Akte X: Die unheimlichen Fälle des FBI

This show is still just as entertaining all these years later! I have recently began re-watching the series and I forgot how good it really is. The writing, especially in the first 5 seasons, is perfect. Whether you are into the overarching alien/UFO storyline or the self-contained creature features, the show is truly great!

Duchovny and Anderson as FBI Agents Mulder and Scully give great performances and have tremendous chemistry. If you have never seen the show I urge you to watch the pilot and give it a shot, you won't regret it! If you have seen it then you know how good it is and it gets even better when you rewatch it!

According to my friends, I am not a true X-phile (don't ask why). Oh well.

The X-Files ranks as one of the most intelligent and brilliant shows on television. It is a cinematic show, using techniques that are more associated with movies than the tv show (like the long unedited sequence in Triangle). Admittedly it was once a better show than it is now, but most episodes are minor masterpieces. But when it peaks, like with "Redux", "Triangle", and "One Son", it peaks like no other show has before.

It is completely unclassifiable. It is a mystery, a sci-fi, and sometimes self parody, and the show has several markedly sexual overtones (the cigarette smoking man). The sexual tension is what probably has attracted the most people. The byplay between Mulder and Scully is cool and reserved, yet you wonder exactly what there really thinking.

It pays homage to old shows, and movies as well ("Duel in the Sun", "Rope"). This show doesn't always give you what you want.

Though it has gotten more Hollywood-ish, it's a testament to the creators and writers that they haven't put Scully and Mulder together (will they or won't they? Probably. It is Hollywood, after all).

This show is a thinking person's show. Sometimes it does get slow, but it always remains interesting.

I am a late bloomer to the X-Files. So I must say there is still hope for you if you have never even seen an episode. I watched the first few episodes and then stopped. I watched off and on if I was bored on Sunday nights. In the fifth season an episode called Bad Blood reeled me in and I 've been addicted ever since. David Duchovny is absolutely luscious, Gillian Anderson is one sexy lady, and of course the stories are great. I'm pretty much caught up by reading summaries, watching reruns, and of course seeing the movie. The X-Files has it all: great acting, great writing, great special effects, and, what else are you going to be doing on a Sunday night ?

Forget alcohol, this absolutely incredible show is quite possibly more addicting. The acting is to say the least amazing, and the characters are so real it's a bit spooky. The first fours seasons are the best, combing sci-fi, horror and reality drama into a most satisfying combination. I find the show fearlessness when showing gore is refreshing (no i do not have a gore fetish)and ability to back up the most wild theories is almost unimaginable. The scripts are so unbelievable, that you might laugh them off at first thought, but they draw you in making you want to believe. Most episodes in the first 5 seasons are phenomenal, though there are some duds, after all, nobody can have perfection. The chemistry shared between the two main characters, Mulder and Scully is at times choking, they seem so connected that you can help but momentarily forget, they aren't real. Splitting them up pretty much wrote the epitaph for the show, bringing them back together for the series finale did boost it ever so slightly. Even before I watched the show I knew half the catch phrases, Trust no one, the truth is out there, i want to believe and characters names, now what does that say? The show will forever be remembered hopefully when it was strongest, not toward then sad end it had.

Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) is a marginalized loner FBI agent stuck in the basement. He's been ostracized because he's a true believer in the paranormal. Dr Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) is a skeptic, a woman of science, and assigned to keep Mulder under control.

The X Files represents a breakout for the sci-fi genre. Its success gave it license to put on more paranormal shows treated as reasonable. It also became a benchmark by which these shows are measured. There are amazing episodes with some less so. The best is the chemistry between the two leads. It broke new ground with great writing from some future notable names. It lasted 9 seasons. It may have gone on too long but it was great while it lasted.