Laura Sook Duncombe’s previous work for The Toast and The Butter can be found here. Note: This essay contains spoilers for The X-Files.
201 hours. Just over eight days. Working 9:00 to 5:00, it would take you five straight weeks to get to 201 hours. It’s a lot of time — the most precious commodity in this world, the one thing that can’t be bought or sold or regained once lost. I am about to spend 201 hours watching a television show, one that I have already seen. Why?
The X-Files, an iconic pop-culture phenomenon in the ’90s, is returning to the small screen for a special six-episode event in January. In preparation for its return, many fans have chosen to rewatch the entire series, in order, one episode per day. No time off for weekends or holidays. There is no prize for doing this, no recognition or tangible reward. I already know many of the episodes by heart, and I need no reminder of major plot points or the mythological arc of the series. So again, why am I doing this?
The short and long answer is Agent Dana Scully. Scully was the hero my pre-adolescent heart craved. Watching the show for the first time was like arriving at a place I’d never been but instantly knew as home. For five years, every Sunday night at 9:00pm, I would sit cross-legged on the floor way too close to the TV in my parents’ bedroom and soak in the gory, macabre, hilarious glory that was The X-Files. I had to watch it upstairs, in my parents’ room, because it was “too scary” for my younger brother and sister. It was too scary for me, too, although I was loath to admit it (I had nightmares about the episode with the killer trees — not even a particularly frightening episode — for years). Like the Barenaked Ladies song, I always watched with the lights on.
Maybe because I watched it alone, or maybe because the show was so adult-oriented, that hour felt like my special passport to adulthood — a Narnia-like gateway into another world, one I wanted to discover and claim. And I adored each and every minute of it.
For those of you unfortunate enough not to know who Dana Scully is, here’s a brief biography: She’s one of four kids, a Navy brat, and a Catholic. She was recruited out of medical school into the FBI, shocking her family by choosing to become an agent rather than the doctor she was meant to be. She is bright and ambitious, a rule-follower determined to distinguish herself in the old boys’ club of the FBI. Dana Scully is a woman who goes after what she wants, always speaks her mind, and throws some killer shade with her trademark raised eyebrow.
At twelve, in my eyes, she was Athena, Justice Ginsburg, and Princess Leia all rolled into one. I wanted to be her, I wanted to be with her, I wanted to hang around in places where she was so that we could breathe the same air.
When The X-Files came into my life in the Fall of 1997, I was smack in the middle of puberty and middle school, the twin trials of adolescent life. To say I was a bit of a loner was a huge understatement. I was new to the school and to the state of Pennsylvania, an outsider in most senses, and I felt like the Little Match Girl, my face pressed up against the glass and staring longingly at the fun, happy, warm things going on inside while I was stuck out in the cold. School was easy for me — always had been — but social interaction with my peers was completely beyond my ken. Flirting and casual contact was a foreign language I studied constantly, but could never learn myself. I watched from under a tree on the playground as girls talked to each other, painted each other’s nails, and “stole” boys’ sweatshirts, marveling at how easy it all looked.
I was too tall, too freakishly developed, too nerdy, and too Southern to ever fit in with most of the other girls. Even if I had worked up the nerve to talk to them, I was afraid of what would come out of my mouth: Star Wars jokes, book recommendations, scientific facts — surely my classmates would recoil and officially brand me as the outcast I already knew I was. So I remained profoundly isolated, watching and longing but never really assimilating into the surrounding population. I figured some girls, like me, just weren’t meant to have close friends.
Scully turned everything around for me. It wasn’t just the way she looked, although she was beautiful. I ached to have her petite stature and pale skin, so impossible for my tall, tanned self. Scully was pretty, and smart, and respected for her knowledge. She didn’t spend her days talking about makeup or boys; she solved grisly crimes with Agent Mulder and kicked ass.
There’s a scene in the first movie in which Scully has to evacuate a building, and the male officer she’s given the order to is hesitating. She stares him in the eye and hollers, “Pick up the phone and MAKE IT HAPPEN!” The man obeys, and thousands of lives are saved. For weeks after I saw the movie, I muttered that line to myself like a mantra. Scully knew what to do, and she wasn’t afraid to shout to get it done.
For the first time, I began to think that maybe there was more to being a girl than cute things and boy bands. Maybe it wasn’t that I was a freak — my definition of “woman” was just too narrow. The first time I saw her flat-out run in her four-inch heels and tackle a fleeing bad guy, my mind was blown. Scully flung wide open a wonderful world of womanhood where just being my nerdy, awkward, tomboyish self could be completely okay. Over and over, she led teams on assignments, saved Mulder’s ass, and proved to be an invaluable asset to the Bureau. Every time she took charge, the tiny flame in my heart burned a little brighter. By the Season 7 episode “First Person Shooter,” when she entered the possessed video game (don’t ask) in all her leather-clad glory and obliterated every enemy in her path while Mulder and the other men’s jaws hit the floor, the flame was a full-on inferno.
