#scully’s abducted anyway

[carefulfears]

thinking about how john lee roche did live in boston in 1973 and did sell bill a vacuum cleaner in october and did case for victims that way and how samantha was probably always gone, one way or another

[bisexualfbiagents]

You of all people should realize that sometimes motivations for behavior can be more complex and mysterious than tracing them back to one single childhood experience.

THE X FILES GIF MEME [2/9] SCENES from Oubliette (3.08)

[randomfoggytiger]

Philes, quick-- save me from doing my own research!

[youhavethesun]

just finished 3.. what was that. why was that an episode. literally the only thing that got me through it was that mulder looked so fucking good in every scene!! unfortunately every scene was bad..

as someone who loves vampire shows these were the worst vampires I have ever seen. they were so incredibly boring. and cringe. I didn’t like kristen’s acting at all and the whole shaving scene?? soo terrible and the music made it even worse.

as always though I will eat up any msr though and I did tear up at the start when mulder was filing scully’s badge and glasses that was heartbreaking </3

[gingerteaonthetardis]

need to start a 'my eyes are up here' gif collection for xfiles s2 because this man is really starting to slip ajdhskahd

[cecilysass]

Mulder’s Depressed Vampire Sex: Me on 3

You know, I like the episode 3. I mean, not the casefile part of 3, which is whatever whatever, but the important part: the blood fetishist lady has her way with Mulder and then he cries.

I definitely loathed the episode back when the show was airing. Back then it seemed like it was intentionally hostile to the ship—like going out of its way to be hostile, having Kristen tell Mulder shit like “I can tell you’re missing someone, but attention please: just a friend. Definitely not more!!!” I honestly kind of felt like she was looking out of the screen directly at me when she said it.

But looking back, knowing that MSR was endgame (and that fans kinda took over the narrative anyway), I definitely see the episode totally differently.

From a Mulder character arc point of view, this episode is all about him being a sad, sad boy. It is all about his depression, his hopelessness, his grief for Scully. It’s also about his drive to try to save women and girls in order to save himself. And he so often seems to fail at this when it is someone he cares about (or even when it is someone he has a fleeting connection with, like Kristen). And that’s so, so devastating for him. In that sense, this episode is a really desperate expression of his grief and frustration.

The HIV/AIDS angle to this ep is super important, too, so we have to make sure we’re getting into the full 1994 mindset on this. Mulder says in alarm to Kristen back in the club, when she’s playing fast and loose with blood: “AIDS. Aren’t you afraid?” (To which she responds that she wants to die.) Mulder knows that HIV transmission through sharing fluids is no joke in 1994 (it probably really shouldn’t be now either, but that’s not today’s lecture). Yet later, when Kristen is shaving him and he’s nicked, he allows this to be the catalyst for sex, even as he makes attempts to stop her from tasting his blood.

So his choice to have sex with Kristen is depicted as reckless, with someone who has been shown being careless about HIV. And he is doing it not just because he is turned on, but because he is being intentionally reckless with himself, clearly knowing the consequences. He shows concern for her, yes, but he’s also self destructive. He wants to fuck the hot vampire, but he also wants to fuck with death.

In other words, there’s a difference between what the episode tells us about Mulder’s relationship to Scully and what it shows us. And what the episode shows us about their relationship is that Scully is central enough in his life that everything is fundamentally affected by her abduction. He’s broken. He’s visibly depressed. He makes decisions that risk his job and his life. All the while he is actually choosing to wear her cross: a symbol that traditionally wards off vampires, as Kristen observes, but also keeps Scully’s presence in his mind constantly and in every frame of the episode he's in. And the episode ends with him looking like a hero in a romance novel mournfully casting his eyes to the hills clutching her cross in his hand.

None of this obviously communicates “I miss my work friend,” right? No objective observer would see this and say, “ah, he clearly is missing someone—most likely a friend, I would say.” But probably that’s exactly why they included Kristen’s “just a friend” line. They knew his grief in this episode was reading very powerfully, and they didn’t want it to seem overtly romantic.

