#It's so weird how she's written makes it seem as though she has foreknowledge about Mia to a certain extent

[thathilomgirl]

Why is almost every mention of Mia's mom in the light novels so mysterious and low-key sad?

[bigskydreaming]

thehollowprince said: And I also stand by the opinion that they could have just done a solo run of the O5 X-Men starting a new timeline with the information they got from the future.

thehollowprince said: Its not like Marvel doesn’t constantly do AUs and retcons

OMG Josh you have no idea how bad I wanted this. They could’ve done SO MUCH with that concept. Letting the 05 keep their foreknowledge and the world they could have created with that?

They could’ve averted the initial Krakoan mission and saved Darwin, Gabe, Petra and Sway in the first place. They could have all been X-Men from their Day One, Scott and Alex would have actually gotten to KNOW their brother and Gabe quite possibly would never have gone full Dark Side despite the writers apparently now seeming obsessed with the idea there’s just something innately bad within Gabe that’s always destined to bear fruit at some point, ugh, whatever, like who do you think you are, Kant?

They could’ve recruited the Giant Size X-Men lineup earlier, and saved John Proudstar, who side by side with his brother Jamie, are a force to be reckoned with. 

They could have convinced Pietro and Wanda to join them instead of the Avengers and been like no but seriously that way lies nothing but shitty storylines and bad decisions that will be blamed on you by your teammates despite the fact that any and all of the bad decisions that were ACTUALLY yours could have been averted if any of your teammates were capable of functioning as an actual support system. Come join us. We have actual support systems, except for the times when we don’t, but we recruited Deadpool to break the fourth wall and he and Logan are currently cutting through the ranks of every writer who would write as hating and fighting each other instead of being a loving fucking family goddammit.

Jean could have faced the Phoenix head-on when the time for that came, using her knowledge of the future not to fear an inevitable death, but rather to know she had nothing TO fear, that the power to not control this force, but just be ONE with it, with no NEED to control it or be controlled by it, a symbiotic union, two beings in harmony deciding on courses of action together. The Phoenix’s innate powers and prerogative of rebirth and destruction tempered by Jean’s mercy, aimed and focused by Jean’s reason, the double-edged sword that is fire capable of warming homes or destroying them completely combined with Jean’s conscience guiding it to use its power for the former rather than the latter.

They could have stopped the Legacy Virus from getting out and killing millions as well as spared us from migraines induced by an AIDS metaphor so shitty at being a metaphor most people forget it was literally written to be an AIDS metaphor.

The body swap would never have happened and Kwannon could have joined the X-Men as a full member from the time she was introduced, rather than dragged along in the wake of Betsy’s tangled storylines for a couple decades.

They could have stopped Fitzroy from killing the Hellions. Hell, if they train Illyana early enough and have her mentored by Wanda who is perfectly fucking competent when left to her own devices, then like, maybe they can even take a jaunt to the future to save Fitzroy from dying in the first place and being resurrected with no soul. Not gonna lie, ever since then I’ve kinda been seriously interested in what the hell would a hero version of Trevor freaking Fitzroy even BE like, y’know? Call it morbid fascination, but like. I kinda want it, guys. LOL.

Add to that note, they could have taken another jaunt to the future and rescued Rachel from being made into a Hound by Ahab. Through the power of some convoluted plot tangle I just made up for convenience, Scott still ends up in a relationship with Maddy briefly, in one of those self-fulfilling prophecy type things where he went into it with the full intention of just averting the future and saving Maddy from her fate as the Goblyn Queen, but somehow ended up in a love triangle with a very alive Jean and Maddy who is fully informed of Sinister’s shenanigans and quite displeased with that asshole, and look, I don’t know how all of this goes exactly, but let’s cut to the chase, my only real endgame with this is making sure that Nate’s born properly, saved from Apocalypse and the techno-virus by the combined efforts of Scott, Maddy and Jean as well as Uncles Warren, Bobby and Hank, and Jean calls up the Phoenix through some psychic bond or whatever and is like hey girl, can I hit you up for a loan real quick? Got some losers that need toasting. 

And in this AU the Phoenix totally has her back, and one brief cosmic power-up and gratuitous Sailor Moon transformation later, Jean glows and intones some epic one-liners with appropriate gravitas, and then just punts both Apocalypse and Sinister to the far side of the universe, never to be seen or heard from again. They like, hit a black hole on the way there I guess. It was very sad. Violin strings may commence with the requiem. Okay that’s enough, they can stop now.

So then through the plot contrivances of fuck you, I said so, Scott and Maddy ultimately part amicably and Scott and Jean get back together and the three of them civilly co-parent both baby Nate and Rachel, as Maddy keeps the healing powers she gained as Anodine and stays with the X-Men for her own reasons.

The telepaths are all better trained by the expertise Jean gained in her powers while in the future, so the next time the Shadow King comes bumming around looking to cause chaos, Betsy, Emma and Jean just look at each other and laugh and say nuh-uh before psychically squishing him into a marble.

Warren never becomes Archangel. Onslaught isn’t a thing. They make nice with Magneto and say okay you may have a couple points, let’s discuss. Bishop arrives in the past for reasons totally unrelated to his original story, has no traitor to seek out among the X-Men, and thus he and Gambit end up besties in complete defiance of that stupid fucking story and because I just think they’re neat together. Yes I said neat. Gambit and Bishop are just neat. Deal with it. 

Bishop still hates that Fitzroy guy though, he’s like, I don’t even know what it is about that guy, he just rubs me the wrong way, even though Fitzroy is not evil here and has always done good with his powers, which are channeled through a device Forge made him that lets him just absorb life force from a wide range around him, spread out and diluted enough that its like, the grass feels weird for a second, like whoa what even was that, and then its over. Actually, y’know what, scratch that. Fitzroy’s powers are stupid and unnecessary the way they are now anyway, so fuck it, this Fitzroy doesn’t need life force or whatever, he’s just a dude who makes time portals. He’s like Illyana with green hair and that ugly goatee. Hey I said this Fitzroy was non-evil, not that he was perfect.

Bobby’s out and proud since he was sixteen, and with actual competence and proficiency with his powers, which make him a Literal Unkillable Gay Icon, he’s an inspiration to LGBTQ+ teens everywhere and inspires other gay, bi and trans heroes to come out. He’s a big brother figure to all the baby gays that later join the X-Men, like, Rictor comes to him for advice back during the time equivalent to early X-Factor, when Rictor’s a trying-too-hard sixteen year old who thought college age Bobby was like the coolest, which is valid, because X-Factor Bobby was like A+ Bobby characterization and deserves more reads. 

So Rictor comes out earlier as well, and by the time they even meet Shatterstar, instead of a slow burn friends to roommates to lovers scenario, Rictor takes one look at the love of his life and wastes no time coming out swinging with an absolutely terrible pick up line. Look, I said his big brother figure Bobby was out and proud in this AU, not that he magically had a better sense of humor. Some things just don’t change, y’know? Luckily, Shatterstar is a weirdo, and thus he finds terrible pick-up lines charming. At least when its Rictor saying them. They walk off for a first date, already practically hand in hand, voices fading into the distance as Rictor asks “By the way, have you met Dazzler yet? According to Bobby, apparently she’s your mom. That Longshot dude with the mullet over there is your dad I guess. We should go say hi.”

Hank gets an assistant hand-picked by the rest of the original X-Men, and who has one job and one job only. To follow him around and observe all his experiments, and he has veto power over experiments that People With IQs As High As Yours Should Know Better But I Guess You’ve Got Reed Richards Syndrome.

Hank’s like, “Hmm, if I built a time machine I could go back to the Jurassic Period and observe whether my theory of - “

Hank’s assistant: “Veto.”

“Damn. Okay I was also thinking of making a deep space communicator that can reach into the farthest reaches of space beyond any known civilization and just say hi, y’know? See if anyone’s out there.”

“Veto.”

“If I combine these genetically modified antibodies here with this strain of of DNA from - “

“Veto.”

“Well Forge built this device that does this to mutant powers but I think I can make it do - “

“Veto.”

“These nanobots I - “

“VETO,”

“Honestly, at this point I think you’re just saying that just because you like saying it.”

“Dr. McCoy, I promise you, I’m really, really not.”

Logan finds out about his future clan of stabby children, and seeks them out. He rescues Daken from Romulus, somebody stabs that loser with the immortal-killing sword, I don’t even care who, and after a few tense months of Logan trying too hard, he and Daken eventually bond over how hockey just isn’t violent enough. If you’re going to make a sport all about hitting each other, just really go for it or don’t even bother, y’know? Logan claps him on the shoulder and sniffs. That’s my boy. Then they find and rescue Laura and Gabby and take a road trip to Earth 1610 to pick up Jimmy. They have a house on campus, and new students walking by it are used to hearing loud growling and even howls. They were assured during orientation that that’s nothing to worry about, it just means the House of Snikt are watching a game and are rooting for opposing sides. 