Scully’s courage gave me courage. Scully’s strength gave me strength. Scully just being herself proved to me that just being myself was nothing to be ashamed of — it was something to be proud of.
She became the older sister I never had. I watched her faithfully every Sunday night for the next four and a half years, never missing an episode unless I was being punished. (Remember, this was in the pre-DVR and Hulu days, when an episode aired only once before disappearing into the ether. If you were lucky, you might catch a rerun in the summer, but that was about it. I keenly recall sobbing the entire hour the show was on the few times my mom forbade me to watch it, mourning the loss of my glimpse into Scully’s world.) In my basement bedroom, I created a low-tech version of tumblr, pasting newspaper clippings, photos, and magazine articles about The X-Files onto a taped-together scroll of notebook paper, which I kept under my bed in a blue manila folder. The scroll was liberally sprinkled with Scully quotes, like “I want you to do me a favor. It’s not negotiable. Either you do it, or I kill you.” I had an X-Files t-shirt I wore constantly, to the chagrin of my parents. And after my bedtime, I would sneak upstairs to the one computer in the house and use our dial-up internet to access the earliest fanfiction forums, spending hours feeding my insatiable urge to be constantly in the presence, even virtually, of my beloved Scully.
Sometimes I felt like I understood The X-Files more than any other person, creator Chris Carter included. It was as if the show existed just for me, and as long as I could tune in and watch, I would be happy.
After a while, though, it wasn’t enough. I never tired of watching Scully navigate trials and triumphs, but I started longing to do the same. Scully could not be my only friend. I felt like I could not waste the gift she had bestowed on me, could not remain alone in my basement with my folders full of fanfiction and theories forever. I figured if Scully could battle aliens, go through cancer, lose her father and sister, bury a child she didn’t even know she had, and lose the man she loved, I could probably make it through middle school. I decided I would be brave like Scully and go out and find my Mulder. Not a romantic partner — that desire didn’t come until many years later — but someone who would accept and understand me; who would help me be my truest self. Mulder called Scully his “one in six billion” — surely I had a one in six billion out there, too.
Clad in my armor — my X-Files tee — I signed up for Odyssey of the Mind, which was like a cross between BattleBots and academic decathlon. I was good with mechanical stuff and I figured if my skills were needed, my presence might be tolerated. Scully had used the magic words “I’m a doctor” to gain access to places she needed to be; surely I could use my talents to break into the Fortress of Friendship.
This decision saved my life, providing me with not just my one in six billion, but six teammates who grew to be my first and closest friends. Although none of them were into The X-Files, they liked Star Wars and board games and science and loads of other things I liked, too. They were smart and funny and they liked me a lot, both for my contributions to the team and for myself. Their friendship became the bright sun in the center of my life, and its glow radiated over everything else in my life and made it all better.
Like Mulder and Scully, my friends and I were far more effective as a team than apart. I eventually grew to love Pennsylvania, my new school, and sometimes even myself. I would remain in Odyssey of the Mind until I graduated high school, eventually winning many state and two international titles. If Scully hadn’t shown me that being abducted by aliens is much scarier than joining a team, I doubt I would have had the courage to do it and find my place.
I am now thirty, considerably older than Gillian Anderson was when she first stepped into Scully’s shoes. In the end, I didn’t turn out much like Scully. I did not become a doctor or an FBI agent. I did not convert to Catholicism. I don’t favor boxy pantsuits. Although I did have a disastrous fling with Scully’s trademark red bob, my hair is back to its natural wavy brown. When it comes to belief in the paranormal, I’m much closer to Agent Mulder than to Scully. A casual observer would never look at my life and see anything to tip them off regarding my love of Agent Scully.
But I still see her handprints all over my life. She showed me how to be brave and face the things that scare me the most, because those things can often turn out to be the best things. She taught me to take pride in my intelligence, joy in my self-reliance, and comfort in my friends. She convinced me that it’s okay to yell when you know you’re right. So many of the things I like best about myself — the things that made me into the happy, healthy adult I am today — I learned from her.
So is all of that worth 201 hours of my time between now and January? As I think about all those hours, it still feels like a very long time. It might be a waste, one of those things you think sounds like a good idea when you first start it, only to come to hate it by the end. But I feel this is something I have to do. I feel I owe it to Scully, in a way, to pay her back for all the hours she spent getting me through my adolescent years. She did so much for me — I can do this for her. I know she’s fictional, and will never know what she did for me, regardless of whether I go through this rewatch or not. But sometimes, attention and honor must be paid. (And of course, I will seize any excuse to watch “First Person Shooter” again.)