I also feel like it’s kind of significant that the only time we actually see Mulder have confirmed sex with someone (besides Scully later) is when he’s depressed and Scully is gone. Linking his grief for Scully to his very-rarely-seen acting out on sexual desire like this also seems kind of psychologically sus to me, but I don’t know, I read a lot of fanfic.

Speaking of which, I did a little fanfic search for 3. And unless I am missing obvious fics (always a possibility), it was kind of difficult. Partly because this is a stupidly hard episode to look in search engines for. (No one should ever name episodes after numbers, although this one I will forgive because it’s from 1994 and they couldn’t have fully understood about Google and AO3.)

But also I just think there hasn’t been a ton of 3 fanfic, probably because this episode isn’t very well-liked. And listen, I get that Scully isn’t in it, which is often unappealing for writers, and there is Mulder/other, which people don’t like. But I feel like there are a lot of possibilities for story ideas here that don’t necessarily take place during the events of the episode. Like: how does it affect them later? Personally I like fics where Mulder and Scully discuss the events of the episode long after (actually I wrote one, which I included in my recs because I’m not that cool). I also think Mulder’s angst and depression has a lot of ways it could go—not to mention it’s the last canonically confirmed time he has sex before like 2000 or something. And it seems like AU takes on what happened to Kristen could be interesting. So what I'm saying is: maybe try writing 3 fics.

3 Fanfic Recs

Three is a Crowd - wendelah1 Mulder has sex with Kristen but can’t stop thinking of Scully.

Analgesic- settledownfrohike Mulder has sex with Kristen but can’t stop being a self-loathing, self-destructive mess. And thinking of Scully.

The Woman In His Heart - Spangle This shorter piece frames Mulder’s time with Kristen as a revelation about his feelings. Angsty and nicely observed. A 2005 Spooky winner, evidently.

False Dawn - emmbright A sharply etched portrait of how Mulder moves through his life between 3 and One Breath. For me this fills in the blanks perfectly.

Dreams - Characteristically_Exuberant This is actually a (great) post-ep for Field Trip, and the events of 3 aren’t the main focus of the fic. But I like how this author discusses what happened with Mulder in that episode and contextualizes it for both agents.

We’re Not Here To Get Involved In Personal Problems - cecily_sass This is mine, also not really a 3 post-ep; it’s an X-Cops post-ep. I feel a little silly including it. But I had them discuss the events of 3 in this fic in a way that sort of lays out my own thesis of the episode, and I thought, hey, it’s my list. Mulder and Scully walk to a gas station in Willow Park in Los Angeles the morning after X-Cops; they discuss plenty.

Any others? I feel like I probably missed some.

[scullysflannel]

right now my favorite angle on the x-files is that all the x-files are death masks for death itself. "solving" x-files, trying to understand and most importantly see and touch what can never be explained, is all just a lifelong reckoning with the inconceivable, which is to say death. clyde bruckman boiling every life down to how it ends, alfred fellig trying to capture death like a ghost, scully's illness, all underpinned by samantha's abduction as the defining hole at the center of mulder's life — and the challenge is to build some kind of life outside that grief, which he's literally made his job, and accept love anyway. I'm not saying this is an original thought, but rewatching it through that lens really hits. dying is perfectly natural but nature abhors normality

[daynascullys]

AMIDST THE CHAOS: An MSR Playlist ⤷ Part One: Mulder

It's the heart in you, I know it in my bones, that made me change direction when I thought better off alone.

playlist / songs ↘

FAVOR by Julien Baker / "Who put me in your way to find? What right had you not to let me die?" I think in the context of an MSR playlist, this song speaks to Mulder's self-destructive and self-sacrificial tendencies and how he comes to learn that Scully does what she does for him — "I used to think about myself like I was a talented liar / turns out that all my friends were trying to do me a favor / I always want to tell the truth but it never seems like the right time to be serious enough / ... / how long do I have until I've spent up everyone's good will?"

