http://goodbadugly.coldfusionvideo.c...lesfinale.html
Written and Directed By:
Chris "I Actually Hate My Fans" Carter (at least, I think it was. It's not worth the effort of varifying).
Starring
Gillian Anderson
David Duchovny
Mitch Pileggi
Robert Patrick
Annabeth Gish
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The X-Files Series Finale (2002)
I had left this review mulling over in my head for months now, not quite ready to unleash the rabid indignation I felt over this. Now, mind, I don't think I qualify as an X-Phile. Although I used to watch the show religiously for the first four or so seasons, I did swear it off even before the whole "Duchovny is leaving so Carter is writing in two new agents" mess (but we'll get to that). Around sometime (I don't remember exactly when, but I think it was when the giant spaceship that had nothing to do with anything before showed up), it became painfully apparent to me that Chris Carter was pulling it all out of his ass with a shovel, especially now that his other hopes for a long-running series, "Millenium" and "Harsh Realm," had both failed. While I do remember Chris Carter claiming that the series will run down to a definite conclusion around the sixth season, lo and behold, there are more layers to add to the already laberynthine conspiracy plots (coinciding perfectly with Chris Carter's need to keep milking the X-Files franchise). Never mind the fact that by the fifth season (I think it was then, give or take one), the Syndicate, the men masterminding the "Big Conspiracy" and pretty much the central villains of the series, were all killed off, with the exception of the show's iconical bad guy, the Cigarette Smoking Man (but don't worry, he would seemingly get killed in an anti-climatic manner as well). It still kept rolling like a snowball, picking up more plot threads and convoluting the ones already there as it went. Even I couldn't have predicted how bad it would actually get.
And yes, it was bad. Probably hoping to prove that Duchovny and Anderson's acting and chemistry together were not the key ingredients to the show's success (something which even detractors of the show were able to note) and wanting to introduce a "new generation" of X-Files agents, Carter wrote in Monica Reyes and John Doggett. While Mulder and Scully were fairly complex characters and given room to develop, Doggett and Reyes were written into tiny boxes, one labelled "EMBITTERED EX-COP WITH A TRAGIC PAST" and the other "NEW AGE WOMAN WITH PSYCHIC POWERS" (or, to quote my friend and better X-Phile than me, ******, "WOMAN WITH TINGLING OVARIES.") When Duchovny left the show and Anderson was quietly pushed into the background, Doggett and Moronica came to the fore in time for the last season. Only instead of Mulder's near-psychotic drive motivating them, this new pair just had Moronica's tingling ovaries. Plus with most of the episodes you didn't have Doggett and Moronica really investigating anything. Both seemed to have come down with a bad case of the "Jessica Fletcher Syndrome;" everything just seemed to happen to them.
Oh, silly me, I forgot to mention the whole "Scully was impregnated with Mulder's super-soldier part-alien messiah miracle baby and because of that Mulder's on the run to find out stuff about it" thing. But it's for the best I don't get into that. Really.
Anyway, I'm supposed to be critiquing this particular two-hour slap in the face, not the continuous slap in the face that was season nine. It begins with Mulder infiltrating a top-secret military base with such ease that it's easy to believe that this base, despite all the signs that it's "important," has the same security as an elementary school after hours. In fact, even though Mulder makes few attempts to disguise the fact that he really doesn't belong there (he even takes the time to stand and gawk down from a catwalk at all the Important Science-y People doing Important Science-y Things on the floor below), he gets far enough to access a computer terminal, which gives him a date: DECEMBER 22, 2012 (fans of Grant Morrison, Terrence McKenna, and, well, Mayan studies in general will get it right away). Unfortunately, time's up, because Mulder is confronted by-er, a...um, "super-soldier." One of the many, many embarrassing things about season nine beyond even Scully's mystery baby was the introduction of a new "important" element to the show's mythos, the "super-soldier," a gimmick which even Marvel Comics found overplayed about ten years ago. Not only did these "super-soldiers" have only a barely tangible relevence to the main conspiracy plotlines, but, instead of exploring questions and issues raised years ago, most of season nine went into exploring these "super-soldiers," and by exploring I mean raising even more and more confusing questions about them. I think the worst part, though, was that no one could come up with a better name, one that didn't bring up the fact that this was one of the most tired-out ideas in a genre full of tired-out ideas.
Anyway, said "super-soldier" beats the crap out of Mulder (who also briefly sees a ghost of the hunky Alex Krichek, who was the show's "wild card" character back when it was interesting and well-written. This is only the first of several "ghosts" Mulder sees of deceased characters, but I'll skip over these since they're just nods to long-term fans more than anything else.) Mulder wakes up in a prison cell where a guard continuously walks in, beating him whenever he fails to "confess" his crime of breaking into a military base and killing a guard. The camera work is pretty good here, sharing the confusion and pain Mulder is feeling in an effective and sympathetic fashion. Too bad it only raises up the viewer's hopes too high.