By the time the last episode airs, I will have given birth to my first child. Somehow that gives this rewatch more poignancy: the fact that I am exposing my baby, in utero, to the entire X-Files canon. If it’s a girl, I hope she one day absorbs the lessons it took me so long to learn from Scully, saving herself a lot of heartache. If I can give her that, through Scully, I will have given her a lot. Heck, I wish the same thing if it’s a boy — all children deserve to know right from the start that they are loved as they are, no matter how strange or out-of-place they think they are.
Would twelve-year-old me, hunched over on my parents’ bedroom floor in front of a small, ancient television, even believe future me if I told her what life had in store for her? That she would grow into her spindly limbs, become comfortable with her height? That college would rock and she would eventually find other X-Files fans and become lifelong friends with them? That she would fall in love with and marry a man not nearly as geeky as her, who somehow adores her anyway, and achieve her lifelong dream of becoming a writer? Even if I could somehow teleport back to 1997 and tell myself all that was coming, it would all sound too wonderful to be true, and twelve-year-old Laura would probably be convinced that the government had sent some kind of evil clone or something to lull her into complacency while they readied their attack. (When I told you I was a weird, conspiracy-addled kid, I wasn’t kidding.) Yet despite how hard it would have been to believe it at the time, all those things came true.
Now, when I watch The X-Files, I watch on my laptop in my own home with my dog curled up at my side. My life is far better than my teenaged self could have ever imagined, and Scully made it possible. She showed me how to blaze a trail for myself in this weird, wacky world and follow it, no matter what seems to stand in my way. So of course I will be doing the rewatch, all 201 hours of it. How could I miss the chance to spend so much time with one of my greatest mentors and heroes?
I will probably still watch it with the lights on, though.
Tags: childhood, dana scully, growing up, heroes, laura sook duncombe, nostalgia, television, the x-files
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I’m not kidding when I say that I started crying reading this. It feels like I wrote it with only a few small details being different (I’m actually shorter than Gillian, for one). I know a lot of people relate to and admire Scully, but this sums up my feelings so perfectly. Thank you.
I teared up, too. So many details – the scrapbook of X-Files clippings, being the nerdy loner in middle school, the unfortunately narrow view of what it meant to be a girl – line up exactly with 12-year-old me. I love the thought that there were so many of us out there, quietly obsessing over the X-Files and waiting to grow up.
I’m really short, too–5′ 1/2″, to be precise–and it just occurred to me, seeing Scully kicking ass among all the tall law enforcement men and criminals with her expertise and self-assuredness, no questions asked or taken… is probably especially significant to me.
Exactly this here too. Thanks, Laura.
OK first of all let me get this out of the way – ODYSSEY OF THE MIND!!! OM represent!!! Seeing that in an article about the X-Files was like looking back at teenage me.
I remember that pretty much the greatest compliment I got in middle school (where I was when the X-Files began) was that my group of friends thought I looked like Scully. I had the fleeting exhilaration of being nicknamed Scully, but it didn’t stick, even among a group of kids that founded the Sci-Fi Club at our high school.
This brought back some great memories, and I’m looking inward to ponder on how my early relationship with Agent Scully may have affected my life. Thanks for this.
OM FOREVER.
YES THIS.
SCULLLLLLLLYYYYYY <3 <3 <3
It never fails to blow my mind when I think about how young her character is, and now that I’m older than her it is SO WEIRD seeing that CHILD Gillian Anderson in season 1 or 2. It’s like being on a college campus this time of year and going “are these people grownups? what?”
X-Files was the show that my family watched together after dinner. It was delightful. When I was a kid I was enthralled and terrified by all the monsters; rewatching it now, I’m most captivated by the loving, respectful relationship between Scully and Mulder, and by Scully’s indomitable will. She’s smart, she’s willing to question authority, and she gets shit done, and Mulder never seems to fear or resent her for it – on the contrary, those are the reasons he holds her in such high regard.
yes, I love that they have that nagging rule-following woman / adventurous goofball man that always needs bailing out dynamic, but you never think “cmon, Scully, just leave,” because it’s not out of disrespect. And she gets her moments to kick ass and be hilarious too.
My entire social life in high school revolved around X-Files. There was a group of us, freshmen to seniors, and that’s… that’s just what we did. On Friday nights we’d gather at someone’s house, make popcorn, eat snacks, watch X-Files, and follow up with as much weird sci-fi and fantasy as we could find; someone rented a laser disc player once and we watched the entire Star Wars trilogy in a night; another time it was The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth. When the show switched to Sundays, the group kind of fell apart. I miss it still.
My group would meet on Mondays after school in a small room we reserved at the local library and try to figure out what the heck was going on. I loved it so much.
Sounds like you would have fit right in at the OBSSE. Great article. You won’t regret the rewatch (I say before reaching seasons 8&9). It has been fun and a trip through everything you love about Scully.
You know (and I may say this because my heart will probably always be SO FULL of love for XF that I can’t see it as an objective thing anymore): season 8 was really not so bad. The first time through I was SO impatient for glimpses of Mulder because I just loved their dynamic, but on rewatch (now that I know where things go and when he shows up) I like it SO much better than I did initially.