FOUR by Sleeping at Last / The lyrics featured in the gifset are from this song: "This blurry photograph is proof; of what, I’m not sure, but it feels like truth" is such a Mulder line. I'm not sure what enneagram I would guess Mulder is, but I think there's something to this song and his tendency to seek out the extraordinary/learning to find the beauty and mystery in the ordinary. Plus the line right before the one above: "I've fallen in love with a ghost / I lost my balance when I needed it most." And in an MSR context: "What if we already are who we've been dying to become? / In certain light, I can plainly see a reflection of magnificence hidden in you... maybe even in me."

I LOVE YOU, I'M SORRY by Gracie Abrams / Anyway... pain!! This song describes how Mulder loves so well: "I like to slam doors closed / Trust me, I know it's always about me / I love you, I'm sorry." And I think it touches an important point about how trauma can impact behavior: wanting to do better is one part of healing, but sometimes we end up in patterns despite ourselves. It doesn't mean that it's not on us to do better, but there can be a feeling of helplessness that comes with trying to do better and failing, knowing you're hurting others and wishing you were learning faster.

SOON YOU'LL GET BETTER by Taylor Swift / This song is so devastating to begin with—truly one of my favorite songs ever—and it is absolutely the worst thing ever to think about the cancer arc and this song :) This whole song fits cancer arc (and abduction arc/literally any time Scully is hurt) so well, but I especially die when I think about the bridge: "And I hate to make this all about me, but who am I supposed to talk to? What am I supposed to do if there's no you? / This won't go back to normal / if it ever was / it's been years of hoping / but I keep saying it because / 'cause I have to." And if you really want to hurt, watch this incredible video. It's fine, I'm fine.

READY TO LOSE by Ingrid Michaelson / The chorus really says it all: "I'm ready to lose everything but you." This song is also where the lyrics I featured in the post come from: "It's the heart in you, I know it in my bones, that made me change direction when I thought better off alone."

ANYWHERE BUT HERE by SafetySuit / Something something abduction arc... "and when I'm not with you / yeah, I know that it's true / that I'd rather be anywhere but here without you."

RUT by the Killers / "So I'm handing you a memory I hope you understand / that steadily reminds you of who I really am." This song reminds me of I Want to Believe; I think it's some of what I imagine Mulder to feel when Scully prepares to leave.

COME AROUND by Rosi Golan / "You feel like breathing / come around, come around, come around, come around to me / can't you see you're my lifeline?" To me, this song feels like a companion to "Rut."

A THOUSAND YEARS by Christina Perri / Cliché, I know, but hear me out — "The Field Where I Died." I know their conversation is Mulder asking Scully about it, but it's so Mulder to believe that they've known each other and been friends, always. "I have loved you for a thousand years, I'll love you for a thousand more."

THE ARCHER by Taylor Swift / "And all of my heroes die all alone / help me hold on to you." There's something so, so beautiful about the way this song builds — "they see right through me, they see right through me, they see right through—can you see right through me? they see right through me, they see right through me, I see right through me, I see right through me." And the way the questions that are asked—"Who could ever leave me, darling? But who could stay?"—are then answered: "you could stay." And guess what? Scully does.

LET YOUR HEART HOLD FAST by Fort Atlantic / This song was one of the choices I almost put for the description: "to believe I walk alone is a lie that I've been told." I've always loved the core message of this song — let your heart hold fast, for this soon shall pass — and it makes me think of Mulder surviving all these years of loss, especially with Samantha.

ORPHEUS by Sara Bareilles / I think there's a theme of "don't give up on me" in these songs, but I think this one adds softness because it goes beyond what Mulder perceives as his own personal shortcomings to speak more generally: "don't stop trying to find me here amidst the chaos / though I know it's blinding there's a way out, say out loud: we will not give up on love now." The beginning of the song makes me think of Mulder as a child: "I know you miss the world, the one you knew—the one where everything made sense because you didn't know the truth." And then one of my all-time favorite lines: "if the bottom drops out, I hope my love was someone else's solid ground." And really, Mulder is love.

