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[dralla]

As a huge fan of the show, the first episode was a real bummer. It's really hard to pinpoint one specific thing, it was all a bit of a mess. I think a lot of it has to do with it only being six episodes so they have to cram as much into one episode as possible. The writing was pretty bad, Mulder's dialogue specifically. The preview for the next episodes look much better. The myth episodes have gotten out of control and it looks like they decided not to scale it back at all. Seriously, let the cigarette man go, that character has run its course. No need to re-tread old material for the sake of fan service.

 

[The Elite]

From what I remember on my rewatch, there were quite a few different alien races.

Greys, a race of aliens with mysterious ties to the planet Earth and its history. These aliens are sometimes also referred as Reticulians for their supposed planet of origin, Reticulum, although abductee Cassandra Spender implied the importance of the constellation Cassiopeia to their origin. The greys include the colonists, although not every grey appears dedicated to colonizing Earth. Note that long-clawed aliens appear to be just a different stage in the life cycle of a grey. In recent decades, some of the greys attempted to recolonize Earth after an ice age forced them to leave; it is stated that they arrived here "millions of years ago" and "walked the Earth before the dinosaurs" in one form or another. Greys in their early stages of life look like yellow and green muscular humanoids with reptile like skin, clawed hands, large black eyes, slits for a nose and a mouth full of sharp teeth. After exposure to immense heat, they transform into an adult grey, which is about the size of a human child, whereas the immature form of a grey is as big as an adult human. They retain most features of the immature version except they lack muscular bodies, green and yellow reptile-like skin, sharp teeth and claws on their hands. Instead, they have frail bodies that are smoother and grey in color with larger heads in proportion to the rest of their bodies.

Faceless aliens and alien bounty hunters, shapeshifting aliens who may be greys themselves. Faceless aliens are free of the black oil (see below) and have mutilated themselves, sealing all openings in their faces, to prevent it from infecting them.
Purity (also referred to as "black oil" or "black cancer") is an intelligent alien virus that is the "life force" of the colonists. The virus can enter a human body to control it, up to and including control of the host's fine motor functions and speech that can deceive even those closest to the host, and can also emit lethal levels of radiation from the host's body when the alien intelligence chooses to do so, which does not appear to harm the host. Under different circumstances, the virus can incapacitate the human host and incubate an immature grey (a long-clawed alien) inside its body.

Kindred: The Kindred look and act like a group of separatist religious such as the Amish, but it is implied they are really gender-changing aliens. They apparently lived on Earth until Mulder and Scully learned too much about them, causing them to flee, leaving strange indentations in corn fields that resemble the outline of flying saucers.

Martians: Martians are gas based lifeforms native to Mars. They can travel in space without ships and are able to possess other creatures such as humans. Besides their gaseous bodies, they have faces that look like twisted human faces, which they can even form when possessing a human. They are known to sabotage human space flights, and one possessed Marcus Aurelius Belt during a space mission when he was an astronaut. However, Marcus managed to throw himself out a window, killing himself and the Martian.

http://x-files.wikia.com/wiki/Alien

You can pretty much ignore the Martians and Kindred in respect to the mythology.

The Greys are the Shapeshifters. Even this wiki doesn't know for sure but it was established on the show.

I am not sure if "Purity" was actually the life force as suggested either. I think it was its own entity. That's why the colonists/shapeshifters tried sowing their faces to keep it out.

 

[liquidtmd]

I mean seriously I laughed out loud when Cigarette Smoking Man was shown.

He got pushed down the stairs. He was diagnosed with Cancer 10+ years ago. He was shown getting blown to fuck by multiple air to ground missles. And...

'Oh hey it's cigarette smoking man'

Chris Carter - I love you and all but seriously...fuck you.

 

[Siegcram]

It's a Chris Carter mythology episode. All the critics who panned this say it gets better in the next two episodes. Some suggest the third is a classic.

Obviously, it's a Morgan episode. Those are all classics.

 

[wesleyshark]

Gah I loved this episode. Felt like classic XFILES!

 

[VICI0US]

I mean seriously I laughed out loud when Cigarette Smoking Man was shown.

He got pushed down the stairs. He was diagnosed with Cancer 10+ years ago. He was shown getting blown to fuck by multiple air to ground missles. And...

