TXF-Vid: Scully PoV - Metal Heart

[astarte]

Artist/Song Title: Garbage - Metal Heart
Subject: The X Files, Scully PoV, Vid-Challenge Season1: Paranoia
Summary: ’But now that we know for sure they're telling lies when they say, no one gets hurt and therefore nobody dies.‘ Paranoia is knowing all the facts.
Length: 03:59 | Size: 64 MB | Format: 720x400 - AVI - zip
Links: megaupload, mediafire, permanent link

While in the mists of vidding 'Matches to Paper Dolls' I said to xandra_ptv, 'We should do a TXF vid-challenge. One vid per season.' Xandra being who she is said, 'Sure.' Because this is the stuff I randomly throw at her to see if something sticks. Finding the right song on such short notice was an hair-pulling experience I will repeat in about, uhm, NOW. The season itself holds up pretty well when you consider it was filmed 1992/93, they had some really cool scenes for TV back then. So this vid happened, mostly because I found S1-Scully precious and her hair wasn't as bad as I remembered, which can only mean that S2 will be hilarious in that department.

Comments

[amyhit.livejournal.com]

Hence the reason why the first clear shot we see of her in 'Metal Heart' is the one in which the lights go out for Mulder's presentation. The darkness engulfs her.

I didn't notice that before, but it's a really great detail. Very appropriate.

She chose the darkness, because she was so curious what was lurking in it and Mulder offered her to show her things that would blow her mind. I mean that is part of why I love her, she could have walked away after the pilot or any other ep and nobody could have blamed her. Not Skinner, not her other superiors.

It's little wonder I love your Scully vids so much, as I tend to agree emphatically with pretty much everything you say about her. And it's no wonder that we both reject IWTB so completely. It has always infuriated me that Scully's taste for and iron-clad commitment to the work seems to have been the most clearly characterized in the earlier seasons. She didn't leave when, in her first month on the job, Tooms tried to rip her liver from her body. She told Mulder in 'Beyond the Sea' that she loved her job. It was only S1, but already she knew her priorities and her values.
You'd think that would have solidified still more in the later seasons, and on into the second movie, but instead her resolve, passion, and curiosity for the work seemed to erode and weaken over time. It was as though CC couldn't think of Scully as someone who was strong and professional and passionate about her work, while also thinking of her as a woman. As soon as the show started to acknowledge her as a woman, it also started to stereotype her, and to undermine the character she'd always been.

I talked with Xandra about this and I honestly think that Scully instantly fell in love with Mulder's mind, the way it worked and how it approached cases from a unique and slightly crazy angle. Because it was completely different from her position and she just has this delighted 'I can't believe he is saying what he is saying'-expression on her face all the time in S1. He entertained her immensely and her own scientific curiosity was equally challenged and satisfied while working on the x files. I mean watching her bored out of her mind teaching in the beginning of S2 in Quantico did settle this point for me.

YES.
My doggedly rationalist side absolutely doesn't believe in love at first sight, but I agree anyway. There was something strong and wise and passionate in Scully that hadn't really had any use before, but when she walked into that basement office, it suddenly had a use, and it started to grow in her like a seed. So while I don't believe in instantaneous love, I believe that she loved that feeling of purpose in herself - so it was inevitable that she also loved whatever beautiful thing it was in Mulder that had set this dormant part of herself to growing.

Not that I think it took very long for them to love each other more pervasively.

[astartexx.livejournal.com]

I totally get what you're saying, it seems to me a lot of Scully's issues became 'womanly' and exploited from a narrow male writers perspective later on. What you said about her daddy issues in your journal a while back, rang true for me. It was such a typical TV female issue and it would have been a hell more complex, if it was about her disappointment in her father. Not about controlling males in general and her need of approval and then rebellion. The captain, who isn't there for most of her childhood. Her growing up and losing that illusion of a perfect father by seeing his flaws crystal clear, when he is at home. Her inability to express her take on life with him, because he would shut her up. But getting back to canon: The tacked on ending of 7x07 Orison destroyed a otherwise perfect Scully ep for me. Why did she need to justify pulling the trigger in a situation like that with becoming an instrument for good or evil? It takes her own agenda away. I just imagine them discussing Scully's S8 fate in the writers room and going, so Scully can't reproduce, I bet that makes her very sad. And the one female one going, 'But she is pregnant, you made her pregnant in the S7 finale. It's solved.' And the rest ignoring that comment and going, 'Imagine if they tried in vitro and it didn't take. Very sad indeed.'

I'm just not sure, why her commitment to the work wasn't enough on its own as a drive for the writers, considering the losses she faced over the years to harden her resolve to fuck this conspiracy up to the ninth degree. It became personal with her abduction and then Melissa's death, her cancer and why on earth, did her infertility take center stage in the season in which she already was pregnant? Such repetitive storytelling. I really didn't need to see her asking Mulder to be a sperm donor, if it wasn't in the context of her taking him against a wall and have her wicked way with him. Season 8 was in ways the worst offender, because it felt so uninspired. The writers didn't take risks - none and the risks were what made the earlier seasons so great, especially on gender roles and stereotypes. Plus half of Mulder's S8 appearances were completely wasted in my eyes. Trying to reproduce the chemistry with a male partner did backfire and in retrospective I would have loved watching a season of her and Monica Reyes kicking ass. (I only seen S8, Xandra told me they fucked her character up in S9, but I cover my ears and go lalalalala.)