PEACE by Taylor Swift / I'm so glad that we get to see Mulder grow over the course of the series and that this song begins to take on new meaning, but I think this song speaks well to the idea that chasing ghosts and monsters is part of who he is, as well as his worry that that isn't going to be good enough, that he can't be what Scully needs—"would it be enough if I could never give you peace?" I think by the end of the series, the meaning of this song can change to refer more to the questions that may never be answered, rather than Mulder's difficulty giving up the chase, which reflects his growth in his partnership and relationship with Scully. But I also think this feels like a very Mulder song because there is so much insecurity; I think at the core of his character is a sense of unworthiness, and it's part of what's so beautiful about his relationship with Scully—eventually, he's able to give her the peace that she brings him.

[actual-changeling]

thinking about season 2 again and how stressed-out and anxious they both must have been.

while scully probably had an easier time dealing with that, mulder was torn between fear of losing her again and fear of being too much.

it's one thing to make sure no insane kidnapper can break into your apartment again and another to sit in your still-destroyed home and stare at the phone—waiting for her to call, waiting for her NOT to call, and somehow both options are horrible.

he wasn't in time to save her, he got so close just to watch her slip away, and then she was returned, and suddenly it was happening all over again, just with her pale and silent in front of him.

something about equally sleepless nights, and i don't want to be a bother and staring at the ceiling with the phone an arm's length away. something about spontaneous moments of bravery and scully, it's me and mulder, it's me and i hope i didn't wake you.

something about mulder swinging by in the afternoon simply to check on her (i'll be out of your hair in a minute) and then he watches her sleep curled up against him hours later.

she's there every single time he opens his eyes, and for the very first time since her abduction, mulder sleeps too.

he's still there when she wakes up choking on panic and with the taste of blood in her mouth, and she listens to his heartbeat until her body calms again. safe, you're safe, whispered over and over with a silent voice only she can hear.

they both know it's not sustainable (not yet, not yet. soon.), but neither of them wants to move away first. they need to get over it, somehow, or rather, they need to learn how to live with it, how to swallow the pain and concern, and how to smile anyway.

weeks later, they talk softly with the phone pressed to their ears more often than not. five minutes here, two hours there, and it's hard to find the bad in what's keeping them sane—so they don't.

every once in a while, one of them will open the door without turning on the lights.

every once in a while, they both sleep and are both still there when they wake up.

[limnsaber]

To explain what I was talking about late late last night but ended up talking around: The X Files wonderfully embodies a spectrum of human emotion, but to me, does none so as well as the way it talks about wonder and love.

On the part of love it says: the truths we look for are in other people. The way we love other people is how we win. Not out of fear but out of love and the bonds we have with each other are the most important truth we can hope to know.

On the part of wonder the X Files says: to look into the unknown is so wonderfully human. To gaze at the stars and wonder at what we find there is human nature. To search for truth -- the truths of the universe, of the unknown, the truths between me and you, is wonderfully, essentially human. It's part of our nature to search for these things and Samantha is the heart of this. Aside from Samantha's disappearance being the inciting event of the show, she is the embodiment of this mystery. To wonder at the stars knowing she's up there, to search for the truth and find greater ones in turn -- Samantha is the key to this.

So to kill her off as an aside just to reach 'closure'; to make her nothing more than a victim rather than the person who invites and embodies for both Mulder and Scully the part that's so achingly unknown seemed like a horrible tragedy to me. Where did it go. Was the truth we found human cruelty??? Was that it the whole time????

