccine – connecting the Black Oil with this replicant invasion.

8X14: This Is Not Happening / 8X15: DeadAlive


Dec 25, 2017 18:49

#46DaysOfMythX D-9 8X18: Three Words

We shouldn’t only stick to the positives of individual episodes, we should also mention the general direction of the season: season 8 doesn’t make anything out of Mulder’s alien abduction experience and incredible resurrection; it spends the first half of the season building Scully & Doggett’s partnership but just as Duchovny returns Doggett moves more to the background as #TheXFiles always had trouble with the ensemble show format; Carter seems to enjoy playing the “who’s the daddy” game when at the time this was the last opportunity for Duchovny & Anderson to be on the screen together. Still, this is a great individual episode in the vein of season 4’s Memento Mori!

8X18: Three Words


Dec 26, 2017 18:10

#46DaysOfMythX D-8 8X16: Vienen

Black oil + oil rig = Mulder + Doggett action adventure! Obviously! The return of the season 3 Black Oil with its radioactive flashes – but also a group of Native Americans immune to it, possibly connecting the Tunguska vaccine (weakened oil) with Gibson Praise (of possible Filipino ancestry) with the Navajo (who were in close contact with the aliens) – a shoestring-thin fan theory which makes some sense…

8X16: Vienen


Dec 27, 2017 18:46

#46DaysOfMythX D-7: one week! 8X20: Essence / 8X21: Existence

Another ending. Somehow along the way the mythology became not just the investigations OF but ABOUT Mulder & Scully, which reduced the scope of that world, while also the stakes inevitably grew to saving the world – signs that it’s time to end this! Also: loads of very explicit Biblical symbolism around the birth of William, an inglorious ending for Krycek, and like for the season openers 1 1/2 worth of story stretched to 2 with all these underground parking chase scenes and conspiring. But it’s a good enough ending!

8X20: Essence / 8X21: Existence


Dec 28, 2017 00:15

The first minutes of 11X01: My Struggle III ! CGB named after Chris Carter’s grandfather, if I recall a Two Fathers-era interview well.

http://www.musingsofacsm.com/


Dec 28, 2017 17:58

#46DaysOfMythX D-6 9X01/02: Nothing Important Happened Today

The sad thing with this season 9 renewal was not the renewal itself but, like with season 8 to a lesser extent, #TheXFiles doesn’t want to let go of the past. Each time we return to the mythology, Doggett & Reyes become minor characters in their own show; Scully becomes more and more unlike her self; again we focus on whether William is normal or not. If there were accusations back in Redux the show was becoming too soap operatic, here with an awfully transformed Reyes, and Follmer, and Kersh, it is certainly it! First mention of the awkward word Supersoldiers to describe the alien replicants.

9X01 / 9X02: Nothing Important Happened Today


Dec 29, 2017 12:42

11X01: My Struggle III tagline: “Accuse Your Enemies Of That Which You are Guilty” (?) C.G.B. inspired by propaganda-master Goebbels?

@cinemovietv instagram


Dec 29, 2017 16:45

#46DaysOfMythX D-5 9X08: Trust No 1

Sappy Mulder-Scully shippiness, a cheesy explosive kryptonite, and always the sceptre of the absent Mulder that weighs down the series. What to save from this #TheXFiles episode? Perhaps just a couple of months after 9/11 a premonition of the surveillance state that was going to flood daily life and change the world and the zeitgeist!

9X08: Trust No 1


Dec 29, 2017 20:37

#46DaysOfMythX D-5 9X10: Provenance / 9X11: Providence

Certainly the low point of #TheXFiles mythology. A welcome return of the Ships of Origins from Biogenesis — but painful melodrama again around the absent Mulder, more boring FBI shenanigans, the uncharacteristically strong and explicit presence of the divine…and the unsubtly introduced “prophecy” around William, which might be indication of his role in season 11! The series cancellation is decided shortly before these episodes.

