Matt Eaton's Blog: History has no future - Posts Tagged "television"
The X-Files
It was an unexpected pleasure to flick on free-to-air TV last night and stumble onto the "encore" telecast of The X-Files, back from the vaults.
Serendipity, perhaps, as these days we pay little attention to what the networks are putting to air and instead become lost in Netflix and DVDs, (barring a good sporting event).
And it strikes me this morning that my sentiment has shifted in the 20 years since I first became an ardent follower of Fox Mulder. I still have his 'I Want To Believe' poster in the back of my wardrobe, presented to me by friends and colleagues at Triple Jay when I left the station to go bush in Byron Bay for six months.
While it remains true that I do want to believe, the precise nature of it has shifted through the years, I suspect.
So much so, in fact, that I found myself sympathising more with Scully last night when Mulder started rattling off a list of every conspiracy theory that has surfaced since 9/11. It was a long list, and added together it sounded like a joke. Like the producers are saying to us: 'You do know how crazy this stuff is, don't you?'
Moreover, the constant imposition of a big brother-type evil secret government that seems to know everything actually starts to undermine the dramatic stakes, because it imposes a sort of helplessness on the viewer. No matter what Mulder might uncover, it'll all get swept away again, out of public view. It worked when there was sufficient mystery attached to the original series, but so much has already been revealed here.
TV drama has grown up so much, thanks largely to HBO, since this show last graced our screens. But The X-Files doesn't seem to have grown with it.
Interesting to see Skinner re-emerge as Mulder's long-suffering benefactor in the FBI. What has actor Mitch Pileggi being doing in the intervening time? Did Chris Carter have him in some cryogenic deep freeze, ready to trot out again two decades later?
As Mulder, David Duchovny has gone a bit puffy around the edges, which is especially noticeable when they play the original series credits at the start of each new episode.
Basically, I'm not sure I'm buying it. Channel Ten is carping on about how episode three has critics across the world raving. Well it had better be a damn sight better than the first two episodes, because at this point it's fair to say I'm no longer a believer.
The truth IS out there. But it's never going to fall into the hands of Mulder and Scully. Sorry to anyone still thinking otherwise.
Serendipity, perhaps, as these days we pay little attention to what the networks are putting to air and instead become lost in Netflix and DVDs, (barring a good sporting event).
And it strikes me this morning that my sentiment has shifted in the 20 years since I first became an ardent follower of Fox Mulder. I still have his 'I Want To Believe' poster in the back of my wardrobe, presented to me by friends and colleagues at Triple Jay when I left the station to go bush in Byron Bay for six months.
While it remains true that I do want to believe, the precise nature of it has shifted through the years, I suspect.
So much so, in fact, that I found myself sympathising more with Scully last night when Mulder started rattling off a list of every conspiracy theory that has surfaced since 9/11. It was a long list, and added together it sounded like a joke. Like the producers are saying to us: 'You do know how crazy this stuff is, don't you?'
Moreover, the constant imposition of a big brother-type evil secret government that seems to know everything actually starts to undermine the dramatic stakes, because it imposes a sort of helplessness on the viewer. No matter what Mulder might uncover, it'll all get swept away again, out of public view. It worked when there was sufficient mystery attached to the original series, but so much has already been revealed here.
TV drama has grown up so much, thanks largely to HBO, since this show last graced our screens. But The X-Files doesn't seem to have grown with it.
Interesting to see Skinner re-emerge as Mulder's long-suffering benefactor in the FBI. What has actor Mitch Pileggi being doing in the intervening time? Did Chris Carter have him in some cryogenic deep freeze, ready to trot out again two decades later?
As Mulder, David Duchovny has gone a bit puffy around the edges, which is especially noticeable when they play the original series credits at the start of each new episode.
Basically, I'm not sure I'm buying it. Channel Ten is carping on about how episode three has critics across the world raving. Well it had better be a damn sight better than the first two episodes, because at this point it's fair to say I'm no longer a believer.
The truth IS out there. But it's never going to fall into the hands of Mulder and Scully. Sorry to anyone still thinking otherwise.
X-Files Episode III
So I watched the critically acclaimed third ep of X.
From the first word uttered by the stoners in the woods, it was clear this was going to be fun, albeit not at all like an actual X-Files episode.
More a spoof. It's like what Saturday Night Live might choose to do with the show if they had an hour to kill.
Sheer genius, though, to bring in Rhys Darby as the "monster". Don't know if any of you are familiar with his work in Flight of the Conchords,, but he is a comic genius. His glorious New Zealand accent alone cracks me up. The man couldn't play it straight if his life depended on it.
Rhys is now, I fear, in danger of being typecast in creature roles, having previously played a very amusing and marginally deadly werewolf in the movie, What We Do In The Shadows.
Very clever the way this episode had Mulder so whimsically doubting himself, while confronting a monster in reverse - a strange forest creature awakened after 10,000 years to find himself miraculously morphing into, of all things, a human - a change he found truly monstrous.
Big tick, then, to the third episode. But a self-deprecating piss-take is still not going to bring me back next week, eager for more.
I guess I'm just too hard to please.
From the first word uttered by the stoners in the woods, it was clear this was going to be fun, albeit not at all like an actual X-Files episode.
More a spoof. It's like what Saturday Night Live might choose to do with the show if they had an hour to kill.
Sheer genius, though, to bring in Rhys Darby as the "monster". Don't know if any of you are familiar with his work in Flight of the Conchords,, but he is a comic genius. His glorious New Zealand accent alone cracks me up. The man couldn't play it straight if his life depended on it.
Rhys is now, I fear, in danger of being typecast in creature roles, having previously played a very amusing and marginally deadly werewolf in the movie, What We Do In The Shadows.
Very clever the way this episode had Mulder so whimsically doubting himself, while confronting a monster in reverse - a strange forest creature awakened after 10,000 years to find himself miraculously morphing into, of all things, a human - a change he found truly monstrous.
Big tick, then, to the third episode. But a self-deprecating piss-take is still not going to bring me back next week, eager for more.
I guess I'm just too hard to please.
History has no future
How can we learn from the past when we keep so much of it hidden from ourselves?
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