In s4-s5 and Fight the Future, it seemed that we inched ever nearer to finding Samantha. It was teased that she was alive: that like the truths we hoped to find, she was still out there, waiting. There was a point at which the extraterrestrial mirrored the human. FTF and these middle seasons almost seemed to say: no, there is no fundamental difference between extraterrestrial and human cruelty. The extraterrestrial forces were in conflict just the same way human forces were. Samantha was sent away embodying the hopes of humanity, however horrible that decision was. Of course, we can't ignore that Samantha was a victim, and the later seasons of the X Files lean into this. Abduction is a violent act, and what Scully, Samantha, and the MUFON women went through was horrible. I really would've loved it if they explored this more, but they didn't, and still there's this contrariness to Samantha's abduction.

It's said in FTF that Bill Mulder held two hopes -- that Mulder would uncover the abuse of the Syndicate and reveal the truth, and that Samantha would be allowed the chance to survive and would be able to give that to the world. There were extraterrestrial rebels fighting against colonization and the Syndicate the same way Mulder and Scully do. This contrariness, this uncertainty, is part of the X Files too.

Samantha's abduction always implied that she would be returned. We were teased that she would be found. Over and over, we are told that she is alive, that she is still out there for Mulder to find. Whether she was a human test subject or off in the stars, the truth was living and breathing, waiting to be found.

The X Files says the truth is out there, that looking to the stars is part of the human experience, that our connections to each other are so fundamental to our worldview and that they enable us to endure anything. The X Files is wonder at the heart, the intersection of the unknown and known, and that the truth is each other. Samantha was Scully and Mulder's first step to that truth. Even with everything that they endured, the wonder and love that is the motivating force of everything that we see is inextinguishable. Samantha is the vessel for these beliefs.

Retconning Samantha Mulder from her place embodying the hopes and dreams of humanity, however horribly that came about, to a child that was abused until she died weakens the sentiments at the heart of The X Files.

yk i’m at the point that i literally don’t accept s7e11 “closure” as canon. it makes me ANGRY now because the more i look at all the past seasons and everything they’ve done with the samantha arc and how important it’s been to mulder’s character, it just defaces and denies all of it. it just- it’s not fair. after all mulder has been through to continue to believe that samantha was abducted just for it to be thrown out the window? for him to accept it finally in a way which was supposed to be meaningful and big but altogether uncharacteristic and hollow? it’s like they tried to abide by paper hearts ideologies but through a seemingly unnessary dark meandering of new paranormalities. it also creates so much more inconsistency along with what we started to see from s5 and beyond in the samantha plot, it doesn’t explain it. for instance, in the colony arc, the samantha-looking clones say “how could we know so much about her” and WHO if not samantha is this woman they were modeled after??? did the clones just grow old from the little samantha’s on that bee farm thing so they knew what she’d age like?? IT DOESN’T MAKE SENSE!!! IT’S NOT ENOUGH!! CC YOU CANT GET AWAY THAT EASY!!

[azure-firecracker]

I hate seeing Scully so distressed but I think Irresistible might be my favorite episode of the show so far. (Spoilers under the cut!)

I’m sure I’m far from the first person who’s talked about this but just…the realization that sometimes the scariest monsters are humans. And the fact that those are the cases that scare Scully the most because these are the ones she should be able to understand because there’s nothing supernatural about them yet they’re just as indecipherable as any supernatural being.

And God, Scully. The fact that she clearly hasn’t really dealt with any of the trauma from her abduction and the way it’s so clearly paralleled in this case with bodies…women’s bodies…being used for the purposes of others without their consent or their ability to retaliate.

How she’s so desperate to make sure Mulder doesn’t see how bothered she is and all the reasons behind that. Because she knows how worried he was about her when she got abducted and doesn’t want to worry him again. Because she’s built so much of her identity on her abilities and not needing to be protected by anybody else. Not to mention that she’s a woman in two different male-dominated fields and is probably averse to showing emotions at all just because of that.

She’s such a good character because she’s the definition of competent and collected, but here we see that just underneath that is a fear of needing others, of not being able to do everything right herself. And yes, she says she trusts Mulder with her life, but she hates the idea of needing to rely on him, of him or anyone knowing that she needs to rely on him.

