S11.E05: Ghouli

[Tardislass]

William was a wombat.....

Final thoughts: Much as the myth arc of the show annoys me, Wong’s episodes always show the steady bond and the tiny moments of M&S that CC and his “platonic soulmates” never cover. 

Second, I guarantee the hair will never be spoken of again. I wish we got a slightly better actor for William - though his lack of apparent grief about parents may be a Scully trait(grieve when the danger has passed) After all he’s being hunted by the DOD.

Finally, all this started a few months ago, what made Jackson want to hack into the website? Did the Japanese doctor contact him? Questions.. 

[Sharna Pax]

I just watched the episode, and I was dreading it, because I don't have good memories of the William-related angst in Season 9. I was surprised to find that I really liked it! Sure, William seems a little screwed up, but I find that sort of refreshing, honestly. There was so much Jesusy stuff surrounding his birth that I'm kind of relieved to find that despite his supernatural powers he's basically a teenage boy - kind of idealistic, kind of self-centered, prone to horrifically bad judgment calls, but fundamentally a sweet kid. It makes sense to me that a teenage boy who knows he can manipulate people's image of reality would be drawn to things like that pick-up artist book, because he's trying to figure out how to use that power. But that doesn't mean he's going to keep messing with people for the fun of it - I get the impression he's learned his lesson about that. The only thing that bothered me was how little reaction he showed to his parents' death, but I put that down to a gap in the writing rather than sociopathy.

I have to say, I wasn't expecting Skinner to be the one to break my heart this episode. The way his face just collapses when Mulder says, "Jackson Van de Kamp was our son," and he tries to say how sorry he is and Mulder basically tells him it's his fault? Kills me.

I found the line "You seem like a nice person. I wish I could know you better," terribly poignant. It's so - inadequate, as Scully would say, and yet so real. What more could Jackson really say to this woman he doesn't know, even if she is his biological mother? And yet we know they're connected, and we know there's a lot of emotion there that can't be put into words.

Loved all the coffee shop stuff, especially Mulder sympathizing with Frankenstein's monster. "He's afraid of fire, he just wants a friend..." Aww, it's Season 1 Mulder!

Edited February 1, 2018 by Sharna Pax

[Mama No Life]

Loved seeing Vega from Motive as the detective.  His voice is so recognizable.

[Tardislass]

Another nice small touch was the planets on Jackson’s bedroom wall and  the telescope.  He’s Mulder’s son and nothing CC writes will change my mind.<i> Fingers in ears<i>

My wish list also includes a Mulder/William moment before the end. I know Scully was the most affected but have one measly scene where they talk.

Edited February 2, 2018 by Tardislass

[eleanorofaquitaine]

3 hours ago, Sharna Pax said:

I just watched the episode, and I was dreading it, because I don't have good memories of the William-related angst in Season 9. I was surprised to find that I really liked it! Sure, William seems a little screwed up, but I find that sort of refreshing, honestly. There was so much Jesusy stuff surrounding his birth that I'm kind of relieved to find that despite his supernatural powers he's basically a teenage boy - kind of idealistic, kind of self-centered, prone to horrifically bad judgment calls, but fundamentally a sweet kid. It makes sense to me that a teenage boy who knows he can manipulate people's image of reality would be drawn to things like that pick-up artist book, because he's trying to figure out how to use that power. But that doesn't mean he's going to keep messing with people for the fun of it - I get the impression he's learned his lesson about that. The only thing that bothered me was how little reaction he showed to his parents' death, but I put that down to a gap in the writing rather than sociopathy.

I have to say, I wasn't expecting Skinner to be the one to break my heart this episode. The way his face just collapses when Mulder says, "Jackson Van de Kamp was our son," and he tries to say how sorry he is and Mulder basically tells him it's his fault? Kills me.

I found the line "You seem like a nice person. I wish I could know you better," terribly poignant. It's so - inadequate, as Scully would say, and yet so real. What more could Jackson really say to this woman he doesn't know, even if she is his biological mother? And yet we know they're connected, and we know there's a lot of emotion there that can't be put into words.

Loved all the coffee shop stuff, especially Mulder sympathizing with Frankenstein's monster. "He's afraid of fire, he just wants a friend..." Aww, it's Season 1 Mulder!

Agreed on William/Jackson being mostly a normal kid, and how that actually was a relief.  I also agree that we could have seen more of a reaction from him about his parents' murder but he did tell Brianna that everyone around him was in danger, so I think it is likely something he was still processing.

The line about Scully being a nice person that he wished he could have known better was incredibly poignant in its simplicity and sincerity.  And kudos to the actor Francois Chau, who was able to convey a teenager's sense of innocence in that scene.  To some extent, that is what made it even more poignant - William's fear that he couldn't show his true self to Scully but still wanted to send a message to her, to know her.  Chau's ability in both of his scenes to show William's yearning to know his mother was really excellent. 

[Italian Ice]

12 minutes ago, eleanorofaquitaine said:

Agreed on William/Jackson being mostly a normal kid, and how that actually was a relief.  I also agree that we could have seen more of a reaction from him about his parents' murder but he did tell Brianna that everyone around him was in danger, so I think it is likely something he was still processing.

