Do-do-do-do-do-doooo

[sabotabby]

I saw the X-Files movie with utterly no expectations. I don't know if a lot of you know this, but I was—surprise!—completely obsessed with the X-Files when it was on the air, right up until it really went downhill and my eyes were starting to hurt from rolling so often.


Anyway, this movie was even worse than the other one, which is a pretty big accomplishment. And given that it had three significant female characters, one of whom is sort of classic for breaking all sorts of TV conventions*, it completely failed the Bechdel Test. Le sigh.

So I liked the little Bush joke, because I'm predictable, and I liked that even though they were doin' it, they still called each other by their last names.

Otherwise, though, who cares? We need another movie about a gay serial killer?

It also drummed into my head how much better TV writing has gotten since I was a kid. At the time, the only show I knew of that had long-running, interesting, weird stories was Twin Peaks—long off the air by the time I was old enough to appreciate it. I was willing to put up with all sorts of silliness to see stories with some sort of intelligent commentary (though, granted, of a subtly libertarian bent—keep in mind that I was a teenager, and also mostly rooting for the bad guys). But looking back, it was pretty terribly written. The movie's like that—all of this cringeworthy dialogue about faith and belief.

Yawn. Also, gay marriage in Massachusetts will result in Russians cutting off your body parts and grafting them on to—uh, what were they trying to do anyway?

* Yes, I wanted to be Scully when I was 17.

Comments

Re: Well, Hell ...

[sabotabby]

It was a bad relationship. I knew I'd be consistently disappointed, but I kept coming back for more. Then again, I really wanted it to end with Mulder and Scully caving and just joining the dark side, so I was never going to get the resolution I wanted.

Also, icon! Hee hee hee. I will probably never read Twilight but between you and cleolinda I think I pretty much know what goes down, and ZOMGWTFFOUNTAINOFBLOOD!

Re: Well, Hell ...

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

Did you ever see, I think it was rachelmanija's post on Tell Me Why the X-Files Sucked at the End? OH SO MUCH BAD BREAKUP MOJO IN THOSE COMMENTS.

Yes, this icon is the one I liked best -- there are dozens now, more and more multiplying all the time -- FOUNTAIN OF BLOOD, BROKEN PELVIS, BROKEN RIBS, BROKEN _SPINE_ NOTHNXBAI. Jesus.

Re: Well, Hell ...

[sabotabby]

I need to see it! Can you link?

Actually, one of my best friends and I met through a mutual X-Files obsession, so I'll always love it for that. But I remember when we were breaking up with it and we'd e-mail each other and complain about the latest WTF.

Re: Well, Hell ...

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

FOUND IT -- had to look in the memories, not the tags. http://rachelmanija.livejournal.com/406594.html

Man, by the time it ended, nobody even wanted to hear bitching about it anymore. "That's STILL on? Why are you STILL watching it?" and I'd be all "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND OURS WAS A SPARKLY LOVE."

Re: Well, Hell ...

[sabotabby]

"When I first met you, there was no one else like you. You were smart and stylish and exciting, and I met tons of cool people because of you. It was so good for so long, but then you completely changed. Love turned to hate, you stole my VCR, I locked a haddock in your security deposit box, and we ended up hiring lawyers to say terrible things about each other. I'm still so bitter about the whole thing that I leave the room if I ever hear your name."

QUOTED FOR TRUTH.

'Scully's pregnant! It's an alien! It's Mulder's! No, the timeline is wrong for it to be Mulder's! S

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

TRUE.FUCKING.STORY.

I also thought (skimming threads again) this person summed it up nicely -- XF was one of the first things I was truly die-hard fannish about, even if it was mostly by myself and I wasn't online for about 8/10 of it, and you kind of get burnt that badly only once.

OTOH the person who wrote the "M-A-R-Y Sue Reyes!" Bring It On cheer parody (cheer-arody?) is cracking me up! Again!

Re: 'Scully's pregnant! It's an alien! It's Mulder's! No, the timeline is wrong for it to be Mulder'

[sabotabby]

True. I had fannish obsessions before, but it doesn't count being a kid and obsessing over the original series of Star Trek or Old Skool Who when they had both gone off the air before I was born.

