The X-Files is hitting a major milestone this year: its 30th anniversary. The spooky sci-fi drama premiered back on September 10, 1993, when nobody could have known that stars David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson would become household names as FBI Agents Mulder and Scully. It ran for nine original seasons, two feature films, and then another two revival seasons to cement its place in pop culture.
Now, I was more likely to be watching Sesame Street than Fox back in 1993, but I was able to start watching live around Season 5 before the Fight the Future film in possibly some poor judgment from my parents, and renting VHS copies of past episodes I missed from the local Blockbuster. (Yes, this was the '90s.) So, watching The X-Files live, taping new episodes, and catching up on earlier seasons via VHS and eventually DVD box set was a formative experience, and invested me in scripted television in a way that guided me to my career an entertainment journalist.
In honor of the 30th anniversary of this iconic show, check out eight lessons that I took away from The X-Files and now apply to TV as a whole!
The Art Of The Slow Burn
As a young TV viewer, I watched Mulder and Scully go years with chemistry sizzling enough for me to note, root for, and hate bees for. (That damn bee from Fight the Future!) After The X-Files went the VERY slow burn route of hinting that they maybe got together (off-screen!) in Season 7 and spending Season 8 dancing around the paternity of Scully's baby before finally letting them kiss, I developed a great deal of patience for the TV slow burn. I wasn't even surprised that creator Chris Carter was still beating around the romance bush in Season 11. In fact, I always feel like a main TV couple is moving too fast if they get together earlier than three seasons in. If only viewers nowadays understood the adrenaline rush of a forehead touch or hand grab!
Notable TXF Examples: Seasons 1 - 8ish
Characters Aren't Dead If You Don't See The Body
This is a rule that has come in very handy over the years for watching and writing about television: if you don't see the dead body of a character, they're not necessarily dead. Mulder seemed to be dead plenty of times, including faking his own death. The Cigarette Smoking Man is the real X-File for how he never stayed dead. Spender seemingly perished before turning up three seasons later, and it took an on-screen shot to the head to definitively put down Krycek.
Of course, there are exceptions to the rule. Mulder's seemingly dead body was buried for months before he was exhumed and brought back to full health in a very Season 8 kind of twist, and CSM was consumed by a fireball on screen in what was originally the series finale before popping back up in the revival. We also never saw Diana Fowley's body, but she seems truly dead, to the dismay of what I assume is 0% of the fandom.
Notable TXF Examples: Mulder, Krycek, Cigarette Smoking Man, Spender
Don't Worry Too Much About Timelines
If you think a modern TV show is convoluted but never watched TXF, give Mulder and Scully's adventures a shot. The mythology's timeline from 1993 onward would take a pretty crazy flow chart to make sense of, and poor Scully was pregnant for more than a full year from late Season 7 to the Season 8 finale. And that's not to mention the Season 8 episode full of flashbacks that fans could only place based on the length of Gillian Anderson's hair! As somebody who has rewatched that episode from VHS to DVD to streaming, it is proof that a show can be much more enjoyable if you don't sweat the details about timelines. How else did I get through characters speeding across Westeros in the late seasons of Game of Thrones?!
Notable TXF Examples: "Sein Und Zeit"/"Closure," En Ami," "Requiem," "Per Manum"
New Leads Deserve A Chance
Mulder's abduction by aliens in the Season 7 finale to accommodate David Duchovny's decision to only return for part of Season 8 meant a replacement partner for Scully: Robert Patrick as Agent John Doggett. I'm as guilty as anyone when it came to hating Doggett early on just because he wasn't Mulder, but I had to either give him a chance or give up the show. By the end of Season 8, I was officially a Doggett fan, and even sided with him over Mulder a couple of times.
Doggett's redemption for me as a fan was proof that new characters deserve a chance to prove themselves on all shows. If Doggett could fill Mulder's shoes on TXF, new characters can fit into any show. After applying that lesson to Chicago P.D., Tracy Spiridakos' Hailey Upton may have become my favorite character on the show, and who doesn't love Misha Collins' Castiel after being introduced on Supernatural four seasons in?
Notable TXF Examples: "Within"/"Without," "Per Manum," "Deadalive," "Three Words," Vienen," "Existence"/"Essence"
Embrace Format Changes
While format changes of any TV shows can be incredibly jarring, The X-Files proved that it can work. The Rashomon-style storytelling of Season 5's vampire venture is a fan-favorite for Mulder's paranormal POV vs. Scully's scientific POV. Another episode (featuring the first Mulder/Scully kiss that didn't really count) cut between the present day and 1930s Mulder (or, more likely, Mulder's concussion), while another was fully filmed in black and white as a comic book story with guest star Cher.
