Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic Where did the X Files fans hang out?

I've recently been having a nostalgic wallow - and a lot of fun - working my way through the X Files again.

I was never much interested in the online fan community for this show first time around, but watching it again has sparked a new interest in me. I'd love to find out what fans were thinking and talking about on various episodes at the time they first aired.

So, anyone know where the main forum at the time can be found? The place where fans reviewed the episodes each week?

LabRat

I watched the X-Files for the first time in recent months, and totally fell in love with it. There are a few active-ish communities on LiveJournal ( this is one ). I suspect the main hangouts were mailing lists and newsgroups, though.

They do have a huge fic archive, though: http://fluky.gossamer.org/

Its layout is similar to the L&C archive, actually, which I love. The main difference is that it does include R and NC-17 rated stories, though. It's also a bit more categorised, likely because it houses something like 35,000 stories. I didn't even know where to begin at first.

It has a page on FanHistory wiki: http://www.fanhistory.com/wiki/X-Files (The runners of the wiki site have shown questionable behaviour but it should be pretty accurate, I think.)

Looks like they even had an IRC channel. XD

Julie

There also is the site below where new x-files fic is
posted before it is put in the archive.
http://ephemeralfic.org/
and the below site where you can post questions
re location of fic, etc.
The x-files lost and found message board
http://www.b2g2.com/boards/board.cgi?user=anwylyd

Thanks, guys. Although I'm disappointed there doesn't seem to be any 'historical' sites, this was very interesting.

As far as fanfic goes, I had remembered that gossamer was the main site to visit, but it is daunting, yes, trying to find what you want. Patti, that lost and found site is going to come in handy, I think. I also found a long-lost CD of fanfic recently, which includes a whole folder of X Files stuff, so I'm looking forward to looking through that and finding some old favourites. Thus further proving my theory that I'm not to be trusted in my first opinions on TV shows.

My only problem is that now I've watched them all and I still haven't worked out my need for a major fix. I'm left wanting. So, I guess...fanfic here we come!

LabRat

Well, if you really want to read fan reviews, Television Without Pity does have recaps of some seasons... However, I find that if I'm really liking a show, TWoP recaps will annoy me as they tend to be really snarky. And for some reason, belittle everything I like about a certain episodes. I'm afraid glowing reviews aren't entertaining to read. XD (I know that's probably not quite what you mean, though. But unfortunately I don't think immediate reactions were archives anywhere. )

I really liked The Truth! And I even loved agents Doggett and Reyes, so I loved S8 and S9. (And can I just say... the fact that I love James Pickens Jr's character on Grey's Anatomy made DD Kersh really difficult to hate. )

For some reason, once I got through S1-S8, I couldn't bring myself to watch S9, so I remarathoned the whole show again. I usually multitask while watching anything, so it's not actually as insane as it sounds. XD But I just found that while multitasking, I missed a lot of the crucial explanations around the series-long government conspiracies, and ended up not understanding what the hell was going on in non-Monster-of-the-Week episodes. (Especially Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man - I didn't hear a word of that episode the first time around.) I made sure to listen in on the rewatch! XD

And as I said, I did end up enjoying S9.

Julie

I never disliked Doggett or Monica - in fact, I rather liked them as characters. But, a few episodes here and there aside, I've never been able to watch S9. Simply because I missed the input Mulder gave to each episode so much. I missed that sly, cynical humour and the quips. And, of course, the interaction between him and Scully.

I keep trying to approach S9 as a completely different show and I think if I can reach that mind set I'd probably enjoy it a lot. But, so far, I haven't been able to get there. Maybe one day.... Given my sudden conversion on how I feel about The Truth, I have renewed hope.

Thanks for the TWP idea. I was really more looking for conversations between fans - you know, threads on an episode with what they liked and didn't like, throwing out speculation and ideas... It's such a shame none of that is around these days. But I'll have fun reading some of the TWP reviews anyway. Even if I don't agree with much of them.

LabRat

I, too, am a new Phile. I watched it for the first time last year and now own all the seasons. I went a little crazy on the gossamer website too and felt overwhelmed BUT I know a really good place to start.

