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  • X-Files: Fight the Future, The

  • X-Men

    		•

    FILMS

    The X-Files
    Fight the Future (1998)
  • Starring David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, John Neville, William B. Davis, Martin Landau, Mitch Pileggi, Terry O'Quinn, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Dean Haglund, Bruce Harwood, Tom Braidwood

  • Directed by Rob Bowman

    • I've had a long-running love/hate relationship with The X-Files. I got into the television show late in the first season (or was it early in the second?) and by "got into" I mean I became a heavy-duty fan with rabid Pavlovian dog-like tendencies.

    At 7:30 p.m. every Sunday (this, obviously, was after the timeslot change from Friday to Sunday, duh) I'd have a medium-paced drool working. By 8:30 p.m., I was working on a good lather. By the time the digital clock on my VCR click over to 9:00 p.m., I was frothing at the mouth and ready to chase my own tail in overeager anticipation to find out this week's lesson on who we were not to Trust.

    My transformation was complete.

    But I won't apologize for it. I was a raging fanboy who later roomed with a raging fanboy friend. It was great. Sometimes we didn't even have to talk about the show. We'd just sit around together and think about the show. Mmmmmm....Gillian. She was our goddess. And Mulder was our Everyman Hero fighting the good fight and refusing to give up until he discovered the Truth that was Out There. (Please note that I use the actress's real name, because she's a real person. Mulder is just a character, thankyouverymuch.)

    This went on for a few years until the movie came out. At the time of its release I had absolutely no critical faculties with which to judge the film. Is it the X-Files? OK, then. It must be good. Simple as pie.

    Since then my opinions have become much more tempered with regards to the show.

    The X-Files movie came out and in the fall I continued to watch the television show with great interest. The following year I missed a few episodes. I don't know, there were other more important things to do. Two seasons ago I couldn't really care if it was on TV. I haven't seen a single episode of this past (and what appears to be it's final) season.

    For two-and-a-half to three years I've been incredibly angry with the writing on the X-Files. Many people argue that it was Duchovny's fault for various things (moving and then leaving), or that Anderson hasn't been putting forth 100% because she wants out of her contract with the show. Whatever. The fact of the matter is: most of the scripts are crap. Actually, let me qualify that....

    Much of the premise of The X-Files resolves around episodic shows that offer only a modicum of resolution. For a single episode, the story wraps up. But Carter and Co. have a nasty and loathsome ability, time and again, to hand over false endings. Someone's dead? Nope, they're really not. Something serious happened? Not really, it was all a scam. You thought this guy was a good guy? Nope, he's a bad guy. All that crazy shit that happened last year? A complete lie.

    Nothing on the show is what it seems. Normally, I'd say that's a good thing. Mystery intrigues people. When it's done correctly. And The X-Files did it superbly for the better part of six seasons. That's a juggling time to juggle so many plot threads. After a while, however, the audience needs something firm to hold onto. Anything. They need assurance that next week's episode won't turn the whole world upside down again. Or if does, it's OK, because we've got our feet firmly planted on a solid piece of story that is immutable.

    The creators and the writers of The X-Files are like the main event at the circus. They wow people and draw a crowd at their amazing feats. And then they realize that what they're doing is pretty damn incredible and become infatuated with their own tricks, never realizing that the audience has grown bored and left. They're still juggling. Under the big top. But at this late date, no one cares if the clown drops the ball.

    OK, so maybe that metaphor is a little thick and unnecessary. But you get the point.

    I've gone from Love to Blah to Hate, back to Blah. I was given the Season One DVD box set as a wedding gift from a friend. I've recently watched the entire thing and I remembered how good the show is. I miss my old Sunday-night friend.

    And Gillian. Mmmmm ... Gillian.

    ...

    Huh? Oh. Yeah. Sorry. Was distracted for a moment.

    Which brings us to the movie.

    The X-Files movie, subtitled Fight the Future (or is that just a tagline? Who knows.), is definitely problematic. But I like it. I can overlook its faults because, at heart, it's an enjoyable adventure story starring two characters that I've watched do a lot of adventuring. And I like to watch them together, despite the fact that their creator is a melonhead.

    (Fair spoiler warning: Stop reading if you don't want to know the plot of the film.)

    The film can be frustrating because it advances plotlines, only to take back those very same advances at the beginning of the season that followed the film. (As you can see, it's difficult for me to discuss the film separate from the television series.) I suppose as an entity on its own, the story makes sense and works, for the most part. But I'm not watching it as a stand-alone movie. It's part of an ongoing story.

    Mulder and Scully almost kiss. For all intents and purposes, they did. It's not really important that their lips never touch. Which is disappointing because this is not directly referenced in the following episodes, if ever. (As I said earlier, I stopped watching.) Or if it is referenced, it's done so long after the moment that it's rendered irrelevant. It's almost like it never happened. The black-oil, colonization storyline is advanced in the film, but not really. Apparently the version in the film (if I'm understanding it correctly) was a mutation of the regular TV-version black-oil. So, again. They take it back. We see a spaceship, but Scully doesn't get to see it. So it's almost as if it hasn't happened. Mulder believes that the spaceships are Out There and Up There. It doesn't matter if he has proof or not, he already believes. Scully's the one that needs to see them. But, of course, she doesn't. Creator Chris Carter needs to keep her as the skeptic.

    Chris Carter is the monster behind this all. He and George Lucas are very similar, in that, they are good "idea guys," but their writing is horrible. They come up with interesting worlds and people to inhabit them. They have a good notion of what the idea behind the show or movie should be. That's where they should stop. They should hand the actual writing and directing over to more capable hands. Carter worked on X-Files, Millennium and Harsh Realm. All good ideas. (I know Carter didn't create Harsh Realm, but that's not important at the moment.) But the more Carter worked on any one of those, the worse they became. Case in point: he shifted his focus away from Millennium during Season Two, handing the baton off to James Morgan and Glen Wong, who promptly made Season Two of Millennium memorable and fantastic.

    But the movie is good. It's watchable and fun. Scully cries "Mulder!" over 150 times. Mulder does likewise with "Scully!"

    But it's good. It's tender when it needs to be, and exciting everywhere else. The best line of the film is when Mulder tells Scully (right before the horrid bee-sting plot device) that she's kept him honest and that he can't continue his quest without her. I like that. They're relationship is so much more intimate than most people can achieve during 50 years of marriage that, at this point, getting nekked would be redundant.

    But I sigh with regret as I consider the tragedy of a show that was so shiny and wonderful and which eventually got tarnished and pooped on.

    I will buy the entire series on DVD. I will watch the entire run of the show. Front to back, end to end.

    But it'll be done at my convenience, without commercial breaks.