It definitely gets a little more absurd the longer the series goes on, but I still love it.

And in Scully’s defense she does have a tendency to get conveniently knocked unconscious or frozen in ice, or locked in a random room, or detained by security at a perimeter fence a lot when the actual spooky shit reveals itself.

There’s definitely some Monster of the Week episodes that feel out of step with her skepticism vs experiences, but I think the mythology episodes (and mythology adjacent episodes) do a pretty good job of having both Scully and Mulder’s respective faiths and skepticisms evolve and change. They even kind of cross over when Mulder has his “this is a conspiracy of men” crisis of faith before the arrival of the alien rebels.

I’ve always kind of read Scully’s seemingly contrary religiosity and hard anti-alien skepticism as a reflection of or exploration of Chris Carter’s own seemingly conflicted religious beliefs. He was brought up in a religious household but his older brother rejected it for science and introduced him to sci-fi before eventually becoming a professor at MIT. You can tell Chris Carter feels trapped between his fascination with both and I always read Scully, especially in the earlier seasons, as his attempt to square that circle.

It does get a little funkier later on, by the late 90s and that may be because it’s heavily (and seemingly reliably) rumoured that Carter got into Scientology. While the religious themes and iconography in his writing only seems to increase, it feels like there’s a lot more frustration with ‘mainstream’ religion not fitting a broader, more esoteric spiritual and paranormal tone. Scully’s skeptic/religious balance feels less like an earnest attempt at squaring a circle and more like an example that the two rigid ways of looking at her life cannot hold. I think you can read that as Carter’s frustration with both traditional religious communities and the scientific/skeptic community as he embraces Scientology.

But also, Chris Carter is kind of a weirdo misogynist whose own sexism and poor character writing pretty much destroyed Scully’s character and pretty much cancelled and then doomed the show more than once. So fuck him.

Also, I probably watch and think about the X Files too much.