The line about Scully being a nice person that he wished he could have known better was incredibly poignant in its simplicity and sincerity.  And kudos to the actor Francois Chau, who was able to convey a teenager's sense of innocence in that scene.  To some extent, that is what made it even more poignant - William's fear that he couldn't show his true self to Scully but still wanted to send a message to her, to know her.  Chau's ability in both of his scenes to show William's yearning to know his mother was really excellent. 

I absolutely loved this choice of actor, and his portrayal of a young, innocent kid. It was heartwarming and perfect. He portrayed a teenager so well, with his face, voice, and mannerisms. Also, upon rewatching, I noticed that he was the one that Scully saw off in the distance when they first got on the Chimera.

Also, maybe I'm just really, really, dense, but why DID William want Scully there so badly? For someone who has spent a lonnng time seeing her in visions, I still don't understand the purpose of bringing her into the whole Chimera/VDK murder situation, especially when he played it off like "Oh, she's just some woman. I think she's my birth mother." 

I loved the parallel of having Scully holding onto the snowglobe to have something tangible of William, and then in the end, having a glass vial with a lock of William's hair, a tiny little "snowglobe" if you will, that she can always carry around with her. It's not weird. As someone said previously upthread, keeping a lock of hair from a deceased loved one used to be the norm. I DO think that that lock of hair will be used to test Mulder's paternity, either because Mulder will be in danger, or because Skinner or CSM will throw the "Mulder's not the Daddy" thing in their face.

I do wonder what happened to the girl that was going to play Emily Van de Kamp. She seems to have been cut out of the episode completely. I was really interested in her character, because I thought she'd be like William in her abilities, and was another lost progeny of Scully.

Annnd lastly, I think the Van de Kamp's move from a farm in BFE Wyoming to a gorgeous house in Norfolk, VA was not coincidental. I think they were not as innocent as they seemed, especially considering William's blogs. I think the government paid them off handsomely for access to William. 

Edited February 2, 2018 by Italian Ice

[tennisgurl]

4 hours ago, Sharna Pax said:

I found the line "You seem like a nice person. I wish I could know you better," terribly poignant. It's so - inadequate, as Scully would say, and yet so real. What more could Jackson really say to this woman he doesn't know, even if she is his biological mother? And yet we know they're connected, and we know there's a lot of emotion there that can't be put into words.

 

I liked that a lot too, and it died really well into Scully at his autopsy saying that her speech to him was so inadequate. Because, really, what can you say at that point? The actor really sold the bittersweet feeling of the moment. 

[Taryn74]

53 minutes ago, Italian Ice said:

Annnd lastly, I think the Van de Kamp's move from a farm in BFE Wyoming to a gorgeous house in Norfolk, VA was not coincidental. I think they were not as innocent as they seemed, especially considering William's blogs. I think the government paid them off handsomely for access to William. 

O.O

Never even occurred to me.  Holy smokes.

[welnoc]

5 hours ago, Ghost of TWOP Past said:

The doctor with the Japanese name is said to have taken human DNA and mixed it with some alien stuff, so I guess I did jump to the conclusion that the human portion came only from one person, because it seems to me it would be MUCH harder to combine portions of multiple individuals into a single, viable amalgamation. So if Sully was established as the human donor, I concluded Mulder could not have contributed  as well. But this is all hand-wavey made-up DNA tech much more advanced than the real world anyway, why not have two humans, an alien, and possibly more thrown into the blender? Yeah, Mulder could still be the partial dad. Hell, William could be part wombat, for all we know. 

Scientists in England are currently trying to replace defective mitochondrial DNA with another person's to prevent disease and it would mean a fertilised egg would have the DNA of 3 different persons. So, I think Mulder's DNA could be in the mix as well.

I'm more bothered by the hair sample if it is intended as a tool for determining DNA because Scully as a doctor would have to know that she'd need to yank the hair out by the roots to get a decent sample. Either the writer didn't know that or he had to use a little poetic licence since Jackson probably would have reacted to that and blown his cover. There would be a problem with swabbing a blood sample too as there actually wasn't any blood at all. 

And surely to goodness, there must be samples of Scully and Mulder's DNA somewhere in the system anyway. Did she really need to swab her cheek?

 

I'm a little puzzled by the incredibly (at least to me) judgemental comments here about Jackson. Kids are phenomenally stupid at making good decisions because they are completely unaware of consequences. And in today's climate of hook-ups rather emotional coupling, there's probably not a lot of emotional connection. Jackson's powers which make him able to emotionally manipulate people are probably another reason he is emotionally distant. He's not a grown-up. I read recently that people do not reach adulthood until they are at least in their mid-twenties and he's not there yet. And maybe he's just really, really introverted; people like that aren't very share-y or expressive when it comes to their emotions. And of course, we haven't seen much of him in the episode; maybe he was waiting until he got himself away from the danger before he fell apart from grief over the death of his parents. There's a lot we do not see in a 45 minute episode.

[Bastet]

1 hour ago, Italian Ice said:

Annnd lastly, I think the Van de Kamp's move from a farm in BFE Wyoming to a gorgeous house in Norfolk, VA was not coincidental. I think they were not as innocent as they seemed, especially considering William's blogs. I think the government paid them off handsomely for access to William. 

