Halftime Report -- X-PHILES WORLD-Season 8 Discussion

[ Show ]

Support VoyForums

[ Shrink ]

VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, [10] ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 20:31:14 02/13/00 Sun
Author: Islandgirl
Subject: Halftime Report

Okay, we've now seen 11 episodes of the seventh season of "XF". Since the standard number of eps for a TV season is generally 22, that means we're at the halfway point. So I thought I'd offer a halftime report.
Overall, the season has been pretty good. IMHO, we haven't seen as many "lame" eps as we saw during the first half of season six. Skinner has also appeared in about half the episodes, which seems about right. I wouldn't want or expect to see him in every episode, but he *IS* the third most important cast member. I think everybody is also relieved that they killed off Fowley early in the season. (This isn't just a shipper opinion. Even my noromo brother felt the character was evil and annoying and didn't add anything to the show.) I'm also glad that they've gone easy on the dream sequence/time warp/hallucination episodes.
I think the season has suffered from three problems, though. First, other than Skinner, we haven't seen enough supporting characters. I'm longing for the Lone Gunmen. I'd also love to see Scully's mother and/or brother again. A second minor (but to me quite aggravating) problem has been the "California connection". Almost half the eps have taken place, either totally or in part, in California. One of the fun things about "XF" has always been guessing where the next ep was going to take place. With only two exceptions, every episode this season has taken place either in California or the Washington, D.C. area.
A more serious problem, at least to me, is the way CC has totally "wimped out" on advancing the MSR. Let's be honest here: after eps like "Milagro" and "The Unnatural" late last season and eps like "Amor Fati" and "Millennium" early this season, CC really cannot fall back on the old "Mulder and Scully are just platonic friends" line. It's been made quite obvious that they *ARE* romatically/sexually attracted to each other, in addition to the deep professional respect and personal friendship they feel.
Even though I didn't like the old "their relationship is purely platonic" line, up until midway through season six it was at least semi-plausible. Now it just sounds stupid. Hopefully, now that a big portion of the mytharc has been resolved, we'll see some resolution of the MSR during the second half of the series' final season.

Here's my ranking of the eps, from best to worst:

1. "Millennium" � as a shipper, the ep where Mulder and Scully finally share their first real kiss probably would have been my favorite no matter what! This happened to be a good ep in other ways, too, though. The whole mood of the episode was vintage XF, it had Skinner in it and Agent Frank Black was great! Bonus points for the hilarious "math geek" line.

2. "Amor Fati" - this gets second place mostly for the closing scene, which was shippy enough to melt even CC's noromo heart!

3. "Rush" - It's hard to explain why I liked this episode so much, but I did. It was an intriguing case that seemed to take a fresh angle on the kind of occurrances Mulder and Scully investigate. They were both in their usual roles of skeptic and believer. If I had a friend who had never watched the show and I wanted them to understand what it was all about, I think I'd start them out on this episode.

4. "The Amazing Maleeni" - This was a fun episode that I really enjoyed. It was an actual *MYSTERY* that kept me guessing until the final scene. It's nice to have an occasional ep that doesn't have any supernatural elements to it. I bet Mulder and Scully get more brownie points with the rest of the bureau for foiling bank robberies than for investigating extra-terrestrials.

5. "Sein Und Zunt" � It was nice to see Mulder, Scully and Skinner all working so closely together on this and Scully doing such a good job of just "being there" for Mulder when he needed her. I also like the part where Mulder was holding a press conference; it's the sort of thing real F.B.I. agents do frequently, but we've never seen it on "XF" before.

6. "Closure" � It was great to see Mulder finally come to a point where he can put Samantha's disappearance behind him. Another thing I liked about this ep was how Mulder and Scully each reached basically the same conclusion, but went about it in their own ways: she by methodically searching the records, he by channeling a psychic.

7. "The Goldberg Variation" - A pretty good episode. The Wiley Coyote line was a classic.

8. "Signs and Wonders" - Of the two religiously-centered episodes so far this season, I thought this was the better one. Bonus points for Mulder's "business casual" look.

9. "The Sixth Extinction" - while this was much better than the previous year's season opener, any ep in which Mulder does nothing but lie in a hospital bed while Scully searches for answers to cure him just doesn't rank all that high on my list.

10. "Orison" - apparently the XF team learned nothing from "Pusher/Kitsungari". Bringing Pfaster back *sounded* like a good idea, but it didn't come across very well.

11. "Hungry" - the only really bad ep so far this season. Mulder and Scully barely appeared in it and the MOTW was a tired retread of the ones from "Tooms/Our Town/2Shy". Minus points for being set in Southern California for no discernible reason other than "XF" films there and they were too lazy to pretend it was someplace else.

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]