9X10: Provenance / 9X11: Providence


Dec 30, 2017 20:02

#46DaysOfMythX D-4 9X17: William

Possibly the series’ most controversial episode! William given up for adoption after Scully’s motherhood is presented as a major aspect of her character since about season 4 is something difficult to fathom, and really feels more like a forced writers’ intervention than a natural character decision. Getting rid of loose ends to clear the way for the movies, or setting up far-future plot developments with teenage William? We will know with season 11. We do get indisputable evidence that the CSM is Mulder’s father, and that William was indeed part of the Supersoldier program (probably via the chloramine program).

9X17: William


Dec 30, 2017 21:25

#TheXFiles S11: best we can hope for is an open-ended ending.
Duchovny: “Unless Chris came to Gillian and me with an idea for an actual end to the show — which would preclude doing any more movies or any more television (versions) — and the three of us decided, ‘That’s fantastic, that’s really the way to end it,’ everything we do (with the franchise) naturally is going to be somewhat open-ended.”

Daily Herald: ‘The X-Files’ and Duchovny: Still seeking the truth after 25 years


Dec 31, 2017 15:27

#46DaysOfMythX D-3 9X19/20: The Truth

A third ending. With a name like that, “The Truth”, how to take the big twist in season 10 seriously? The trial that occupies most of the finale is essentially the trial of Carter & Spotnitz before their critics, the display of proof that the mythology makes sense and is a coherent whole. Carter couldn’t envision the end of the series without the presence of the CSM, already quite ridiculous here, but with what was very obviously supposed to be his final death. The status quo at the end is essentially similar to that at Requiem — Syndicate destroyed, alien colonization threat still hanging overhead — with the difference that Mulder & Scully are together + a promise for a 3rd film in the form of a date: Dec-22-2012. Not a very exciting finale for #TheXFiles, a series that deeply changed television, but a finale nevertheless.

9X19/20: The Truth


Dec 31, 2017 19:04

#46DaysOfMythX D-3 Non-mythology bonus! Movie 2: I Want To Believe

A first long-awaited return. All in all, a good horror film with supernatural elements and a dark atmosphere, but not much more. A kind of kitchen sink stand-alone investigation that lacks some punch, and a heavy atmosphere with very explicit religious themes more characteristic of Millennium than #TheXFiles. In retrospect, we see here a growing distance between Mulder & Scully that will have deepened in season 10.

The X-Files: I Want To Believe

Social media archive: 2017 (part 9)

Archived from the Eat The Corn Facebook page.


Dec 11, 2017 19:29

#46DaysOfMythX D-23 5X01: Unusual Suspects

Between this episode, Travelers and the introduction of Jeffrey Spender and Diana Fowley, season 5 is the season that looks back at the foundation of #TheXFiles! Vince Gilligan has fun with the Lone Gunmen, brewing his concept for the spin-off show that would become reality some 3 years later. Interesting that this episode comes straight after the MKULTRA-heavy “Demons” and could reinforce the perception that Mulder’s belief in aliens is completely constructed from a conspiracy of men, in continuity with the “Redux” trilogy — “My Struggle I” hardly added anything new. And look at that mobile phone!

5X01: Unusual Suspects


Dec 11, 2017 19:46

#46DaysOfMythX D-23 Part 2: 5X15: Travelers

With its never-heard-of-again experiments, this is not the best of episodes, especially given the huge untapped story potential of doing a story set in the 1950s with Mulder’s father and the CSM and J.E.Hoover. But at least after David Vincent in “Talitha Cumi” Mulder got to meet his other ancestor Carl Kolchak, Carter must have felt very vindicated!

5X15: Travelers


Dec 12, 2017 17:31

We interrupt our #46DaysOfMythX to look forward:
Of drafts, cliffhangers, mass-produced vaccines, cut scenes, Trojan viruses and arc (de)coherence: exploring additional info on #TheXFiles S10 mythology, mainly based on a post-My Struggle II Q&A discussion with Anne Simon, and theorizing about @[362989843738755:274:The X-Files] S11 in light of recent promotional material. Some spoilers therein, but this is mainly what fans do: theorizing!

