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A review by stephen_arvidson
X-Files Season 10: Volume 1 by Joe Harris, Chris Carter
2.0
This premiere volume, collecting the first five issues of The X-Files: Season 10, is set roughly a decade after the series ended. Former FBI agents Mulder and Scully are living a quiet existence together—that is, until Deputy Director Skinner shows up with a new threat. Scully soon finds that she has a personal stake in the case when it appears that the child she secretly put up for adoption may be in danger.
Much as I appreciate Joe Harris' attempts to bring back beloved characters who perished in the course of the TV show (i.e. Cancer Man, the Lone Gunmen), I'm more bothered that Chris Carter, who lent a contributing hand to these comics, would allow The X-Files to take on the same nihilistic practices so often found in superhero comics and video games. Bringing classic characters back from the dead not only subverts the drama of their deaths but also weakens the impact of any future character deaths because anyone who follows the series knows they'll just be resurrected at a later time. Nevertheless, Season 10 makes clear bids toward legitimacy and relevance with its opening myth-arc, of an ascendant cabal bent on hastening the alien re-population of Earth, and Harris seems bent on assuring readers that this isn't a disposable media tie-in.
The mismatched art styles and varied depictions of Mulder, Scully, and other classic X-Files characters are somewhat jarring, though not as problematic as it is in Volume 2 or the stultifyingly awful one-shot, The X-Files: Conspiracy. If you're looking for better comic stories featuring Agents Mulder and Scully, I strongly recommend the Topps Comics adaptations from the mid-1990s (which is now being reprinted under The X-Files: Classics; the artwork found in those issues is both superior and consistent.
Much as I appreciate Joe Harris' attempts to bring back beloved characters who perished in the course of the TV show (i.e. Cancer Man, the Lone Gunmen), I'm more bothered that Chris Carter, who lent a contributing hand to these comics, would allow The X-Files to take on the same nihilistic practices so often found in superhero comics and video games. Bringing classic characters back from the dead not only subverts the drama of their deaths but also weakens the impact of any future character deaths because anyone who follows the series knows they'll just be resurrected at a later time. Nevertheless, Season 10 makes clear bids toward legitimacy and relevance with its opening myth-arc, of an ascendant cabal bent on hastening the alien re-population of Earth, and Harris seems bent on assuring readers that this isn't a disposable media tie-in.
The mismatched art styles and varied depictions of Mulder, Scully, and other classic X-Files characters are somewhat jarring, though not as problematic as it is in Volume 2 or the stultifyingly awful one-shot, The X-Files: Conspiracy. If you're looking for better comic stories featuring Agents Mulder and Scully, I strongly recommend the Topps Comics adaptations from the mid-1990s (which is now being reprinted under The X-Files: Classics; the artwork found in those issues is both superior and consistent.