John Kenneth Muir's Blog, page 895

Ark II Bumper & End Credits with 1976 Commercials

Cult Movie Review: Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

Star
Trek: First Contact
(1996) is likely the finest of The Next Generation feature
films.  In part, this is so because the
film combines an extremely popular villain, the Borg, with an extremely popular
idea in the franchise: time travel. 




In
part, First Contact also thrives because the film is more
action-oriented and visceral than some of the other entries in the canon. The
screenplay, by Brannon Braga and Ronald Moore also goes through fewer contortions
than Generations
did to fashion its compelling tale. 
Where Generations seemed confusing and contrived, First
Contact feels stream-lined and sleek. 





Perhaps
most importantly, Star Trek: First Contact – while
occasionally gory and quite violent – remembers that the core of Star
Trek’s appeal does not rest in warfare and hatred, but rather in the
exploration of the “human adventure.” 




By
ending on the high note of humanity’s first contact with the Vulcans, First
Contact honors Star Trek’s important legacy of hope
and promise.  This vision of a better
tomorrow (and of a better humanity, to boot), differentiates the franchise from
virtually all other space adventures, and makes the film a pleasure to watch,
even fifteen years after its theatrical release.  An average Star Trek movie can
excite you with space battles, certainly, but only a very good one can tap into
the inspirational nature of Gene Roddenberry’s celebrated creation.




Accordingly,
film critics approved of and admired the film, and First Contact remains one
of the best-reviewed Star Trek films in the saga’s
history.  Variety wrote: “ Star Trek: First Contact"
is a smashingly exciting sci-fi adventure that ranks among the very best in the
long-running Paramount franchise. Better still, this is one TV spinoff that
does not require ticket buyers to come equipped with an intimate knowledge of
the small-screen original. Fans and non-fans alike will line up for this wild
ride, and many will be repeat customers.”




Lloyd
Rose at The Washington Post praised Jonathan Frakes’ direction,
and
opined “There are moments of visionary beauty in this film that rank
with "Metropolis," with
Josh Meador's interior vistas in "Forbidden
Planet" and Irvin Kershner's and Ralph Quarrie's work in "The Empire Strikes Back" -- that
is to say, with the best fantasy films ever made.”




As a reviewer and unapologetic  Trek fan, I boast deeper reservations about First Contact than Rose apparently did, and feel that while the
film is indeed the best of the Next Generation cinematic efforts,
it still falls short of the cinematic majesty and scope of The Motion Picture
(1979), or the sheer emotionality and humanity of The Wrath of Khan
(1982). 




Part of the reason that Star Trek: First Contact
doesn’t work on the same rarefied level as those aforementioned titles is that
many of the earthbound scenes involving James Cromwell’s recalcitrant Zefram
Cochrane boast no effective foil for the mischievous inventor of warp
speed technology.  Riker, Troi and Geordi are
beloved characters to be certain, but they are never really established
effectively in the script as larger-than-life personalities with the heft to
match Cochrane note-for-note and blow-for-blow. 
As a result, the film’s pace lags badly every time First Contact returns to
Earth and the Borg are shunted off-screen.




By contrast, the Borg themselves (itself?) are
incredibly effective in design, concept and execution.  They are visually-inspired, dynamic villains,
and First
Contact benefits strongly from their presence, even if aspects of their
culture (namely the Borg Queen) now seem contradictory and unnecessarily
muddled.   As a longtime Star Trek fan, I was also
disappointed with some of the shoddy continuity in the film, especially because in most cases the flaws were unnecessary and could have been easily rectified
in post-production.




But such quibbles aside, Star Trek: First Contact
remains a fun and involving science fiction adventure.  It’s an eminently sturdy entry in the
long-lived franchise, and comes close to recapturing successfully the character
chemistry that made Star Trek: the Next Generation so beloved an endeavor.






“A group of cybernetic creatures from
the future have traveled back through time to enslave the human race... and
you're here to stop them?”





In
the 24th Century, the cybernetic Borg attempt a second invasion of
Sector 001, the home of the human race.  Instead of warping to planet Earth to join the battle, however, Captain
Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) and the U.S.S Enterprise-E are ordered to
stay away.  Starfleet fears that Picard’s
traumatic experience being assimilated by the Borg could make him an “unstable
element” in the critical defense of Earth.




With
his crew’s support, Captain Picard ignores Starfleet’s orders and assumes
control of the fleet battling the Borg Cube. 
Able to hear the Borg’s thoughts, Captain Picard pinpoints the
cube’s weakness and destroys it, but not before a Borg escape craft opens a temporal anomaly and travels into Earth’s past.




Caught
in the energetic wake of the escaping Borg sphere, the Enterprise crew can only watch as
Earth of the past is assimilated by the cybernetic organisms.  The starship follows the Borg to the past, to
April of 2063 in an effort to prevent the change.  There, they learn that
the diabolical aliens plan to scuttle Earth’s “first contact” with alien life
forms following the successful test flight of Zefram Cochrane’s (James Cromwell’s)
experimental warp ship. 




Picard
realizes he must preserve the timeline, or the human race will become…Borg.




Before
long, the Enterprise herself is infested with Borg invaders.  Lt. Commander Data (Brent Spiner) is captured
by the Borg Queen (Alice Krige), who requires the information stored in his
android brain if she wishes to access the ship’s computer and stop Cochrane’s historic
flight. 




Meanwhile,
on Earth’s surface below, Commander Riker (Jonathan Frakes) must convince
Cochrane to make his historic flight…




“I am the beginning. The end. The one
who is many. I am the Borg.”