I think if CC goes that route near the end, he - and you - will be picking up on something Wong had no intention of laying down.  We know, via this interview, that Wong cast Jackson as a one-off, but Carter was taken with him and decided to incorporate him later somehow:
 

Quote

 

It was interesting, because Chris and I didn’t talk about how important Jackson/William’s character could be to the show and its impact on the rest of the season. When I cast that, I cast Miles just for this episode. And it was really to the credit of Miles—he’s so great. He has a quality that really reminds me of how David is. And he has this heartthrob appeal to him without seeming like a CW character.

I found him on tape from New York—and it was through the process of shooting the episode. Chris was like, we have an idea for how the season could end, and Miles was so great that it impacted how we wrap up toward the end of the season.

 

Wong, as the parent of an adopted child, wanted to show that Jackson had enjoyed a good life with his parents:

Quote

I wanted to show that William didn’t have a horrible upbringing with his adoptive parents. I really wanted to express that—that part of it was right, and Scully made a good decision.

That's what I've always wanted, so I wouldn't want to see that fucked with.

[Italian Ice]

4 minutes ago, Bastet said:

I think if CC goes that route near the end, he - and you - will be picking up on something Wong had no intention of laying down.  We know, via this interview, that Wong cast Jackson as a one-off, but Carter was taken with him and decided to incorporate him later somehow:
 

Wong, as the parent of an adopted child, wanted to show that Jackson had enjoyed a good life with his parents:

That's what I've always wanted, so I wouldn't want to see that fucked with.

 

I was basing my comments off of the Ghouli.net website, where Jackson/William wrote several entries, one of which said that he grew up in a literal bubble because his immune system was destroyed, and his parents pretty much never visited him, and he was basically a lab rat for his entire childhood, and was subjected to "doctors" who basically experimented on him endlessly, all with the Van de Kamp's express permission, one would surmise, since he's a minor. It might not have been Wong's intention to show that in the episode, but it's part of his backstory that the show later created for him. Maybe all that will factor in in the later episodes with William/Jackson. They probably wrote all those entries AFTER they knew that they wanted Miles to come back and do more episodes.

[Neptune]

It was a big deal and we saw a lot of people for the part, but one person kind of sort of almost he was William as we imagined him. While I think some people imagine him as the golden child, I imagine him as a person who had grown up with great difficulty with adoptive parents who loved him but who had powers, if you will, that he didn't understand and that made him different than other kids and that would have turned him into a certain kind of boy and young man. Markedly different than he might have become had he been raised by Mulder and Scully.

https://www.cinemablend.com/television/2305051/why-the-x-files-finally-brought-that-long-lost-character-back-for-season-11

[Bastet]

7 minutes ago, Italian Ice said:

I was basing my comments off of the Ghouli.net website, where Jackson/William wrote several entries, one of which said that he grew up in a literal bubble because his immune system was destroyed, and his parents pretty much never visited him, and he was basically a lab rat for his entire childhood, and was subjected to "doctors" who basically experimented on him endlessly, all with the Van de Kamp's express permission, one would surmise, since he's a minor. It might not have been Wong's intention to show that in the episode, but it's part of his backstory that the show later created for him. Maybe all that will factor in in the later episodes with William/Jackson. They probably wrote all those entries AFTER they knew that they wanted Miles to come back and do more episodes.

I thought you were referencing the little bit we saw of the blog in the episode in forming that opinion, so thanks for the clarification.  So:  Ah, yes - if that's on the site (and is something "official" rather than the fan-submitted stuff; I've no idea, as it's not the sort of thing I'm interested in checking out), that obviously casts a different light on Jackson's parents (which is a shame on several levels, IMO), but I indeed think that's something completely unintended by this episode, but something created later to fit in with a storyline developed after this was written and shot. 

[Ghost of TWOP Past]

Quote

Scientists in England are currently trying to replace defective mitochondrial DNA with another person's to prevent disease and it would mean a fertilised egg would have the DNA of 3 different persons. So, I think Mulder's DNA could be in the mix as well. 

Digression: mitochondrial and normal DNA are entirely separate strands in distinct parts of the cell, and while a fertilized egg receives half of its regular DNA from the father and half from the mother, ALL of the fertilized egg's mitochondrial DNA comes solely from the mother. So for William to end up with the father's mDNA would be an even trickier trick than what we're already discussing. :) 

[Taryn74]

8 hours ago, Sharna Pax said:

I have to say, I wasn't expecting Skinner to be the one to break my heart this episode. The way his face just collapses when Mulder says, "Jackson Van de Kamp was our son," and he tries to say how sorry he is and Mulder basically tells him it's his fault? Kills me.

Yes!  Heartbreaking.

 

3 hours ago, Bastet said:

Wong, as the parent of an adopted child, wanted to show that Jackson had enjoyed a good life with his parents:

Quote

I wanted to show that William didn’t have a horrible upbringing with his adoptive parents. I really wanted to express that—that part of it was right, and Scully made a good decision.

That's what I've always wanted, so I wouldn't want to see that fucked with.

I've been thinking some more about this.  I don't think the Van de Kamps were knowingly involved in anything nefarious concerning Jackson.  At the most I think they could have been offered a tidy sum of money in exchange for allowing Jackson to be "monitored/tested for his abnormal brain activity" and never knew it was a shadowy government's way to gain access to him.  (The psychologist implied Jackson had been suffering from the same "brain on fire" thing that Scully went through in MSIII.)