Some Complementary Season 10 Mythology Elements


Dec 14, 2017 00:05

#46DaysOfMythX D-21 5X13: Patient X / 5X14: The Red and the Black

This is it! The triptych of Patient X + movie + One Son will essentially explain nearly everything in the mythology of #TheXFiles! Developments are so dense, characters are so many that Mulder & Scully enter the action about mid-way into the first episode, the mythology has become that ever-burgeoning monster, far away from the independent investigations of the early seasons. The story where Mulder finds his faith into searching for alien life is also the one where the alien-as-divine beings metaphor is the strongest. The memorable abduction scene on the bridge, directed by Chris Carter, is echoed in My Struggle II — will we also see a second UFO overpower the first in season 11?

5X13: Patient X / 5X14: The Red and the Black


Dec 14, 2017 00:13

We are at D-21 and here is 11X01: #MyStruggle3 press release! Or, the art of being vague in order to preserve spoilers!
“Picking up after the last event series’ cliffhanger, Mulder and Scully learn that they aren’t the only ones desperately searching for their long-lost son, William. The very fate of the world may depend on it in the all-new “My Struggle III” season premiere episode of THE X-FILES”

SpoilerTV: The X-Files – Episode 11.01 – My Struggle III – Sneak Peek, Promotional Photos & Press Release


Dec 14, 2017 20:32

#46DaysOfMythX D-20 5X20: The End

“Burn it” (again)! Goodbye Vancouver (for now)! Hello “the key of everything in #TheXFiles” (1st iteration)! A mix of a setup of the situation in the movie, with the closure of XF, and an introduction to themes to be developed later, with the alien origin of Gibson Praise’s abilities, peppered with relationship tension that is now part of what the series is, with the introduction of Diana Fowley, a character whose purpose is essentially to delay the consummation of Mulder & Scully’s relationship!

5X20: The End

 


Dec 14, 2017 22:23

#TheXFiles Season 11:
11X01: My Struggle III
11X02: This
11X03: Plus One
11X04: The Lost Art Of Forehead Sweat
11X05: Ghouli

Den of Geek: The X-Files Season 11 Episode Descriptions Give Us New Hints


Dec 15, 2017 18:58

#46DaysOfMythX D-19 #TheXFiles Movie: Fight the Future

Noir 70s conspiracy film meets summer blockbuster. After one year of buildup, this is the apex of TXF-mania and TXF’s moment of glory in the zeitgeist! Fans were frustrated there were not more answers, but there’s a lot: not only connecting much of mythology threads since season 3 (bees, Black Oil, vaccine) but also having the viewer privy to inside conversations of the Syndicate, where collaboration with aliens and the whole colonization plotline is confirmed. This very explicitly contradicts the turn of events in the season 10 #MyStruggle episodes.

The X-Files Movie: Fight the Future


Dec 16, 2017 17:46

#46DaysOfMythX D-18 6X01: The Beginning

Hello Southern California! #TheXFiles are reopened but we don’t follow those assigned to them, Fowley & Spender: the series has become more about Mulder & Scully by now. Soft reboot with Scully remaining a skeptic after the events of the movie, but in exchange we get a great final shot that connects Black Oil, big clawed alien monster, and grey alien. The alien origins of mankind developed in Biogenesis are introduced here.

6X01: The Beginning


Dec 17, 2017 16:52

#46DaysOfMythX D-17 6X11: Two Fathers / 6X12: One Son

This is it! With some mental gymnastics, Carter & Spotnitz manage to do what many (most?) thought impossible: explain the mythology and give a chronology of events! Few scenes with M&S though, CGBS gets the spotlight (too bad more flashbacks didn’t make it to the final edit) and Cassandra is the key to everything (2nd of its name). The Syndicate mythology that essentially started with “Anasazi” is closed here, unexpectedly at mid-season, clearing the way for simpler mythology episodes. The connections made here are so air-tight that later games with the mythology menace for the coherence of the whole to crumble – I’m looking at you, season 10!

