With the release of the new X-Files movie, X-Files: I Want to Believe I’ve been wanting to finally complete the entire TV series, a series which I watched back-to-back within a few months last year, viewing seasons 1-7, aka The Mulder Years, but never quite felt the urge to watch 8 and 9, so I’ve been joined by my friend and fellow X-Files lover, Lee in trying to get through seasons 8 and 9 before eventually watching the movie.
Within a few days we’ve already watched 14 episodes of season 8 and my impressions of it, I must say are entirely positive. So much so, I would genuinely say I’ve not actually missed the presence of Mulder as a lead FBI detective alongside Agent Dana Scully at all because Agent John Doggett is a fantastic addition to the show and he doesn’t feel tacked on or out of place at all and that’s full credit to both the acting ability of Robert Patrick and the writing prowess of Chris Carter.
It’s a shame really that Doggett wasn’t brought in earlier, as an actor Robert Patrick absolutely oozes charisma in the role, an ex-marine and much like Dana Scully when the show started, a real sceptic. With his army background he gives a whole different character to those possible through Mulder, Scully or Skinner and a salutary addition to the program.
It’s actually a stronger season than some of those I’ve seen before hand and with the show re-capturing it’s ‘edge’ that I felt got lost in the seasons leading up to this. If you’ve put off watching them for petty reasons like I have, or you’ve simply not had chance then I really recommend you do (but not before watching the others if you’ve not seen them – obviously).
When you can pick up the X-Files so cheap these days I pray you all sensible enough to go out and buy 9 sets of some of the greatest story tellings of our time. Genius is perhaps a word that’s overused in our society, but I certainly don’t think it’s out of place when describing the standard of quality for the X-Files as a TV show.
Hurry up and get to the end of it :p Go see the film and send the discs on the way there
I thought Doggett was a good addition too, felt like there was a lull for too long before he came along.
I a 3 week holiday lasy year and managed to get though every single season and episode (play.com had an offer on at the time – each season was on £8.99 on DVD). It gets kind of addictive once you get going.
Never quite liked the addition of Doggett (i call him the T1000 dude), he never seemed to fit in as much and definately wasn’t as believeable as mulder (i did like how mulder was always in the background even though he wasn’t directly in it).
I don’t think he was ever meant to be a direct replacement as Mulder, so he was never going to be as ‘believable’, he was there to play the role Scully played when the show started, Scully playing Mulder.
As for sending the discs out Haly, my friend still hasn’t brought them around, saying that, I wouldn’t have been able to afford it til Wednesday anyway
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I used to love the X-Files when I was younger, though it got to the point where the truth was literally around the corner but Mulder decided to go to the bathroom, or turn around and scratch his head at the critical moment- thus I eventually got bored of it. The forefather of Lost-style television!
P.S. Thanks for the Blu-Ray site recommendations, I just ordered Blade Runner (the five disc set with the Final Cut) from Axelmusic, should be a bit of an improvement over my original DVD that I got shortly after DVDs came about!