The
Borg are really no-brainers as movie antagonists.  The most beloved episode of Star
Trek: The Next Generation remains the two-parter “The Best of Both
Worlds,” concerning a Borg incursion into Federation space. The Borg are such popular villains
because they promise a fate much worse than death. 




It’s
one thing to be killed by drooling, murderous aliens; it’s another thing
entirely to have your individuality wiped away and your intelligence sublimated
into the Borg Collective.  In that state,
your memories belong to the Borg.  Your
physicality belongs to the Borg.  Your
very soul…is theirs. 




Somewhere
inside, you may want to struggle against the Collective or Hive, but you can’t
succeed.  You must stand by and watch in
a kind of living Hell as the Borg exploit your knowledge and exploit your body,
perhaps even condemning your very loved ones to the nightmare of being “one”
with the collective. It’s a horrid fate to imagine, let alone endure. 




The
Borg threat also works remarkably well in the context of The Next Generation, a
series that -- through the inclusion of half-Betazaoids, Klingons, androids,
the blind and other colorful characters -- champions diversity as a worthwhile
human ideal.




The
Borg destroy diversity, making all life-forms conform to their vision of
perfection, thus making them a perfect adversary for our colorful and very individual 24th
century heroes.




Assimilation
into the Borg group consciousness is such a powerful, frightening notion that
it would be nearly impossible to ruin the threat of the Borg in a two-hour
motion picture.  And yet, First
Contact almost achieves the impossible by giving the Borg a heretofore
unseen new ruler, a single individual called the Borg Queen. 




Now,
let me be plain: Alice Krige is remarkable as the Borg Queen here.  She gives a performance simultaneously terrifying and
sensual.  Similarly, her
appearance is both frightening and incredibly sexy.  And yet the very idea of a Borg Queen
represents a terrible undermining of the original notion of the Borg: a collective life form.




Now,
suddenly – after several years of Next Generation episodes – we learn that that the Borg are
ruled by an individual leader?  By the
equivalent of a Queen Bee?  And worse,
this Queen Bee is apparently seeking a human mate?  Here, it is plain she seeks not to make
drones of protagonists Captain Picard or Data, but to make them her lovers and
companions, co-rulers of the lower Borg caste. 





In
one fell swoop, then, the terror and anonymity of assimilation is largely
undone.  For one thing, the Borg can
maintain individuality after assimilation, as the presence and personality of the Borg Queen prove.  For another, our heroes don’t face total
erasure of individuality.  Instead, they
get to hob-knob it with the sensual, if sadistic, Borg Queen.  There are some humans who may not consider
that arrangement so terrible, frankly, given her overt sensuality…




I
understand the (flawed) thinking that individuals make a “better” enemy in a
movie than a group of bad guys, but the popularity of the Borg as a collective in the
Next
Generation TV series proves the fallacy of such thinking.  First Contact invents a new character
in the Borg Queen that -- while beautiful and menacing -- totally undercuts the
terror of the Borg equation.




Her
presence raises important questions too. 
How does the Queen exist in multiple dimensions at once, since First
Contact suggests that she was present on the Borg ship with Locutus,
although though we never saw her there in “Best of Both Worlds?”




Secondly,
and perhaps more importantly, how do the Borg survive (into episodes of Voyager )
if their multi-dimensional Queen keeps getting destroyed?  How many Queens are there?  How does she die?  Does Star Trek now possess an un-killable
character?   Also, because she can apparently be in more than one dimension at a time, why does the Queen have to bother with sending a message to the Borg of her time by sensor dish?  Why not just transition from one place to another, one time to another?




Another
serious problem in First Contact again comes down to how writers Ronald Moore and Brannon
Braga choose to highlight crew interaction.  Specifically, superficial “movie
thinking” undercuts what could have been incredible scenes
of conflict and drama between Enterprise team members.  




Here,
Patrick Stewart delivers an incredibly well-written Moby Dick speech about the
Borg, explaining in detail why he won’t fall back again, why he won’t let the
Borg win.  Stewart does a terrific job
with the material.  It’s the monologue of
an obsessed, driven man, and it works quite effectively in terms of the character we
love, even if it seems logical that he would have exorcised these Borg demons
already, given the span of time between “Family” and First Contact.






But
forget all that. Picard gets called on the carpet and called out for his obsession
with Borg… by Lily (Alfre Woodard), a one-time guest star in the
franchise.  She goes toe-to-toe with Picard
and points out how his pursuit of the Borg doesn’t make sense.  She’s known him for maybe a few hours, when
she makes the speech.




I’ll
be blunt: this confrontation should have occurred between Captain Picard and
Dr. Crusher (Gates McFadden).  She has
known Captain Picard longer than anyone else aboard ship, she can speak from
experience -- not hear say --  that his orders usually make sense, and she
boasts the standing as chief medical officer of the Enterprise to stop Picard
in his tracks if he is acting in a manner that is dangerous to the well-being
of the starship’s crew. 




If
this were an original cast Star Trek movie, do you have any
doubt that it would have been McCoy calling Kirk on the carpet over his
behavior, as he did, explicitly in Star Trek: The Motion Picture
(1979), Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) and Star Trek V: The Final Frontier
(1989), to name just three incidents? 
McCoy could do it because he was Kirk’s confidante, and because he had
that standing as CMO to question a captain’s behavior.