Scully and the crew (including series longstay and FBI director Skinner, Doggett, and Monica) find Mulder in a jail awaiting a trail for breaking into government property and killing an officer. More interestingly, he's to be tried by a military tribunal. To be honest, I kind of liked this premise at first. Not only was it eerily relevent in light of recent events in America, but it also seemed a good way to try to wrap up a series that's essentially about two people trying to prove the seemingly unproveable. Oh, how wrong I was...
But we'll get to that later.
Mulder is thoroughly brainwashed, or rather pretends to be so. Go Mulder! I think it's to Duchovny and Anderson's credit that through out this whole painful spectacle they still give it their all. This is especially true for Anderson, who otherwise went through most of season nine in Just Here For The Paycheck mode. I guess she realized, with the show being cancelled, that the fans deserved more at the very end (you hear that Carter?!). It was rewarding for me especially to see Duchovny/Mulder deliver the same old Mulderian quips that made the character so likeable. There's even a well-performed scene where Scully confesses having to give up said miracle baby (which, I forgot to mention, had Mulder as the father...yeah, I know, I know) for adoption for its own safety. Of course, any dramatic impact this scene might have had is ruined beyond repair when Mulder replies, "I know. Skinner told me." I mean, I know this isn't supposed to be Shakespeare or anything, but...I can't help but imagine in "Macbeth" when Macduff is told about the horrible murder of his family by Macbeth's cronies that Macduff replies instead, "Oh, I already know about all that. Lady Macbeth mentioned it the other day over beer and haggis." Maybe it was actually in the play's first draft.
Anyway, Mulder hints that he discovered something at the facility that's too horrible to mention (but which most people, particularly those who have actually been following the show for some time, have already accurately guessed at from seeing the date). He also picks Skinner to be his lawyer, which the script seems to do more for giving the poor guy something to do than anything else. But it would have been astronomically worse if they made Mulder become his own attorney, so I won't complain. Meanwhile, Doggett and Monica recognize Mulder's aggressor and so-called victim from the name as a "super-soldier" they had encountered before. Like a slasher-movie franchise villain, X-Files' "super-soldiers" are virtually incapable of getting kacked (unless exposed to a certain metal...but I'll spare you the headache I'm getting recalling all this stuff), so the two agents decide to try to prove that the body said to belong to this "super-soldier" is a fake. Please keep in mind that all this time could have been spent unraveling nine years of muddled plotlines and unanswered questions. I certainly did.
As the trial progresses, with Mr. Gulia from The Wedding Singer as the prosecutor, we're treated to a parade of characters who had appeared over the course of the show. With each one, we're given a rushed summary, complete with an entire season's worth of flashbacks, of the show's ongoing plot about two FBI agents named Scully and Mulder the latter who is a renegade whose dad was involved in the big bad conspiracy and is subconsciously trying to find his sister who was abducted by aliens and the former who was assigned by the FBI to be the "scientific" check to Mulder's far-out investigations and then there are the aliens and a sentient virus called the 'black oil' and the evil Syndicate and their plan to colonize the Earth with aliens who are engineering a slave race of alien-human hybrids but look the Syndicate has made a vaccine against the 'black oil' oops but they're killed by alien rebels opposing the colonizers and now there's a new 'shadow government' taking their place. Don't ask how "super-soldiers," Scully's miracle baby, and a number of other things fit in, because I don't know. And I don't expect even the show's writers know either. Just smile and nod, or weep in a corner like I'm doing. Of course, nothing is resolved, explained, or cleared up. Things as recent in the show as Scully's miracle baby are only mentioned and suddenly dropped. No attempt is even made to link it to the older aspects of the story. During the trial, one character snipes, "Is all this leading anywhere?" Later Gulia notes, "With all these E.Ts running around, it's hard to keep these aliens straight without a score card." Good God, when your own characters are complaining about the plot, you know you've got some problems!
After just an hour of this, Doggett and Monica get confirmation the body the prosecution has doesn't belong to the person Mulder is claimed to have killed. This leads up to a truly hilarious scene where Scully rushes up to Mulder with the proof Doggett and Monica got and says: "I have what's going to get you off." Well, at least now I got a good sound byte from Anderson herself to use in my mind later during my 'private hours.' Sadly, Scully underestimated the unconstitutional power of the military tribunal. The new evidence is shouted away and Mulder is sentenced to die despite everything.
