It honestly feels like 11-year-old me is controlling pop culture right now: Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio are in a movie together, Keanu Reeves is everywhere you bloody look, and now my other great love / fantasy boyfriend, David Duchnovny, is back on TV in his finest form: as Fox Mulder, FBI.
I have no idea how I missed the big announcement, but the good people at SBS Viceland have decided to gift us an episode of the original, old-school classic The X-Files every goddamn night at 7.30pm — plus it’s available for catch-up bingeing on SBS On Demand.
If you weren’t a kid of the 90s like myself and have never experienced the original X-Files, do yourself a favour and give it a go. It follows two FBI Special Agents, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson). The classic odd-couple pairing of a believer (Mulder) and a sceptic (Scully), the agents are tasked with investigating cases called X-Files, which are mysterious, often unsolved cases involving elements of supposedly supernatural or paranormal activity.
While you’ve got your classic “monster of the week” style narrative for some episodes, there’s also a continuing backstory of Mulder’s sister, Samantha, who he believes was abducted by aliens when he was 12, the incident driving his determination to uncover more about extraterrestrials and their earthly activities. Plus your usual government cover-up business which leads the agents to “trust no one”.
The whole point of Scully, a trained medical doctor and generally logical person, is to make sure Mulder stays grounded and objective when investigating these cases (hint: this barely ever happens).
If you already know the show then just rewatch the whole thing again — I did it a few years back when the streaming service Presto was a thing (RIP) and it was so worth it. You bet your ass I’ll be giving it a third go-around now it’s on SBS.
In the meantime, if you love aliens and mysteries and crimes and weird stuff, why not check out PEDESTRIAN‘s podcast, All Aussie Mystery Hour? You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts HERE, or on Spotify HERE. Or, you can just listen / download below.