 

2 hours ago, Italian Ice said:

I was basing my comments off of the Ghouli.net website, where Jackson/William wrote several entries, one of which said that he grew up in a literal bubble because his immune system was destroyed, and his parents pretty much never visited him, and he was basically a lab rat for his entire childhood, and was subjected to "doctors" who basically experimented on him endlessly, all with the Van de Kamp's express permission, one would surmise, since he's a minor. It might not have been Wong's intention to show that in the episode, but it's part of his backstory that the show later created for him. Maybe all that will factor in in the later episodes with William/Jackson. They probably wrote all those entries AFTER they knew that they wanted Miles to come back and do more episodes.

Well, we'll see by the end of the season I guess, but I take any of that with a grain of salt.  Mulder himself said Jackson's Ghouli world was a fake reality.  That could all be fiction.

Edited February 2, 2018 by Taryn74
Rats.....I responded to a lot on page 1 too and it got lost.

[Tardislass]

6 hours ago, Neptune said:

It was a big deal and we saw a lot of people for the part, but one person kind of sort of almost he was William as we imagined him. While I think some people imagine him as the golden child, I imagine him as a person who had grown up with great difficulty with adoptive parents who loved him but who had powers, if you will, that he didn't understand and that made him different than other kids and that would have turned him into a certain kind of boy and young man. Markedly different than he might have become had he been raised by Mulder and Scully.

https://www.cinemablend.com/television/2305051/why-the-x-files-finally-brought-that-long-lost-character-back-for-season-11

Thanks for that article and as I suspected CC is still insisting M&S are platonic. By now I’m sure the cast and crew just roll their eyes when he says this. It’s okay Chris, couples who’ve known each other for 25 years do have sex. Really hope someone else is helping write the finale.

[Mrs. Stanwyck]

I agree that I don't think Wong's intention was for us to feel that the Van de Kamps were shady or that William didn't have a good family life.  During Scully's conversation with the psychiatrist, the psychiatrist says that Jackson loves his parents and there was no indication that he would want to kill them.

[teddysmom]

I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, this episode was interesting in that we got William's story, and that he has powers beyond human. I liked the ending where he was disguising himself but was  interacting with Scully.

On the other hand, the dialogue was awful.  I'm so tired of M or S saying "I need answers",  Skinner telling Mulder to "leave this alone", etc.  How about "I need to know if this is William, and what happened to him, and if he's okay".  And Skinner, you telling Mulder to leave this alone is like me telling my dog, "don't get excited when you smell hamburgers frying on the stove". 

Agree that they're sleeping together and Carter's coyness about it is ridiculous.  FFS she thinks Mulder is the father of William, how the hell else did that happen, Chris?

I can understand her not living with him, he'd drive me crazy too. 

I will say the stuff with him creating the Ghouli monster and fucking with his two girlfriends is a more than a little messed up.  That and him having two girlfriends and the one calling the cops to get even was like something out of  tween tv drama

[eleanorofaquitaine]

I was struck last night that the Bob thing, which was played as a joke, was really a nice way to echo the main themes about the episode.  I mean, they made it explicit when Scully said that perhaps Fox doesn't exist in coffee shops (playing around with alternate universes again) but really, it was about Mulder's line near the beginning about "like I want to explain Fox again for the millionth time."  Sometimes it is easier to pretend like you are someone - or something - different because life gets complicated, and pretending like you are someone else uncomplicates it.  So even though this episode was primarily about Scully and William, it was very nice to see father and son using the same strategies to deal with life's complications.

[welnoc]

13 hours ago, Ghost of TWOP Past said:

Digression: mitochondrial and normal DNA are entirely separate strands in distinct parts of the cell, and while a fertilized egg receives half of its regular DNA from the father and half from the mother, ALL of the fertilized egg's mitochondrial DNA comes solely from the mother. So for William to end up with the father's mDNA would be an even trickier trick than what we're already discussing. :) 

Yes, I'm aware of that but I was using it to point out that there are, right now, fertilised eggs with the DNA of three persons. I wasn't suggesting that Mulder's mDNA would be present. In the research, the egg has mDNA from a donor but there is still DNA from both parents.

What I meant was that CSM could have diddled with the fetus conceived by Scully and Mulder and not that he grabbed an egg and inserted a bunch of alien DNA into it.

[Rushmoras]

You know, I keep thinking that if these new seasons and storylines would have happened only a couple of years and not a decade from the original run, I'd me more invested. Now, I hardly seem to care about anything, which is being shown in this season. Everything seems so... I don't know, boring and this sense of deja-vu that you've already seen some parts of the story-line in other TV series and movies. I don't know. But, if the last weeks episode was the worst of what Morgan coocked-up, so this episode is got to be the most boring one for me out of the MoT episodes so far. I don't know. Yeah, well, Scully is heartbroken for her "dead" (not dead) son, but so what? I haven't seen him in a decade or two. Why should I care.

 

Anyways, I rate this ep 6/10

[KBrownie]

2 hours ago, welnoc said:

What I meant was that CSM could have diddled with the fetus conceived by Scully and Mulder and not that he grabbed an egg and inserted a bunch of alien DNA into it.