And the ending. I need to watch it again for it to really sink in. I’m sure everyone has said everything there is to say about this already. Scully has just been fighting for her life in this desperate attempt to regain the agency and control she’s been missing since she got abducted, and of course it’s terrifying. And then Mulder gets there and all of this fear she’s been feeling all along sinks in but she’s so afraid of letting him in, of needing him or anyone. But he’s so gentle with her and he doesn’t let her brush everything aside the way she’s been doing all episode, and instead he really looks at her and he doesn’t even have to say anything but the way he looks at her just speaks volumes. He sees her, all of her, and he doesn’t need her to be okay all the time and all he wants her to know is that it’s okay for her to let her walls down with him.

And she finally does, and wow the way she just leans into him and lets herself go limp because she can finally admit that she needs to. And the way he holds her, not with the frantic worry he had while she was abducted but with all the care in the world like he could just to hold her there forever as long as it’ll make her feel safe. And for a second, maybe, she does.

Also correct me if I’m wrong but I think he was kissing her hair? It was hard to see.

Anyway I’m VERY in my feelings rn. Beautiful.

[carefulfears]

a lot of these fans are scully hardcore fans who call mulder an asshole for fucking someone while scully is abducted and in danger and i’m like maybe let him have the one thing that makes him forget all this even for a split second and makes him stop the self flagellation for a moment ?? you know..

tbh i feel like kristen was kind of more an indulgence into self-hatred (and a sort of feeling of betrayal?) than anything else but i totally get what you’re saying anon and you’re so right like…omg…let me not speak…

[bisexualfbiagents]

THE X FILES | Firewalker (2.09)

[randomfoggytiger]

Mulder tried to be romantic a couple of times: wanting to take G to a game, wiping the BBQ sauce off her face and then using the same napkin, and ,of course, the baseball scene.

What would Scully do to sweep him off his feet? She failed with the wine and cheese platter, but what would he respond to? Would she need to dress up as an alien and cook him a green slime spaghetti meal? Would she rent out a movie theater for the night to watch his favorite movies or set up a screen to watch his monster films under the stars in a wheat field?

Took a few days to answer this-- sorry!

Hmmmmm... hmmmmmmm....

With Mulder, any and all efforts either succeed or fail depending on one single, solitary factor: his head space. Mulder positively responded to the cheese platter, actually... before he lost himself, again, in his work; and he followed that same path in The Unnatural (meaning, this interpretation of his character was cosigned by David Duchovny.) Detour displayed both his obliviousness and his avoidance: Mulder had decided, beforehand, that he wasn't going to progress forward; so, all of Scully's efforts automatically went into the Spam Mail bin (i.e. he only let it affect him so far.) In short: he didn't take her advances seriously because he wasn't ready to seriously reciprocate.

Further evidence to support this is after their kiss in Millennium: Mulder is charmed-- nay, downright googly-eyed-- at every little joke, gesture, or face Scully makes. Scully arriving late? Sappy grin. Scully jealously pushing past him? Endeared confusion. Scully wearing (briefly) a magician's hat? Dream come true. Scully plugging a murderous skimpy game warrior full of bullets? Couldn't be more of everything if he tried. And, to be fair, there were plenty of moments before their kiss where that pattern held true: every sarcastic quip she made, every large smile she gave, every smart diatribe on the exact type of plane that was buried in the ocean.... But, again, he only let that feeling go so far-- he's a distancing kinda guy. Scully's not the only Avoidant type, after all (post here.)

In conclusion: Mulder's a cheap lay when it comes to Scully (and, sadly, with anyone else who expresses loyalty, devotion, or affection.) He is very easily pleased.

[xf-cases-solved]

S2E10: Red Museum

Case: Bro, don't make me try to summarize "Red Museum," so many things happen and every single one of them is baffling.

You know what? This entire episode feels like an SNL Stefon sketch, so I'm going to write it as one.