Emma’s recruited practically the day they get back. She’s only just started at the Hellfire Club and has only done a tiny bit of Evil when Warren schedules an appointment with her, and then he, Scott and Jean make a better pitch than Shaw and his ilk could ever match. They’ve been to the future. Come join with us and we’ll give you an all access pass to memories detailing exactly what’s going to happen in these particular areas and many more. All you have to do is ask. Oh and also please don’t seduce any married teammates. Its bad form. To be honest, I don’t think it’ll be an issue because Deadpool assures us Morrison has been taken care of, and don’t worry if that makes no sense to you, its a head-scratcher for us to. Just roll with it. 

Nate ages normally here so its not like he ends up besties with forty year old Wade, but the latter having his own plot-contrived knowledge of the future because He’s Just Like That, decides that he won’t be denied at least SOME kind of bond with The Bestie That Wasn’t. He becomes Nate’s official babysitter. Well, not official, seeing as how Scott, Jean and Maddy don’t hire him and are very clear that their son is not to be left alone with this man at any time, he is a terrible influence and he keeps giving our kid guns. But then Wade just shows up anytime they’re out because he just has a sixth sense for Making Trouble, and he terrifies away whatever babysitter’s there and greets the returning and exasperated parents with a cheery wave. 

“I know what you’re going to say, but don’t worry, we didn’t do anything dangerous or against the law. All we did today was I taught him to make bombs, but we were very careful, we wore safety goggles and really, they were very little bombs. Not even anything atomic. I honestly don’t think any of them could have even blown up this whole house, and I’ve been meaning to say, I’m not impressed with the structural integrity of this place. Couldn’t you have picked something with a sturdier foundation? Its like you don’t even expect random space mercenaries to attack your place out of the blue every other month. Have any of you even read a single issue of your own comics?”

Scott’s jaw twitches Ominously. Wade starts gathering up his things. Jean rubs her forehead wearily.

“Wade, what do you even think ‘dangerous’ means?”

Wade pauses and cocks his head. Gives it a solid twenty seconds of thought. Then he shrugs. 

“I don’t know actually. Don’t think I’ve ever really thought about it. I always figured it was just one of those things people just say. Like, ‘oh, it looks like rain today,’ even if they’re not a forecaster and have no real meteorological credentials to speak of. ‘Oh, this mission will be dangerous,’ and I don’t even have to use up all my ammo and I only get shot twice. Y’know?”

“Leave,” Scott says. More like intones. House shakes a little bit but that might just be Wade’s imagination. Its very active.

“Leaving!” He says hastily. He jumps through the closed window and then teleports away amid the falling shower of broken glass. Why didn’t he do that while he was still inside the room? No one knows. Not even Wade knows. Why did the chicken cross the road? Who the fuck cares, now is it Original Recipe or Crispy?

Scott, Jean and Maddy search the house while Nate angelically claims they won’t find anything, Wade doesn’t even bring him cool stuff anymore cuz he knows you’ll just take it.

Maddy finds a high-tech laser space gun under a floorboard in the closet. She holds it up with one eyebrow raised pointedly. Scott and Jean flank her and their own eyebrows raise in solidarity. Well Jean’s does. Scott’s probably does but its hard to tell sometimes. Depends on what glasses or visor he’s wearing.

“That was already there,” Nate tries. Most powerful telepath and telekinetic in the world, but the kid can’t lie for shit. There’s not much point in trying when one of your moms is the freaking Phoenix, and that’s a skill that takes practice he just doesn’t have. 

The three sets of parental eyebrows make a V, judgingly.

“One month of no video games or TV?” Okay, so terrible liar but quick on his feet. At least he knows when he’s beat and jumps straight to trying to shape his own punishment proactively.

“Two months. And no flying lessons either,” Jean says. “And don’t pout at me, young man. You know the rules. No weapons inside the house unless your grandpa Corsair is visitng and we’re too tired to fight him on keeping knives under his pillow. This is a Do As We Say, Not As We Do house. Deal with it. Now, this is going with the others and you can have it back when you’re eighteen.”

It would have been three months, but Jean and Maddy caught a telepathic sniff from Scott. He’s just so proud of his kid thinking so tactically. He’s growing up so fast. Both women mentally roll their eyes. Why is he like this.

“I don’t see what the big deal is anyway,” Nate sulks. “Its just a stupid laser gun. I mean, Uncle Gabe blew up our last house with his brain.” 

“Yes and it was an accident and he feels absolutely terrible about that which is why we’re not going to bring it up when he and Armando come visit this weekend, right?”

“You can have my full compliance for two weeks off my sentence.”

“Or we can have your full compliance or two weeks will be added to your sentence,” Maddy says.

“You guys suck,” declares the ten year old vessel of near unlimited psychic might. He goes to his room, stomping all the way up the stairs so his grievances can be heard even by the House of Snikt next door. Course, they’ve already been listening to the whole thing with their enhanced hearing. There was nothing good on TV. Jimmy made popcorn and chewed with his mouth open just to piss off Daken. 

‘The second Father leaves the room, I am going to stab you in such a slow healing place you’ll still be bleeding at bed time.’ Daken mouths at his little brother from another universe. Jimmy scrunches his face in confusion. 

‘What?’ He mouths back. He’s terrible at reading lips. Or anything that isn’t skateboarding, really. And yet Father’s so happy that ‘at least one of my kids is content with stupid normal stuff and doesn’t go around drawing cover fire just because a mission is going so well its boring and they haven’t even gotten to pop their claws out yet.’

“That’s only because you’ve coddled him. He’s barely ever even been shot at. Just the one time on vacation in Majipoor and he wasn’t even the target, the assassin was aiming for me. If you would just let me take him on a proper outing to gain some real experience - “

“Not gonna happen.” Logan shuts that down real quick.

“Really Father, just look at him. He has zero situational awareness. I’ve been glaring a hole in the back of his head for a full minute now and he has no idea. That could just as easily be an actual laser scope, you know. He’s a disgrace to the whole family.”

“Daken, we’ve been over this,” Logan says firmly. “You have your sisters to bond with over gratuitous violence. Leave your brother alone. I don’t want anyone traumatizing him until trauma finds him all on its own. It’ll happen sooner or later, he’s as much a part of this family as anyone and that means its as good as done already, so there’s no need to hurry it along. If later on he decides he’s got a taste for it, you can take him on all the outings to get shot at that you want. But he’s gotta figure it out for himself first, and he doesn’t need his big brother being the one who introduces him to all that. He idolizes you, you know.”

Daken scoffs. He can’t even get the brat to chew with his mouth closed.

“He cut his hair from that style he liked so much, just because you hated it so much,” Logan says obliviously. Daken nods like he’s conceding the argument and hastens from the room while he can still keep his mouth shut. It won’t benefit anyone at this point to tell their father that Jimmy really only cut his hair because Daken told him he would set it on fire if he didn’t. 

Ugh, families are the worst. Don’t even get him started on Laura stealing some of his clothes to wear without asking. And then has the gall to yell back at him when he yells “Silk! Its the finest cut of silk! Does that mean nothing to you?” at her.

“Oh get over it. Its not like I asked for killer robots to interrupt my date.”

“Of course they were going to interrupt your date with that Julian boy. I keep telling you, he’s a magnet for trouble. I can tell. I’m one too, remember?”

“Fine, whatever, you’re right and I should just expect every date with Julian from now until the end of time to end with fire and disaster.”

“Well now you’re being melodramatic. There’s no way that boy makes it past twenty five. He doesn’t even have a healing factor.”

“Why do you hate him so much anyway? If you’d just give him a chance - “

“What are you talking about? I give him a chance every single time he’s here and I don’t kill him.”

“Ugh, I can’t even talk to you when you’re like this. You always do this, you just decide on something and then you commit to that like the fate of the world depends on you standing firm on what’s usually a completely arbitrary decision in the first place!”

Daken sniffs. “I can assure you, there’s absolutely nothing arbitrary about my disdain for the Keller boy.”

“His name is Julian,” Laura enunciates with a glare.

“I don’t care,” Daken enunciates with an expression of lofty superiority.

“You two are so dumb,” Gabby says from the end of the hallway. They both turn identical glares on her. They’d noticed her arrive several minutes ago but they weren’t about to be distracted from their battle of wills. “Laura, you know Daken isn’t actually going to kill Julian. He doesn’t do that anymore except for really bad people sometimes and he just talks about stabbing people or killing them cuz he thinks he’s funny and then he gets all pissy because nobody ever gets that he doesn’t really mean it. He doesn’t even hate Julian and he used to be fine with him before he started dating you, its just he doesn’t think he’s good enough for you.”

Daken frowns at the petite would-be peacemaker. Meddlesome toddler. “What are you even babbling about? None of that is remotely true.”

Gabby rolls her eyes up at her brother from her much lower height. She taps the side of her nose with emphasis. “You do know we all have the same abilities to smell and analyze scents as you do, right? And you know everything you can tell from peoples’ scent, right? Of course I’m right, I can smell it as clear as anything and so can Jimmy and Dad and we actually all know this and talk about it all the time, and its why Dad never actually gets mad at you for talking about killing people because he can smell you’re saying it just cuz you’re used to saying it but really you’re too marshmallowy on the inside now to do half the stuff you claim you’re gonna do. Hate to break it to you bro, but you’re a closet softie and you’ve been made. The nose doesn’t lie. Only reason Laura doesn’t know it is because you piss her off like its your favorite hobby and its probably impossible for her to smell anything beyond her own scent of Royally Pissed Off.”

