Opening The X-Files

More than 20 years after it was first broadcast, The X-Files still holds the public imagination. Over nine seasons and two feature films, agents Mulder and Scully pursued monsters, aliens, mutants and shadowy conspirators across the American landscape. Running for more than 200 episodes, the series transformed television, crafting a postmodern mythology that spoke to the anxieties and uncertainties of the end of the 20th century. Covering the entire series from its debut through the second feature film, this book examines how creator Chris Carter and his team of writers turned a scrappy cult favorite on Fox into a global phenomenon.

Darren Mooney is a pop culture critic working in Dublin, Ireland. He runs his own website (the m0vie blog), co-hosts a weekly film podcast (The 250), and contributes regularly to the Irish film monthly magazine CinÉireann.

Darren Mooney
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 236
Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2017
pISBN: 978-1-4766-6526-9
eISBN: 978-1-4766-2880-6
Imprint: McFarland

Acknowledgments v
Foreword by Kamail Nanjiani 1
Preface 3
1. The Cultural Context of The ­X-Files and Ten Thirteen 11
2. The ­X-Files: Season One 27
3. The ­X-Files: Season Two 40
4. The ­X-Files: Season Three 54
5. The ­X-Files: Season Four/Millennium: Season One 71
6. The ­X-Files: Season Five/Millennium: Season Two/Fight the Future 91
7. The ­X-Files: Season Six/Millennium: Season Three 111
8. The ­X-Files: Season Seven/Harsh Realm 125
9. The ­X-Files: Season Eight/The Lone Gunmen 138
10. The ­X-Files: Season Nine 157
11. I Want to Believe 174
Chapter Notes 183
Bibliography 224
Index 225

• “A must-read for fans…The X-Files is pretty much a television series in tune with American culture of the 1990s.”—Sherry Ginn, Marvel’s Black Widow from Spy to Superhero
• “The truth is in here! If The X-Files were a college class, Mooney’s book would be the essential text. It not only supplements, but greatly enhances one’s enjoyment of the groundbreaking series.”—Rod Lott, Flick Attack
• “A welcome, and well-written addition to X-Files lore, by an author who knows his stuff.”—John Kenneth Muir, author, The X-FilesFAQ