6X11: Two Fathers / 6X12: One Son

 

 


Dec 18, 2017 22:07

#46DaysOfMythX D-16 6X10: S.R.819

We back-pedal a bit for this Skinner-centric eepisode, a race against the clock in the vein of F. Emasculata. The story thread introduced here is very interesting – nanotechnology, potentially of alien origin – but it is inexplicably almost not picked up again in the rest of the series! Apart from the return of Krycek and the last appearance of Senator Matheson (unfortunately), the Tunisian connection is probably a hidden reference to Strughold!

6X10: S.R.819


Dec 19, 2017 14:40

#46DaysOfMythX D-15 6X22: Biogenesis / 7X03: The Sixth Extinction / 7X04: The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati

After the second-longest analysis at EatTheCorn, here comes the longest one! After the very conspiratorial/political mythology of the earlier seasons, this next chapter is much more philosophical/spiritual and incredibly refreshing despite it being jarringly different. Story threads from seasons 4 (Black Oil) and 5 (alien origins of mankind) converge and as Mulder & Scully’s beliefs grow closer. And so we enter #TheXFiles’s last season!

6X22: Biogenesis / 7X03: The Sixth Extinction / 7X04: The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati

 

 


Dec 20, 2017 13:25

[French] X-philes francais! La mythologie expliquee en 3 parties – une video basee sur les articles egalement accessibles chez @[351006395090488:274:LVEI – La Vérité Est Ici] – des articles que j’ai utilise pour ma propre analyse disponible en anglais, espagnol et allemand ici: http://www.eatthecorn.com/mytharc-primer/ A partager! Merci @[100001033573206:2048:Bertrand Keufterian]!

 


Dec 20, 2017 18:24

#46DaysOfMythX D-14 7X10: Sein und Zeit / 7X11: Closure

This being the last season of #TheXFiles, it is only normal that the series closes its mysteries chapter after chapter. A stand-alone turning into mythology, many portents accumulate to get Mulder to accept an ironic truth: that Samantha has been dead all along. With Fowley out of the picture too, no burden can come to interrupt Mulder and Scully’s romance anymore. At odds with the rest of the mythology in tone, very spiritual and elegiac, if not in content, with previous promises she’s alive, this is a controversial two-parter of incredible beauty if one is willing to get carried away.

7X10: Sein und Zeit / 7X11: Closure

Some Complementary Season 10 Mythology Elements

Season 11 is less than a month away! Its two-and-a-half mythology episodes promise to be very dense: a lot of plot to go through, a lot of returning and new characters, William, flashbacks, the ungrateful task of attempting to reconcile this new mythology direction with what we considered to be “the truth” in seasons 1-9… and conclude in a cliffhanger for season 12! Season 10’s mythology’s lukewarm reception motivated FOX to downplay the mythology this season, however the new mythology doesn’t sound more welcoming to new fans and still has to convince old fans. Since My Struggle II aired, fans have been trying to connect the dots in the hope that the mythology would make sense, once more — theorizing is a typical x-phile occupation.


Follow and comment the #46DaysOfMythX (FB, t) as we count down to season 11 by reviewing the “classic series” Case Files — and finish transferring material from the old version of EatTheCorn to this modern version!

A shout out to the incredibly ambitious X-Cast Podwatch project, with one hundred 20-minute podcasts covering two episodes at a time released daily (or even more than daily)!


We analyzed in detail the complementary mythology elements in the book “The Real Science Behind The X-Files” by virologist, X-Files science advisor and Chris Carter friend Dr. Anne Simon here.

Carter’s other science advisor, for the second film onwards, is Dr. Margaret Fearon, a medical doctor and microbiologist, and Simon’s friend; the sick boy Christian Fearon in I Want To Believe is named after her.

Simon & Fearon contributed with ideas and suggestions to Chris Carter when writing the season 10 mythology episodes. For their work, they were credited for co-writing the season finale My Struggle II! On February 22 2016, Anne Simon hosted a viewing party for the finale in the University of Maryland, where she works.

What follows is commentary on the behind the scenes info and bits of information that she revealed during the Q&A session that night — long before season 11 was a reality and long before Carter put fingers to laptop to write the My Struggle III script!