Ugh. Meddlesome insightful toddler. Who asked for her intervention anyway? Daken crosses his arms in a way that’s decidedly aloof and not at all sulking.

Laura’s staring at their sister assessingly. “That’s really what you think is going on? And Jimmy and Dad think so too? You’re not just saying all that?”

Gabby bats her eyes up at them. “Would I lie to you?”

“Yes,” Laura says without missing a beat.

“Without a shadow of a doubt,” Daken says dryly, right on her heels.

“For the sake of a candy bar,” Laura adds, because that really did happen.

“Or just boredom, because god forbid you pick up another hobby that isn’t just Chaos.”

“This from the guy who only has fun when there’s blood and bullets flying about,” Gabby fires back from a position of petite petulance.

Daken smirks down at her. “Didn’t you just say I don’t really mean it when I say all of that?”

Gabby narrows her eyes. “Touché. My own words thrown back at me. I am undone.”

“Yes, well - “

Daken’s cut off as Jimmy chooses that moment to walk past them down the hallway to the bathroom. He’s laughing and shaking his head.

“You guys are both so dumb. She plays you like this all the time, and you never see it.”

“Silence, mortal!” Gabby thunders at their brother menacingly. The effect is somewhat diminished by the fact that she can’t hit a baritone note to save her life.

“No, I’m interested in hearing what he has to say,” Daken says coolly. “For once. This is a moment without precedent and one unlikely to occur again, so let’s explore it a bit.”

Jimmy sighs and shakes his head without ever losing that amused smirk. “Had to tack on that last part, didn’t you. Just couldn’t help yourself.”

“I am a faithful student of the Truth,” Daken says, matching his brother smirk for smirk.

“The point, Jimmy?” Laura prods aggressively before that can erupt into a wholly separate thing she wants no part of.

“Oh, right.” He shrugs nonchalantly. “Its kinda her thing with you two when you get like this. You pick a fight with Laura, Laura gets pissed off and succumbs to the family curse of Tunnel Vision at the Worst Possible Time, and you both go back and forth endlessly and like you have all the time in the world for your stupid tete a tete, because on account of you both being practically unkillable and immortal, you kinda do and you know it. And then whenever she gets bored of listening to you two, Gabby swoops in and draws both of your attention until you’re both so focused on being annoyed with her you don’t even realize you’re actually side by side agreeing with each other, and she keeps it up just long enough til she’s sure she can just say she’s bored now and just leave the room, leaving you both annoyed and frustrated by a fight you can’t even claim to have won because she really just kinda...left, in the middle of it, and you’re so focused on that, you’ve totally forgotten to be pissed at each other. And by the time you do remember, like, the moment has passed and peace has been returned to the kingdom. Or at least as peaceful as this place ever gets.”

Daken stares at his mistake of a brother in the hopes that if he stalled long enough, his senses would arrive at a different conclusion. But nope. Scents don’t lie, unlike baby sis, apparently. He’s telling the truth. And Daken really does not....care for that conclusion.

Gabby stamps her foot and glares up at their brother.

“You are such a tattletale. I am providing a service, by keeping this family free of these two constantly at each others throats, and how is that service repaid? With betrayal! I hate you, you’re dead to me. Never speak to me again or at least not until I’ve stopped being mad at you, but that could be like ten years or something, I don’t even know right now.”

She draws up to her full height and squares her shoulders as she thunders this Mighty Mouse style at the still laughing Jimmy. Then, seeing she’d yet to make a dent in his armor of amusement and he was failing to take her pronouncement seriously, she punctuated her declaration by spitting on their brother’s shoe. Daken’s eyebrows shoot up again, this time in amusement of his own. Gabby then spins around on her heel and stalks off down the hallway, muttering more dire threats under her breath as she goes, the sound of them nonetheless carrying clearly to three siblings with enhanced hearing of their own. And apparently, little sis could be quite creative. Who knew she’d been hiding such talent?

Jimmy barely even notices; he’s still staring down at his shoe.

“Dude, you spit on me! That’s so not cool.”

“Some things need to be expressed so strongly, mere words will not suffice,” Daken says loftily, savoring a slightly renewed sense of superiority.

One quickly dashed, of course, because apparently he just can’t have anything.

“Bold words from the seventy year old who needed the sixteen year old to clue him in he’s being regularly manipulated by the twelve year old,” Jimmy fires back. As a return volley, its obnoxiously effective, and Daken’s still grinding his teeth and searching for an adequate rejoinder as Jimmy just grins even wider and then strolls off down the hallway as well. Whistling either an absolutely hideous song or else proof that he’s absolutely hideous at whistling. Tough call. With him it could be either.

Daken and Laura both stare after him in silence as he rounds the corner and disappears, leaving only the lingering scent of smugness in his wake. Daken hates the scent of smugness. It has a particularly....cloying feel to it. Well not his of course. But everyone else’s, especially little brothers? Acrid is the only word adequate for that.

“Sometimes I really do want to stab him. Just a little bit. And I’m not even lying,” Daken says. Laura just nods, her own nose scrunched up in distaste as well.

“Honestly? Me too.”

Brother and sister enjoy the rare moment of solidarity.

“You know what’s really bugging me?” Laura says suddenly, still staring off down the hallway. Daken turns an inquiring eye on her, prompting elucidation. She frowns.

“Where the hell did he learn a phrase like tete a tete? I mean. Its Jimmy.”

Daken does know what she means, and frowns as the nagging awareness of that leaps from his sister to himself like memetic chain lightning.

“And he used it correctly. That’s....unexpected.”

“Sometimes I wonder if maybe he’s not as completely airheaded as he pretends, and the fact that he’s got everyone so convinced of that actually means he’s running circles around the rest of us,” Laura says. She shrugs. “Of course, then I have to question everything and who has that kind of time and also the very idea of genius mastermind Jimmy disturbs me on a deeply visceral level. So then I just. Stop doing that.”

Daken nods and sighs. “Sometimes, that’s all you can do.”

“Okay, this is annoying. I kinda still want to fight, but now fighting with you feels kinda anticlimactic. Ugh, siblings are the worst,” Laura declares with a glower. “They ruin everything.”

“On that, we can agree. With allowances for temporary occasions of some of them being bearable,” Daken says. “Some.”

“That’s the nicest thing you’ve never said to me, big brother,” Laura says lightly. Daken swiftly scowls but she holds up a hand to forestall any rebuttal. “Sorry, don’t mean to ruin the moment. I’m thinking about how else we can put all that frustrated energy to good use. Wanna go pick a fight with the Summers’ kids?”

A slow smile spreads across Daken’s face. “Well now. Finally, a family outing I can get behind. I believe that’s precisely what we need right now. Care to lead the way?”

He still hates her boyfriend, of course, but he supposes he can let that be. 

For now, at least.

[agentelmo]

The X-Files MSR Analysis Series: Season 1 Episode 5

“Jersey Devil”

Previous episode analysis - 1x04 Conduit.

Ah yes, Jersey Devil.  The episode about two strange human beings driven by ancient, hereditary traits to survive - one a sexually-territorial male who stays hidden from the world, and his mate, who, guided by reproductive needs, leaves the safety of her ‘tribe’ in an attempt to procreate.  

Oh and there’s a couple neanderthals running around eating people, too.

What?

I love that the first line of my notes for this episode simply says: “Scully rocking the salmon and navy.”

She’s so beautiful in this episode - I mean, she’s beautiful in every episode - but she gets a few great wardrobe changes here and she looks so lovely.  Although the final outfit she dons is a zinger.  

My word. The 90′s, eh?

So we start with Scully arriving at the supposed basement office that clearly isn’t in the basement.  Seriously, watch how they they walk out of the office and straight into the bullpen.  

At first, I genuinely wondered if perhaps I’d not remember that they started in a normal office and get sent to the dungeons basement later (I last watched TXF over a decade ago guys, go easy on me) but a little Google research reveals that nope - this is simply a huge continuity error in this one episode.  Weird!

So anyway, Scully arrives, and to her amusement, finds Mulder catching up on some essential reading, perusing the latest issue of a fine gentleman’s literary publication.

You know... he was reading a dirty titty mag for filthy manslags. “Marty” will definitely be calling that super hot line, later.

Scully can barely contain herself.

I like the way Scully is totally chill with Mulder and his porn; she never gives him a hard time about it.  It’s an amusing aspect of Mulder’s character that’s mostly played for laughs - but the reality is he’s a man; he has needs and no one to satisfy them, (hands down ladies, no volunteers) despite the fact women do find him attractive.

I know, obvious statement is obvious.

But isn’t it true that one of the most unrealistic aspects of the X-Files is how celibate throughout the entire show he is?  I mean, just look at the guy.

....

Uhh... I’m sorry, what were we talking about again?

Oh yeah.

