Not gonna lie: "My Struggle IV” made me angry. VERY angry.
I may do a review later, but right now, the rant.
First of all: I don’t watch shows that are as violent as this episode was, and there’s a reason for that. This episode threw WAY more blood, brains, entrails, and gore at me than I was prepared for.
I would maybe not complain about that if the rest of the episode had offered me anything of equal intensity in exchange. But it did not, unless you count the intensity of my rage at how Chris Carter chose to resolve the William storyline and the show in general.
It isn’t even that he LITERALLY threw Skinner under the bus, or that Monica Reyes got shot in the head. It isn’t that Mulder, the man whose integrity and innocence Mr. X used to kill to protect, became an unstoppable killing machine. It isn’t even that what Cancer Man said about Scully’s pregnancy, which we were all hoping was going to turn out to be a lie, turns out to be true. It’s…
OK, I know I have maybe 5 X-Files fans following me at this point and you’ve probably all read my core dump about Scully’s maternal melodrama in seasons 1-9. “My Struggle IV” proves that Carter’s thinking about reproduction and parenting is still EXACTLY where was in the 1990s. He still thinks of paternity in exclusively genetic terms. He still has zero interest in the non-DNA aspects of parenting. He still can’t leave Scully’s reproductive organs alone. And he still presents assisted reproduction as an alien, invasive, evil technology that produces monsters and mutants instead of children.
What makes me the most angry? Probably the fact that as soon as Scully hears about how William was really created, she starts treating him as disposable. “He was never meant to be.” That’s exactly what she said after Emily died. Emily was, genetically speaking, her child; but Scully wasn’t allowed to parent her because as an alien-human hybrid she wasn’t “meant to be.” She actually gave birth to William AND RAISED HIM FOR A YEAR, but because apparently it wasn’t her egg, she “was never a mother to him.” She WAS. SHE WAS. I have a friend whose daughter was conceived with a donor egg, Chris, would you like to show up on her doorstep tonight and explain to her that her daughter isn’t REALLY her child? Or would you like to come into my house and try to tell me that because I provided neither egg nor sperm nor womb for my own daughter, she isn’t really mine? Really? Cause I WOULD ADVISE YOU NOT TO.
But in fact, in this episode, Chris Carter has ALREADY come into my house and told me that. And that is why I want to punch him.
From Chris Carter’s point of view, it’s all OK because they have a second baby now that’s REALLY hers and Mulder’s. Well fuck him. First, it’s impossible; second, children are not fungible. They’re not interchangeable. Gaining one doesn’t make up for losing another. My brother and sister in law had a third child after they lost their second one. They’re really glad to have him; but he doesn’t really make having lost his sister any easier. You have come into my house and insulted THEM too, Chris Carter. Is there anything else I love that you can insult?
Well, there’s the fandom. You’ve insulted all of us pretty effectively. Here, I’ll give you confirmation that they had sex…but I won’t show you any of it, or any of the foreplay of it, or any kissing or any of that, and in the end I will reveal that I only had them have sex in “Plus One” so they could make a miracle baby. Who raised you, Chris Carter? What did they do to you? Have you considered therapy?
Did you want us to feel like idiots for having stuck with your show this long? Well congratulations then, ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED.
Techincally, this episode is probably better than “The Truth,” and it’s definitely better than “My Struggle II.” So it’s still the best ending the show ever had. But…GOD FUCKING DAMMIT! How can a guy create a show this good and still treat it this badly?
(Yes, I know, the patriarchy, it was a rhetorical question.)
Well…I have enjoyed S11, much of the time; it’s been fun reading and writing about it with all y’all, and the show will always be part of me…but damn, Chris Carter, NO. MORE. Just LEAVE this show alone, do not TOUCH IT, ever again. Maybe you can go sit down with Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss in a bar somewhere and get drunk and plan an X-Files 12/Sherlock 5 series together. Yeah, do that, have a good time, and just keep it to yourselves and leave the rest of us alone. DAMN.
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