The making of My Struggle II

  • About The X-Files returning after so many years, Simon says: “I heard Chris many times saying he would never do it again. I never thought it would come back.
  • Carter asked Simon: “I want you to come up with a way to kill everybody off – everybody except the chosen few“, among whom Scully. Simon: “I was really surprised when he asked me to kill everybody off. Because then who would be the audience? And how would you get out of it?
  • This is the third time she’s been asked something like that in the series [I suppose the other two refer to bees carrying smallpox in 4X21: Zero Sum, and the Black Oil virus itself in Fight the Future]
  • In the beginning there was a misunderstanding: Simon had Scully be the victim. But Carter said no, that alien DNA has “got to be the key“.
  • Simon had the idea of the threat not being an alien virus again, but something that would remove the immune system. She came up with a mechanism to lose one’s ADA gene. Carter was very happy with the idea and kept asking “write a lot more“, “I want more science“. The use of actual science is one of the distinguishing marks of The X-Files.
  • Anne Simon and Margaret Fearon together came up with involving Crisp-Cas9: to have the smallpox vaccine with a second virus that would deliver the DNA that would then deactivate ADA gene. [Simon certainly remembers her own contribution in making the smallpox vaccine a tagging device in 4X01: Herrenvolk; we still don’t know how this new use of the smallpox vaccine articulates with what we learnt before, and why the conspiracy would know how to use this virus from at least the 1970s but then focus on using the Black Oil virus.]
  • How is this activated? Carter wanted it to be chemtrails and aluminum [following recent conspiracy theories]. Simon thought it could be the level of CO2 in the atmosphere, which is rising; Carter didn’t like that idea. [The trigger remains unexplained.]
  • Margaret Fearon came up with the symptoms observed in the first victims, and using anthrax as an example.
  • Simon was helping with My Struggle II at the same time Carter was shooting Babylon. Every day there were pages going back and forth with corrections and suggestions, it was a difficult time for Carter. [This is the actual script; we do not know how far ahead the story was conceived.]
  • Simon says that My Struggle IItakes place 6 weeks after the first episode” [as mentioned in the dialogue]. In My Struggle Ithere are some hints that something is going wrong. So it’s really taking quite a while before thew immune system is starting to go down“, it is “very gradual” [but this connection between the two episodes is never made explicit in the scenarios].

Gillian Anderson calls William, the presumed pilot of the UFO/ARV!

What could come next

  • Carter cut the final 10 pages of the My Struggle II scenario to create that cliffhanger. [We could then say that season 10 and season 11 mythology were conceived as a single story arc, if not in the details then at least in story directions.]
  • Simon knows what happens after “that close encounter” at the end of My Struggle II. [This would mean that the occupants of that craft could be alien, and that the arrival of the UFO/ARV was not something that was added after the first draft in order to create a cliffhanger for next season.]
  • Simon and Fearon had mapped out the science for the next episode [My Struggle III] already.
  • With Scully’s vaccine, we all have alien DNA now. Simon: “could this be what they wanted all along? Maybe this is their plan.” [This gives credence to the theory that the Spartan virus is a ploy and the real objective is to have people vaccinated with Scully’s cure, which will prove to be a biological Trojan horse of some kind. The alternative would be that there are several kinds of aliens, and those would be benevolent towards humans.]
  • About producing the vaccine with Scully’s extra nucleotides on an industrial scale for the whole world: “The idea is that then they would be able to synthesize this. But initially it would require Scully’s blood. That was all worked out. Chris was asking about that, but how long would it take… So where are the last 10 pages?” [Does that mean that a general cure for the entire world’s population is what we will see in My Struggle III and only necessitates 10 pages? This is asking a lot of suspension of disbelief! Scully would presumably get some slight help from the CDC and the WHO — perhaps even from the occupants of that UFO/ARV as well?]
  • Simon wrote more material: “I had a dream kind of thing, where you go back and the Cigarette-Smoking Man takes his first puff, he was really young, I thought it was good. And Chris said no, you cannot do a back in time thing, because he was doing it with Monica and I didn’t realize he was planning on that.” [But then My Struggle III seems to be all about flashbacks to a young CSM! Perhaps Carter kept Simon’s ideas for My Struggle III.]
  • And finally, about My Struggle II and the coherence of the mythology: “I hope people can see how this episode fits in with the mythology. I think it explains a lot. What was the conspiracy? This is the conspiracy. Now, did Chris know that this was the conspiracy? Obviously not because I told him what the conspiracy was — but he knew there was a conspiracy, he just didn’t know what it was.” When she sent ideas, Carter was happy: “Chris could see that it fit what had been done before.” [My Struggle I & II present lots of problems of continuity with earlier episodes: the purpose of the Syndicate, the absence of Colonist aliens, the absence of Black Oil in greys, the credulity of Mulder, the absence of Supersoldiers, the chronology of the Syndicate using the smallpox vaccine to introduce this Spartan virus since the 1970s while spending decades afterwards to find a way to use the Black Oil virus as the trigger of the Apocalypse instead and developing hybrids immune to it, the inconsistency of the CSM’s behavior if he manipulated everybody from 1947, and more. Some of these problems depend on future twists in My Struggle III and so forth, but it is likely that is will not be possible to reconcile everything.]