If you're looking for a monster-of-the-week X-Files tale centering around obscure religions, look no further. Fox network's hottest new episode is "Red Museum." This episode has everything. A cult of creepy vegetarians who all wear red turbans and whose sermons are all written on the fly by a dude who has a really impressive WPM. Children wandering around the woods in their underwear with "HE/SHE IS ONE" written on their backs with black Sharpie. Walk-ins.

Oh, what's a walk-in? It's that thing where a body's original soul is replaced by a new, different soul for some reason.

But that's okay if that's not for you. If what you're looking for is a story about a deep-seated conspiracy of unethical medical experiments, look no further. Fox network's hottest new episode is still "Red Museum." This episode has everything. An awkward road trip with an old man out into the countryside where he tells you his life story, unprompted. A random plane crash implicating the local doctor. Bovine somatotropin.

Oh, what's bovine somatotropin? It's that thing where you genetically engineer a growth hormone and give it to cows to make them produce more milk.

Still not what you're looking for? That's no problem. For those of you itching for some more myth arc plot, look no further. Fox network's hottest new episode continues to be fucking "Red Museum." This episode has everything. A middle-aged white man you're somehow supposed to distinguish from the millions of other middle-aged white men and remember that he's the guy that killed Deep Throat. A complete lack of usable evidence. Purity Control derivatives.

Oh, what's Purity Control? It's that thing from "The Erlenmeyer Flask" where you mix human DNA with alien DNA to conduct a series of experiments on the unsuspecting human population. 

Also, there's a perv creeping on kids through peepholes.

Anyway. This episode... goes some places. 

Moving on.

Does someone die in the cold open: My notes say, "no death in CO, but that kid is fucked up," which I feel is a good summary.

Does Mulder present a slideshow: YES!! Our boy and his projector have finally been reunited at last! He hasn't done a slideshow since "Tooms," which actually makes it all make sense now, bc that was the one he did in court that made me (and Scully) want to die from secondhand embarrassment. Maybe Scully had been keeping the projector locked away until he proved he could be trusted with it. She had the key to the storage closet in her pocket when she was abducted.

Does the evidence survive the investigation: Yeah, nah.

Whodunit: Bro, I don't fucking know. All of them. They all did it. Every single person is complicit. You're complicit. I'm complicit. Just blow the planet up and start over.

Convictions: 🙄😒

Did they solve it: Last line of the episode is "this case remains open and unsolved," soooooo. I'm not even giving them a "no, but" bc they didn't even manage to keep Deep Throat's killer alive long enough to get any useful information out of him. Maybe they shouldn't have given you guys the X-Files back, actually...

[how do i determine if a case is solved? check the scale here: x]

This episode is sponsored by: Part one of this five part SNL Stefon YouTube compilation for those of you who had no idea wtf I was referencing up there

***

General Total Stats:

(green means stat has changed since last ep; red means new stat added to list)

Total Cases *Definitively* Solved So Far: 15 (they haven't solved anything since fucking "blood," and technically they weren't even on the x-files then. they haven't solved a genuine x-file since "roland," and i only gave them that one out of pity. time to just keep the x-files closed and assign them to the department that tracks down people who pirate movies. mulder & scully and the search for the Truth 20-something college kid making copies of jurassic park to give to his cousin in exchange for weed)

Total Number of "Mulder/Scully, It's Me": 9

Total Number of Times Scully Has Conveniently Not Seen Something Crucial: 6

Total Number of Times Mulder Has Been in Mortal Danger: 14 (i think they technically both could have gotten blown up, right?) 

