The X-Files - The Complete Second Season
by Chris Carter, Daniel Sackheim, David Nutter, James A. Contner, James Whitmore Jr.
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Actor: David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, Mitch Pileggi, Robert Patrick, Tom BraidwoodDirector: Chris Carter, Daniel Sackheim, David Nutter, James A. Contner, James Whitmore Jr.
Brand: The X Files
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language); French (Original Language)
Format: Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 1124 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-01-31
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
Product features:
- Condition: New
- Format: DVD
- Box set; Closed-captioned; Color; DVD; NTSC; Full Screen
DVD Reviews of The X-Files - The Complete Second Season
DVD Review: I take back every bad thing I've said about 20th Century Fox
Summary: 5 Stars
I've blasted Twentieth Century Fox over and over the past few years for not making THE X-FILES available in an affordable edition. I was especially miffed this past year as they brought out the inexpensive but incomplete Mythology editions. Finally they have given us an edition that recollects the original DVD releases but in a new format and a dramatically lower price. For anyone with even the slightest doubt, this is the edition of THE X-FILES to get. Although I like to collect my favorite shows on DVD, and I consider THE X-FILES to be one of my two or three favorite shows ever, I have not bought any season, opting instead to rent and rerent the discs from Netflix. Partly this was because I am on a budget and partly because I revolt at paying over $40 for any television season. Once we consumers start paying those kinds of rates, the producers will provide us with nothing priced lower. I was determined either to wait the folks at Twentieth Century Fox out or give Netflix a lot of X-FILES rentals. To complicate matters, buying the seasons used is complicated by the fact that so many sellers on Amazon and elsewhere are actually selling cheap Hong Kong rip offs, not a very good option. Now, however, we not only can pay a reasonable price, but a better format, with the slim line cases that are both longer-lasting than the original fold out cases and more aesthetically pleasing.
There are two major differences between Season One and Season Two of THE X-FILES. First, there is an overall increase in the quality of individual episodes. The writing and production in Season One was very sharp, but the writing was even more finely honed in the second season. Even in the episodes that dealt with the "phenomena of the week," there is a persistent increase in the quality of the new characters introduced and the complexity of the situations. In other words, there is no sophomore slump for these guys. The second major difference is a slight increase in the complexity of the back story. Partially this is done by a couple of multi-episode stories and partially by developing the longer arc of a complex and nefarious conspiracy of silence on the part of a shadowy federal agency that seems to be connected with the Department of Defense. There is a great deal of character development, especially of secondary characters. The Deep Throat of Season One has been replaced by a new Deep Throat, a highly placed African-American played convincingly by Steven Williams who is far more ruthless than the original Deep Throat. Assistant Deputy Director Skinner becomes a far more important character, one whose loyalties are hard to place, but one who clearly is capable of at times being Mulder and Scully's most loyal friend, though more frequently their taskmaster and disciplinarian. The Smoking Man continues to lurk in the shadows, radiating patronizing tyranny and an aura of conspiratorial intrigue. He was a presence in the first season, but he becomes a full fledged character in the second, moving from a non-talking character to one who talks a fair amount. Even Mulder and Scully, who were magnificently conceived characters from the very first episode, learn new things that show their lives to be more complex than they had suspected (and in the two shows that begin Season Three that complete the story that begins in the final episode of Season Two show that there is much, much more to learn than they even remotely suspect).
The start of the season finds Scully in a coma, the X-Files unit disbanded, and Mulder assigned to outrageously trivial surveillance work. Of course, all works out in a series of spectacular episodes. Those fans of Gillian Anderson's crystal blue-eyed, porcelain beauty might notice that she doesn't look quite as lovely early in the season, a function partly of a terrible hairstyling mistake (her bob with bangs instead of her usual part, which utterly alters the balance of her face) and partly of her being extremely pregnant. I applaud the makers of the show for not trying to work her pregnancy into the story line, instead hiding it use of the billowing trench coats that help constitute Scully and Mulder's uniforms. The pregnancy is easy to see in her face, it getting rounder and fuller as she got further into the pregnancy. In fact, if you do a screenshot of her in her last episodes before having her daughter, and compare it to one from an episode either early in Season One or from Season Three, the difference in her face is dramatic. Pregnancies are always hard to work around, but this is one of the more interesting attempts in TV history for their refusal to work it into the plot. Amazingly, she filmed the extraordinary pair of episodes "Duane Barry" and "Ascension" while very close to term. There is absolutely no more terrifying image in all of THE X-FILES than that of the glimpse of Scully's gagged face in the trunk of Duane Barry's stolen car from the video camera of a police car. One has to admire the professionalism of an actress who will climb gagged into a car trunk
One thing that is not frequently noted is how unusual both Mulder and Scully are from most action heroes. Neither has especial physical prowess. In fact, it is hard to recall a time when Mulder has come out on top in a scuffle. These guys are not street fighters, and while each can often be found drawing their guns when exploring a room or building, they are not by television standards trigger happy individuals. Furthermore, only rarely do they come across as being in absolute control of situations. They are not forceful individuals, either physically or in personality. They tend to back down a lot. They do not throw their authority around very often, not merely, I suspect, because they do not trust that judges will back them up, but because their style is more to persuade and cajole rather than to force. They stand in stark contrast to all similar characters in action or FBI shows.
My one complaint with Season Two is that there is too much emphasis on individual shows. I'm sure much of the cause of this was pressure from network execs to limit the multi-episode stories. Also, the creators themselves were not quite certain to what degree they wanted to emphasize the "Mythology" shows. Certainly many of the single episode shows are absolutely outstanding. For instance, the one featuring Jim Rose and The Enigma from the Jim Rose Freak Show is incredibly entertaining (as well as quite funny, with the most unique ending of an evil entity in the first two seasons of the show) as well as shocking; it is one thing to see The Enigma shoveling living bugs down his throat (in their stage show, he eats worse, including glass and worms), but it is rather surprising when Scully snacks on a grasshopper (something that interviews confirm was not faked, though her producing the grasshopper later through sleight of hand was). But as fine as many of the individual episodes are, the series rises to a completely different level in those episodes that expand to two or three episodes. The stand alone episodes make great TV, but the multi-episode arcs make spectacular television. I always experience a sense of disappointment when I realize an arc has ended and we have returned to the X-File-of-the-Week format.
Those who have not yet seen THE X-FILES in their entirety are lucky because they can now work their way all the way through the series season by season, not having to wait a week (or several months in the case of season-ending cliffhangers) to see what happens next, and being able to watch them in pristine DVD without having to be interrupted by inane commercials (is "inane commercial" redundant?). This is television as fine as it has ever gotten. And now thanks to the new slim format sets, they are affordable as well.
Description of The X-Files - The Complete Second Season
Two FBI agents investigate cases that apparently involve the paranormal.Genre: Television
Rating: NR
Release Date: 31-JAN-2006
Media Type: DVD
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