I also, largely, don’t get the hate for the second movie. Googling surgery is definitely bad but it made me happy to see Scully and Mulder together and relatively content domestically. Like, it was the grownup relationship those two deserved. But then I was always there primarily for character stuff and some scares.
I am with you 1000% on season 8 (Doggett is actually likable and compelling, Scully gets to try on the believer hat and there’s the episode where no one believes her about her baby’s origins that works as a great commentary on how a female Mulder would be treated, they kiss(!!!), etc.)
The 2nd movie… not so much. I was always more into the relationships too, and I like seeing them as a domestic couple, but their individual arcs just didn’t make sense to me and also they’re fighting the apocalypse they gave up their son for by totally ignoring it? Idk, ymmv and all that.
I also think Redrum is a legit great hour of TV, although that is basically down to an amazing acting job by Joe Morton and the XF agents have relatively little to do. But if the monster actor is good enough I’m pretty happy to sit through an agents-lite episode (c.f., Hungry).
There was a lot of stupid plot shit that went down that I think Chris Carter and others thought they could just kind of handwave away. William is probably the most notable example but then babies in established drama shows are not usually a great addition. If anyone had asked me, which they definitely should have, there was a massive, missed opportunity to revive the Syndicate for a younger generation with Krycek and Marita Covarrubias at its head. Like if CSM had died in that one season finale where Krycek pushed him down the stairs and then Krycek and Marita had gone around recruiting new people, THAT would have been more interesting than the whole supersoldier plotline that came out of nowhere.
Plus there would have been way more quasi-hate sex and scheming between the two of them and I am always down for that.
OH YES!!! That is what should’ve happened! I will now make it my new head canon. Thank you 🙂
Yes to all of this! ( I say a mere few days after watching Redrum). And I’m surprisingly into season 8 so far. I held off watching it because I knew Doggett was coming in and Mulder leaving, but now I’m mad that I waited so long.
I am there for character stuff, too, and I really disliked the second movie… not that your liking is invalid in any way!… to me it just seemed like a really, really mediocre episode. So I had a lot of trepidation about the new episodes, but it sounds like they’re bringing in the great writers who really get the show and the characters. So, fingers crossed.
Nah, I mean I get it from a dramaturgy perspective. I just think my personal judgement was drowned out by my inner middle/high school/college self. But this is also influenced by the fact that I never had much use for the mytharc, except insofar as there was always a ton of character development and that I watch a lot of bad horror movies (A LOT) so my tolerance for plot weaknesses as long as there are no freaking aliens involved may be higher than average.
Thank you for reminding us how enigmatic St. Scully can be.
OMG I remember you.
‘At twelve, in my eyes, she was Athena, Justice Ginsburg, and Princess Leia all rolled into one.’
I’m 37 and still feel much like this about her – I rewatch the box set at least once a year.
yep. feel that way about her right now as a grown adult.
I dunno, I think those trees were like, the second or third scariest monsters. Tooms was definitely scariest for me.
I came to The X-Files as an adult (well, college student) and I wish my younger self could have experienced, in her formative years, the character of Dana Scully the way you describe.
The porcelain doll that made people kill themselves was it for me. Oh my god, I can’t even be in the same room with one now.
I’m only a season and a half in, but so far my winner for scariest monster is the creepy little clone girls.
Understandable! I have a friend for whom that episode inspired a lifelong phobia/hatred of identical twins. Talk about formative influences!
To be fair, I did also lie awake in bed for an hour the night we watched the first Tooms episode thinking “I am a grown woman and The X-Files is fiction, but also, what if the liver-eating dude is real.”
I’ve admitted this before but I watched the first Tooms episode at age 22 and slept with the lights on for a WEEK. No joke.
I feel much better now admitting that I started watching the X-Files at 24 (still only on season 4; I got distracted rewatching Grey’s Anatomy) and had the absolute bejesus scared out of me by Tooms.
TOOMS IS LEGIT THE SCARIEST.
My stepdad says the Frankenstein monsterish brothers are the creepiest for him. I loved that episode though, so.
I could not love this more. I loved The X-Files fervently and totally – I remember distinctly the night my family hit heavy traffic getting home from something or other and I missed a new episode (a big deal in those days when programming a VCR required something akin to a degree in engineering). I cried.
I loved Scully, of course, and I was madly in love with Mulder (I think I’m still looking for him on some level), but what I loved most was their relationship. A man and a woman who were both so smart, deeply understood each other despite their differences, and could make banter seem like the sexiest activity imaginable. They were best friends in the best way, and that felt revolutionary to watch. I wanted them to get together eventually, of course (well, second only to my desire for Mulder to step through the screen and marry me), but mostly I just wanted to watch them hang out together and solve mysteries and challenge each other and support each other forever.