'Oh hey it's cigarette smoking man'

Chris Carter - I love you and all but seriously...fuck you.

we saw multiple clones of mulder's sister in her adult form.

we saw a syndicate colony manned by clones of mulder's sister and other children

the eve program..

we've seen beings who can take on anyone's physical likeness

we've seen beings regenerate their entire body from nothing more than a single almost-indestructible vertibrae

the CSM, at one point, held in his hands a CD containing the key to cures for every ailment known to man.

he also injected himself with hybrid DNA near the end.

there are any number of answers for why he could still be around.

 

[BattleMonkey]

The episode seemed kinda pointless if they are going MOTW and only 6 eps long anyways. Whats point of setting up this big new "plot" to just ignore it for a series thats going to be done quick and not have a conclusion?

 

[pel1300]

god that was a borefest.

I know X-files, by today's standards(the golden age of TV), is pretty dated and cheesy....but...I really had hopes this would be a more modernized version of The X-files, something that would be of the same calibur of today's great shows like Game of Thrones, House of Cards, Breaking Bad, etc.

It was just awful...the show hasn't evolved AT ALL since the 90s...the acting was wooden...the wholething just lacked that spark that today's shows have.

 

[The Elite]

The episode seemed kinda pointless if they are going MOTW and only 6 eps long anyways. Whats point of setting up this big new "plot" to just ignore it for a series thats going to be done quick and not have a conclusion?

The finale will be mythology as well and I wouldn't be surprised if one of the episodes in between turns out to be more mythology than is advertised as well.

 

[Fei]

I know X-files, by today's standards(the golden age of TV), is pretty dated and cheesy....but...I really had hopes this would be a more modernized version of The X-files, something that would be of the same calibur of today's great shows like Game of Thrones, House of Cards, Breaking Bad, etc

The OG X Files was certainly on par with today's greats. I hope this new mini-series doesn't warp our perception of the original's greatness. Last night was disappointing, but I'll be watching tonight.

 

[Siegcram]

Season 1-3 of the X-Files shits all over Game of Thrones and House of Cards from great heights.

 

[pel1300]

Season 1-3 of the X-Files shits all over Game of Thrones and House of Cards from great heights.

nostalgia glasses

s1-4 of GOT and S1-2 HoC shits all over X-Files s1-3.

 

[Real Hero]

Game of Thrones and House Cards are not even close to the best shows on currently. X files at its best (Home, Jose Chung's From Outer Space etc) was absolutely as good those shows.

 

[strafer]

Both Game of Thrones and House of Cards are terrible shows in my opinion.

Doesn't hold a candle to X-Files.

 

[streetsahead123]

Game of Thrones and House Cards are not even close to the best shows on currently. X files at its best (Home, Jose Chung's From Outer Space etc) were fabulously as good those shows.

Cannot RT this enough

 

[The Elite]

nostalgia glasses

s1-4 of GOT and S1-2 HoC shits all over X-Files s1-3.

I just watched a lot of the show recently. I would say Game of Thrones has a stronger first few seasons but I think X-Files is better than what HoC delivers.

Also, when X-Files is at its best it is untouchable.

 

[liquidtmd]

nostalgia glasses

s1-4 of GOT and S1-2 HoC shits all over X-Files s1-3.

Silly Wang waving contests.

What I will say about the early X-Files...it has the strength any truly classic show has. Strip away the legion of well groomed background staff. Strip away multi location expensive shots. Strip away fancy CGI creatures. Strip away huge budgets. Strip away big melodrama...

Some of its best moments and fine television drama were just two actors in a dark room / basement / someones backyard woods just talking. With good chemistry, dialogue and direction. Thats all you need. Thats why I'm really pinning my hopes on the MOTW episode to bring that to the fore

 

[streetsahead123]

S1-2 of House of Cards shits all over almost nothing

 

[SArcher]

Lllooovvvved it. The show still totally works.

 

[pel1300]

S1-2 of House of Cards shits all over almost nothing

lol..Sure buddy. Credibility shot.

 

[Extra Sauce]

I doubt that all the aliens that were encountered were entirely benevolent. I am sure some of them did, in fact, work with the syndicate. At least, I hope that is revealed in time.

The key falsehood "My Struggle" proposes seems to be that the syndicate orchestrated the invasion, allowed Mulder to think it was happening ("The Truth"), in order to subdue his quest for the truth. That truth being that the syndicate, or whomever was in charge after the original group was killed, had designs on using alien technology to institute their own nefarious take over of the world.