I don’t care who calls him Spooky, if there’s a single guy at my place of work who is witty and intelligent and looks like that, I’m trying my luck.  So where are all the single FBI ladies?  (I swear to God I didn’t Photoshop that picture, by the way.)

I just always found it intriguing that a guy with what appears to be a moderately high sex drive, barely ever has sex even though he quite easily could.  Remember season 6′s Dreamland I, Skinner’s secretary?  Yeah... ‘nuff said.  

I guess he just doesn’t have Morris Fletcher’s way with women?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad he doesn’t get laid.  It plays nicely into my theory that while Scully is around, Mulder rarely ever looks at another woman seriously - there are the odd few that he is physically attracted to, like Dr. Bambi Berenbaum from season 3′s War of the Coprophages, but it’s only a perfunctory interest - we never see these characters again.  

The only women who ever pose a genuine threat to the MSR are Mulder’s old flames - so it’s Mulder briefly revisiting old feelings from a time before Scully.  Otherwise, since meeting Scully, he’s never become romantically attached to someone new.  Isn’t that interesting?

So why might he prefer to turn to porn?  Well, all I’ll say is this - do you remember that in Dreamland I, after falling asleep watching porn the night before, Morris Fletcher’s wife tells Mulder he was mumbling something about “Scully” in his sleep.  Yeah.  I’ll leave you to fill in the blanks with that one.

Aaaaaaaaaaanyway...  that was quite a tangent, wasn’t it.  Man, who knew there was so much to analyse in a few seconds of Mulder looking at a copy of Hankypanky?  Which, by the way, is the best name for a porn mag, ever.

It is relevant, I swear.  Mulder’s sexual needs figure into the plot of this episode in a very indirect way.

No, really.   

It’s really surprising to me just how much Scully smiles so far in season 1.  She was so carefree back then, eh?  Had no idea what she was in for.  At this moment in time, she’s just a normal FBI agent working some weird cases with her sexy crackpot partner.  

S1!Scully enjoys simple pleasures, like how in this scene she seems to get a kick out of bringing him a weird case that she knows will pique his interest.  She enjoys holding court - she’s the one with the information and she likes to tantalise him with it. The UST is simmering nicely.

I love the way her face tracks his, begging for his attention.  And he responds with a bit of casual, flirtatious innuendo - she loves this little game they play with each other as much as he does, look a her.  I wish she would get lucky, Mulder.  HINT HINT.

For some reason she seems especially radiant and lovely in this episode.  I already mentioned this, didn’t I.  But seriously, let’s all bask in the glow of how stunning she is - she’s like a cross between Princess Diana and a 50′s pin up.

Don’t you think?  Is it just me?

Ahem... so moving along, they head on over to Atlantic City to see what this weird man-eating case is all about, and run into an immediate roadblock when the local detective gets all territorial with his jurisdiction over the case.  

Put a pin in this scene in your mind - human behaviour is under the microscope in this episode, and this detective guy is demonstrating some classic traits that are discussed in more depth later.

I love that when she means business and wants Mulder to stop what he’s doing and listen to her, she calls him Agent Mulder.  

Oh please, don’t give me fanfic ideas, because I can’t write fanfic for the life of me, but someone, somewhere, must have written a fic where they call each other Agent Mulder and Agent Scully in bed, right?  Someone PM me that shit.

So they leave and Scully is still in flirty tete-a-tete mode as they venture outside.  

Fuck, that man has a beautiful smile.  He really needs to smile like that more often.  It makes me giddy that Scully can make him smile and laugh so easily, especially considering what they just went through together in Conduit.  They’re so good together even at this early stage, it makes my heart hurt that it takes them 7 years to get their shit together.

Also, Scully’s comment about the Jersey Devil is another, more flippant, example of how she low-key reads Mulder’s mind regarding his theories on a case.  She’s joking about the murderer being the Jersey Devil, but that’s exactly what he suspects.  

I really am enjoying watching all of the regular dynamics of their later relationship play out for the first time in season 1.  Its’s so much fun.

Mulder, you realise you’re flirting right now, don’t you?  Come on, now... 

Look at her smiling back at him as he attempts to seduce her with the fantasy of what sounds suspiciously like a date; where they grab a hotel together *insert raised eyebrow here* and then go take in the sights and sounds of Atlantic City.  

He’s messing with her, of course, he just wants to focus on the case, but he enjoys the back and fourth and know she enjoys it too.  They have an unspoken understanding, and, in moments like these, they really do exist in a world of their own together.  

Of course, he doesn’t at all expect what comes next.

I cannot express enough how much I love how Mulder completely deflates when he says “you got a date?”  

I also love that a date is his immediate assumption - he says it so quick it’s out of his mouth before he even thinks.  Is this something he’s been worried about coming between them at some point?  I’d say so. 

He is well aware that she is a beautiful, intelligent woman, so of course she was bound to inevitably do what beautiful, intelligent women do - go on dates - have a personal life.  He probably didn’t want to have to acknowledge, that at some point, their little bubble was going to burst.  His deflated response is probably a reaction to thinking that time is now.

So would it be fair to say that Mulder is a little bit threatened by the idea that Scully wants a life that would take her away from him and their their work together.  Yes, definitely.   But I do think he’s willing to admit that to himself? Definitely not.

Even after learning she’s not going on a date, he remains deflated.  Their sparky, fun, UST-laden tooing and froing has been snuffed out, and Mulder unceremoniously throws the keys over to her in defeat.  He knows it’s not fair of him to punish her for having a life, but he kinda does anyway, since he ditches her to investigate alone.

Poor S1!Scully is just starting to learn here, that Mulder can be an inconsiderate dick sometimes.  Or as she’ll put it later - a jerk.

It’s a flaw of his character, which I guess gives him some depth and makes him more real.  

But mostly, it just makes him a dick.  A beautiful dick, but a dick all the same. 

Wait, hang on... that didn’t come out right. 

Unfortunately for Scully, leaving her to make a 3 hour drive, alone, after he was the one to make her come all the way out here in the first place, is the least of his future transgressions.

So lets enjoy his suffering a bit more, shall we?  Just look at his face when he hears she can’t spend the weekend with him fart-arsing around Atlantic City looking for cannibal cave men.  

Dude… seriously, stop pretending - we know you don’t like it when the real world takes Dana Scully away from you. 

Now we come to a scene that, only with 9 years of hindsight, becomes equal parts devastating, bittersweet and omg-squee-shippy-tastic!

Let’s break it down.

So first, Scully with children.  She’s a natural at it - attentive, loving, affectionate.  The little hug she gives the boy at the end; I can’t even--she would have been such a great mother.

Would have been.  

That’s the kicker, isn’t it.  Poor S1!Scully is completely oblivious to the fate that awaits her.  Our foreknowledge of future events makes these scenes painfully bittersweet now.   Despite the fact she would have been wonderful at it, her one chance at motherhood slips away after only a single year with William.  She never had, and now never will have, the chance to truly be a mother and raise a child of her own.  

I’ll let that sit with you for a while.  

Edit:  Ahem, yeah so... this was written before My Struggle IV, obviously.  As insane and unexpected as it seems, Mulder and Scully do have another child together making this point pretty much moot.  But I’ll leave it in for, you know, historical record? lol! 

Feels like a ton of bricks in the pit of my stomach just writing it.  In my work I have counselled women who have had to come to terms with infertility, and what it means for them to be a childless.  It’s an incredibly harrowing thing to accept for many of them, feeling incomplete; less of a woman; their bodies betraying them; denying them something they feel is rightfully theirs - and sadly what society tells them is the greatest contribution they could ever offer to the world - a body that can create life.  It’s perhaps, with my experience of these women, that I now look at Scully in a way that I didn’t when I was a teenager; watching the X-Files the first time around.

It makes me appreciate her strength, and her selfless, unwavering, devotion to doing what she thinks is right, regardless of the cost to herself, in a whole new way.

But for S1!Scully, all this talk about motherhood amounts to is a distant thought that, one day, she’ll meet Mr. Right and will start a family of her own.  Just like most of us assume, and never question, until it doesn’t happen.

Told you this would be devastating.

All hell is breaking loose at this party with only her and her friend to herd the gorilla-masked kiddies (another oblique reference to primitive human behaviour), but she’s enjoying herself despite it all. 

Doesn’t it feel strange to see Scully with a close friend that isn’t Mulder?  To see that she once had some small semblance of a life outside of him.  It makes me really realise how much she gave up for him and for their work together.  What motivates a person to do something like that?  Just a passion for the work?

It’s also very unfamiliar to see that Scully once contemplated not becoming a mother.  That actually, she felt she wasn’t cut out for it.  Although perhaps this is merely a cover for how she really feels.  We know from season 5′s Christmas Carol, that Scully has a fear of getting close to people, and tells Emily’s adoption officer that she avoided attachments before her cancer because she was scared of the pain of losing those she loved.  We know this changes for her though, as Scully will be forced to painfully acknowledge, in that same episode, that she didn’t realise how much she wanted to be a mother until she couldn’t have it anymore.  