I’m totally going to go rewatch the entire series now, aren’t I?
never fear, you are not the only one still looking for mulder on some level…and/or hoping for something in your own life that mirrors their ‘best friends/equals/true love’ dynamic.
in any case, yes, go rewatch it all!
Oh damn. I think I need to re-watch X-Files too, now. I have yet to find that Dana Scully’s greatness can be overstated.
Has anyone watched The Fall? Gillian Anderson’s character in it is also highly excellent.
SO EXCELLENT. i think the more important question here is will i ever stop watching the fall, and the answer is no, because Stella is my adult role model the way Scully was a role model when i was a child.
Also outstanding in Hannibal, a show which is just chock-full of tough acts to follow.
Dr. Bedelia DuMaurier, however, is the worst role model ever.
The single best compliment I have ever gotten was from an ex who said he was rewatching X-Files and that Scully’s lips reminded him of mine. I think my pants disintegrated instantly.
!!!
YES!!! I love this.
Oh man. I super had a very similar proto-Tumblr: black notebook (ofc) with a decoupage cover and episode ads from the TV guide that came with the Sunday paper pasted inside where I also copied down all the episode descriptions and then gave them a star rating once I’d seen them.
Also: books and comics? Anyone? I definitely had those. I particularly liked the episode adaptations because they had painted art and I thought they were pretty.
Sometimes I felt like I understood The X-Files more than any other person, creator Chris Carter included.
Yes, well, in regards to the later seasons I wouldn’t call that much of a stretch.
Seriously, though, I was a huge X-Files fan, too, and I made myself late to my doctor appointment because I couldn’t not read this and then of course I had to comment. THANK YOU!
Chris Carter is the same as George Lucas. They gave us something awesome that became much more awesome in the hands of different writers and directors.
The Chris Carter Effect http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheChr…
Oh dear . . . down the tv tropes rabbit hole I go . . .
Should have come with a warning!
Oh, Scully, how I’ve missed you.
This was an amazing read, and it hits home for me. I grew up near where it was originally filmed, and I was 10 years old when they started shooting the first season. I was always a drama nerd, did some local background extra work, and had the amazing opportunity to act as a stand-in for one of the twin girls in the episode “Eve”. I will forever kick myself for not having any idea at the time what an amazing opportunity it really was. The show was still new, it hadn’t become huge yet, I had never even watched it and might not even have been allowed at that age, but nonetheless I got to work on it, and meet the actors as well. I remember hanging around Gillian and David, and though they were just strangers to me then, it was impossible not to be awed as they stood around looking ever so cool in their trench coats beneath the bright lights. It was a great memory, and I still have (and shall forever treasure) the slightly crumpled paper scrap I got their autographs on (which my shy and ignorant ten-year-old self only did because my fellow stand-in twin goaded me into it–bless her).
It was only after that experience that I started watching the show, and fell in love, and became a die-hard fan, right down to reading the novelized versions of my favourite episodes. Scully was an amazing woman to grow up with as a role model–confident, uncompromising in her values, totally intrepid, and not sexualized like almost every other heroine in almost every other medium. The exceptional value of her character becomes truly evident in sharp relief against the lack of other, comparable strong female characters on TV in those days. Scully is one-of-a-kind, and I for one am beyond psyched for the new episodes.
THAT EPISODE IS SO GOOD THO
The lovely Lavenderyngium just texted me to ask why I haven’t dressed as Scully for Halloween my entire adult life. I didn’t start watching X-Files until two years ago and thus had not yet discovered my a) respect for b) passionate crush on her yet.
Anyway, I LOVE Scully (and Gillian Anderson), and this is a fantastic article. Thanks!!
I did last year! #greatlifedecisions Highly recommend it.
It’s on my to-do list. Halloween or if I ever happen to go to a con.
Wow. A friend who routinely shares Toast articles sent me this! I relate so much to this article and so many of the comments that I’m compelled to leave a comment: hi! I am so glad to know that other people out there felt so strongly about this show and especially Scully. I feel like I’ve found my people! 🙂
I see your Odyssey of the Mind and raise you Science Olympiad, baby! Cheers to finding your place in the battleground that is middle school.
I am so frustrated, though, that Dana Scullys remain rare. This is tangential, but I was just shopping on Old Navy for kid clothes, and guess which gender the Star Wars graphic tees are NOT sorted under? It’s 2015 and companies still haven’t caught on to the idea that little girls might be into sci-fi. Sometimes I feel like things haven’t progressed at all since the 90s.
Hello fellow Science Olympian!
Proud Science Olympian here. In the nerdy part of my middle school Science Olympiad was a huge deal!
People ask me pretty often if I was named after Dana Scully – I wasn’t, but this article makes me wish I was
I just want everyone to know I just went to see Gillian Anderson on a panel on the weekend, where she rubbed her butt on a hat for charity. My heart grew like 5 sizes at that panel.