Again,
Crusher – who shares breakfast with
Picard every day as we know from the series – is that person in The
Next Generation universe.  Yes,
Stewart and Woodard are powerful in the confrontation scene together, but it
doesn’t resonate deeply in terms of Star Trek history, because Picard
doesn’t get checked by one of his own, by one of his crew. These movies are supposed to be about how
starship crews work together to resolve problems, right?  Shouldn't the person who actually knows Picard be the one to question him?  You may recall, I had a similar problem with how Generations used Crusher.  She should have been Picard's "Nexus" ideal, given their relationship there. And she should do her duty as CMO here, in First Contact. It's not that I have a thing for Crusher (though I like her just fine).  It's that as a member of the team, when there is an opportunity to use her character appropriately...she should be thus used.  And she never is.  In any Star Trek movie.  Even Chekov, Sulu and Uhura had moments in the sun in the original Star Trek films when there was opportunity.




I’ve
always believed this a major flaw in the Next Generation movies: they give
the supporting cast members little to do, and farm out the dramatic work to
guest stars inside of established characters. 
The Moby Dick scene would have been infinitely more powerful if Gates
McFadden – whom we know and love as
Crusher – had been given the opportunity to stand up to Captain Picard.  I wrote above how Riker, Geordi and Troi don’t
seem equal to the task of countering Cochrane here.  The same is true of Crusher in First
Contact : she’s written like a doormat. 
She remains on the bridge, without questioning orders, while Lily enthusiastically
performs her job as chief medical
officer.




This
reveals -- as we see time and time again – that there’s definitely a pecking
order in the Star Trek: The Next
Generation movies:  the men get
better roles than the women do, and Picard, Riker, Worf and Data get the lion’s
share of the drama, while the rest of the characters are afforded only brief
moments that play as the equivalent of shtick. 
Troi gets to play drunk, for example. 
In First Contact , Crusher not only shirks her duty to hold Picard’s feet
to the fire over a bad decision, she actually loses a patient (Lily again…) who is under her
protection.  That’s the best the writers
could come up with for a character who raised a son, overcame the tragic death of her husband, commanded the Enterprise from time-to-time and even headed Starfleet Medical?




In
short, for First Contact , the writers decided to go out and invent a woman
tough enough to challenge Picard, when a woman already in the Next
Generation stable could have done it just as well, and it would have
resonated far more with the Trek fan base.  All they needed to do was to write Gates
McFadden a decent part.




In
the introduction to this piece, I wrote about some careless errors in the film.  Let me name just a few.  At one point, Picard tells Lily the Enterprise consists of 24 decks. Later, Worf’s security chief replacement reports that the
Borg control "deck 26."  If we’re to
believe Picard, that deck doesn’t exist. 
By looping “24” over the “26” dialogue, this would error would not have
occurred.  I just can’t believe that
nobody was checking continuity on a major studio’s tent-pole franchise.




Other
matters of concern include the origin of Zefram Cochrane.  He is a character from the original series
episode “Metamorphosis,” and one with an entirely different look and origin (in
terms of home planets, apparently) than what this movie establishes. But First Contact feels no obligation to
explain the discrepancies in Cochrane’s biography. 




Also,
since when can Captain Picard hear the voices of the Borg?  Is this a common side effect of those who
have been separated from the Collective? 
If so, did Hugh, the Borg refugees of “Descent” and Seven of Nine also
hear Borg voices in their heads whenever they encountered them?






In
spite of such problems, Star Trek: First Contact is a highly
entertaining movie with many dramatic and visually-appealing high points.  




Prime among these is the zero-gravity
sequence in which Picard, Worf and Hunt must battle the Borg on the exterior of
the Enterprise hull, on the main deflector dish. 
This scene is splendidly-directed, buttressed by incredible special
effects, and it features an undercurrent of anxiety throughout, as the Borg – slowly becoming aware of Picard’s
interference – begin to menace the crew as the team works to stop them. 




I
remember, circa 1994 or so, I was deeply disenchanted with the Star Trek
universe and consequently looking back at Space: 1999 (1975 -1977) with much appreciation, because I felt that the world of the Enterprise had become too safe and predictable.  Space adventuring was no longer
dangerous.   Now it consisted of
vacations on holodecks, endless resources and material wealth, courtesy of replicators,
and even families living on the saucer section while exploring the final frontier.  I lamented the fact that not once in Star
Trek: The Next Generation or Deep Space Nine up to that point,
had any main character been seen in a space suit, actually reckoning with the actual
environment of space.  The crew members of Starfleet seemed to me too insulated from danger.




So
I was delighted that Star Trek: First Contact included
this zero-g sequence and put my qualms to rest, at least momentarily. 
The zero-gravity action scene in Star Trek: First Contact reminds us
that these men and women are in a dangerous profession, and that even with all
the comforts of “technology unchained” in the 24th century, they
must still sometimes go out into space with precious few resources to fight
enemies, or attempt to repair their ship.  
The zero-gravity fight scene is actually my favorite in the film because
it is so tense, and because it features so many nice character touches, from
Picard’s unconventional cleverness (blasting a Borg into space by shooting the
deck of the ship…) to Worf’s “always be prepared” mentality, bringing a blade
out into space with him.  It’s terrific
stuff.




I
also enjoy the climax of Star Trek: First Contact tremendously because it
remembers that Star Trek isn’t always supposed to be about battling hostile
aliens.  This is one of the reasons why I’m
not all that impressed with Star Trek Online . It’s a game about
going out to other worlds and fighting aliens, about firing phasers and
engaging in battle.




