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klimov wrote:Yeah, Tim, I used to love this show when I was 13. Hence the shock and the question: was it always this atrocious?
I don't know if I'd say atrocious is the right word, but I was never a die hard fan. As has been said it was spotty at best. The first two seasons were probably the most solid and then it just started to get silly with the mythology. I think I stopped watching completely somewhere after the first movie.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

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My wife and I began watching the series from the start about 4 1/2 years ago; I'd only ever seen the random episode and I think she was completely cold. "Spotty" is exactly the right word — you'd have an extremely solid episode surrounded three deep by some utter clunkers.

The X Files was ahead of its time in more ways than one — as I've said before, it's too bad it didn't premiere in the era of 12- or 13-episode seasons. Instead, it had to slog its way through a primetime network schedule and pump out 22-25 episodes a year — and very often the writers plainly were scraping the bottom of the barrel.

We stopped watching after season 3, and although I occasionally restart it on Netflix it struggles to keep my attention.
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

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O-dot wrote:My wife and I began watching the series from the start about 4 1/2 years ago; I'd only ever seen the random episode and I think she was completely cold. "Spotty" is exactly the right word — you'd have an extremely solid episode surrounded three deep by some utter clunkers.

The X Files was ahead of its time in more ways than one — as I've said before, it's too bad it didn't premiere in the era of 12- or 13-episode seasons. Instead, it had to slog its way through a primetime network schedule and pump out 22-25 episodes a year — and very often the writers plainly were scraping the bottom of the barrel.

We stopped watching after season 3, and although I occasionally restart it on Netflix it struggles to keep my attention.
Well said, they helped launch a lot of the quality genre t.v. we enjoy today but the old model of cranking out that many episodes was way too much for a show like this. I thought it generally trended upward through the fifth season and the first film, which remains pretty stellar, but then trended down promptly after that. And I'm not a super fan, but I am having fun watching it with my kids.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

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watched the first two episodes last night. we dove right in with a mythology episode, then had a "monster of the week" episode. everything felt like the x-files to me. like it had never ended. not sure what you guys were expecting. yes, there has been some phenomenal TV since the original x-files went off the air, and i supposed the possibility existed that they could have learned from what worked there, but i think you give them too much credit. it was again, to me, exactly what it always was (with the exception of the last couple seasons when duchovny left). there are moments of greatness surrounded by almost confounding "ok-ness" at best.

specifically, mchale playing the "alex jones" character was pretty good. the 2-minute exposition toward the end, giving the 100k-foot view of the over-arching conspiracy, felt like where mulder would have ended up, thought-wise, and definitely played like they were reading from infowars. duchovny to me looks like he's really sleepwalking through this. seems very disinterested. gillian is upsettingly skinny, which accents the oddness of the work she's had done. i can't put my finger on it, but her face is just... long now. skinner looks essentially the same - must have been the masked magician doing his magic on him. cigarette smoking man, toking through the trach was sufficiently creepy. my main concern is with as few episodes as he has to work with, carter is going to do more "cramming" of the mythos into episodes and we'll end up with more things like the back half of the first one, which i guess you all hated, as he's trying to make up for that second film, and this season will kind of sour everyone on the entire thing even more, and we'll be done with the x-files. this would be too bad, as there is no shortage of oddness and creepiness in today's world, let alone conspiracy theories. even if this season ends with mulder & scully "walking away" for the last time and some new blood wanting to "continue their work", that might be the best possible outcome. they could make the occasional cameo, carter could hand it off to someone else to work with (ala lucas) and we may end up with a great show. but, doubt any of that is going to happen.

we'll always have the 2-episode "duane barry" arc.

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btw, one of the most hilarious things to me in the original series was how often scully says "mulder" when talking. how many times do real people say each other's names when talking? it's crazy. so i decided to keep track. in both episodes, she said "mulder" 18 times. hilarious. hey, at least she's consistent.

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TC wrote:my main concern is with as few episodes as he has to work with, carter is going to do more "cramming" of the mythos into episodes and we'll end up with more things like the back half of the first one, which i guess you all hated, as he's trying to make up for that second film, and this season will kind of sour everyone on the entire thing even more, and we'll be done with the x-files.
Very much this. Trying to re-tell, re-create and expand on an entire mythos within six episodes seems like a dumb idea, to be honest.

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They tried to backfill Mulder and Scully once, I never want to see that again.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

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yeah, that's fair. i'm just saying the idea has plenty more to say and these two are clearly done with it.

tonight's episode is supposed to be "hilarious". great, yeah - that's what this show needs. comedy. when you have 23 episodes to fill, fine. 6? this is a bad idea.

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TC wrote:tonight's episode is supposed to be "hilarious". great, yeah - that's what this show needs. comedy. when you have 23 episodes to fill, fine. 6? this is a bad idea.
They should have taken a page from Lynch and the new Peaks and made it one overall story and just split it up into six episodes. As you said, they're acting like this is a regular series and pissing away screen time.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

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Tonight's was a Darin Morgan Special, if you don't know what those are then you're not a fan, and this was a phenomenal entry into that particular sub genre. Loved every second of it.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

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I finally watched the first three episodes of this. Gods, those first two episodes were horrible, especially the first one. Pretty much everything I disliked about the X-Files originally. The third episode was good. So I guess at the end of the day the show is pretty much as it always has been. Some total crap and some good stuff. That said, I still say with only six episodes it would have been smarter to do one overall story. Unless they were rolling the dice that it'd be so popular it'd get more episodes later. Which given the ratings seems likely.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

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skinner looks essentially the same - must have been the masked magician doing his magic on him.
:roflmao:
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

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darkness wrote:it would have been smarter to do one overall story
this. but it seems the other people here that like the x-files prefer the "monster of the week" over the mythology, so what would he have done with one overall story? that's the thing - i think carter likes the idea of the x-files more than he actually has an idea.

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TC wrote:i think carter likes the idea of the x-files more than he actually has an idea.
This may be the truest thing ever said about the X-Files.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

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Very well said. I was always more of a mythology guy myself, until of course that went to shit. Actually with such a short run I think monster of the week is the way to go here. Fan reaction to the first episode kind of bears that out, although I liked it fine.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

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Well that third one sure was something. It started of kinda weak but I was on board the second I saw Rhys Darby sitting in that porta potti. From then on, they just went to town and had fun with it. Liked that.

Still can't figure out what they want to do with these six episodes though. So far we have a terrible first episode that tried to get rid of the entire mythos. Then a monster-of-the-week episode that felt like your average X-files episode. Then this one.

Weird.

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Trash Man was fine, but all the Scully Mom shit? What the hell? Just really turgid and slow.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."