Since Chris Carter is determined to not just let William's conception be, the former would be way more palatable than the latter.  

Edited February 2, 2018 by KBrownie

[Sharna Pax]

5 hours ago, eleanorofaquitaine said:

I was struck last night that the Bob thing, which was played as a joke, was really a nice way to echo the main themes about the episode.  I mean, they made it explicit when Scully said that perhaps Fox doesn't exist in coffee shops (playing around with alternate universes again) but really, it was about Mulder's line near the beginning about "like I want to explain Fox again for the millionth time."  Sometimes it is easier to pretend like you are someone - or something - different because life gets complicated, and pretending like you are someone else uncomplicates it.  So even though this episode was primarily about Scully and William, it was very nice to see father and son using the same strategies to deal with life's complications.

Yes! I was thinking that too. It's also a very low-key way of showing how easy it is to get trapped in a lie and have to keep telling it. Mulder uses "Bob" one time to make things easier, and next thing you know he's a regular at the coffee shop and that's just his name there. And honestly, I can understand why Jackson keeps hiding, once he's started. I think he wants to connect with Scully, and wants her to be happy, but he's just lost his family and there's at least one government agency trying to kill him, and he has no idea what will happen if he reveals himself to these unknown bio-parents who work for the FBI. Traveling the country like an amalgam of every YA coming-of-age road-trip novel you've ever read sounds like the smart move under those circumstances.

3 hours ago, welnoc said:

What I meant was that CSM could have diddled with the fetus conceived by Scully and Mulder and not that he grabbed an egg and inserted a bunch of alien DNA into it.

It does seem like it must be something like that. Jackson just seems so much like Mulder's kid, regardless of what the CSM did or says he did or thinks he did. (The implications are still really horrible, but I find it easier to think about if I imagine it narrated by the narrator from Jane the Virgin. "It all started when the Cigarette Smoking Man artificially inseminated Scully with Mulder's sperm! And some alien DNA! I know! Straight out of a telenovela, right?")

3 hours ago, Rushmoras said:

Scully is heartbroken for her "dead" (not dead) son, but so what? I haven't seen him in a decade or two. Why should I care.

As I said upthread, I wasn't really expecting to care all that much - or rather, I was expecting the acting to tug at my heartstrings but the underlying storyline to leave me cold. I was really surprised by how moving I found it to see Mulder and Scully, together, watching their son on that grainy security footage, and knowing that in spite of everything he's going to be okay. I think it's because we spent so much time, in the original series, watching Mulder and Scully grow into people who could have a child together and raise him together and be good parents. And everything odd and strained and uncomfortable about their relationship since then has stemmed, I think, from the fact that they feel they're supposed to be a family of three. So for me, seeing that kind-of reunion wasn't so much about William as it was about briefly filling the void in Mulder and Scully's lives. The ending is bittersweet; they've missed their son's childhood, and they don't know when they'll see him again. But he wishes them well, and he can take care of himself, and really, isn't that the main thing?

[Bastet]

15 minutes ago, Sharna Pax said:

The ending is bittersweet; they've missed their son's childhood, and they don't know when they'll see him again. But he wishes them well, and he can take care of himself, and really, isn't that the main thing?

Which is why I would love for that final shot to be, at long last, the wrap-up of the damn William storyline.

[Taryn74]

20 minutes ago, Sharna Pax said:

So for me, seeing that kind-of reunion wasn't so much about William as it was about briefly filling the void in Mulder and Scully's lives. The ending is bittersweet; they've missed their son's childhood, and they don't know when they'll see him again. But he wishes them well, and he can take care of himself, and really, isn't that the main thing?

Scully needed this closure every bit as much as Mulder needed closure over Samantha.

"I'm fine.  I'm . . . free."

Scully didn't say the words but the look on her face said it all.

[Tardislass]

1 hour ago, Bastet said:

Which is why I would love for that final shot to be, at long last, the wrap-up of the damn William storyline.

Sadly no.

My perfect end- Mulder, Scully and Jackson/Will all sit down together for the first time at park/restaurant/coffee shop.  No overwrought crying or hug. Just three people introducing themselves. Fade to black with Xfiles ending notes. El Fin!

Just don’t kill off Skinner(since I have dreadful feeling he’s going to get killed off).

[Italian Ice]

Random musings, but I think the guy that William made Scully and Mulder keep seeing was not only the author of that book, but was in fact, the doctor who led Project Crossroads, and perhaps he later appeared in life as an author under a pseudonym, BUT William might have known his real identity since he hacked in the DOD. That, and I still think William was a lab rat.

 

The question is HOW William's DNA was so incredibly tampered with. Was it *already* tampered with when Scully tried IVF? Was it later tampered with during her time with Dr. Parenti? So many questions, so little answers, but I'm sure they'll tell us. William is, as they looovveeee to remind us, the key to everything this season, and I still think the last episode will be the Apocalypse coming true, and William saves Mulder and mankind in the end. 

[ganesh]

On 2/1/2018 at 1:32 PM, tennisgurl said:

If CC had any sense, he would have ditched this alien conspiracy crap by season 5. 