For me, that’s but one small aspect of Star
Trek , and not, for me, the one with the most appeal.  Star Trek: First Contact features
great battle sequences, but more than that, ends on the high note of first
contact.  It shows us an important and
inspiring scene in human history, our first, peaceful meeting with
extra-terrestrials.  In this case, the
humans who broach that contact are fatigued from war, and not “perfect” (like our 24th
century protagonists).  And yet they lead with trust and peace, and a wonderful,
new era is opened up because of their willingness to go out on a limb.  Frankly, I find
the final scenes of First Contact absolutely inspiring, reminding us of the better angels
of our nature.  We can greet the
unknown not with fear, paranoia and suspicion, but with hope and peace and
trust. 






In
ending the film on this high note, rather than the (admittedly-satisfying) defeat of the villainous
Borg, First Contact remembers and honors the highest aspirations of
Gene Roddenberry and the Star Trek saga. 
Remember “the human adventure is just beginning?” the tag-line of Star
Trek: The Motion Picture?   First
Contact literalizes that motto, and shows us the wondrous beginnings of
man’s odyssey to the stars, beginning with the first moments of brotherhood with another
race.  It’s a fantastic and inspiring
story-point.




I
also appreciate the creativity involved in Data’s subplot in First
Contact . I didn’t care for how Data was utilized in Generations …as a
veritable bi-polar psychotic. Here, he seems more...balanced.  He faces temptation as the Borg perform an
assimilation in reverse.  Usually, the Borg
apply mechanical prosthetics to biological skin.  Here, they apply biological skin to a
mechanical apparatus.  It’s an interesting
idea, especially since Data suggests early on that he can’t be assimilated by
the Borg.  The Queen proves him wrong,
and in a diabolical fashion that tempts Data.  We never really believe he has turned to the dark side...but as Data suggests, a few seconds can feel like eternity when we're uncertain of his exact motivations. 




I understand that Star Trek fans are divided on the subject of Frakes as a director.  He gets good performances from the cast here, and manages several action scenes nicely.  Judging by First Contact , he certainly seems up to the center seat...the director's chair. 





Between
the zero-g action, the up-lifting last moments of first contact, and Data’s unique experience being
Borgified, it’s largely futile to resist First Contact , a high-point for the
Next Generation cast at the movies. 

Movie Trailer: Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

Sci-Fi Wisdom of the Week: Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

" Believing oneself to be perfect is often the sign of a delusional mind."




- Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

Underrated but Great # 2: The X-Files, Season 8 (2000 - 2001)

The Conventional
Wisdom:




Many
of you are already familiar with the conventional wisdom about The
X-Files (1993 – 2002).  This
conventional wisdom has been disseminated and repeated across fan hubs and critical
review web-sites for many years now.




It
goes something like this: After star David Duchovny departed the series as the
lead actor, the series went down-hill…fast.  In fact, The X-Files stayed on the air a few
years too long, and ended in something resembling disgrace and embarrassment.




Well,
the truth is out there…and it’s much more nuanced and intriguing than the
conventional wisdom suggests.  First,
it’s accurate that during the eighth season of The X-Files , David Duchovny reduced
his participation considerably.  He was
no longer the star of the program, and he appeared as Mulder in
less-than-a-dozen episodes airing that year. 
But he wasn’t gone entirely.




His
successor in the male lead position was actor Robert Patrick ( Terminator 2 [1991], Fire
in the Sky [1993]).  On The
X-Files , Patrick played John Doggett, an ex-New York police detective
who did not boast a familiarity with the paranormal or supernatural, but
instead constructed his cases upon the bedrocks of common sense, a finely-tuned
moral barometer, and good old-fashioned police work. 






In
short, Doggett equaled “dogged.”  He was
a superb, tireless agent (as Scully once noted: “above reproach”), and the character and performance provided the
series with a welcome injection of fresh blood. 
Yes, Doggett was quite different from the beloved Agent Mulder, yet if
you speak to many  X-Files fans that actively disliked Patrick’s tenure as
Doggett, they won’t name either the actor or the character as the source of
their upset.




Instead,
a series of arguments are raised. 
For instance, a few of these critics will suggest that the writing was
bad in Season 8, even though episodes were by-and-large penned by the same
authors who toiled on earlier seasons of The X-Files and knew their way
around the series’ premise and characters. 
Their stories in season eight at least deserve a fair hearing.




Some
will tell you that the monsters of the week during Season 8 suddenly grew “tasteless,”
based on disgusting premises like a vomiting monster (“The Gift”) or a creature
that could crawl into the rectum of a grown man (“Badlaa”). 




And
yet -- again -- one must wonder why
earlier, highly-praised X-Files stories such as “Home”
(featuring an amputee and genetic mutants), “F. Emasculata” (concerning a disease
with exploding flesh pustules), “Bad Blood” (with extracted human organs dripping
blood from a scale during an autopsy) or “The Host” (with a creature hiding in
a port-a-potty) did not encounter the same negative response of
“tastelessness.”  Throughout its run, The
X-Files was persistently and gory, and that’s a
good thing in my estimation, especially in a medium (at the time) that favored
homogeneity.




Another
oft-voiced complaint is that during Season 8, Scully and Doggett ended up
striking off on their own too much, and thus ending up in mortal jeopardy without
back-up.  Once more, did those folks
complaining about this issue ever actually watch the earlier seasons of The
X-Files?  




This
sort of situation happened all the time
to Scully and Mulder.




One
potential answer underlying the conventional wisdom is that, at some point,
many critics of The X-Files decided, a
priori, that a Mulder-less version of the show wasn’t going to be something
good, or something in which they could fully invest and actively engage with.




So
they erected a series of false premises about the series to reinforce their pre-existing
beliefs. 




The Affirmative
Case:




So,
if the conventional wisdom is wrong, why is Season Eight a strong season and one worthy
of praise and The X-Files legacy?




First
and foremost, there’s Doggett.




