Well, this is different.
OK, these episodes kind of bothered me. A lot.
Seven seasons. Seven seasons of Mulder and Scully, with occasional appearances from Skinner, Kersh, the Smoking Man, Krycek, the Lone Gunmen, and other assorted minor characters. Same show, same intro, same basic idea.
And now they've recut the intro and added a new character to it? No, I do not like this. This is not The X-Files. This is some other show with the same title and a few of the same characters. And Mulder is still missing and being horribly experimented on. But hey, he's got a pretty prominent role in the new intro, doesn't he?
I don't know where this is going, but I don't think it's anywhere good. There were, however, a few flashes of awesomeness here. First, let's deal with the not-so-awesome.
Kersh is back, and damn, either he's just an asshole bureaucrat on a huge power trip who's going to be an ultra stickler for the rules or he's being manipulated by outside forces like we thought Skinner was earlier in the series. Well, or he's just really really stupid and/or naive. Kersh could know full well exactly what's going on and is part of a giant coverup, so any mention of aliens and he can get rid of Scully and Skinner without so much as a warning. Though I suppose he did warn them in 'Within'. Still, I don't trust him and I don't like him. He's only getting in the way.
(Actually, it occurs to me that that's only not-so-awesome in universe - it's not so bad from a storytelling perspective, even if Kersh does piss me off.)
And Scully is clearly right here, as she so often is. And she's kind of a believer now? She's the new Mulder! Of course.
They couldn't go back to Scully being the skeptic to someone else's believer because she's seen too much. She's obviously not Mulder and she isn't like Mulder in that she won't just blindly believe every far-fetched theory that comes across her desk. But she can't turn her back on him or all his theories just because he's gone. I think if he'd disappeared in the middle of season one, she could have easily forgotten about him and gone back to a normal FBI job.
But now, she's way beyond that. As is Skinner, for that matter, but much more surprisingly. Skinner is now being all open-minded and trying to explain exactly what he saw, and the hell with the consequences, right? And he's trusting the Lone Gunmen again, which will never not be funny.
Also just to acknowledge Scully's best moment in the episode, there was that bit where she threw her cup of water at Doggett and it was pretty much the greatest thing ever. He is not to be trusted, and I'm skeptical of his assignment to the X-Files. It seems ... well, it seems a lot like Scully's assignment to Mulder in the Pilot. He's being sent not simply to observe her work, but specifically to discredit her. And based on what she discovered when she looked up his history with the FBI and other government and law enforcement, I think he's much less likely to come around the way she did.
There was a small glimmer of hope for him, though, which is that his report from their case displeased Kersh, so I don't think he's entirely just Kersh's man. Had Scully been in the room when that conversation happened, it might be possible to assume it was staged for her benefit, but unless they're just trying to cover up a conspiracy for the audience, which would be a terrible idea, I think we can believe Kersh is not pleased with the development that Doggett seemed so quick to report truthfully on exactly what transpired in the desert.
Which I realise I haven't even really talked about. I've seen other shows do things with doubles of characters, and it usually turns out pretty well. We've seen the Bounty Hunter appear as other trusted people before, but here he uses his shapeshifting ability incredibly well and even when he appears to be caught in the act by being the second Scully in the room, things are happening fast enough that most of the witnesses can't really tell what's going on.
For the audience, it was easy. Even when he appeared as Mulder it was easy, so it's not like there was a whole lot of tension - besides that of the scene itself - with us wondering whether Mulder had completely lost his mind.
Also, you know how some child actors age well and some don't? Jeff Gulka, who plays Gibson, went from being a Harry Potter-like eleven-year-old in seasons five and six to a kind of awkward teenager here. I believe that of a real person, but isn't Gibson supposed to be kind of special? He can read people's minds, so maybe that could be a source of awkwardness, right? Either way, I guess he makes his escape and he'll probably turn up one or two more times in the series - I doubt they'd bring him back now and leave his story hanging. It seems the entire mythology centers around him at this point.
And with shapeshifters on the loose, maybe it would be a good idea for everyone to agree on specific questions only they would know the answers to so they can determine they're talking to who they think they're talking to. It worked in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Well, OK, it was kind of goofy, but it was still effective.
So now it's on to episode three, which I'm sure will have absolutely nothing to do with this plot, and that means Mulder probably won't be in it at all.
I'd consider rage quitting, but I've made it this far and I've only got 39 episodes and a movie left. I'm going to finish this, even if it turns out to suck.
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