Total Number of Times Scully Has Been in Mortal Danger: 14 (i expected these two stats specifically to be more disproportionate, but so far they're pretty even huh)

Total Number of Sexually Charged, Uncomfortably Intimate, and/or Flirty Moments Between Friendly Coworkers: 19 (bbq napkin scene. she wants to devour those ribs and then devour him)

Total Number of Autopsies Scully Has Performed On Screen: 5

Total Number of Times Scully Plays Doctor: 2 

Total Number of Times Mulder Talks to an Informant: 21

Total Number of Times People Making Out in a Car Are Hurt or Killed: 2

Total Number of Times Someone Correctly Guesses a Password: 3 

Total Number of (Plot Relevant) Nosebleeds: 5

Total Number of Times Mulder Has Tasted/Sniffed/Touched Something Questionable Without Following Proper Safety Procedures: 4 (it was just gas, but it was on the floor of a slaughterhouse, directly underneath a hanging hunk of beef, and there was a very obvious red can labeled "gasoline" sitting three feet away on the floor, so i feel like he could have made that inference without sticking his hand in it)

Total Number of Times People Fight in a Parking Garage: 1 

Total Number of Times Someone Says "Trust No One": 3 

Total Number of Times Someone Says "I Want to Believe": 4 

Total Number of Times Someone Says "The Truth is Out There": 2 

Total Number of Cigarettes Cigarette Smoking Man Has Smoked: 16 

Total Number of Maggie Scully Sightings: 3

Total Number of Lone Gunmen Sightings: 3

Total Number of Alex Krycek Sightings: 3 (no more krycek for right now 😔. mulder's projector has returned, but still we lie in wait for rat boy's resurgence)

Total Number of Times I Had to Look Up What State the Episode Takes Place in Even Though I Literally Just Watched It: 13½ (not only did i not know, but i wrote this up over the course of two days, and had already forgotten by the time i got to this stat even tho i looked it up yesterday)

Total Number of Times I Had to Look at an Episode's Wikipedia Page to Fill This Out Because It Was Fucking Confusing and/or Too Boring for Me to Pay Attention: 7 (i am still not convinced i followed the whole thing. i don't think it's possible)

[enigmaticxbee]

X-Files Solve Rate

Although I tend to think of X-Files episodes and cases as open-ended - the Flukeman surviving somehow in the sewer, perhaps to return one day… - perhaps Mulder and Scully solved more cases than I give them credit for. In Tooms Scully tells Skinner that their case solution rate of 75% is above the bureau standard - and according to my calculations their solve rate really was 75% at that point in season 1! Of course it didn’t stay that high, and the more mytharc cases the worse their rate becomes since those episodes often end with an empty warehouse, no alien fetus, and their informant dead on a bridge. Of course it depends on how you’re counting a “solve” - I usually went based on whether they could write a report to Skinner that wasn’t just a giant shrug emoji - but I do wonder how often they actually got any kind of conviction…

Season 1: 71% - off to a great start! Of course they shut down the X-Files anyways…

Season 2: 64% - not as good, but there were a lot more mytharc episodes, including a major unresolved abduction arc.

Season 3: 54% - not great, but there were several two-part mytharc episodes which mostly go unsolved, as well as several MOTW cases like Jose Chung’s ‘From Outer Space’ which are classically unresolved.

Season 4: 58% - I assume Skinner’s reaction at the end of El Mundo Gira applies to all their post case meetings, whether solved or not

Season 5: 45% - even worse! Of course I’m unfairly including the two episodes set pre-X-Files in Mulder and Scully’s solve rate. But uhh, there’s not much argument against shutting down the X-Files in this data (sorry 🙈)

Season 6: 68% - actually if you look at the second half of the season when they get the X-Files back they’re at 80%!

Season 7: 73% - their best season solve rate since season 1 - think they’re working extra hard to prove that getting romantically involved won’t affect their work? Happy agents make successful agents!

Season 8: 62% - Scully and Doggett actually do pretty well with the MOTW cases in the first half of the season, but the mytharc-heavy second half brings down their average.

Season 9: 84% - with Scully’s help Doggett and Reyes do surprisingly well. Although I miss the classic who knows what really happened endings of the early seasons.

Seasons 10 and 11: 67 and 75% - even more starkly continuing the trend of resolved MOTW cases and unsatisfying conclusions to the mytharc episodes.