He is the third
leading “Chris Carter male” we have
encountered, following Fox Mulder and Millennium’s Frank Black (Lance
Henriksen).  My wife, a therapist, coined
the phrase “The Chris Carter male”
because she became intrigued by the writer’s male characters, and their common
traits.  She describes the Chris Carter
males as “chivalrous and heroic, but unavailable
emotionally to the women in their lives.” 





When I interviewed
Chris Carter in late 2009, he responded to this psychological classification
and noted that it was “dramatically-interesting
to him” to write for characters when “it’s
what’s withheld that counts, or is that important.”




He went on to say:  “If
the character is remote or unable to speak about these things – because it’s
series television we’re talking about here – it becomes something that needs to
be discovered.  So if you discover these
things too quickly, if a person is too emotionally available, it actually takes
away from interest in the character.”






What's Doggett laughing about with his budz?

With
this premise in mind, Carter and the other writers of The X-Files grant Doggett
a particularly intriguing arc in Season Eight. He starts out as a dependable but relatively
unimaginative by-the-book agent in the premiere “Within/Without.”  In fact, viewers even feel a little suspicious
of him starting out because when we first see him  approaching Mulder’s basement
office in “Patience,” he is depicted laughing outside the door with
colleagues…as if mocking the X-Files. 
He’s responding to a joke we don’t get to hear, and so the audience
response is suspicion…even paranoia.




Later
in the episode, one penned by Chris Carter, a police detective, Abbott
(Bradford English) proves downright dismissive of and hostile to Agent Scully
(Gillian Anderson). Doggett steps in and whispers something to Abbott to back
him off.  Notice that we never hear
Doggett’s words, nor see his facial expressions as he speaks to Abbott in this particular
scene.  Once more, the implication is
that Doggett is not entirely trustworthy. 
He may be sympathizing with the misogynistic detective…we don’t know for
sure.  Again, the primary feeling with
Doggett is one of suspicion, or uncertainty.




After
these moments and a few others like them, we slowly warm to Doggett, and his
sense of emotional unavailability begins to recede. In later episodes we learn that his marriage
failed, and that his son died under tragic and mysterious circumstances (in
“Invocation”), but more importantly, we begin to see how he and Scully develop
a working relationship.  The distance we
feel from him diminishes.  But the
important thing is that Doggett as a character earns our trust over a period of episodes.  He is not inside “the circle” (like Skinner
is, for instance) instantly.




In
some ways, this is a touch very respectful of Mulder, and Mulder’s role on the
series.  It would have been terrible, not to mention unbelievable, to
have a character jump in and pick up where Mulder – after eight years – left off, emotionally vulnerable with Scully
and trusted by Skinner.  Instead, the
writers gave us a character that had to find his way both on the job, and with
the dedicated fans of the show.




In
addition to the new and at times ambiguous presence of Doggett, the eighth
season of The X-Files is successful because, by and large, the stories
feature interesting “monsters of the week” (soul eaters, Siddhi mystics,
microscopic flesh-eating ocean life…), ones often based on myth and folklore.  But the stories are good for more than that
reason.  In particular, they establish
the new dynamic for the characters and their interactions.




The
original and admittedly brilliant X-Files dynamic of Scully/Mulder is
best expressed as the comparison of two distinctive and competing world views: science vs. faith/skepticism vs. belief.  Virtually every story in the first six years
was filtered through this highly entertaining and cerebral double lens.




In
Season Eight -- with a mostly absent Mulder to contend with -- that dynamic could
no longer function.  So instead, the
episodes of this span largely concerned how Scully had to re-train herself to
“see” the world, accommodating Mulder’s genius into her own perspective.  This endeavor not only made Scully grow as a person, it
kept Mulder as the “absent center” in Carter’s words, of the drama.




Consider
for a moment just how often the episodes in Season Eight involve “sight,” or more
specifically, “learning to see.” Here are some examples: 




In
“Patience” Scully tries to see the world (and a specific case) as Mulder would
see it, but admits she has difficulties making the same leaps of faith. 




In
the episode titled “Medusa,” Scully assumes control of a command center on an
investigation, and must “see” through Doggett’s eyes in the subway below.  Again, she’s re-learning how to interpret the
world and its mysteries. She needs Doggett as her “eyes and ears” to do that.  He needs her, oppositely, calling the shots, because of his inexperience on the X-Files.




In “Via Negativa” a cult leader grows a “third
eye” by opening his mind to the path of darkness, and Doggett nearly goes the
same way, into a new realm of diabolical sight. 





In
“The Gift,” Skinner commends Doggett for seeing a case through Mulder’s eyes…by
getting inside the missing agent’s head.  





“Badlaa”
involves an Indian mystic who can cloud the sight of normal people, including
Scully and Doggett, making them see -- or not see -- what he wishes.  Our very reality is up for grabs, and Scully
must make a decision based on what she believes, not what she actually sees. 




Even
“Three Words” is about sight in some critical sense. It concerns how Mulder
comes to see Doggett, and then how Doggett comes to see himself: as being
manipulated by an untrustworthy informant. 





“Alone”
is about blindness (another aspect of sight), and about how in the absence of
clear sight, trust can substitute for vision.  This lesson comes in relation to competitors Doggett and Mulder, who are
trapped by a kind of lizard monster in a dark labyrinth.  His eyes sprayed by venom, Doggett can’t see
his nemesis well enough to shoot it.  He
must place his trust in Mulder, and Mulder’s words to survive.




The
leitmotif of “learning to see” appears in more than a handful of episodes, and
grants the eight season an umbrella of unity that draws it together.   