Awesome piece.
My strongest memories of this show were struggling to be brave enough to watch it. Sunday nights: watch, miss all the grown up jokes on The Simpsons; try to brave The X-Files, as long as the aliens weren’t too visible.
I’m rewatching now. And this time I will brave the Mulder-free episodes (I’m actually dreading the season seven quality drop the most, because yeesh).
As a recent rewatcher, yeah, season 7 is a bit rough.
It is not necessary, nor advisable, to watch after season 7. Sorry Reyes and Doggett fans.
It starts okay, and then goes down a VERY steep cliff. And I really like a lot of season six. Cheers to Vince Gilligan for giving us a a good, non-ridiculous (X-Files-wise) body switching episode.
I tip-toed into season 8 last time I tried, but it wouldn’t take. I happily went back to seasons 3-5 endlessly.
But-but don’t I need to watch every episode in honor of the new ones?
No, no you don’t. Unless that kind of thing pleases you.
Yay-yuh, Dreamland 1 & 2 for the win! And seasons 3 – 5, and 6, yes.
Season 6 was my favorite, hands down. Season 5 is second fav.
Also, for all rewatchers… this recap series is so, so entertaining and rewarding. (Not least because dirtbag Mulder is not ignored.)
Reopening The X-Files
Meghan Deans http://www.tor.com/series/reopening-the-x-files/
I’ve been reading so many good Scully fanfics lately. Good job, Toast.
“At twelve, in my eyes, she was Athena, Justice Ginsburg, and Princess Leia all rolled into one. I wanted to be her, I wanted to be with her, I wanted to hang around in places where she was so that we could breathe the same air.”
Basically same. Except I’m 22 and watching for the first time (just started season seven). Similarly turbulent emotional, growing up kind of time, though. Also, Gillian Anderson is making me further question how I thought for so long I was 100% straight.
Every semester since going back to college I choose a show to watch as a reward for finishing my homework. This semester it’s been the X-Files. This was partly because my husband was a deeply fervent fan and partly because I remember watching a couple of episodes here and there in junior high and liking it.
It’s possible I’ve been enjoying it more than a 4th go round of West Wing or Firefly. And that’s specifically because of how much I love the character of Dana Scully. I’m midway through season 3 and I want nothing more than to be her when I grow up (I can still say that in my mid to late 30s right?). I am completely smitten with her and quote her aloud to my amused husband with increasing regularity.
Having little jealousy pangs right now because you are right on the cusp of my favorite season and it would be so rad to see it for the first time again. 🙂
There’s a scene in the first movie in which Scully has to evacuate a building, and the male officer she’s given the order to is hesitating. She stares him in the eye and hollers, “Pick up the phone and MAKE IT HAPPEN!” The man obeys, and thousands of lives are saved.
“This is why I’m HOT (Dana Scully)” [um, not “hot” in a reductive way] http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=J6oiKvEiu3A
BEEN GONE ALL EVENING BAD BLOOD HAVE WE TALKED ABOUT BAD BLOOD YET
I AM HERE FOR BAD BLOOD WANNA TALK ABOUT BAD BLOOD?
See response to Nikki for some discussion. 🙂
Few things delight me as much as that episode. I love the portrayals of how they perceive themselves and the other. And Scully is so awesome in hers and Mulder is so cute/pathetic in his.
Here’s a discussion of the episode:
I Was Drugged!: X-Files Season 5, “Bad Blood” by PlaidAdder http://archiveofourown.org/works/1793035
So here’s what I like about this device: the duelling perspectives express for us some of the frustrations that each partner has with the other—it’s the fifth year now, in any relationship that lasts that long you’re going to start finding a lot of stuff the other person does that really pisses you off—and also validates some of the peeves that we as viewers have with both characters (after 5 years why is Scully’s first reaction always to deny the possibility of the paranormal? after 5 years and cancer, why does Mulder still treat Scully as if her life is so much less important than his quest?).
I disagree with her assessment of what happened to Scully at the end of the episode, but can understand why she perceived it that way, because the show definitely has portrayed rape as okay and even funny at times. D: Such as in Small Potatoes and The Postmodern Prometheus.
You might really like her whole “Meta” series. Discussing the X-Files from a feminist (and queer) fan’s perspective. And, as needed, a “you guys, that was really shitty writing there” perspective. http://archiveofourown.org/series/95798
Oh hey if you’re JUST getting into the X-Files, I made a list of the best stand alone Scully-centric episodes for you to cherry pick from Netflix http://johnleavittlives.tumblr.com/post/128212046…
I wanted to be a medical examiner as a kid cause of Scully, she’s the best.
Thank you for this! I’m just now watching the series and freely admit there are some storylines I’m aggressively meh about.