The 'gang,' not standing for this one bit, bust Mulder out of jail with absurd ease and urge him to flee to Canada. Nonplussed by promises of socialized health care and all the fresh water you can shake a stick at, Mulder (without Scully's consent, mind) drives off with Scully to New Mexico. Or Nevada. Well, that general area. Meanwhile Skinner is about to get his ass grilled (and possibly killed) for his possible involvement in the breakout. Doggett and Monica also find that all the records kept in the X-Files have been destroyed. Oops.
Back to our favorite duo. They end up at some abandoned Native American ruins where they're told the "keeper of the truth" is. It turns out to be the Cigarette Smoking Man, who was supposed to have been killed by Krichek a season or two ago, but you know how these kinds of things work out. This is probably the finale's second or third Authentically Effective Scene, as a frail, depleted CSM mocks Scully and Mulder (oh, who happens to be CSM's son via adultery by the way...yeah, I know, I know) with what he knows Mulder knows. Exactly how he knows all this, and how he managed to orchestrate Mulder's arrival at both the base and at their current location (which is what is implied) isn't explained, but can just be chalked up to the character's general mystique and badassness. With only ten or so minutes left, we finally get a little piece of explanation during CSM's verbal spar with Mulder and Scully: the final phase of the alien's colonization plan for earth is initiated December 22, 2012. Um, ok. And...?
Well, there is nothing after and. Doggett and Monica show up to warn Scully and Mulder that the Bad Guys are on their way and, boy, are they pissed. After a skirmish with the "super-soldier" who beat up Mulder at the beginning, Mulder, Scully, Dogget, and Monica flee as fighter jets blast away the ruins. There's a nifty scene where CSM, after calmly awaiting his death, is vividly consumed to the bone by flames after a few near-direct hits. Wow, I guess they really wanted us to know that he's dead for sure this time. Afterwards, Mulder and Scully are at a hotel room in Roswell, New Mexico (I think the place where they stayed on their first case together, proving at least a little thought when into this.) I was touched a little bit by this scene, which showed the strength and depth of the characters and gave a rather nice send-off to them at the same time. Still, it really couldn't quite make up for a generally terrible script and a terrible way to conclude a long-running and popular show with enough confusing plotlines to overwhelm even the most determined fan.
The most horrible thing about all this is that in the beginning, the X-Files took a sleek and smart approach to the supernatural and, more specifically, conspiracy theory. Now the 'overreaching plot' of the X-Files (the parts taht can be made out) just seems like something Stan Lee and Gene Roddenbury would dream up together after a night of drinking coffee at IHOP and smoking weed. I say this in all seriousness. There was a period where a character dropped the phrase "shape-shifting alien bounty hunter" without bursting into laughter.
The point of a finale is to provide resolution, for both characters and for the show's ongoing storylines. The only characters that actually earn an ending are the CSM (whom we were supposed to think was dead anyway) and Mulder and Scully (who are coming back for another movie in the near future anyway). As for the storylines, here are all the questions I still had about the show after watching the so-called finale:
What was up with that giant spaceship found off the coast of Africa with the human genome etched on it? What is Gibson? More importantly, why is Gibson? What was the Cigarette Smoking Man's real agenda? What was poor, dead, and sexy Alex Krichek's real agenda? Why wasn't anything more done with the rather cool idea that our social security numbers and smallpox vaccines are all part of the conspiracy's master plan? Who was X and who was he working for? How many relatives of Scully and Mulder had to senselessly die just to provide good cliffhangers over the years? Why did a bunch of "super-soldiers" watch over Scully's birth of said miracle baby in the hokiest and most blatant allegory to the birth of Christ ever concieved? Why was Scully's miracle baby so bloody important anyway and every cult, government agent, and shadowy organization on the planet after him and Mulder for the last season? And did that shot that was given to him really make him a normal human? What the hell's the deal with Mulder's sister getting abducted by aliens then raised by the Cigarrette Smoking Man and then horribly killed by a child molester? And why did the Syndicate clone her a whole bunch? Whatever happened to those clones anyway? Whatever happened to the 'Russian Syndicate' that was such a big deal for at least one season? Is Skinner going to die or just have a really bad day at the office? Where do Doggett and Monica go from here? Do they become private detectives with a cool spin-off series? What about all the stuff about the genetically engineered water from the beginning of just the last season? What about all the other 'miracle babies' other women were having, as well as that whole cancer thing? Does Chris Carter know no shame? And, finally, how can I even recall all this without drinking enough cheap wine to stun a rhino?
I only know the answer to one, the last one, and the answer to that is I can't.