This solves two problems. First it dances around the issue of the December 21st, 2012 invasion date that was previously set in stone. It's now more of a soft launch for whatever the shadow government is planning. Second, it allows Chris Carter to adapt the show to the current post-September 11th sociopolitical environment that is fearful of government spying, corruption and war-mongering in a way it never was before.

Carter was a bit clumsy in the execution, and he needed a two hour premiere, but I think the episode does solve the above problems. The show is now designed to play on current fears but without dismissing its supernatural roots. It's a very well thought out design.

This man gets it.

 

[Octavianus]

First episode was alright I guess... Nothing great, but as far as Carter episodes go it wasn't one of his worst.

I know X-files, by today's standards(the golden age of TV), is pretty dated and cheesy....but...I really had hopes this would be a more modernized version of The X-files, something that would be of the same calibur of today's great shows like Game of Thrones, .

I'm really glad it's nothing like GoT.
GoT is the epitomy of everything I dislike about modern tv. The acting is 'hollywood' wooden, the story progresses at a snails pace and gets bogged down by irrelevant badly written side stories.

Also, The golden age of tv was over a decade ago with shows like Rome, Deadwood and Carnivàle.

 

[streetsahead123]

It kind of boggles my mind that the episode wasn't universally hated. The writing was SO lazy. Mulder throws away everything he's believed for decades over pretty much nothing. We get no sense of the current dynamic between Mulder and Scully. The new characters weren't fleshed out at all and weren't used well at all. The plot was total nonsense and it ignored a good portion of the show and if it's setting up for another "twist" that there actually ARE aliens, that's somehow even worse/lazier. And the dialogue itself was atrocious. "You want so badly to believe!" Ugh, so bad.

 

[pel1300]

First episode was alright I guess... Nothing great, but as far as Carter episodes go it wasn't one of his worst.

I'm really glad it's nothing like GoT.
GoT is the epitomy of everything I dislike about modern tv. The acting is 'hollywood' wooden, the story progresses at a snails pace and gets bogged down by irrelevant badly written side stories.

Also, The golden age of tv was over a decade ago with shows like Rome, Deadwood and Carnivàle.

You think Rome is beter than Game of Thrones?

LOL....

Your criticisms of GoT only apply to the later seasons.

Any please, elaborate on this "wooden Hollywood" acting you speak of in today;s tv shows?

This latest X-Files episode had some pretty fkn wooden acting. Don't even think about comparing it to the likes of Peter Dinklage in GoT.

GoT is the victim of commercial backlash. If I wrote these posts 3 years ago, no one would respond with "GoT?!??! LOL terrible wooden acting, pointless sideplots, blahblahblah"

 

[Octavianus]

You think Rome is beter than Game of Thrones?

LOL....

Your criticisms of GoT only apply to the later seasons.

Any please, elaborate on this "wooden Hollywood" acting you speak of in today;s tv shows?

This latest X-Files episode had some pretty fkn wooden acting. Don't even think about comparing it to the likes of Peter Dinklage in GoT.

Haha, sorry. Not sure why I even bothered. Have fun with your dick waving contest.
GoT is the best show evuh and Emilia Clarke is ah-mazing xoxo

 

[Schattenjäger]

First episode was alright I guess... Nothing great, but as far as Carter episodes go it wasn't one of his worst.

I'm really glad it's nothing like GoT.
GoT is the epitomy of everything I dislike about modern tv. The acting is 'hollywood' wooden, the story progresses at a snails pace and gets bogged down by irrelevant badly written side stories.

Also, The golden age of tv was over a decade ago with shows like Rome, Deadwood and Carnivàle.

I disagree - I think we are still in the golden age ...

Especially now with Netflix and Amazon prime .... Soooooooo many good shows out there.... It's impossible to keep up

Still have to watch :

Making a murderer
Fargo season 2
Daredevil
Jessica Jones

And this doesn't include shows I am just starting to discover :
Mr robot
Mad dogs


Soooo much quality out there


Saw the first 20 mins of xfiles and so glad it's back

 

[The Elite]

It kind of boggles my mind that the episode wasn't universally hated. The writing was SO lazy. Mulder throws away everything he's believed for decades over pretty much nothing. We get no sense of the current dynamic between Mulder and Scully. The new characters weren't fleshed out at all and weren't used well at all. The plot was total nonsense and it ignored a good portion of the show and if it's setting up for another "twist" that there actually ARE aliens, that's somehow even worse/lazier. And the dialogue itself was atrocious. "You want so badly to believe!" Ugh, so bad.

