I want to believe the truth is out there...

Let me say that if I have to point out a single piece of American culture that molded me and shaped me into the person I am today, it was The X-Files. Hands down. It's hard for me to talk about it, though I do tend to joke quite ab it about it as I "come out" to people close to me about my X-Files fetish. I own all of the seasons. I own 90% of the trading cards. I know the most obscure trivia. In short, I am an X-Files fan. To the core.

I expected to go to X-Files I Want To Believe by myself, but fortunately good friends Josh and Michelle humored me and agreed to see XF rather than Batman. The movie was, initially, a disappointment. I sat there while the credits rolled shaking my head and saying "what?". And for two minutes, I hated it. Then, walking out of the theater, I said "It just wasn't what I expected." Because, you see, there are no aliens. Not a one. There's no CSM, no cornfields, no bees, no space ships, and no black oil. Instead, the movie features a psychic pedophile priest and Amanda Peet.

Not what I expected.

And yet...

As I walked to my car, I got nervous. There was a man walking in the next aisle over, no doubt toward his car, yet I got nervous. I watched him, and he watched me (probably thinking 'what the fuck is that girl staring at me for?') and when I got into my car I locked the doors. Because, you see, rather than use aliens to frighten us, this time the X-Files addressed not the fears we do have, but the fears we *should* have. The monsters that are not of other worlds but from this one. Terminal illness, stem cell research, religion and faith, animal experimentation, illegal organ donation, even car accidents on snowy roads were the featured monsters of this movie and they worked. They worked on a level that only Chris Carter could produce.

We got a good dose of Scully and Mulder's relationship, and some excellent name drops from the series. Gillian Anderson, David Duchovney, and Mitch Pileggi, the three "most important" characters from the series appeared and, though they were older and wiser, the movie grew with them.

So, though the movie was not what I thought it was going to be, I think it actually ended up being more than what I wanted. It left me thinking about issues that are very real and combined that with my absolutely favorite group of characters. All in all, not too bad for eight bucks.