I said literally the same thing after the first movie. The ship blew out of the ice in Antarctica and took off, and the ended with the re opening of the X Files: how can one man fight the future? It was the perfect time. There's still plenty of government conspiracies and secrets to uncover. 

[ganesh]

On 2/1/2018 at 7:29 PM, welnoc said:

Kids are phenomenally stupid at making good decisions because they are completely unaware of consequences. And in today's climate of hook-ups rather emotional coupling, there's probably not a lot of emotional connection.

That's not really a problem for me, but the inclusion of the book put me off. I didn't even think it was still a thing. That goes from dumb teen to potential predator at that point. 

10 hours ago, Rushmoras said:

Everything seems so... I don't know, boring and this sense of deja-vu that you've already seen some parts of the story-line in other TV series and movies.

This is was I meant by CC is still making the show for the 90s. I liked the plot about how private military companies are taking power from the government; that's current.

I'm all for Mulder and Scully having adventures. I wish DD and GA were made executive producers and had more creative control. 

[Italian Ice]

10 hours ago, ganesh said:

That's not really a problem for me, but the inclusion of the book put me off. I didn't even think it was still a thing. That goes from dumb teen to potential predator at that point. 

This is was I meant by CC is still making the show for the 90s. I liked the plot about how private military companies are taking power from the government; that's current.

I'm all for Mulder and Scully having adventures. I wish DD and GA were made executive producers and had more creative control. 

I still think the book was written by the Project Crossroads doctor under a pseudonym, which William would have known, since he hacked the DOD. 

[ganesh]

To what end would he have written the book? 

[Neptune]

[Italian Ice]

2 hours ago, Neptune said:

 

Imma take that as our clue that CSM is full of shit (as always).

[Mystery]

On 2/1/2018 at 6:30 AM, luna1122 said:

My only issue with this episode is...why make William such a little dick?

That was my thought all through this episode. "William's kind of a dick." 

[AntiBeeSpray]

5 minutes ago, Mystery said:

That was my thought all through this episode. "William's kind of a dick." 

Same here. Didn't like him at all. 

[DesertCyclist]

TIL Mulder and Scully's son is Bobby Briggs.

[Ottis]

This was pretty bad. No emotional impact with William. Don’t know the kid. Scully’s emotion was wasted on me. William basically came out of nowhere. 

No interest in the two girls. Mild interest in Skinner’s explanation. But then back to William. Don’t understand why he can create an alternate reality only sometimes. 

I’m not sure why people think William was a dick? 

Edited February 10, 2018 by Ottis

[ahisma]

On 2/1/2018 at 2:35 PM, Sharna Pax said:

especially Mulder sympathizing with Frankenstein's monster

I did love that! But I was mildly annoyed that he referred to him as Frankenstein, rather than Frankenstein's monster, as that kind of pedantry is usually Mulder's bread and butter.

[Sharna Pax]

It occurs to me now that I spoke too soon when I said that this episode wasn’t Jesusy in the way that William’s birth was. There’s a definite parallel, I think, with the moment in the Bible when Mary Magdalene finds the stone rolled away from Jesus’s tomb and the tomb empty, and then meets Jesus himself but doesn’t recognize him and thinks he’s the gardener. That’s not to say that William himself is a Christ-figure, because I think he’s obviously not – he’s a perfectly normal, not entirely likable teenage superhero with two girlfriends and questionable taste in literature. But look at that sequence of events in the hospital: Scully goes to the room where she left the body, finds the body bag empty and the window open, and then, almost immediately after, meets William and speaks to him without recognizing him. The parallel is too close to be a coincidence.

So why, if William isn’t a Christ-figure, and isn’t meant to be (thank you, James Wong, for being very clear about that), what are those parallels doing there? I have an idea, and I hope you guys can bear with me while I talk about Rudyard Kipling for a moment.

There’s a really beautiful Kipling story called “The Gardener” that’s also written around this passage. There’s a twist I don’t want to reveal, so I’m going to have to be very cryptic, but basically it’s about a woman visiting the grave of someone she lost in WWI. At the end of the story, she asks a stranger a question, and he answers, and we suddenly understand two things: that she has been carrying an unbearable, lifelong burden of guilt and secrecy, and that this brief exchange has, for one moment, freed her from that burden. The conversation, though she never realizes it, is a tiny miracle, a moment of grace for a woman who desperately needs it. Nothing happens that’s incompatible with reality – the person she lost in the war doesn’t come back to her – but she herself is, on some level, brought back to life.

The poem that accompanies the story begins, “One grave to me was given/ One watch till Judgment Day/ And God looked down from heaven/ And rolled the stone away./ One day in all the years/ One hour in that one day/ His angel saw my tears/ And rolled the stone away.” To me, the look on Scully's face as she watches the security footage at the end of Ghouli is the look of someone who has just seen the stone rolled away from her own particular tomb. I don’t know if James Wong has read “The Gardener,” or if this is just a case of like causes begetting like effects, but I think the episode is using the biblical allusion in much the same way the story does – to make us think about all kinds of resurrection, all kinds of renewal, and what it's like to carry something for seventeen years and then, against all expectation, feel that burden lifted.

