Tuesday, March 22, 2016

Saturday, March 12, 2016

So, In The End, Was Season Ten Worth It?

Having watched six episodes of what was essentially a greatest hits recap of everything the X-Files was back in the 1990s, was it worth it?

In some ways, it was refreshing to see the characters Mulder and Scully, having aged and matured and coping with how their lives turned out. It was fun seeing Duchovny and Anderson jump back into their roles with a sense of wry bemusement and savvy.

We got at least a handful of well-crafted episodes in "Founder's Mutation" and "Mulder and Scully Meet the Were-Monster," that harked back to the best of the Monster of the Week episodes. In a televised world where such Puzzle shows involving the unknown are common-place - LOST, Supernatural, the Arrow/Flash 'verse, Grimm, a slew of other fantasy series - it was fun seeing the originals do it and do it well.

On the other hand, we got yet another round of realizing that Chris Carter really didn't know what to do with his Mytharc surrounding the threat of aliens and sinister government conspiracies. All we got were the opener and closer of the season - "My Struggle Parts I and II" - which both felt like shortened, rushed endeavors that merely threw plot ideas out there but never delved into them. In a longer season, one with 22-24 episodes with at least one Mytharc tale every fifth episode, there was perhaps more room to flesh things out, introduce a plot twist or two, a sense of foreshadowing or something.

There wasn't enough sense of mystery involving the Mytharc this time.

The way the season ended - a cliffhanger of the nation dying of a triggered plague, with a UFO showing up over Mulder and Scully on a crowded bridge - certainly invites FOX - or any other network - to bring back the series for a Season Eleven with more episodes to give the plots room to impress.

But I hope to God it means someone putting Carter on a leash and whacking him with a nun's ruler enough times for him to plot out something f-cking coherent again. When he painted himself into a corner with that whole shapeshifter civil war thing, that got sad...