Which makes sense when you realise that this scene here, in Jersey Devil, was probably one of very few times Scully considers, and actually tests out, whether she wants a life outside of her FBI career, before discovering she cannot conceive.

Scully’s friend, El, hitting the nail on the head.  She would be a great mother, but she has to choose it.  She has to decide what’s more important to her - career or family.  It’s not something she’s seriously thought about until now.

Being told she doesn’t have a life definitely affects Scully too, she plays it off as a joke here, but we know her actions after this conversation betray her true feelings.  She starts to wonder if her work with Mulder is overtaking her life, and that she doesn’t have much else outside of her career.  It worries her enough into taking action to change things.

Ah and then it comes to this part of their conversation.  The part that gets our little shipper hearts pumping.

You know what’s funny about this scene now?  The fact they’re basically discussing finding a man to have a child with.  Scully easily dismisses the idea of dating and having children with Mulder, but the irony is that this is now foreshadowing... because that’s exactly what happens.

7 years from now.

That’s some epic retroactive foreshadowing, right there.

But sticking with the present moment, what might Scully’s reason be for calling Mulder a jerk?  Well what did he do to her earlier that day?  The way he flirted with the idea of them spending some off-duty hours together in Atlantic City and then got weird when she said she had plans and ditched her when she couldn’t do what he wanted.  That’s definitely a jerk move.

She quickly corrects herself, acknowledging that his behaviour earlier that day maybe doesn’t wholly represent who he is, but still, I enjoyed the fact she basically admits that his ditching her bothered her more than just being slightly inconvenienced.  Hmm, I wonder why... eh, Scully?

Now, things start to get a bit more interesting.  As I mentioned before, Scully played off the fact she has no life as a joke but she’s clearly conflicted on whether she’s okay with such a skewed work-life balance.  She’s now questioning if she needs to spend more time away from work and start to build a life for herself.  And then...as if the hands of fate reached in themselves...

A WILD DIVORCEE DAD APPEARS! 

DIVORCEE DAD USES “CREEPER SMILE”.

IT’S SUPER EFFECTIVE???!

Seriously, why does she go on a date with this guy, he looks like a total creeper.  The way he’s like, hey, check me out being all fatherly with my I’m-single-and-ready-to-mingle smile.  Ugh.  Dana!

Back to Mulder now, working off a hot tip from a homeless HBO fan, he’s been hanging out like a hobo trying to catch a glimpse of this Jersey Devil.

Uh, I take it all back.  Maybe it was for the best Scully didn’t tag along on this one.  

Scully: What happened to ‘grabbing a hotel’, Mulder? Mulder: FBI cutbacks, Scully.  Wanna share my blanket? Scully: ...  

Can you imagine?  Them sitting together, in the cold, huddled under a tiny blanket...

Hmm... wait, I’m changing my mind again.

Mulder sees a dark, human-like figure in an alleyway, but is blocked from pursing it because he is stopped and arrested by the police, due to their mistaking him for a drunk.

Mulder redefining the meaning of the phrase “hot mess”.

So I’ve seen enough American TV shows to know that when you get arrested you get one call, right?  So Mulder’s one call - the one person he can rely on to help him out is.... *drum roll*

OMG! NO WAI!  Much unexpected! Very shock!

So much sass.  Mulder getting sassed by Scully is my favourite thing.  Like, ever.

Methinks she’s enjoying getting some sweet, sweet, revenge on him for ditching her, too.  Just a lil’ bit.

I love how he just smiles at the end, as if to say “alright, Scully. You win.”

Then, while shovelling his face with food, Mulder tries to convince Scully of what he saw in the alleyway.

Their usual back and forth ensues – Mulder puts forward a fantastic (albeit pretty on the nose) theory about what he saw in the alleyway.  Scully runs the gamut of reasons why it might not be what he thinks it is, making Mulder work for his theory.  Which is good on one hand, since it’s teaching him to be critical rather than willing to believe anything at the drop of a hat. 

But on the other hand, he’s actually right.  I think this dynamic would work better if he didn’t always guess pretty much exactly right all the freakin’ time.  I think Mulder needs to get it wrong a bit more often to 1. humble him a tiny bit and 2. not make it always seem like Scully’s scepticism is just getting in the way.

As it stands, the main purpose Scully’s sceptical, scientific, approach serves is keeping her and Mulder out of danger.  Without her pulling him back from the edge a lot of the time, I think he’d have got himself killed ages ago.  Which we’ll get a live demonstration of later in this episode.

Mulder then extends the invitation once more, for Scully to join the hunt, and for them to investigate the case together.  

Then the conversation turns veeeeeery interesting.

Scully catching Mulder off guard is another one of my favourite things.  His surprised head snap gives me Cheshire Cat face.  

She’s put her personal life above their work together twice now and, again, he does a piss poor job of hiding that he doesn’t like it.  

But notice something here.  When he thinks it’s another birthday party, he isn’t threatened.  He doesn’t ask her to cancel, he’s seemingly unaffected - disappointed no doubt - but notice how quickly his attitude changes when she clarifies that, this time, it is a date.

First up... wow, Mulder.  Can she cancel?  That was bold.

He can definitely sense she’s withdrawing, and he’s beginning to feel territorial about it.  As selfish as it might be, he wants their work and partnership to take precedence in her life, but she’s resisting. 

Although, it only seems to bother him when it’s a date, apparently.  HMMMMMM.  Sooo... a kid’s birthday party is less threatening than a date.  

I WONDER WHY.

Second... Ouch, Scully.

She’s clearly showing, once again, that her friend’s comment about not having a life got under her skin.   Why do I think this?  Well I’ve never thought of Scully as petty, but that below the belt comment about Mulder’s life was kinda petty.  I think in some small part she is resentful towards Mulder for the current state of her social life - she’s allowed herself to get swept up in his hurricane these past few months and is now a tiny bit sensitive to the assumption that she should drop everything to go Jersey Devil hunting with him.  

She’s trying to take back control and get out of this all-consuming bubble they’ve been living in.

Now the next scene is fucking gold.  Here’s where everything should hopefully fall into place.

Scully takes Mulder to meet her old university professor in Maryland.  Mulder is asking the Professor questions about the Jersey Devil and he explains to Mulder that the wild man myth is universal - almost every culture has one.  It represents an apparent symbolic fear of man’s dual nature as creators and destroyers of life.

Look at Mulder... Naww.. tell me more, teach!

The Professor starts to talk about how humans have hereditary traits which make us tribal and aggressively territorial, driven by selfish sexual and reproductive drives which makes cooperation beyond our perceived ‘tribe’ extremely challenging.

Now think about that for a second – what has been going on with Mulder and Scully since the beginning of this episode. 

First Mulder has been territorial with Scully; he wants her to himself – not to share her with the demands of a personal life.  He wants her to be as dedicated to the X-Files as him, but is finding it difficult to accept that she wants to go off and exist outside the bubble of their partnership - outside their “tribe”.  

He is also, on some subconscious level, driven sexually – because why the hell else would he petulantly accuse her of having a date the way he did?  He’s not threatened by her spending time with friends, but he is threatened by her spending time with other men.  Perhaps not consciously, but somewhere deep down, it bothers him that she would go on a date.  Both a kids party and a date result in her spending less time with him, so why does a date, specifically, sting more?

I do feel like I need to reiterate here, that I don’t think Mulder is in love with Scully at this point.  But he’s very attached to her, and seemingly, he doesn’t like to share.

Then we have Scully – who has spent a great deal of time this episode discussing her thoughts on becoming a mother, and deciding if she wants to prioritise finding a man and having a family over her career.  She then accepts a date with a man based on these discussions – so here, Scully is being driven by her reproductive needs.  

She is also driven sexually too though, I mean, we know she thinks of Mulder as being “cute”.  So she has definitely acknowledged a sexual attraction to him - and well, who wouldn’t.  

But also the shy smile she flashes the creeper divorcee dad suggests she finds him attractive too - she’s not wanting to start dating for the singular purpose of getting preggo, of course not.  Like Marty and his Hankypanky mags, she has needs too.

Now, pop your head into Mulder’s kitchen for a sec guys, c’mon just a sec.

FORESHADOWING!

Well, maybe... that damn alien invasion is gonna happen some day. Right, Chris Carter?!  RIGHT?!

The scene then transitions into referring to the Jersey Devil directly rather than a meta commentary on Mulder and Scully themselves, and I love that it was Scully’s intention for her old professor to talk some sense into Mulder, but instead Mulder gets the guy to admit that what he’s suggesting, about the Jersey Devil being a pre-historic human, is feasible in the realm of extreme possibility.  

Scully, ever the scientist, can’t argue with that one.

As much as she wishes she could.

Later that evening, Mulder sits in the basement-not-basement office looking subdued, staring at evidence photos, twiddling his thumbs... bored.  He really is useless without Scully.

Beautiful, beautiful Scully, on the other hand, is on her date looking OH SO NINETIES.  But still, lovely.

And OH MY GOD.  Divorcee dad is boring as fuck.

No one wants to hear how you fantasise about running people over with your car on a first date, Rob.