Yeah I wrote it for my SO who never got into the series despite really liking Scully (he’s also a scientist) I tried to keep it short but aid probably add Arcadia to the list ( they have to pretend to be married!) Eve 6. ( lots of good creepy performances) and The long with the lake monster cause it finishes the story of Scully’s dog.
Thanks so much! I rewatched it (and then some) last year, and round about now I’ve been wanting to pick some eps to watch again and have been coming up dry. And I’ve been reading a lot of good Scully fic, so this is perfect.
What an amazing, wonderful, spot-on article; it is as if you rounded up all of my feelings about Dana Scully’s hand in shaping my life and put them into the perfect words. I started my re-watch already but have been taking a break, and now I am inspired to get right back to it! Thank you so much for writing this. I think you have spoken so well for those of us who grew up watching this awesome TV show, as well as us girls and women who became braver because of Scully.
This was beautiful.
This was so beautiful and touching! I related with many things that you wrote. =)
I was 8 when The X-Files first started. My dad loved it and would make me watch it with him…It scared me so much that I ended up hating everything related to the show for many, many years. My best friend when I was 12 was a huge fan and he would tell me all the time that I should watch it and I always refused. Maybe I should have listened to him. I’m in my 30s now and I really miss Scully’s influence in my teen years, maybe I would have turned out different, idk… Anyway, I decided that I should let go of the grudge earlier this year and I completely fell in love with Dana Scully, I mean, how could any girl/woman not fall in love with her? All I know is that I deeply regretted not watching it back then.
I would read the hell ouf of a fanfic in which Dana Scully was at Hogwarts, or Hermione was an intern on the X-files. Tell me such exists.
OMG. Scully at Hogwarts. She could be the new muggle studies teacher! This would, obvi, be how Hermione lands that intern position. If this doesn’t exist, it clearly should.
It’s not quite what you wanted but there is a crossover!
http://archiveofourown.org/works/2320568?view_ful…
YOU ARE MY VERY FAVORITE PERSON RIGHT NOW.
We aim to please!
In college I dealt with being a lonely virgin on Valentine’s Day by making handmade valentines for all my friends. They involved lots of Elmer’s and glitter and printed-out images of Dana Scully in a lab coat, with the words “Smart is Sexy.”
It’s one in 5 billion! 🙂
YES!!! Everything in this post and all these comments is totally wonderful! I wish I knew you all in middle school.
However, I’m here to tell an amazing X-Files story. It is not my story, Though I wish it was.
When my friend was in middle school, she like many of us, adored X-Files with the excessive fervor that only a middle schooler can. So much so, that she made her own X-Files FBI badge. (This was accomplished by pausing a videotaped episode and taking a photo of the opening credits! Oh how times have changed.) She carried this with her in her wallet everywhere. One day, after buying a coffee from the cute high school boy who worked at Starbucks, she was walking home when the Starbucks Boy called to her to wait. When he caught up to her he said: “Hey you forgot your wallet – Special Agent!” And then my friend dissolved into a puddle of preteen embarrassment.
In retrospect, she says the Starbucks Boy said it in a gentle and joking way, but it was hard to hear as a middle schooler. And this friend of mine grew up into a college professor at Brown! Every time I think of the story it makes me love her a little more.
I’m embarrassed to admit to knowing this, but the Barenaked Ladies lyric is “with *no* lights on”.
I hope the smoking man’s in this one
I don’t make mad films like Kurosawa, but if I did they’d have a samurai.
It’s hard to clarify just how important Scully was as a character on television. At the time there were few female characters we would call nowadays consider full-fledged and complex figures of both action, intellect, focus, and powerful. Even when made a victim (her abduction) she fought against it, even in the face of office politics and personal disappointments she maintained her sense and value of self.
She has her own Trope for God’s sake.
In the 90s there came this movement of Grrl Power, a form of active feminism that sought to break the standard norms of how our culture defined young women. Buffy in particular became a symbol of that power. Thing was, thing is, Scully got their first and showed us how it’s done.
I think we’re pretty much the same age…and we got into X-Files at pretty much the exact same time 🙂 I felt this, HARD. I channel Scully at work on the regular. I remember the first time I went to a software engineering conference by myself as a college student, walking around in my boxy, ill-fitting suit with my coffee, thinking, “Agent…motherfucking…Scully. 12-year-old me would DIE if she could see me now.”
Um not to mention my entire sexual orientation pretty much just imprinted on X-Files. I’ve never dated someone who didn’t remind me powerfully of one of the characters. When I met my husband he was wearing a long black trenchcoat and drove a bad American car.
I’m doing a mini-rewatch because I already have a kid and I don’t have an hour a night to scare myself silly. One a week though? I’m making the time 🙂 Thanks for writing this. X-Files was and is SO important to me.
I didn’t write this but I could have. Thank you for doing it. Feels lovely to know we weren’t the only ones enthralled with Scully in our formative years.