Episode Highlights:






Scully (and the audience), on the outside looking in.

1. “Patience.” Written and directed by
Chris Carter.  This is a standalone story
(or “monster of the week”) involving a  sort of man-bat (who sees quite differently than
human beings, by the way…) seeking vengeance against tormentors from the year 1956. 




But
this episode – essentially a second pilot for the series – cunningly sets up the
fundamentals of the Scully/Doggett relationship as well as the season’s
obsession on sight.  Furthermore, it features
a great commentary on what it means to live in fear.  On the latter front, consider Ernie
Stefaniuk’s moving monologue about what fear did to his marriage…and to his (now
deceased) wife.  For forty-four years the
couple lived in virtual isolation on a six mile stretch of land and denied
themselves modern conveniences, family contact, and more.  In the post-9/11 age, “Patience” takes on a
new meaning given the government’s color-coded exploitation of fear during the last decade.




Chris
Carter is a gifted director and he proves it again in “Patience” with the carefully
constructed and perfectly framed scene I mentioned above wherein Scully is castigated and
treated poorly by Detective Abbott, and Doggett steps in to ameliorate the
detective’s concerns. 




A
less clever director would have included a frontal shot of Doggett’s
explanation or provided audio of his words. 
Instead, the moment is left intentionally ambiguous because we never learn
exactly what it is he said.  




This makes
us wonder if Doggett will be there for Scully when she needs him…




“Patience”
is the first standalone episode in the series sans Mulder, and it is therefore
the template for the two final seasons, diagramming the fresh terrain of
the burgeoning Scully/Doggett relationship and the importance that “learning to
see” will play in upcoming episodes. 




Also,
“Patience” is a coded-title and a message directly to X-Files fans.  Be patient, and you’ll be rewarded with a new
character dynamic that, conceivably, could rival the richness of the original
format.






Burks or Siddhi Mystic?

2.”Badlaa.” 
By John Shiban. This absolutely go-for-broke episode concerns a Siddhi
mystic (Deep Roy) who travels to America inside the rectum of a four-hundred
pound businessman. 




Yes,
you read that synopsis correctly…




When
the vengeful mystic evacuates the rectum, the fat man bleeds out, and we are spared no
nauseating detail.  One thoroughly
terrifying scene finds the mystic hidden inside a corpse, and as Scully begins
her autopsy, we see his tiny hands wriggle
their way out of a chest incision.






Doggett or Siddhi Mystic?

The sense of escalating terror generated by this episode is not only visual.  The Siddhi mystic – an amputee -- drags himself from one location to another on a
scooter with squeaky wheels, and that ubiquitous squeak quickly emerges a
fearsome harbinger of terror.  We come to
expect it, and fear it.




But
the episode works splendidly not because of the nutso (if inspired) premise,
but because it fits into the season’s leitmotif about “learning to see.” Specifically,
director Tony Wharmy achieves something extraordinary in terms of visualizing
certain crucial moments in the play.  It
is established early on that the Siddhi mystic can control how people perceive
him, and there are at least two instances in the tale when Scully sees people
who are already present on the scene – in
long establishing shot – standing in the distance, observing her.




One
is Charles Burks (Bill Dow), bracketed inside the door frame at the X-Files FBI
office.  Another is Doggett himself,
standing pool-side, with strange light reflected on his face.  Neither figure gets a traditional entrance
when Scully sees them: they’re already present -- motionless– and the implication is that there is something not
quite right about them.




If
you go back and watch this episode with a careful eye, be certain to ask
yourself at all times, who is Scully actually “perceiving” and receiving
information from? Those she knows and trusts, or the mystic himself, carefully
insinuating his “sight” into her mind? 
It’s a brilliant idea and a visual grace note in a highly disturbing and provocative episode.






Learning to see.

3. “Via Negativa.”
By Frank Spotnitz.  This is another
brilliant standalone episode. In
philosophy, the "via negativa" is an approach to understanding
God; a strategy that seeks to define God by enumerating those things God
is not. God is not mortal, God is not Evil, and so forth. Sometimes, this unusual approach to comprehending the
Divine is also called Negative Theory or The Negative Way. 




The episode "Via Negativa" finds stalwart Doggett
investigating the brutal murders of two FBI agents who were staking out an apocalyptic
cult. Doggett is investigating this particular X-File alone because
a pregnant Scully is away at the hospital. Still new to the X-Files unit, Doggett
is uncertain and rudderless. He's no Mulder, and boasts no interest in being
Mulder. Leaps of faith don't come easily or naturally to him. Without Scully to
ease him in, the "dogged," meat-and-potatoes Doggett is, in a very
real sense, vulnerable, to what he learns during this
investigation.




Doggett
discovers that the members of the apocalyptic cult died horribly and that their
still-at-large leader, Anthony Tibbett, is an ex-convict who developed a
peculiar brand of evangelical Christian/Hindu philosophy. Tibbett suggests that
"the body is but clay...to hold the twin aspects of the human spirit:
the light and the darkness." Furthermore, he believes that if his
dedicated followers gaze into the path of darkness ("the Via Negativa"
of the title), they will see God there.




To help
them reach this dimension of darkness, Tibbett administered experimental hallucinogens
that would awaken the cult members’ "Third Eye." It is this
"Third Eye" -- the Hindu gyananakashi, or "Eye of
Knowledge, positioned between hemispheres of the brain -- that can see into the realm of darkness..






