There's a rumor The X-Files wasn't supposed to have a story arc, but one had to be created because Gillian Anderson got pregnant. What do you think about that?You are the one-hundredth question to be asked via Formspring, for whatever that is worth.
The gist of that is true. Producer Frank Spotnitz once said the colonization storyline was created after it was discovered late in the first season Gillian Anderson was pregnant. What muddies the waters is that Chris Carter has said he had created a five year plan for the series, but it is not clear whether he meant a loose story about Mulder’s missing sister Samantha that could be revisited every now and then to break up the monster of the week stories, or if he meant he developed the colonization story in the second season to last five years. There is a stronger argument for the latter.
First, Mulder’s story about how he is sister was abducted changed from the pilot , in which he said she was taken from her bed at night while he was paralyzed by some force and unable to help her versus the later story in which he was playing Stratego while babysitting her when she was taken. Samantha’s story meandered all over the place before it was finally determined in the seventh season she really was dead. You really cannot reconcile the times a clone of her as either a little girl or a grown woman shows up throughout the series. If there was an arc created for Samantha at the beginning of the series, it was terribly planned out.. It sounds more like the colonization plan was the five year arc Carter was referring to and ought to be counted from the second season on.
Second, there were no hints until the first season finale, after it was known Anderson was expecting, there were hints of the Syndicate’s conspiracy. The aliens stories from the first season were standard, episodic fare: abduction, military use of alien technology, and the government holding an actual alien prisoner. You can even see some elements of the arc, like ancient alien entities on Earth and cloning, used in the first season that were not unrelated to the mythology.
Third, the series shifted gears in the second season. Deep Throat was gotten rid of without any hints before his death he was part of the Syndicate, while characters important the arc like Skinner, Krucek, the Cigarette smoking man, and the Syndicate were introduced. The second season introduced the patern of multi-episode arcs: season premiere, two parter in the fall, two parter in the spring, and season finale. There is the evidence the plan got cooking in the second season.
Finally, the colonization arc sputtered out by the and of the sixth season, which would spn 1994-1999 if counted by years rather than seasons. The mythology not only shifted at this point to the idea life on earth began in outer space, the mythology shifted again later to the super soldier bit. It looks like they ran out of story for the mythology arc, but kept the series going because FOX was making a mint off the popular, now award-winning series. The hints of romance started hot and heavy around this time, too, even though carter said he never intended for the agents to hook up. The relationship angle must have been thrown in when the series had to be reinvented.
All I can say about it is how lucky we are Anderson got pregnant. While the monster of the week episodes are some of the best, some of the mythology stories are very good. The Scully abduction/cancer arc is my favorite arc of the series. Your mileage may vary, of course, but the accidental creation of the mythology because of Anderson’s pregnancy was the best thing to happen to The X-Files as far as I am concerned.
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