[millennium]

So Scully, the great pooh-pooher, suddenly believes in visions as a bonafide form of communication.   And then makes the magical leap that the visions must be coming from her long lost son of course.   And the ship she remembers from the vision is attached to the file sitting right on Mulder's desk.  And then ... 

Just putting the absurd leaps of logic and coincidence aside for a second, when did Mulder and Scully get their jobs back?   An episode or two ago it was like they didn't even know Skinner anymore, now they're back in Mulder's basement office as if everything's same-as-it-ever-was?

I actually felt embarrassed for Gillian Anderson in the crying scene.   She's a fine actress but the writing was terrible.   There was no emotional build-up to that scene.   It fell flat and went on way too long.

Oh looky, CSM in Skinner's office, listening in on a phone call with Mulder.   If I had any self-respect I would have switched off then and there.

I think I'm angriest that this episode started off like a promising Monster of the Week story, riffing on the Slender Man murders (which were topical again just last week), only to be written off as just William being a dick.  

Edited February 11, 2018 by millennium

[Taryn74]

8 hours ago, Sharna Pax said:

and what it's like to carry something for seventeen years and then, against all expectation, feel that burden lifted.

Yes!  That's exactly what I saw in Scully in that final scene as well.  I think I mentioned in a post earlier that for me, that was her "I'm fine, I'm free" moment to echo Mulder's in Closure.

[Sharna Pax]

9 hours ago, Taryn74 said:

Yes!  That's exactly what I saw in Scully in that final scene as well.  I think I mentioned in a post earlier that for me, that was her "I'm fine, I'm free" moment to echo Mulder's in Closure.

Yes, you did! And I should have quoted you, because I completely agree, and that's what made me think of "The Gardener" in the first place. “Closure” has always reminded me of Kipling’s story “They,” in which a man is drawn again and again to a particular house, not knowing why. We guess early on that the children he's seen at the windows and heard playing are all ghosts, but only at the end of the story does it dawn on us - and him - that one of them is his daughter. It's lovely and sad and halfway between a ghost story and a dream-vision of heaven, and like "Closure" it's very much an ending. Having seen his daughter, the man goes away again, knowing that he can never allow himself to return.

I hadn't thought to put "Closure" together with "Ghouli," but when you did, "The Gardener" popped into my head right away. Because what all these stories have in common - "They" and "Closure" and "The Gardener" and "Ghouli" - is that the person who is grieving gets exactly the miracle they need and no more. A dream-vision of a lost child, a short conversation with an apparent stranger - it's not much, really. It can't bring back everything that's been lost. But it's enough  - enough to free someone from a self-imposed prison and allow them to find peace.

Edited February 12, 2018 by Sharna Pax

[eleanorofaquitaine]

This is an interesting conversation. I wouldn't at all be surprised if the Biblical allusions are intentional.  We usually think of the story of Christ's birth and death for their theological or supernatural implications but IMO, the reason why both stories endure is precisely because they are so human.  Parents find themselves in difficult circumstances at a particularly vulnerable time, and are able to get through the ordeal by finding safe harbor.  Friends and family grieve over the untimely, violent death of a loved one, and long so much to see him again that they actually cannot recognize him when he does reappear.  Those are stories that people can relate to, whether or not they believe in Christ as the Son of God.  

I think that Wong, knowing how deliberate the Christ parallels were in Existence, probably also wanted to bring those human elements of Christ's resurrection into the story of William's return.  I hadn't really thought about it until this conversation, but clearly, William unzipping the body bag is meant to be seen as similar to Mary Magdalene only finding the shroud in Christ's tomb. 

Edited February 12, 2018 by eleanorofaquitaine

[WAnglais1]

GA held my attention in the morgue scene. She's an excellent actor and brought it. 

No one has mentioned the lights on William's bedroom wall: WHO. (World Heath Organization, Doctor, ...Are My Parents, ...Am I). 

Teenage boys are stupid. I was one and I remember. William also appears to be an introvert, so the PICK UP ARTIST book would be an attempt to understand what he would see in movies and the like aimed at his demo. It's completely wrong, but you think it's cool and how guys have to be. When you're older, hopefully you grow out of it and see how you should behave. Like when Bobby Hill called out Boomhauer on KING OF THE HILL. "You just hit on every woman until someone says yes?" 

This season has been good, not XF great, but good. And good XF is better than 90% of the stuff on TV. 

[Taryn74]

57 minutes ago, WAnglais1 said:

No one has mentioned the lights on William's bedroom wall: WHO. (World Heath Organization, Doctor, ...Are My Parents, ...Am I). 

Yes!  I thought that was such a cool touch.

 

58 minutes ago, WAnglais1 said:

William also appears to be an introvert, so the PICK UP ARTIST book would be an attempt to understand what he would see in movies and the like aimed at his demo.

I agree.  I saw his having a book like that along the same lines as Mulder's porn addiction.  I never got the impression that Mulder viewed women as objects or any of the other problems associated with men and porn, and I don't think William/Jackson is some kind of sleazy teenage playa (despite having two "girlfriends") either.

 

1 hour ago, WAnglais1 said:

This season has been good, not XF great, but good. And good XF is better than 90% of the stuff on TV. 

Absolutely agree.  I've considered this a pretty solid season so far, tbh.  Possibly even better than S9 of the original (and WAY better than S10).