These episodes are so iconic that any diehard fan can probably name the titles just off of my descriptions, all because a format change worked incredibly well. That can work incredibly well in other shows as well, if given the chance! For example, Supernatural excelled at it for any viewers who could suspend their disbelief.
Notable TXF Examples: "Jose Chung's From Outer Space," "Bad Blood," "The Post-Modern Prometheus," "Triangle," "The Lost Art of Forehead Sweat"
Hospital Scenes = Relationship Development
Between getting shot, given cancer, abducted by aliens and/or shadow agents in the government, and other miscellaneous crises, Mulder and Scully spent a lot of time in hospitals. I therefore learned pretty quickly that there's nothing like hospital visits to really deliver some meaty relationship scenes between the duo. Whether out of fear of losing each other or Mulder threatening a man who accidentally shot Scully, I grew to look forward to whenever somebody would be injured or sick for the sake of character development...as long as they recovered, anyway!
For better or worse, that carried over into other shows. If somebody is in the hospital, odds are that something juicy is going to happen. There's nothing like a near-death experience and hospital stay to thicken the plot! I still sometimes think back to Joshua Jackson's hospital bed scene in Season 2 of Fringe opposite John Noble, when he finally connected dots about his past. And what Law & Order: SVU/Organized Crime fan didn't love Stabler and Benson in the hospital after she was shot back in the spring? That wasn't even a serious injury and the scene was great!
Notable TXF Examples: "Beyond The Sea," "One Breath," "Memento Mori," "Redux II," "Tithonus," "Requiem," "Deadalive," "Empedocles"
Character Beats Plot
I'll admit it – The X-Files is a hard show to enjoy if you care more about the plot than about the characters. Scully's whole pregnancy storyline doesn't make a whole lot of sense if you look too closely at it, but it was juicy for her as well as Mulder and even Skinner! Samantha becoming starlight after seven years of mythology? Great two-parter for Mulder if you focus on his journey! Scully remaining skeptical despite everything and Mulder rarely acknowledging that his final theory is only correct after Scully's science disproved his other ones? Honestly, a little infuriating if you don't just roll with it most of the time.
But focusing on character over plot after learning to do so from The X-Files has served me well on many other shows, particularly in genre series, procedurals, and medical dramas. I haven't watched hundreds of depressing episodes of Law & Order: SVU because it's only the especially heinous cases that I'm interested in (#TeamBenson for life), and I don't need to be a medical expert to enjoy Chicago Med. I'm an expert at suspending disbelief for the sake of enjoying shows, and that's thanks to The X-Files. See also: every superhero show I've ever watched.
Notable TXF Examples: "The Post-Modern Prometheus," "Kitsunegari," "How The Ghosts Stole Christmas," 'Orison," "Per Manum," 30 years of mythology, Seasons 9 - 11
Selective Canon Is Good For The Soul
In case it's not clear by now, I love The X-Files nowadays even as I loved it as a kid who was probably way too young to be watching it. I also have plotlines that I despise. Mulder's brain disease that barely mattered except to damage his bond with Scully? Chris Carter can keep it. Diana Fowley existing? No thank you. Cigarette Smoking Man fathering Scully's baby through science? Absolutely not, no matter what the creator said about the twist!
Examples like those are why I sometimes look back at The X-Files with what I think of as selective canon, a.k.a. ignoring certain elements of the show that are 100% objectively canon but that I hate and will unashamedly ignore. Now, I don't do this for current shows that I cover as a journalist, but old shows that have already ended and I can revisit as a fan? Selective canon for certain twists and episodes all the way.
Did Gendry really identify himself as "Gendry Rivers" in Game of Thrones' final season? Not if you ask me. Did most of the Star Wars sequel trilogy happen? I can choose to remember the film saga ending on Return of the Jedi's Ewok dance party. Did the Lone Gunmen die on TXF? Not if I ignore their spinoff and a certain Season 9 episode. Is the Cigarette Smoking Man the father of Scully's child instead of Mulder after a Season 7 episode? No, he damn well is not. Did the show end with a happily-ever-after for Mulder and Scully in Season 8, or with Mulder saying "Maybe there's hope" to Scully in Season 9? Sure, depending on my mood about Seasons 9 - 11.
Selective canon really helps with enjoying old TV shows and movies, and I have The X-Files to thank for that. Don't get me wrong – there are some fantastic episodes that I wouldn't change a thing for. And then there are episodes like "Small Potatoes," which was too lighthearted about the SVU-worthy crime of the week but super funny if I ignore a detail or two.
Notable TXF Examples: "Small Potatoes," "Demons," Within," "Jump The Shark," "My Struggle III"
If you want to revisit all eleven seasons of The X-Files (or try it for the first time after I thoroughly spoiled you here), you can find the series steaming with a Hulu subscription.