Now we could get meta-meta, and suggest that I myself, writing this analysis, am getting quite territorial over the MSR relationship and am threatened by this dude, and that’s why I mock him to pieces.  But honestly, there’s just something about him that feels super disingenuous and needy... he screams “please replace my wife and be my son’s surrogate mother” to me.  

I mean, they’re not even 30 minutes into their first date and the guy is asking Scully to go on family days out with his kid to the beach.  Fuck off, mate... how about you woo me a bit first, yeah?  Let me decide if I like you before saddling me with mothering your kid.  Geez.

Then he drops a real clanger... which, well - to be fair - isn’t that big a deal to S1!Scully.  But, knowing what’s to come, this comment is just unforgivable.

What a douche.

So let’s check in on Mulder again, what’s he up to during this torture.

Look at this lost puppy, slumped in his chair, staring at the clock.  I bet he’s checked that clock every five minutes since 7:30.

Mulder... it’s only been 25 minutes.  Get it together, man.

You can’t tell me he isn’t feeling shitty, thinking about her being out on a date.  Why else would he be moping in his office, and staring at the clock on the wall?  GETTING EXACTLY ZERO WORK DONE.  I’m getting Chinga vibes, here.

I don’t think he even really understands why, but he hates this.  He wants her there - he’s used to her presence now and he’s bizarrely at a loss without her there to focus him.

He then gets a call from the Park Ranger who tells him a body, that is possibly the pre-historic human they’ve been looking for, has turned up in the woods, and that it has been sent to the coroner’s office.

This gives Mulder the excuse he didn’t know he was waiting for to call Scully and try, once again, to pull her back into the bubble.

Look at how bored shitless she is.  She’s waiting for you to rescue her.  GO MULDER GO!

#SorryNotSorry

The next day Mulder and Scully go back to Atlantic City to inspect the body, but it’s not there to inspect.  Mulder theorises that the male neanderthal might have had a female mate, and they go back to the location where Mulder spotted her previously to see if they can find her again.

As they search, Mulder muses about what this neanderthal woman might be like.  He questions whether she’s that different from Scully and himself.  

Which is exactly the point of this episode - the fact that the two of them are also driven by ancient hereditary instincts.  The same way the neanderthal woman and her mate were.  Mulder and Scully’s personal life subplot reflect how the modern world has changed how we act on these instincts; but that ultimately we all want the same things.   Mulder wonders out-loud whether she feels emotion, or does she just live on instinct - spending her days looking for food.  To which, Scully replies...

I don’t know why, but I love that Scully knows how to make Mulder laugh.

Then just when we were starting to enjoy their being together, working as one again, Mulder goes and rushes off without Scully.

She calls to him several times, and he ignores her and then parkours his way to freedom.

Mulder and Scully: SYNCHRONISED PARKOUR MASTERS!  Although Scully does it in heels, so she wins.

Mulder is cornered by the neanderthal woman, which he should have seen coming, really, these guys do hunt and eat people, right?

She knocks him down and looms over him.  He basically looks like a 16 year-old boy who has never touched a girl before.  It’s kind of adorable seeing him pinned to the floor by a naked woman with a look of terror on his face.

Be gentle with me, please.

Never mind.

Scully arrives, just in time, to save Mulder.  Get used to that, Scully.

They then head out into the forest, to find neanderthal lady before Detective ThisTownAin’tBigEnoughForBothOfUs hunts her down with his SWAT team and kills her.

Sadly, that’s exactly what happens.  They gun her down before Mulder and Scully are able to intervene.

Mulder is devastated.  In no small part due to the fact that she’s a woman, alone, vulnerable - hunted.  She ticks all the boxes to mess with Mulder’s head and trigger his need to rescue.

Mulder seems quite emotional as he asks the detective why he killed her.  The answer he gets doesn’t give him any relief, in fact, I think it only leads him to despair more.  Searching the detectives eyes, not quite believing what he’s hearing.

Scully can see Mulder is on the edge; becoming too emotionally involved.  So she does what only she can.  

She steps in and speaks to him in their private language - where with just a look and a touch, she can bring him back to himself.  

I love this aspect of their bond.  It’s so subtle, but loaded with a quiet intimacy that’s always just below the surface.  These two work best when they are in this bubble together - just the two of them.  Every now and then, with just a small gesture, they forget everyone else and withdraw into their own private world.  

A week later, back in the FBI not-really-basement, Scully, is telling Mulder about the autopsy results of the neanderthal woman, and gets frustrated as Mulder excitedly prepares to meet a colleague at the Smithsonian - throwing himself further into his work.

Clearly still feeling conflicted about how to balance her work life against her personal life, she tries to convince Mulder that, he too, needs to do some work in that area.  But what she’s not understanding is that this is what Mulder does for himself - his work.  When he said before that he has a life, this is what he meant.  To him, this is living - it’s the life he chose and he’s not ashamed or embarrassed about it.

Mulder is a career non-conformist.  He doesn’t work by the rules and he doesn’t live his life by the rules either.

It’s at this point Scully gets a call from creeper divorcee dad, offering her a night out at a Cirque du Soleil show.  

Her complete and utter lack of interest in taking him up on his offer finally makes it click for her why Mulder would reject her offer of a day off, or to go get a beer.

Mulder has absolutely no interest in doing those things.  They hold no value for him, and no enjoyment, in exactly the same way that she realises she has absolutely no interest in dating this guy, or going to see Cirque du Soleil with him and his freakin’ kid.  Geez, man... stop it with the family days out.  Someone buy this man a copy of Dating for Dummies.

This epiphany affects Scully deeply, as I think she realises in that moment that working with Mulder and being an FBI agent is the life that brings her the most fulfilment and excitement too.  She never did want to date in the first place, it was a comment from her friend that made her question whether or not the way she lived her life was “okay”. 

Now it seems she’s decided it is.  She doesn’t care about conforming to what is expected of her anymore.

Reminds me of something Gibson Praise says about Scully in season 5′s The End.  

I think she reaffirmed for herself, this attitude of not caring what people think, in this very episode.  To be who she is, do what she wants and not give a flying monkey what anyone says.

So rolling it back a bit - when Scully gets the call from her divorcee date, Mulder answers the phone, and I’d say he is definitely aware of who it is by the way he walks out of the office without waiting for Scully.

He assumes she will not be coming with him because, well, she has a life now, right?  She has more going on than just work and he has every reason to believe she would rather be doing other things with her time, especially after that speech she just gave begging him to take some time off.  He thinks he’s got the message loud and clear - that she doesn’t feel the same way about their work as he does, and that this is how things are gonna be from now on.

It’s also a bit petulant of him, isn’t it?  The way he storms off after giving her the phone perfectly illustrates that.  Not to mention his dejected walk over to the requisition desk after he leaves the office.  The way he sounds so defeated as he asks for a car.

So despite trying to be “okay” with it, Mulder is still feeling threatened by this guy encroaching on their partnership – I’m sure of it.  The reason I feel so sure is that when Scully approaches him at the requisition desk, he straight away asks who it was on the phone.  

Why is he interested? If he isn’t bothered then why ask?  Mulder hasn’t shown any interest in her private life before.  For the most part, these two never discuss their personal lives.  At least, not at this stage.

Is the tension in this conversation not entirely palpable?  He really doesn’t like it, does he.  I still don’t think he has even realised why he doesn’t like it.  The guy is an Oxford educated psychologist and profiler – if he looked at himself for 5 seconds he’d know why – which is probably why he doesn’t. 

We don’t see this side to Mulder often, as the series progresses we tend to see this kind of thing more from Scully.  To be fair, it’s usually because women fawning over Mulder just seem to keep popping up all over the place.

But I love seeing this.  More jealous!Mulder, please.  I’m dying to see season 11 for the Mulder vs. Skinner fight that is apparently over Scully.  Not to mention it supposedly involving Skinner’s long harboured feelings for her.  Fuck yes, please.  Can we get some jealous!Mulder up in that, Mr. Carter?   

“You gonna have dinner with him again?”

WHY DO YOU WANT TO KNOW MULDER? HUH?

You notice how he perks up slightly after hearing she’s not going to see the guy again?  You really need to hear the audio to notice it - but his voice changes. 

Ohhh burn.  Guess he didn’t like being told he doesn’t have a life, either, eh?

Every now and then Mulder lets slip the odd bitter comment, it’s something he’s doing right up until My Struggle I – revealing his true feelings through backhanded, sarcastic comments rather than outright saying what he feels.

You tell him, Scully.

Phew and that’s Jersey Devil done.  Another freakin’ long one!  I’m almost certain the next episode will be far shorter... much less MSR to work with.  This episode was chock full of it. Next up... 1x06  - Shadows.

[the-desolated-quill]

The Vampires Of Venice - Doctor Who blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this episode yet, you may want to before reading this review)

People occasionally ask me why I write so much negative criticism about Doctor Who. Aren’t I supposed to be a Whovian? How can I call myself a Whovian if I don’t like the show. Well that’s the thing. I do like the show. Very much. That’s why I criticise. Yes I moan and nitpick and complain, but it all comes from the deep rooted affection I have for this barmy old sci-fi show that I’ve been watching since I was 6 or 7 years old. I love Doctor Who, warts and all. And it’s episodes like this that remind me of why I started watching this show in the first place.

