The X-Files Review – Season Seven

Seven down, two to go. I will eventually manage to
review every season of this series as a whole, but at
least now we’re caught up to the point where
individual episode reviews began. (The reviews of
the first half of the season predates the 42 point
system, too.)

Cast and Crew

David Duchovny
as Fox Mulder.

Gillian
Anderson
as Dana Scully.

The series creator was Chris
Carter
.
Complete information is
available from this IMDB
page
.


Buy from: Amazon.com
or Amazon.ca

Past TV reviews can be found here.

Original Airdate


This season originally aired in 1999 and 2000.

Synopsis

This was the last year with Duchovny as a full time
cast member. We
saw an end to the Samantha storyline, and the
acceptance of Mulder’s
theories by both Skinner and Scully. We saw a
variety of “monster of
the week” episodes, ranging from the return of Donnie
Pfaster in
“Orison” to some talented magicians in “The Amazing
Maleeni” to the
fan-dividing “Fight Club” and “First Person Shooter.”
Finally, we saw
a return to the roots of the series in “Requiem,”
which also featured
a great scene that had Mulder, Scully, Krycek,
Marita, and the Lone
Gunmen finally appear on screen simultaneously as a
complete group.
In many ways, it felt like the creators wanted this
to be the last
season.

Watching the season unfold live the first time, it
felt to me like the
writers were running out of steam, and that the
creative team was just
going through the motions. Duchovny had Chris Carter
in court, and
there was much debate about whether or not there
would be an eighth
season. Watching it again several months after
season six, I can see
that it wasn’t quite as tired as I remember. I
suspect that I was
tired with seeing so much of the same stuff roll on
by. The
conspiracy had, for the most part, been wrapped up
the year before.
Samantha’s abduction was wrapped up about mid-season.
There didn’t
seem to be much left to cover. The attempts to do
more of the
humorous episodes (including “X-Cops,” “The Goldberg
Variation,”
“Hollywood A.D.,” and “Fight Club”) than previous
seasons felt like a
departure from what we had known. The tone shifted
from where the
show had been five years before. Had Duchovny stuck
around, I’m not
sure we’d have even seen a ninth season.

High Point

“Requiem” was a nice way to cap off the season. If
only the last two
words of dialogue, as well delivered as they were,
hadn’t been
delivered…

Low Point

“Fight Club” was not a good episode. Watching the
entire season as a
whole, I’m now fairly certain that “Requiem” was
intended to be the
first part of a two part series finale, but that that
plan had to be
axed when the series was renewed. I would swear that
Chris Carter
wrote “Fight Club” as a filler to make up that lost
hour of
television. The slide show scenes were amusing, but
the rest can
be missed without feeling too upset.

The Review

This season suffered greatly in originality.
We had some
uninspired new creatures, and some returning freaks
of the past. I
give it 2 out of 6.

The effects (outside of the final moment in
“Signs and
Wonders” and one of the first moments in “The Amazing
Maleeni”) were
very good. Anson’s autopsy in “Je Souhaite” looks
phenomenal. I give
it 6 out of 6; those two odd moments involve
distortion of humans,
which is extremely difficult to get right, and take
up maybe one
minute of total screen time. The other 17 or 18
hours look very
good.

The stories were quite varied. “Fight Club”
was weak;
“X-Cops” had a thin story that was thicker than the
plots in the show
it spoofed; “The Amazing Maleeni” had a
non-supernatural heist that
worked very well. In terms of the long-term plotting
that the series
was best at, we got next to nothing, which was my
biggest complaint
for the season. The good weeks were good, but as a
season package,
there’s not much that it added to the big picture. I
give it 3 out of
6.

The acting was not bad, but very relaxed.
It was as if the
cast knew it wouldn’t take much effort to play these
roles anymore, so
the effort didn’t go it. Some guest stars worked
very well, and
others didn’t. (The only time I believed Krista
Allen’s acting was
when she played a porn star in Anger
Management
.
Even her work as Maitreya and Jade Blue Afterglow was
a stretch.) I
give it 4 out of 6.

The emotional response varies with the
quality of the
episodes. There are some gems, and there are some
that are not. I
give it 4 out of 6.

The production didn’t amaze me at any time,
but it never
irked me, either. It followed along with the
established techniques
and norms. Mark Snow did a great job on the music in
the last Skinner
and Mulder scene of the season, and the rest was
exactly what we’ve
expected from Ten Thirteen productions and the show.
I guess I
shouldn’t hold the lack of originality here against
the production
crew; they did a great job on the “same old same old”
material they
were asked to put together. I give it 5 out of 6.

Overall, it’s got some good stuff, but some
fans of the show
may not be interested at the price that it’s been
given. While I
obviously thought it was worth buying, you may not.
In my opinion,
the only weaker season is season nine; judge your
purchases from
that. It has good stuff, but it’s not all good.
(The bad doesn’t get
as bad as “The Field Where I Died,” though.) I give
it 4 out of 6.

In total, The X-Files: Season Seven receives
27 out of 42.