[Taryn74]

@Sharna Pax's post in the S1 thread made me think of something but I didn't want to comment on it there.  Quoting the post --

Quote

Then I watched Eve, which of course is a classic, and I don't have that much new to say about it. But I did find that my heart twisted a little bit for Mulder and Scully when they took the evil twins into the diner for a bathroom-and-poison break and I got to see what they would look like as parents on a family road trip. That little moment when Mulder goes up to pay for the sodas and he thinks to hand the money to one of the twins so she can pay? He's so naturally good with kids. It's one of those things that was just sort of sweet at the time but in retrospect is sad.

One of the things that breaks my heart the most for Mulder from S9 on is that he never got the chance to know his son, at all.  He got to spend, what, maybe a week or two with William as an infant, before he went on the run?  I know Scully only got a few months with William, but any parent knows how much a child's personality starts to emerge even within those few months.  Scully's "missing out" is very different than Mulder's "missing out" and I think that shows up heartbreakingly well in Ghouli.  There's a moment in the morgue when Mulder is hugging Scully after her tearful monologue, and he glances over at Jackson's body for literally half a second before looking away.  I feel so much pain for him in that moment.  It's like he has to focus all of his energy on how Scully is handling the situation and take no time to deal with his own grief and sense of loss.

And then at the end, it's Scully alone who gets a moment of closure with William.  That was a beautiful moment and I don't want to detract from it, but it had to break Mulder's heart all over again, you know?  Again and again, Mulder is just on the outside looking in.  Did William/Jackson even know Mulder was his father?  I have to assume no, or I think he would have found a way to slip in he wishes he had time to get to know both of them, not just Scully.

How is this show able to kill all my feels for so many years?  :/

[festivus]

I know, I really feel for Mulder in this situation.  I think he's always felt that he didn't get to grieve the same way as Scully because he wasn't there so he just does his best to take care of her without really expressing his own feelings. I think DD is killing it in this storyline. 

[AntiBeeSpray]

29 minutes ago, festivus said:

I know, I really feel for Mulder in this situation.  I think he's always felt that he didn't get to grieve the same way as Scully because he wasn't there so he just does his best to take care of her without really expressing his own feelings. I think DD is killing it in this storyline. 

I do too. He keeps his feelings more on the inside about it and we got a glimpse of it via the 'dreams' in Founder's.

[Baby Button Eyes]

How did Mulder and Scully do this turn about with expressing emotions. At the beginning of the series, it was Mulder who expressed all the feelings and Scully was the one who would hold it in.  Now, it's like opposite!

Edited February 19, 2018 by Baby Button Eyes

[Sharna Pax]

1 hour ago, Taryn74 said:

One of the things that breaks my heart the most for Mulder from S9 on is that he never got the chance to know his son, at all.  He got to spend, what, maybe a week or two with William as an infant, before he went on the run?  I know Scully only got a few months with William, but any parent knows how much a child's personality starts to emerge even within those few months.  Scully's "missing out" is very different than Mulder's "missing out" and I think that shows up heartbreakingly well in Ghouli.  There's a moment in the morgue when Mulder is hugging Scully after her tearful monologue, and he glances over at Jackson's body for literally half a second before looking away.  I feel so much pain for him in that moment.  It's like he has to focus all of his energy on how Scully is handling the situation and take no time to deal with his own grief and sense of loss.

And then at the end, it's Scully alone who gets a moment of closure with William.  That was a beautiful moment and I don't want to detract from it, but it had to break Mulder's heart all over again, you know?  Again and again, Mulder is just on the outside looking in.  Did William/Jackson even know Mulder was his father?  I have to assume no, or I think he would have found a way to slip in he wishes he had time to get to know both of them, not just Scully.

You know, I watched Ghouli twice, and the second time I found myself pretty much just watching Mulder. Duchovny has such a rep for being poker-faced, and I've never really understood that, because I think he has a very expressive face. Look at that phone conversation in Memento Mori that we all love - it's so effective because we see all the dread and confusion that he's feeling, but all Scully hears in his voice is love and reassurance. But here Mulder is so impassive it's like he's wearing a mask. And I think you can see the moment when he puts the mask on. When they're still at the house after the shooting, he looks into the room where they found Jackson and sees him being zipped into a body bag. Mulder stands in the doorway and looks at the body bag, and for just a moment his mouth starts to twist - and then he just shuts that down and goes looking for Scully. It's like he realizes that if he starts thinking about this he won't be able to function enough to help Scully, so he just doesn't let himself feel anything.

And it makes me so sad for him, because I don't think that ability to suppress your own emotions is something you develop all in a moment. I think that on some level Mulder's been expecting this. Not this specific scenario, of course, but I think it's been a very long time since Mulder felt any kind of hope relating to William. Scully talks about feeling that she and William would one day be reunited - I don't think Mulder ever thought that would happen. When Mulder and Scully are talking after the body disappears, and Mulder tells Scully, "Your hope is not a fact," he's speaking from experience. This is someone who spent decades believing his sister was still alive, and who turned out to be wrong. And I think that experience has always affected how Mulder feels about William. I think that as much as he's always wanted to put his family back together, there's a part of him that believes that a family is just something he doesn't get to have.