The Vampires Of Venice was written by Toby Whithouse, who previously wrote the excellent episode School Reunion where David Tennant’s Doctor was reunited with the classic series companion and fan favourite Sarah Jane Smith. While I don’t think this episode is quite as good as his previous outing, it’s still hugely entertaining in its own right. 16th century Venice is a beautiful setting. Yes it’s a shame the canal is clearly CGI, but the rest of it looks good. And as for the villains.... Oh Whithouse. You know how I love a good villain. Now you’re just spoiling me.

Helen McCrory and Alex Price damn near steal the show as Rosanna and Francesco. I LOVE them! They’re both pretty intimidating at times, but they’re also delightfully camp. The dramatic twirling of capes and the almost orgasmic gasping they make after they’ve drank blood, it’s all so enjoyably silly. One scene I found very amusing in particular was where Rosanna and Francesco are sitting on the floor and she’s stroking his hair while his head rests on her lap. I just had the biggest grin on my face throughout. But as funny and over the top as they can often be, I never felt as though I was laughing at them. It certainly doesn’t diminish their threat or, in Rosanna’s case, the emotional drama surrounding their characters. If anything I felt it actually brought me closer to them. In fact these villains have something that has been sorely lacking this series. Character and personality. Francesco is this loyal, but petulant mummy’s boy and Rosanna is the doting mother that will do anything for her 10,000 offspring. They’re a ton of fun to watch and both McCrory and Price really throw themselves into it and are clearly enjoying themselves immensely, which just makes me love them even more.

It also helps that Rosanna isn’t the typical evil megalomaniac that often plagues this show. There’s a lot of effort to give her some depth and complexity. She’s trying to save her race from extinction and clearly spoils her children rotten. ‘What’s that? You want some wives? Okay. Mummy will go find you some.’ She’s still evil. She doesn’t give two shits about humanity and even tries to guilt trip the Doctor into helping her by mentioning the extinction of the Time Lords, but she’s not evil just for the sake of being evil. She’s motivated by self preservation and a strong maternal love for her children’s future. So when her plans ultimately fail and she sacrifices herself to be eaten by her children, thus dooming her race, I couldn’t help but feel slightly sorry for her.

I love how they incorporate all the traits and cliches you’d come to expect from vampire stories. A perception filter tricks you into thinking they look human, but it doesn’t work in mirrors, hence the lack of reflection. The vampire teeth show because your subconscious is trying to alert you to danger. They don’t drink blood, but rather drain you of your moisture because they’re aquatic beings who need water to survive. One thing I’m slightly confused by is their aversion to sunlight. Okay, they live at the bottom of the ocean so I guess sunlight would make them uncomfortable, but enough to disintegrate them? That doesn’t make sense. It’s also really inconsistent. One minute they’re hissing and cowering from sunlight and the next they’re just wandering around in broad daylight.

As much as I love Rosanna’s motivations and character, her plan is a bit weird. We’ll skip past the bit where they convert women into aliens by draining them of blood and filling them with alien blood. Doctor Who often plays fast and loose with science, and frankly I’d rather not go there. Instead let’s talk about her ultimate plan. She wants to sink Venice.

Um... why?

There’s clearly room in the canals for 10,000 of the fuckers. Why not just live there? Also the world is covered in 70% water. Couldn’t they just up and move somewhere else?

Still, at least I have an emotional connection with this setting, unlike with the previous episodes. Lucian Msamati and Alisha Bailey are both great as Guido and Isabella. Not the most interesting characters in the world, but they were likeable enough. I did feel slightly sad when they both died and I liked the parallel Whithouse draws between Guido and Rosanna. Both care deeply about the future of their children and both end up sacrificing themselves when they can no longer provide for them. That was a nice touch.

While I enjoyed the plot and villains, it’s the main characters I feel that really let the side down. Let’s start with the Doctor. I’m still enjoying Matt Smith’s performance for the most part. His scenes with Rosanna are absolutely electrifying and I love the subtle flirting between them. Can you imagine any other Doctor making that work? I’m also captivated by his silent menace. He’s clearly partially sympathetic to Rosanna’s predicament until she reveals that she didn’t even know Isabella’s name (who she executed a scene ago), demonstrating her own cold and ruthless efficiency, and motivating the Doctor to take action. And yet despite everything, he’s still devastated when she kills herself at the end. All very complex and multi-layered and so on. What I’m less fond of however is the humour. Something just feels very off in this episode. Like it all feels a bit too forced. For example, when him and Rory are talking about Amy kissing him:

Rory: “And you kissed her back?”

Doctor: “No. I kissed her mouth.”

That just seemed a bit too glib for my liking. Same goes for all the ‘mine’s bigger than your’s’ gags between the Doctor and Rory. But my least favourite joke was right at the beginning when the Doctor bursts out of a stripper’s cake. See I didn’t find it funny because I was too busy questioning why the Doctor couldn’t have just walked into the pub and talked to Rory like a normal person. I mean I know the Doctor is an eccentric, but this is taking the piss. It doesn’t feel like something the character would do. It just feels like the writers are trying too hard to be funny.

Rory is... okay, I guess. I did grow to like him in the episodes to come, but here he’s a bit weak. He seems like a nice enough guy and I do like the scenes where he confronts the Doctor about his behaviour, but he comes across as a bit pathetic. Plus Arthur Darvill gives a very wooden performance I feel, particularly in the sword fight with Francesco where he has this ‘I’m acting now’ kind of vibe to him. Again, it just feels like he’s trying too hard to be funny. Thankfully he does get better as time goes on, either because he grows into the role or he gets better direction, so I won’t complain too much.

However, while I do like the scenes where he confronts the Doctor, it feels as though he has more foreknowledge about the Doctor and his behaviour than he ought to have. They do explain that Rory researched the Doctor after what happened in The Eleventh Hour, but that doesn’t account for lines like this:

“You know what is dangerous about you? It's not that you make people take risks, it's that you make them want to impress you. You make it so they don't want to let you down. You have no idea how dangerous you make people to themselves when you're around.”

You got all that from a Wikipedia article?

I’m not saying Rory isn’t right. He absolutely is. I’m just questioning how he’s able to make such informed and authoritative judgements considering he’s only known the Doctor for five minutes.

And that’s not the only weird line of dialogue. Take a look at this one near the end:

“All I can hear is... silence.”

Obviously this is meant to continue the series arc surrounding Moffat’s crack (God I’m so immature), but... who the fuck talks like that?

Finally there’s Amy, who I really didn’t like in this episode. You may recall that in the previous episode she tried to have sex with the Doctor (how could you not recall it? I’m still having nightmares about it. Family show, Moffat. Family show). The Doctor invites Rory along in an effort to revitalise their relationship, and apparently it works... though I don’t understand how. First off they keep trying to downplay what happened at the end of Flesh And Stone to a simple kiss, which is most certainly not the case. A woman runs off on the night before her wedding and tries to have sex with another man. This isn’t a trivial thing guys. Second, there’s no effort to explore how Amy feels about all of this, the episode instead focusing on the Doctor and Rory’s dick measuring contest. Why is she so reluctant to marry Rory? It’s not as if he’s abusive or she’s being sold into a life of domestic servitude. If she’s not attracted to him, why is she marrying him? And third, Amy and Rory barely spend any time together. There’s never a moment where the two talk about what’s going on or try to make sense of their current situation. So when they do finally reconcile near the end after they kill Francesco, it just feels very forced. Rory clearly loves her, but she shows no interest in him until he clumsily fights off a vampire, at which point she’s suddenly trying to eat his face off. It just makes her come across as extremely shallow (and that’s hardly surprising considering she’s a Moffat creation).

As a continuation of the Doctor, Amy and Rory’s story, it’s incredibly flawed, but as a standalone adventure where our favourite time traveller battles a bunch of vampires from outer space, it’s very enjoyable indeed.

[gywair]

I finally watched Endgame. I’d put it off a week since its release. It felt like planning to attend a funeral. This series has been part of my life for a decade. Going to see the cumulation of over twenty films felt too heavy to see. Putting it off only made the tension build though. Finally, bite the Infinity Stone and ordered tickets.

First, I watched it in “4DX”. This is similar to the theme park rides that started popping up that are a mixed medium experience. So the seats move, air blasts at you, there are water effects, lights flash, and even smells get pumped into the room. In theory, this seems really interesting but usually, I go to movies I don’t care about to try out new gimmicks. My first 3D film was My Bloody Valentine. It was silly and fun. It also helped me adjust to what a 3D movie would be.

My first 4DX-like experience was the Empire State Building ride as narrated by Kevin Bacon. A sentence that makes me feel like I suffered a stroke while writing but is a real thing that exists that I have experienced. It’s been a few years since that and I think it lasted less than 20 minutes (probably less). Sitting for an entire movie seemed like a whole different worm can.

