X-Files Series on DVD
F.B.I. Special Agent Dana Scully (Anderson) was first introduced to Special Agent Fox Mulder when her superiors wanted someone to keep an eye on “Spooky Mulder” as a precaution. Together they set off on a long and perilous journey to find “the truth”. When no one believed them, the duo would get even more desperate to prove the truth of alien life on other planets and the existence of a conspiracy crawling up the ladder of our government all the way to the Pentagon.
Of course, as much as this storyline played a major part in the popular TV series, not all the X-Files episodes were centered on the subject of extraterrestrials. If you want tongue and cheak humor, watch for great episodes like “Small Potatoes” or watch for such guest stars as Peter Boyle as the colorful psychic in “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose”. Watch for such guest voices as Jodie Foster in “Never Again”. If you want straight, scary horror, The X-Files has plenty. Check out episodes like “Squeeze” and the follow-up, “Tooms”, “Ice”, “Shapes”, or “Home”. These episodes are in the first four seasons.
Many more episodes with even more wild content followed. Such episodes as “Dreamland” and its follow-up, “Dreamland 2” has Mulder switch places with an employee in Area 51. Lily Tomlin and Ed Asner guest star in the campy but downright fun “The Ghosts Stole Christmas”. Watch for a Cops spoof in “X-Cops”. Then, among others in the 5th, 6th and 7th seasons, you have David Duchovny writing and directing the funny mystery “Hollywood AD” with his wife, Tea Leoni guest starring.
It’s at this point when the series takes an unusual turn. Special Agent Fox Mulder is abducted. We loose Duchovny completely for the first half of the next season. Scully receives a new partner to replace Mulder. Best known as the T-1000 in Terminator 2: Judgement Day, Robert Patrick comes on board as Agent John Doggett. He’s more skeptical of the existence of life elsewhere than Scully ever was, and almost weakens the series with a stale performance.
We’re given a long chain of events leading to the ultimate end of the series. Agent Doggett investgates Mulder’s disappearance with Assistant Director Skinner and the Lone Gunmen while Scully stays home to deal with a strange, and unexplainable pregnancy. We finally see an end to such X-Files villians as Alex Krycek, the Cigarette Smoking Man or “Cancer Man,” and many others. Then, Mulder and Scully run away from the F.B.I. to hide with the truth they’ve uncovered, only to arrive right back where it all began in a nice full circle.
The X-Files has its weak points. Some episodes are just too strange. Some episodes are just not very well written. But, a great deal of them are good, easy to understand, and great fun to watch. There hadn’t been a series like it, and there hasn’t been a TV show like it since its finale. What it was replaced with were wannabe in-depth examination mysteries like Cold Case or even CSI can be explained as an X-Files copy. Nothing can take credit for the great TV imagery, the smart concept and storylines, and the snappy humor of The X-Files.
Now the only question you should be asking yourself is what’s stopping you from going out your local Wal-Mart or entertainment retailer or going straight to Amazon.com and buying the entire X-Files series on DVD. One season is now reasonably priced just under $40. It’s a steal for the great TV series you’re getting – which is right up there with E.R. and The Simpsons as one of the top ten of the 1990s.