An otherwise useless zoom-in into Scully’s eye echoing the closing shot of the episode

Would the original conclusion that Simon is referring to actually take place right after what we saw in My Struggle II? How could we switch from a UFO/ARV suddenly appearing and menacing Scully to Scully saving everyone by mass-producing her vaccine, thus cancelling that particular Apocalypse? — until…”could this be what they wanted all along?

Recent season 11 promotional material seems to confirm a theory that started as hearsay mentioned by Jonathan Maberry all the way back to October 2016: that starting from the zoom-in in the first scene in the X-Files office until the zoom-in in the last shot, My Struggle II would be a sort of vision of the future that Scully had. This could be a premonitory dream, a vision given to her by somebody who has psychic powers (spiritual beings, aliens, William?), or a vision projected on her by someone via her implanted chip, which can be tele-operated (e.g. to call her to a specific place, as in 5X13: Patient X) — perhaps so that she would know of the future and act to prevent it. This is not the retconning of Millennium end of season 2 to beginning of season 3 (the viral Apocalypse was actually a local event with low death toll), but it is a way out.

My Struggle I cut scene

The DVD/BluRay (released in June 2016) included some excellent making of documentaries by Julie Ng, whose love for the series shows on every frame! — some additional anecdotes that did not make it in the final edit of the documentaries can be found here and here (originally a feature for X-Files News, it has disappeared there?).

“Our lives are at danger now.” echoes Deep Throat’s “Your lives may be in danger” from 1X01: Deep Throat in the same way the Old Man’s “You’re nearly there. You’re close.” echoed Deep Throat’s “Don’t give up on this one. Trust me. You’ve never been closer.” from 1X23: The Erlenmeyer Flask!

This included a cut scene for My Struggle I. In it, Mulder is waiting to meet the Old informant a second time in the same spot. Instead, he meets who pretends to be the informant’s daughter, who tells Mulder that her father was dead — presumably killed by the conspiracy because he was feeding Mulder with presumably true information. My Struggle I was a very dense episode and this short scene was cut for no other reason than for time; we can thus consider this information as canon (until proven otherwise).

This scene explains why we do not see the Old informant in My Struggle II, something that would have made narrative sense given the important impact of his information on Mulder’s beliefs, and given the informant’s promise of revealing more secrets to Mulder in the future. Instead, this character was of one-time use: Carter introduced him, he told Mulder what he needed to say, served his purpose, and was written out, all of which in the same episode. (Sadly, the actor portraying him, Rance Howard, passed away just days ago, on November 25 2017, making the return of this character impossible without a recast.)

This is one more example of the issues Carter’s recent scripts have with pacing, and Carter’s tendency in most of his post-season 5 mythology episodes to have characters tell the plot and not have Mulder and Scully actually investigate to uncover the truth.