The peak of my X-Files obsession also happened around '97 when I was just discovering the internets and making internet friends. So I also associate it with a really kickass community that occasionally wrote much better stories for that universe than Carter did.

Re: 'Scully's pregnant! It's an alien! It's Mulder's! No, the timeline is wrong for it to be Mulder'

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I actually watched the first ep when it was first broadcast (COUGH CREAK TAP CANE) (some friends of mine who were into Crystals and Aliens, in NM, no rly, were into it. They quickly were disillusioned) and got really involved with the TNT blocks and Thanksgiving Day marathons (I so wish they still did those....sigh), but I didn't know that many IRL people, other than T, who were as crazy about it as I was, and altho I got online in about.... //squints 1995, 1996, I didn't have any kind of a blog til about 2000, and I didn't have any idea of the TON of fannish activity going on til I got on LJ -- in fact one big reason I got on LJ was all the Buffy discussion and fanfic and icons and analysis and stuff. So my online fannish experience is much more tied up with LJ and the Whedonverse -- I totally missed the website fanfic archives and mailing lists and stuff (altho I was on a couple of b5 mailing lists that collected JMS's UseNet postings).

WELL I'M SURE ALL THAT WAS ABSOLUTELY FASCINATING. Anyway, I don't even know if you could have an experience _like_ that one anymore -- what with _all_ the LJ communities and message boards and fans and it basically being impossible to keep a lot of huge plot developments secret. It'll be interesting to see how the last season of Lost winds up -- a big problem with X-Files was they did try to keep going after everyone's contracts were up, just as if it were a franchise, and it was so dependent on the chemistry of the leads that just absolutely flopped. Altho it is interesting US TV is sort of drifting towards shows with limited episodes and much more structured storylines -- the driving force utterly used to be syndication, and you celebrated the 100th episode mark because that meant everyone would get a cut of the profits from reruns. Now it's much more about people mainlining DVDs over the course of a weekend or something, and that REALLY exposes storyline plotholes. (XF in particular was really bad at jumping from tragedy one week to broad farce the next.)

(argh, I shall shutup now.)

Re: 'Scully's pregnant! It's an alien! It's Mulder's! No, the timeline is wrong for it to be Mulder'

[sabotabby]

I like the structure they (theoretically) had going with Veronica Mars and Heroes—long, complicated storylines and some unanswered questions, but the major mystery wrapped up in a season.

(XF in particular was really bad at jumping from tragedy one week to broad farce the next.)

Brady Bunch. Dead Lone Gunmen. Or was it the other way around? At any rate, it was horrible.

Re: 'Scully's pregnant! It's an alien! It's Mulder's! No, the timeline is wrong for it to be Mulder'

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

I didn't see VMars (too soon after Buffy, I WAS GRIEVING OKAY) but the Heroes S1 storyline was pretty good (reservations about gender/race issues aside) -- I thought they really fluffed S2 just in terms of plot and momentum (EVEN MORE reservations about gender/race issues aside), tho. It'll be interesting to see where they go with S3, esp w/ the v vocal fannish criticism and the abbreviated S2. The spoilers I've heard sound pretty stupid.

Re: 'Scully's pregnant! It's an alien! It's Mulder's! No, the timeline is wrong for it to be Mulder'

[sabotabby]

First season of VMars is worth watching. The second one, less so, but it has its moments. The third one lost me three episodes in with a deeply misogynistic storyline that apparently got even worse, and sidelining all the POC, including pretty, pretty Francis Capra. But structurally, the first two seasons were great. There was one major mystery, and then each episode had two other subplots. You couldn't really get into it without watching it in sequence and from the beginning, but the writing was good enough that I was willing to do that.

Heroes has skanky gender/race issues and S2 was ridiculous. But again, I liked how they structured the first season.

Re: 'Scully's pregnant! It's an alien! It's Mulder's! No, the timeline is wrong for it to be Mulder'

[sabotabby]

Also, this thread is so good. I forgot all about I'm not a psychologist.

Re: 'Scully's pregnant! It's an alien! It's Mulder's! No, the timeline is wrong for it to be Mulder'

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

I KNOW
I
KNOW

SO DID I

Man I love how you keep seeing little tidal rushes of MORE fan rage, like "Here from metafandom/my flist/friends-of-friends/a link and I JUST HAVE TO SAY...."