X
X-Files, The
Identification Science-fiction television series
Creator Chris Carter (1956- )
Date Aired from September 10, 1993, to May 19,
2002
This science-fiction series won a Peabody and various other
awards during its nine-year run. It solidified the Fox net-
work’s reputation for edgy, avant-garde programming and
became one of the network’s first and longest-lasting major
hits.
Launched in October, 1986, the Fox network initially
struggled to lure a significant number of viewers
away from the Big Three—the National Broadcast-
ing Company (NBC), the Columbia Broadcasting
System (CBS), and the American Broadcasting
Company (ABC). In the early 1990’s, Chris Carter, a
marginally successful television writer, was con-
tracted to produce pilot shows for Fox. Carter
blended popular beliefs in government conspiracy
theory with alien abduction, added horror elements
from older science-fiction programs such asThe Twi-
light Zonein the 1950’s andKolchak: The Night Stalkerin
the 1970’s, and wrote the pilot episode forThe X-Files
in 1992.
In the first episode—called simply “The Pilot”—
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents Dana
Scully (Gillian Anderson) and Fox Mulder (David
Duchovny) investigate the unsolved deaths of sev-
eral high school classmates in Oregon. After their
first meeting in his basement office (when she
knocks on the door, he replies, “Sorry, nobody down
here but the FBI’s most unwanted”), their investiga-
tion revealed that alien abduction was involved, that
some government group knew but covered it up,
and that nothing could be proved—or disproved.
These premises established the basic template for
the two hundred episodes that followed.
The show’s success hinged upon the intellectual
(and sexual) tension between the two agents and
myriad characters. Mulder was an Oxford-educated
psychologist and criminal profiler whose core be-
liefs stemmed from his conviction that he had wit-
nessed his sister’s abduction by aliens. Scully, a scien-
tist and pathologist yet a devout Roman Catholic, is
assigned to keep an eye on “Spooky Mulder.” Deep
Throat, one of Mulder’s sources, tells him, “Always
keep your friends close. But keep your enemies
closer.” It is clear that he wants Mulder, who is obvi-
ously on to something, kept under scrutiny, or else
Mulder would just be fired. From this beginning,The
X-Files(including feature films in 1998 and 2008)
continued the government-alien mythology, but
added stand-alone episodes, ranging from “monsterDavid Duchovny and Gillian Anderson in the 1998 filmThe
X-Files.(Hulton Archive/Getty Images)