Carter took a bold leap into the unknown by choosing to do a cliffhanger without a guaranteed season 11, which, with two years’ negotiations versus five months for season 10, nearly didn’t happen. Nevertheless, he created an X-Files cliffhanger like no other where everything — characters’ fates, humanity’s survival, the very meaning of the narrative of the mythology that makes the fabric of the show — is up in the air, and got people talking. We will know shortly how, and if, it all comes together!

Social media archive: 2017 (part 8)

Archived from the Eat The Corn Facebook page.


Dec 01, 2017 15:55

Welcome to our 600th member — somebody amongst [redacted], [redacted], or [redacted]! Thank you and keep visiting!


Dec 01, 2017 17:31

#46DaysOfMythX D-33 3X21: Avatar

First of 3 Skinner-centric episodes (with s11: of 4?) that would be a stand-alone if not its connections to the mythology with Skinner’s blackmailing by CSM’s henchman the Grey-Haired Man (introduced in Piper Maru – keep an eye out for these small recurring roles!). Mitch Pileggi meets Amanda Tapping in bed here…they would work again some years later in Stargate Atlantis!

3X21: Avatar


Dec 01, 2017 17:45

#46DaysOfMythX D-33 Part 2: 3X23: Wetwired

A throwback to the “conspiracy is everywhere” feel of seasons 1-2 with this oft-neglected gem of an episode, terrifically directed by Rob Bowman, deliciously paranoid and with some excellent acting by @[952678361446981:274:Gillian Anderson]! Mind control themes similar to “Blood” with a technology twist. First “John Gilnitz” reference: visual effects producer Mat Beck is credited for writing this episode, most likely he did a first pass and the John Gilnitz trio did rewrites. Only negative: Mulder’s too deus ex machina color blindness.

3X23: Wetwired

 


Dec 02, 2017 21:27

#46DaysOfMythX D-32 3X24: Talitha Cumi / 4X01: Herrenvolk

A two-parter that does some extremely important fleshing out of the mythology, but which doesn’t quite gel overall – perhaps Carter was too busy developing Millennium in parallel? Key interesting concepts are introduced: the aliens-as-god concept, the CSM as Mulder’s father, hybrids as slaves, bees carrying viruses, colonization as the end game. By now Carter has a clear idea of where he wants to take his mythology, but there will be many additional layers still along the way. Of note: the use of the smallpox vaccination is provided here as an identifying and cataloguing system, already quite complex biologically – My Struggle II suggests a whole other level of complexity and stretches believability with the Spartan virus being hidden in there too since at least the 1970s!…

3X24: Talitha Cumi / 4X01: Herrenvolk


Dec 03, 2017 19:32

#46DaysOfMythX D-31 (one month remaining!) 4X09: Tunguska / 4X10: Terma

We are in the series’ darkest season and we are in for a rough, black-slimy, muddy ride pairing Mulder and a memorably duplicitous Krycek! An international spy thriller/blockbuster approach mixed with important mythology developments, probably as a result of the mix of sensitivities if Spotnitz and Carter – by now the script for the movie is being drafted and pieces are being put into place for how the mythology should make sense over the next couple of seasons, perhaps unprecedented in XF’s history. The black oil/cancer is really introduced: with alien stuff being used for international biological warfare we are actually not far from season 10’s mythology…

4X09: Tunguska / 4X10: Terma


Dec 04, 2017 17:32

Widespread genetic modifications in order to drive a targeted population or an entire species into extinction, using for example Crispr-Cas9? It’s being researched right now by DARPA (the US military)…

The Guardian: US military agency invests $100m in genetic extinction technologies


Dec 04, 2017 18:50

#46DaysOfMythX D-30 4X07: Musings of a Cigarette-Smoking Man

An episode of dubious “canonicity” – but what a memorable episode it is! Since Morgan & Wong left in s2, the mythology has grown immensely beyond just the games on general ideas and concepts in s1-2… What M&W give here is not only a pastiche of conspiracy theories and meta commentary on how the obsessed X-Files viewer thirsts for more conspiracies – but also a poignant and just psychological profile of the show’s main antagonist. A masters’ lesson in film-making and narration!