I was surprised it wasn't more hated as well. I am glad people are taking a wait and see approaching with it though.

The acting was wooden in this one. No hate to the actors either as the dialogue was clunky as fuck.

I still kind of dug it because it felt familiar but it's going to need to deliver in quality instead of surviving on nostalgia.

 

[BkMogul]

Of all the things we've seen in 200 episodes, to throw it all away by way of the Government utilizing alien technology they obtained 40+ years ago is a long stretch. It'll also be tough to explain fully in one episode. Hopefully the next 4 MOTW episodes drop lots of tidbits.

 

[pel1300]

Haha, sorry. Not sure why I even bothered. Have fun with your dick waving contest.
GoT is the best show evuh and Emilia Clarke is ah-mazing xoxo

Damn straight you shouldn't have bothered if you are gonna resort to pathetic retorts like that.

lol @ you claiming "dick waving contest" when you reply with the cliche "yep you're always right you're the king of the world" response. Especially amusing is how you say "Emilia Clarke is ahmazing" as if that somehow discredits Game of Thrones when in fact most GoT fans cite her as one of their major gripes with the show. Yeah, GASP.. GOT fans admit their show isn't perfect and criticize her acting as one of the flaws.

Face it. This episode sucked. X-Files, even if it may be in your opinion the greatest show ever, has never recieved the critical acclaim that many shows of the past decade have recieved.

And the show hasn't aged as gracefully as you wish to believe. Even the great season 3 still seems pretty cheesy.campy by today's standards.

 

[FafaFooey]

Holy shit, that was bad. Sure it was exactly like X Files used to be but tv has evolved.

No suspense or buildup whatsoever. I can just see the FOX execs screaming at the top of their lungs "SHOW MULDER AND SCULLY AS EARLY IN THE EPISODE AS POSSIBLE."
3 minutes in and we're back to the same old shit

 

[JeffZero]

GoT is the best show evuh and Emilia Clarke is ah-mazing xoxo

You clearly haven't been browsing GAF lately if you think that's the hivemind consensus here...

 

[TyrantII]

I mean seriously I laughed out loud when Cigarette Smoking Man was shown.

He got pushed down the stairs. He was diagnosed with Cancer 10+ years ago. He was shown getting blown to fuck by multiple air to ground missles. And...

'Oh hey it's cigarette smoking man'

Chris Carter - I love you and all but seriously...fuck you.

That's the least of the problems with this episode.

 

[pel1300]

Holy shit, that was bad. Sure it was exactly like X Files used to be but tv has evolved.

Exactly my point.

 

[The Elite]

I don't think this episode's faults have anything to do with the evolution of television in the past decade. It's just a clunky episode trying to fill in too many blanks in 45 minutes. This would have been a middling mythology episode at best in 1998.

 

[Ogni-XR21]

It wasn't as bad as those early reviews made me fear it would be. It felt like 3 mythology episoded of season 7-9 quality crammed into one. The writing left a lot to be desired and I guess that also brought down the motivation of the actors. I can't imagine that GA and DD did not see the flaws in the writing, of course it will cripple your performance.

Let's hope this got all the exposition out of the way. Really looking forward to episode 2.

 

[TyrantII]

First episode was alright I guess... Nothing great, but as far as Carter episodes go it wasn't one of his worst.

I'm really glad it's nothing like GoT.
GoT is the epitomy of everything I dislike about modern tv. The acting is 'hollywood' wooden, the story progresses at a snails pace and gets bogged down by irrelevant badly written side stories.

Also, The golden age of tv was over a decade ago with shows like Rome, Deadwood and Carnivàle.

I don't think you can classify three shows on one pay to view network as a golden age of television, no matter the quality. They were great, but they were more the progenitor to the current golden age which is across networks and delivery mediums.

 

[KingKong]

You think Rome is beter than Game of Thrones?

LOL....

Your criticisms of GoT only apply to the later seasons.

Any please, elaborate on this "wooden Hollywood" acting you speak of in today;s tv shows?

This latest X-Files episode had some pretty fkn wooden acting. Don't even think about comparing it to the likes of Peter Dinklage in GoT.