Doggett delves deeper and deeper into Tibbett's strange, dark
beliefs until the agent himself takes a walk on the Via Negativa during
a horrifying dream sequence. The scene is cast in a suffusing blue light, and
intermittent fade-outs and pulsating strobes provide a sense of fractured time
and  splintered consciousness. This tense, virtually silent scene witnesses a sweaty,
desperate Doggett (depicted in extreme close-up) contemplating murder...and the
specter of his own internal darkness.




Another scene, in which a vulnerable, confused Doggett
confesses to a baffled Skinner (Mitch Pileggi) that he’s uncertain about his
own state of consciousness (dreaming or awake...) also serves as Doggett's
authentic indoctrination into  The X-Files... the horrifying
case from "outside" that changes him "inside."



In "Via Negativa" there's a deep underlying fear at work. Doggett has
no support system. His walk on "the dark path" is a
walk alone (or so we believe, until the denouement) and there's something
incredibly unsettling about the brand of evil he faces here. This episode is
absolutely terrifying.



A succession earned, not bestowed.



4. “The Gift.”  This episode by Frank
Spotnitz and directed by Kim Manners is another story that focuses on “sight”
and how people see things differently. 
Agent Doggett investigates one of Mulder’s old cases, and finds evidence
that Mulder may have committed murder. 
Through enigmatic flashbacks, we see Mulder’s unorthodox work on the
case, and the execution of the crime. 




Only in the end do we come to understand that Mulder’s blood-soaked
act of murder is actually one of mercy. 
And we uncover this revelation not in straight-forward narrative fashion,
but through Doggett’s investigation as he follows literally in Mulder’s
footsteps, and comes to make a similar choice regarding mercy and decency.  The result, at episode’s end: Doggett – for the briefest of instants – imagines
the specter of Mulder in his office, as if a tacit sign of approval of
Doggett’s presence there.  He has,
finally, earned the right to sit where Mulder once did.




The monster of the week in “The Gift” is a great one too: a
“soul eater” who may be summoned to eat the bodies of the sick.  After eating sick people and absorbing their
diseases, the soul eater than regurgitates the digested human beings…and they
re-form and are resurrected.  Both Mulder
and Doggett go through that horrifying process in this episode (another
instance of “parallel” footsteps), and yes, the vomiting scenes are nausea
provoking.  But regurgitation isn’t the
point of the story.  The point is that
the soul eater is a tortured creature who cannot die and who must keep healing
others…and absorbing their horrible illnesses. 
He’s in pain and wants his life to end.




As the episode commences, you think that “the gift” of the
title belongs to the soul eater. He is giving those he digests and regurgitates
the gift of health. But at episode's end, we learn that Doggett has actually
given the monster the greatest gift of all: death. Release.




This is a poetic and lyrical  X-Files episode, and one
that asks us to see the soul eater differently at different times.  He’s a monster and a terror at first.  But then – as we look into his eyes – we register that if he is a soul eater,
his soul too has been eaten by a lifetime of physical suffering.






The truth we now know, and have "learned to see..."

5: “Existence.” Written by Chris Carter
and directed by Kim Manners.  In this
season finale, a pregnant Scully gives birth to her unusual child, and we learn
– at long last – that Mulder is the
father.  Shippers will enjoy the
Mulder/Scully kiss, but on a more significant note, the episode provides the
punch-line to the season-long exploration of "learning to see."  




Before our eyes – for
we don’t know how long – Mulder and Scully have been together…romantically.
And, now, we suddenly see and understand it all.  It’s a beautiful end to the season, and to
this nearly-season long arc.  We’ve
traveled a long road believing one thing, or suspecting one thing, and then –
in a single scene, and with a single line of dialogue – we finally see “the
truth.”  It’s a perfect capper to Season
Eight.  In this final installment of the year, the audience learns to see, thus mimicking the odysseys of Scully and Doggett.  How's that for elegant storytelling?




Season Eight could have been one of jarring change and false starts, but instead, The X-Files triumphed with fine storytelling, great performances, scary monsters and a recurring theme.




Other Season Eight high notes: “Roadrunners,” “Medusa,” “Three
Words” and “Alone.”

The X-Files Season Eight Trailer

Pop Art: Classic Sci-Fi TV Tie-In/Non Star Trek Edition

Collectible of the Week: Flash Gordon Playset (Mego; 1977)

This is another Mego playset from the 1970s for which I harbor deep and abiding love.  In 1977, Mego manufactured a line of toys from Flash Gordon (1936), including four 10-inch action figures (Flash Gordon, Ming the Merciless, Dale Arden and Dr. Zarkov), and this terrific playset/carrying case.




"The world of Mongo comes alive in this double sided playset" the box informed kids.  "One side is Ming's Throne Room complete with Ming's throne."  




"The other side is Dr. Zarkov's secret laboratory with a simulated computer and (3) computer cards."




The set also "fits all Flash Gordon figures (not included.)"




Like the Star Trek, Planet of the Apes and Wizard of Oz playsets, this Flash Gordon playset is  constructed of hard cardboard, surrounded by laminated vinyl, I believe.  The illustrations on this set are really quite beautiful as I hope you can see, and strongly evocative of Alex Raymond's art work.  






The three computer cards included here are double-sided, and feature images of all the characters, plus a city of Mongo, plus a rocket on approach.  They slip down through the top of the computer, into the viewscreen. panel. 




You might think that the timing (the mid-1970s) was weird for a Flash Gordon boomlet but I remember in the mid-1970s -- around the time of Star Wars -- finally getting to see the original serial at my local library.  On Friday afternoons, I think, I went to see it, one chapter at a time over a span of weeks.  Also, if I'm not mistaken, some TV stations had begun to play the original Buster Crabbe serials as well.  It was kind of a mini - Flash Gordon fad.  My grandmother from Texas (now deceased), was thrilled to see the serials again because she had loved them as a kid.  It was pretty awesome, actually, that my grandmother, mother and I could all sit down and discuss together Buster Crabbe and Flash Gordon .