Our very own Sue S. has written some fics on there that are EXCELLENT! (hope you don't mind me outing you Sue!) Some are nfic, some are not, ALL are excellent. And from there, you can see who she co-wrote with or wrote the story for and find some other very awesome writers.

Cool! But, I've checked the author listings on gossamer and can't see any trace of a Sue S or even a Sue anything.

I'm assuming Sue used another name there?

LabRat

Labby, try Suzanne Schramm under Author Pages. She has 20 stories.

Some other good ones...

Playing Godess by Shalimar
Never by Allison Kinney
Hot Shower by Susanne Berringer

I really liked a lot of Susanne Berringer's stories too. I think she and Sue wrote some together or for each other or something.

Happy Reading!

I loved all the stories on this fic rec list: http://myutopia.livejournal.com/54324.html

Some are R-rated, but include a warning for that. I'd start with Parabiosis - amazing story. And Fathoms Five is also amazing (it's a futurefic, though). In fact, all the stories by that author (Penumbra).

Actually, Labby, have you seen the second movie, I Want To Believe? If not, you must! I loved it.

Julie

Thanks for the fic recs, guys. I read a few of Sue's last night and thoroughly enjoyed them.

I'd been a bit frustrated wandering randomly through gossamer as the stories I'd chosen just didn't match my mood. It wasn't that they were badly written - they weren't - just that I could find anything that really hit the spot and gave me what I wanted. Sue's certainly did that - so I was very happy. Helped take the edge off the craving very nicely. I'm looking forward to reading the rest of hers today.

Julie, yes, I didn't like IWTB as much as the first movie, but I enjoyed it. It didn't suck. And it was nice to see Mulder and Scully still together. Although, I had a bit of a downer on it first time around as I thought they ended it on a note that implied they were breaking up! It was only just recently that I found something online that talked about a post credit shot (which I'd completely missed) which spoke to exactly the opposite. In fact, I just ordered it from Amazon at the weekend and now that I've watched all the others, up to The Truth, I'm eagerly awaiting its arrival so that I can get completely caught up.

Did you know - I just discovered this yesterday while browsing the net - that there's a possibility of a third movie, to be released in 2012? Whether it will ever get there, who knows? But all the players seem keen. I'm not sure how I feel about that to be honest - but it might be nice. So long as they don't go breaking up M/S.

LabRat

You know, the first time I watched IWTB I was afraid of the same implication you observed, but the second time I watched it - even without the post-credit shot of the two of them happily on vacation - I concluded the exact opposite. She was in turmoil over the procedures she was putting her young patient through, and that's what was so hard on her; not her relationship with Mulder. She was leaving to perform another surgery on the boy, when Mulder offered to take her away from it all, and when she said, "Don't make this harder than it already is," I took it to clearly mean she was just finding it really tempting but knew she couldn't cancel the surgery, not matter how hard she was finding it to "put the boy through hell" (as another doctor and then Scully herself had put it).

I suppose it's still up for interpretation (in the true spirit of the X-Files...), but that's how I like to see it, anyway. XD

I saw one fan say she kind of liked how Scully threatened to break up with him because if they can break up, it makes them a real couple.

And yes, I read about the possibility of XF3, and I am so hoping it happens!

Julie

I just thought of a site you might enjoy. Unfortunately, it is no longer online but parts
of it are accessible via the Wayback Machine.
It was a fan site where they recced fic, posted
some absolutely hilarious email posts they had
sent each other re the show while it was still airing. On one page they posted quotes from various fanfics with snarky comments that were very funny. They called themselves the BNAJ league. I'll see how many pages i have bookmarked.

http://web.archive.org/web/19991106002951/www.coyotecom.com/BNAJ/fanfica.html

http://web.archive.org/web/19991108231011/www.coyotecom.com/BNAJ/quotes1.html

http://web.archive.org/web/19991023074934/www.coyotecom.com/BNAJ/quotes3.html

http://web.archive.org/web/19991105230534/www.coyotecom.com/BNAJ/fanfic.html

Enjoy

Thanks, Patti! Some of those fanfic quotes are hilarious.

LabRat (who SO wants to read those stories...)