GoT is the victim of commercial backlash. If I wrote these posts 3 years ago, no one would respond with "GoT?!??! LOL terrible wooden acting, pointless sideplots, blahblahblah"

Rome is absolutely better than GoT. GoT is a midtier HBO drama at best

 

[TyrantII]

I'm actually surprised so many hate the mythology episodes. Out of season 8 and 9 when they had no clue how to drag it out besides super soldiers, I always found them interesting and fun.

They did take a dump on them when they abandoned the Mulder abduction storyline and threw CSG down the stairs. They really should have picked it up there, and retconned the last two seasons.

Edit: damn mobile

 

[Extra Sauce]

The Golden Age of Television is very much ongoing. If one wants to designate a more specific period of television during the early 2000s, they'll have to find a different name for it!

 

[pel1300]

Rome is absolutely better than GoT. GoT is a midtier HBO drama at best

Rome S2 was a rushed mess.

GOT S1 is brilliant. You sound like a contrarian.

 

[btags]

I'm actually surprised so many hate the mythology episodes. Out of season 8 and 9 when they had no clue how to drag it out besides super soldiers, I always found they interesting and fun.

They did take a dump pretty much when they abandoned the mudker abduction storyline and there CSG down the stairs. They really should have picked it up there, and retconned the last two seasons.

Me too, guess I am just nuts (not that I hated MotW episodes either, they were great too!).

 

[pel1300]

The Golden Age of Television is very much ongoing. If one wants to designate a more specific period of television during the early 2000s, they'll have to find a different name for it!

Damn straight.

Love this part:

"The Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad, The Shield, Game of Thrones and Mad Men are generally considered the basis of the so-called Golden Age of Television"

 

[The Elite]

I'm actually surprised so many hate the mythology episodes. Out of season 8 and 9 when they had no clue how to drag it out besides super soldiers, I always found they interesting and fun.

They did take a dump pretty much when they abandoned the mudker abduction storyline and there CSG down the stairs. They really should have picked it up there, and retconned the last two seasons.

I like the mythology but it did get full of itself by a certain point. The highlight of the show is still the monster of the week content.

Like I said though, "My Struggle" would be a middling mythology episode. Not the best foot forward when you're trying to reestablish yourself.

 

[Jason Frost]

So guys lets speculate. Do we really believe it's a just a group of men pretending to use alien tech in order to take over America and then by extension the world?

I mean in the context of this show. It's not a reach that this could possibly be the endgame. I mean the CSM did lots of shit to hide the truth.

But then where do the Aliens fit in the grand scheme of things? I mean in the previous seasons we had Alien Bounty Hunters, Mulder being abducted etc.

CSM is the only real alien left alive on earth.

He's the one behind every conspiracy ever created in the X-Files.

Even behind the new conspiracy saying that aliens are not real and about how they are a coverup to hide the "truth".

It was all part of his bigger plan; to have the control on the United States of America and then dominate the world.

Believe.

 

[liquidtmd]

That's the least of the problems with this episode.

Oh I agree - but it felt the icing on the cake as a symbol of Carters lazy assed writing.

"Look! Its the guy you love to hate! Who cares if ive used the apparent death of CSM as a narrative cliffhanger at least four times and served up explicitly his return and death again as a cheap out of place cameo in the series finale closure - let's wheel him out again"

He could technically be an alien shapeshifter. He could be his evil spanish twin cousin Alberto. My point is his appearance felt more forced than Duchovnys delivery of some lines.

 

[Tesseract]

fucking awful, what the hell did i just watch

jesus christ

 

[The Elite]

fucking awful, what the hell did i just watch

jesus christ

A conspiracy of bad writing.

But I am still excited The X-Files is back.

 

[TyrantII]

I like the mythology but it did get full of itself by a certain point. The highlight of the show is still the monster of the week content.

Yeah, like both. MOTW tended to be a nice retread on The Twilight Zone. That said some of the worst episodes were the MOTWs.

Mythology jumped shark the last two seasons, after barely hanging in there during season 7. You could see the end that should have been another film after the season after the last film; then the show renewed, Actors jumped, and they milked it with new blood for as long as possible.

 

[Lashley]

I enjoyed it, excited for the second episode today.

 

[pel1300]

it says a lot that even the the honey moon period (now), people are already shitting over this episode.

It was fkn garbage.