Today, I don't own any of the Flash Gordon action figures, alas, which came equipped with plastic swords and cool helmets.  But I do own this wonderful Mego playset and its box, which remain in excellent shape.

Cloned from a Mutual Zygote: Dragon Sidekick Edition

Horror Lexicon #15: The Organizing Principle

I wrote about this genre convention extensively in my reference book Horror Films of the 1980s (2007; McFarland) but if you seek to create a horror film in the slasher milieu, your first step must be to determine an organizing principle.




The organizing principle is a facet beyond mere setting or location.  It provides a horror film with a series of connected leitmotifs, and therefore a sense of unity.  In other words, the organizing principle is a film's central idea, transmitted or expressed across creative factors such as setting, motive, and even characterization.






I utilized this example in the book, but it illuminate what I mean when I discuss the organizing principle.  Imagine that a producer seeks to create a knife-kill film titled The Librarian .  The organizing principle is therefore a character of a certain vocation, as the title indicates. That vocation lands that character in a specific place (a public library), and determines exploitable elements in the story: a card-catalog, a drop-off box, a study room, the long, dark aisles filled with books, and so on.  A decapitated head might be discovered in the drop-off box at a climactic moment, the key to the killer's identity might be discovered in the card catalog, and the last-act chase of the final girl (a grad student) could occur in a labyrinth of book rows.  The crime causing the murders could be a defaced library book, or a book that was returned late.




See how the library provides more than one element of the film's creative gestalt?  It grants you a lead character (a book-smart college student, let's say), a villain (a psycho librarian), and a story (a crime in the past causing a murder spree in the present).  It might even provide specific weapons (like a heavy book, for instance, wielded at a crucial juncture).  




So the organizing principle is the very thing the slasher film hangs its (blood-soaked) hooks upon.  It is the key to motivation, setting, slasher and more.  






Let's consider Terror Train (1980) in terms of the organizing principle.  In this film, the organizing principle is not the train, as one might suspect, but rather magic, or illusion.  Master-magician David Copperfield appears in the film as a red herring (a distraction in terms of determining the identity of the killer), and a magic show occurs on the train at one point.  Finally, the revelation of the killer's identity depends on illusion-versus-reality. Do you trust your eyes, or are they tricking you?




In virtually every slasher production you can name, the organizing principle determines virtually every ingredient the movie will require to succeed; a whole world of connections upon which to hang the narrative.  This is so important, I submit, because the slasher format is episodic by nature.  The narrative in most of these films consists of a series of stitched-together, almost complete-unto-themselves short films in which a victim is stalked and murdered.  When one victim dies, you rinse and repeat...and move to the next set-piece until, finally, the killer is destroyed.  The organizing principle unifies all these episodes and gives them consistency of setting, location, motivation and victim.




Below is a chart slightly modified from the one I used in Horror Films of the 1980s.  It illustrates the organizing principle's usefulness in making coherent all the creative elements of a slasher movie.  I added two 1990s examples to the chart to show how, even after the 1980s, the organizing principle was utilized to make the format work.










Movie Title


Organizing
Principle


Setting


Crime
in the Past


Victim
Pool




Friday the 13th


Summer camp


Camp, cabins,
lake, woods


drowning;

negligence


Camp counselors.










He Knows You’re
alone


Weddings


Dress shop, bride’s
home, chapel


Bride jilts fiancé.


The wedding
party, dress tailor…







Night School


College


Classrooms, dean’s
home


Infidelity


Students, dean of
college, professors.







Prom Night


Prom night


High school


Accident caused
by classmates as children


Prom goers who as
children participated in accident.







The Dorm that
Dripped Blood


College campus


College campus
(cafeterias, dorms, basement, etc.)


Unpopularity with
fellow students


College students













Final Exam


Exam Week


College campus,
et.


NA


College students







Friday the 13th
Part II


Summer Camp


Camp, cabins,
lake, woods


Murder of Mrs.
Voorhees


Camp counselors










Graduation Day


Track Team


Track field, high
school, locker room, prom


Death of a young
track student


Track coach,
track team members







Happy Birthday to
Me


Birthday parties


College, birthday
party


Family break-up
on birthday


Birthday party
invitees







The Prowler


Jilted Lover


School dance


Dear John Letter


Young lovers at a
dance







The Burning


Summer camp


Camp, cabins,
lake, woods, island


An accidental
burning


Campers, counselors




Slumber Party
Massacre


Slumber party


High school,
slumber party location, the house next door


NA


Slumber party
attendees




Curtains


Theatre/acting


A casting retreat
weekend


Losing an
important role


Young ingénues;
older actress, director




Sleepaway Camp


Summer camp


Camp, cabins,
lake, woods


Twisted sex role


Camp employees,
campers




The Initiation


Sororities


Sorority house,
campus


Witnessing of
burning and infidelity


Pledges, sorority
girls, frat boys




Silent Night,
Deadly Night


Christmas


Toy store at
Christmas, Christmas eve


Santa Claus kills
parents


Naughty teens.




Terror at
Tenkiller


Summer vacation
at a lake


Cabin, lake,
local diner


NA


Vacationers




Scream


Horror movies


Video store, high
school, movie party


Marital infidelity


Movie-loving
teenagers




I Know What You
Did Last Summer


Fishing community


Fishing boat,
fishery, local store, fishing holiday pageant


Murder


Teens of the
fishing community trying to make good and leave hometown.