For me, I didn’t really like it. The water, lights, and smells were cool. The smoke was nice too. The seat, however, is made for someone slightly smaller. So when Iron Man gets kicked in his kidneys, oh spoilers BTW, the seat hits you too like a demented message chair. I think normally it would softly strike you in the back on your rib cage. For me, it went straight to my soft organs. This made the fights are to concentrate on (a problem for a movie about fighting). Likewise, little jets of compressed air go off just above your head. For me, they were pointed directly into my ears. So each time they fired off, I couldn’t hear and had the painful sensation of a ghost giving me a wet willy (I’m also blessed with ear problems so your experience may vary).

Anyway, big thoughts:

The Good:

The job of wrapping up 20+ movies was a big task. This film does that. It has a large cast of characters and several errant storylines to wrap up in a short timeframe. Cause even with 3-hours, this felt like there was still more to say. Which isn’t bad cause that means there can still be more films but for a chapter closer it was ambitious.

I was satisfied by the investment I’ve made into the franchise. This was a fitting close to this chapter. Each film contributed in ways that made the complete journey feel fluid and necessary.

It makes several subversions of expectations. Not just for characters but for narrative design. It kept me guessing the entire time. Even with seeing a handful of tiny spoilers, I was never sure what was going to happen.

Avengers served up heaping mounds of gratuitous fan service in the best ways possible. Sometimes this can be very bad like in animes when the whole episode is about boys spying on girls in a hot tub. Here, it’s Captain America fighting a copy of himself or Professor Hulk half-assing some smashing. One of the best parts of the film is about time travel. Here they show off fan-favorite Loki popping up at different points in history.

One important aspect to me for a story of any kind is how much foreknowledge a viewer needs before starting the work. If you watch Pirates of the Carribean 3 or Return of the Jedi, you will be pretty confused. However, you can pick up just about any Marvel movie anywhere in the series and have a fair idea of what is going on. This continues in this installment. Some context is lost or hidden but anything you need to know is shown/told/explained to you. This, for me, is what makes a story stand on its own legs.

See?! This scene just makes sense all on its own.

The Bad:

With so many cooks in the kitchen, there are still weird dangling problems in the continuity. Things still feel left open to interpretation. Even the filmmakers didn’t agree on how elements in the film worked which is something that should have been determined before the first Avengers movie was written. It feels haphazard with how certain things were written off or ignored.  This plays well into feeling like a comic book where different creators retrofit things to fit their narrative but it still felt jarring.

For example, in Captain Marvel, the cat has a stone. Well… so does Thanos… but also now Loki… There is a lot going on and even a whole (if well delivered) exposition still didn’t completely cover all their bases. It feels like they slapped it together at random at times. I get that they can play with the timeline literally but I feel like there were still a lot of open questions that should have been answered that weren’t.

I could rewatch all the movies (read as: will eventually) to get the full context. This makes the act of enjoying these films more academic though than just for pleasure viewing. It’s not that I don’t want to do this but for casual viewers, there was a lot of backstories to keep up with to get each nod.

The Ugly:

After years of hearing that fans want more women characters, the film tried to give them the limelight for an action sequence. The rest of the film is mostly about a boys’ club rushing around doing action hero stuff. Yes, Nebula and Black Widow make important contributions to the plot but they feel sidelined or overshadowed by the boys. The problem here is that the women are treated more like set dressing than people important to the plot to move ahead. If Spiderman had finished running the Infinity Glove to the van it would have served the same device. Instead, they made a big show of having the girls team up for a few seconds.

Supposedly this movie was gonna have a “Big Gay Film Moment” TM that would make people happen. Instead, it just suggested that gay people do actually exist. IDK man, like that, is a pretty cold take. If Warmachine and Bucky had started making out after the big fight I would have been cheering my head off. I’m not upset by any means. This is more of a missed opportunity for the filmmakers to do something and instead, they took the safest path.

  Hope you weren’t invested in Starlord and Gamora cause that entire trio of films is pretty much null now so far as character development for Gammy. She had an awesome arc. Then they killed her off. Then she comes back but now she doesn’t know Quill. Okay, well this means that other dead people come back… right? Oh, no? Vision and Black Widow are still gone? Weird… I heard this is cause they were killed pre-Snap BUT so was Gamora and they got her back. I think they were just running out of time. I hope Scarlet Witch gets to go back to her robo-boyfriend.

Was that all just a wild middle finger to Gunn? That’d be drama.

The funeral… why isn’t anyone crying? Everyone seems so calm. Is this like when you have already been to like six superhero funerals that week and five are already back on their feet?

I told myself I wasn’t gonna cry.

Characters:

Alright, so this film had way too many characters to really cover perfectly as a group. I have some stray thoughts on several, however.

Hulk is my new boyfriend and I will fight you for him. Banner has made peace with himself and created a half-way point between Hulk and himself. Now he is permanently strong and smart. This is wonderful for character development as he finally finds the peace and belonging that he has wanted since Edward Norton tore up downtown as the rage-y green giant. His new hipster persona felt satisfying and fresh for the film universe. Something of a reversal of the Ragnarok Hulk.

Captain America finally bangs and accepts his position as “America’s Ass”. I’m so proud of my boy. He’s all grown up.

It took Iron Man a decade but Tony Stark finally discovered how to care about something other than himself. His character arc is the film universe’s arc to this point. He was the foundation for everything that came after. This film serves as much an Iron Man movie as it is an Avengers’.

Black Widow kind of gets the shaft here. She began as a coldhearted assassin and ends up as the corporate mom leading the heroes’ home base. There is so much to still unpack for her. Her character has so much potential just under the surface but no one seems to be interested digging into it. I mean Scarlett Johansson “kills” in the role but this movie doesn’t really give her anything to do except talk to Hawkeye…

Hawkeye tried to be the Marvel Aquaman comeback kid and he just comes off as edgy but not in a good way. More like a midlife crisis day buys a motorcycle than the Crow. Like, he tries to make it sound like his entire career of being an assassin was more good than being an assassin now. He does get a brutal back story but I feel like he falls short of reaching his character potential here. He does get some cool scenes and then just gets shoved to the back of the movie.

Thor is bae. He has a brutal journey to this movie but he gets a lot of character work here. His beer belly hermit hijinks provide a much needed comedic break. I also cried like a baby over him.

Rocket has finally gotten some growth as a person. In this movie, he gets to interact with the core team more. This was a lot of fun because of his sass with characters like Iron Man. Also, he finally dons his iconic blue flight suit and red scarf–not important but it was a fun Easter egg.

It only took two Guardians and an Avengers but they finally let Karen Gillan really make Nebula rule. Gillan is a fabulous actor so it was always painful that Nebula just ran around screaming. In Endgame, she finally gets to have some real personal moments that don’t feel weird. Paper football was the best scene honestly for the emotion and narrative. I mean, her whole career as a sour rage junky comes to a boiling point and then she FINALLY gets to open up the tiniest bit with Tony. I really hope there is something… anything in the future where she gets to be this new fun Nebula. It’s like your weird aunt went on vacation and actually had some personal growth and brings you back some neat shells and a guy named Desmond for herself.

Ant-Man got some funny moments in but nothing to really write home about. He was our Joe McEverydude here and it worked fine. I’m baffled at the taco scene but it was worth it for Hipster Hulk to share with him. Like, I know Scott Lang as a character isn’t super bright. That’s his whole thing. But, I just can’t understand what would drive him to go outside the fancy building to eat tacos on a bench facing the jet landing pad.

Warmachine got some interesting developments here. I’m sad now that he didn’t get to build a romance with Nebula (that is just barely suggested here). He felt like a full member of the team rather than just a sidekick from movies past.

The Falcon & Bucky were there. I really wish there had been some kind of closure or growth moment for them. In Winter Soldier, they were at each other’s neck. Now they seem cool. A friendly word or a high five could have sold me on their growth but they kind of get forgotten instead. I was never gonna see my Falcon-Bucky slash make it to the silver screen but would it have killed the Russos to have one heated kiss between these two obviously boyfriend material lads.

**EDIT** —–> THERE IS A SPIN OF THESE DORKS. OMG.

Alright. I’m psyched for this.

Captain Marvel comes in at the end of this list just like she did in the movie. That’s right, she shows up as a Deus ex Machina and looks cool but really got burned here. She deserved better. She just drops in for a minute to help and then jets. Still cool but she gets no development here. Her movie rules though so I’m gonna forgive it. Mostly. That said, it was wild to see basically an Amy Dangerous on screen and that was special for me.

Closing Thoughts:

It was a really fun movie. I may never watch it again. Just like the other Avengers, it’s a good time but it feels more like a spectacle than a great film. That’s not bad but when I watch a film, I wanna see characters grown in new unexpected ways. I want to see hard choices and emotions. Those moments were there but as little islands between big budget action scenes. I really enjoyed it but for the same amount of time, I might just watch Ragnorok again or Detective Pikachu. Finishing this movie felt like the end of a long (20 movie) hike. It was a great adventure. The fun of it was the friends we made along the way. I don’t regret a minute of it.

But it feels good to be at the end.

For now.

Endgame Thoughts I finally watched Endgame. I'd put it off a week since its release. It felt like planning to attend a funeral.