4X07: Musings of a Cigarette-Smoking Man


Dec 05, 2017 18:45

#46DaysOfMythX D-29 4X15: Memento Mori

The mythology is now writing itself: the Carter/John/Gill/nitz quartet produce an Emmy-winning script in no time after Darin Morgan says he’s unable to finish the script he would have written for season 4. The “cancer arc” angst begins: #TheXFiles progressively focuses more on the interactions between the lead characters, and less on just “the case”. And this episode should be seen *after* “Never Again”, please, Scully can be a whole character without suffering a terminal cancer thank you!

4X15: Memento Mori


Dec 06, 2017 23:33

#46DaysOfMythX D-28 4X17: Tempus Fugit / 4X18: Max

A return to the mythology of season 1 — military chasing UFOs, alien technology retroengineered in aircraft, and the tragic consequences abduction experiences have on lives of the common folk, Max Fenig and Sharon Graffia — only done with considerably more budget! A great two-parter, totally disconnected from the cancer arc surrounding it, sadly featuring the untimely demise of Agent “maybe Danny” Pendrell…

4X17: Tempus Fugit / 4X18: Max


Dec 07, 2017 21:05

#46DaysOfMythX D-27 4X21: Zero Sum

Carter & Spotnitz’s planning starts paying off in this episode, which gives a feeling of a serialized narration that #TheXFiles only rarely did (early season 2, season 8). Written by Spotnitz and Howard Gordon (unfortunately, his last XF!). The bees, smallpox and Syndicate are connected. The focus is on Skinner and his deal with the devil/CSM — M&S are minor players, the mythology now has enough secondary characters to fuel entire storylines with their motivations and alliances.

4X21: Zero Sum


Dec 07, 2017 21:40

Meanwhile, #TheXFiles season 11 is preparing to shoot its last episode. Prepare for a cliffhanger and undetermined period for negotiations for a potential season 12!
Anne Simon: “Earlier tweet about #XFiles cliffhanger based on CC saying that he was going to have one. So why not make it good one & hope/pray for happy resolution? Just like end of S10, cliffhanger means MORE likely future movie/seasons.”

 


Dec 08, 2017 19:11

#46DaysOfMythX D-26 4X23: Demons

A masterful episode for Mulder’s characterization — is any of his visions real or his own mind’s creations? — and for the visuals — the flashes are an evolution of the considerable work Ten Thirteen did to establish an original visual identity for Frank Black’s visions in Millennium. Written by producer Bob Goodwin, the episode could be revealing the Mulders’ and the CSM’s debate about who should be abducted, Fox or Samantha, and who their father really is. As this seed of doubt about his identity is planted, we move towards the end of this traumatic season and the story arc around Mulder’s rejection of everything extraterrestrial.

4X23: Demons


Dec 09, 2017 22:05

#46DaysOfMythX D-25 4X24: Gethsemane / 5X02: Redux / 5X03: Redux II

Carter likes to do variations on themes and season 10 is surely a variation of these episodes, where Mulder has a crisis of faith regarding his life’s quest in extraterrestrial life – which was already barely credible. Carter knew that firm answers were coming with the movie in one season’s time, and this was his last credible opportunity to present the theory that everything we’ve seen was the doings of a humans-only conspiracy! Big ideas, the apex of the carterian purple prose monologues, the return of characters unseen since the Pilot, a complete re-reading of modern American history since World War II, but also scenes that were the most soap-operatic #TheXFiles had done (at the time), all these make this trilogy an epic synthesis of the science/paranormal/religious themes underlying the series.

4X24: Gethsemane / 5X02: Redux / 5X03: Redux II

 


Dec 10, 2017 13:41

#46DaysOfMythX D-24 5X05: Christmas Carol / 5X07: Emily

A character study that turns mythology mid-way through. Even with hindsight though, it’s really difficult to reconcile with what type of hybridization we are seeing here, possibly a one-of-a-kind experiment. With the movie fast approaching, these episodes had an unexpected experimental approach and an elegiac feel to accompany Saint Scully’s endless suffering…

5X05: Christmas Carol / 5X07: Emily