Whoa wait — three kids? I thought it was just the jerk brother and poor Melissa?
Charles was the invisible bro.
But anyways, yes to all of this. Rediscovering the x-files made me nostalgic for Vancouver in a way I never thought possible, and rediscovering Dana Scully (and subsequently getting back on board with Gillian Anderson’s acting career) proved to be one of the best decisions I ever made. Plus, it gave the world this blog: http://gilliananderson1996.tumblr.com/
I can’t believe how much I need this blog in my life.
Kinsey score… rising…
That last one is probably my favourite. I remember saving it and saving it until one day I was like, okay. I’m ready. I know what I need to say about this outfit.
Vital decision.
I can’t stop.
Right now, I am Gillian in this image. She is me. My job is the incarcerated alien freedom fighter with a Nokia strapped to his chest that is handcuffed to me.
I, however, am not wearing a custom pinstriped power suit with no top on underneath, so maybe that’s why I keep flipping all the tables in all the conference rooms.
Awesome blog is awesome.
Most importantly…
Thus photo has it all: a weird height-warping optical illusion, that hot guy from the “Scully gets a tattoo and has adventures” episode, a possible lurking Skinner, a really stellar monochromatic outfit on the lady in the background, and our favourite iridescent mermaid shawl.
The only thing missing is Gillian’s Emmy, but she’ll pick that up later.
[double post]
Sorry, I tried to make them smaller, but I failed.
I was in college and she was my Scientist idol and now I’ve been rewatching and she’s no less inspiring- definitely a goddess in my personal pantheon.
I know this is a tiny nit to pick, but the Barenaked Ladies are “Watching X-files with NO lights on.” You do you, tho!
Also, I once went to work on Halloween dressed as Scully. It’s a pretty work-friendly costume. 🙂
Vital decision.
<img src="http://41.media.tumblr.com/12aa0aefb648e68600be2a3026502670/tumblr_nekr3snD5W1twz39uo1_1280.jpg">
<img src="http://41.media.tumblr.com/27ec92751c5945f0c130d14e8eac2a45/tumblr_nb30vdzxGs1twz39uo1_500.jpg">
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<img src="http://40.media.tumblr.com/6f6d96841741f0a0ddc253707097cc86/tumblr_n8q7ayiQaA1twz39uo1_1280.jpg">
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[double post]
Most importantly…
<img src="http://41.media.tumblr.com/c3015d9506f7d4848426a3580d67a338/tumblr_nau6n3macW1twz39uo1_500.jpg">
Thus photo has it all: a weird height-warping optical illusion, that hot guy from the “Scully gets a tattoo and has adventures” episode, a possible lurking Skinner, a really stellar monochromatic outfit on the lady in the background, and our favourite iridescent mermaid shawl.
The only thing missing is Gillian’s Emmy, but she’ll pick that up later.
Sorry, I tried to make them smaller, but I failed.
I will fully express my gratitude and expression to you in a facebook pm, but in short, Scully and The X-Files saved me too and you helped me see that. There was a reason I was so lost after the show ended, I felt as if I had nothing to hold on to anymore. But I had to keep going. I knew Scully was just a character made up in Chris Carter’s (sometimes twisted) head, but I kept thinking “well, there aren’t many women in the FBI and Scully’s a badass, so that’s why I have to push through and get through high school, just like she got through quantico…”
“WWSD” – What would Scully do.
oh and I really wish you could have come to the NF foundation Scully marathon. It was a hoot! We threw pennies into buckets when watching various Scully-centered episodes.
I will fully express my gratitude and expression to you in a facebook pm, but in short, Scully and The X-Files saved me too and you helped me see that. There was a reason I was so lost after the show ended, I felt as if I had nothing to hold on to anymore. But I had to keep going. I knew Scully was just a character made up in Chris Carter's (sometimes twisted) head, but I kept thinking "well, there aren't many women in the FBI and Scully's a badass, so that's why I have to push through and get through high school, just like she got through quantico…"
"WWSD" – What would Scully do.
oh and I really wish you could have come to the NF foundation Scully marathon. It was a hoot! We threw pennies into buckets when watching various Scully-centered episodes.
It’s so funny/wonderful/touching when I read things like this. I know there are many of us out there, girls who grew up under the “Scully Effect,” but it never gets old reading about our likened experiences. The tall, awkward, middle school me always surges up inside to say, “Hey, you were just like me! Where were you in the mid-90s?”
However, I too was a new girl lucky enough to finally find some fellow nerdettes (Though their love was for Buffy and the Labyrinth.) who would have to listen to ramble on every Monday during Mock Trial practices about “Scully this” and “Scully that.” I too was happy to find someone in pop culture to admire and be excited about, to want to emulate, and at thirty, I still want to emulate her as well. I hope my daughter will be able to find someone as awesome as Scully -even better if it’s her- to want to emulate too.
Congratulations on the little one, and thank you for sharing!