FAQ

How did Carter come up with the idea of The X-Files?

Carter was interested in science, his brother is a physicist, and Chirs is kind of a dilettante amateur scientist. But Chris thinks that magic - the unexplaned, a mystery - is always fun to write about. What he wanted was to do a good scary show. The two characters he came up represented the two sides of him; the scientific and the intuitive, then he switched genders. Carter says, "At the same time a bunch of other elements came together. You know you start working on something, and all of a sudden your antennae becomes fixed. I saw a guy who worked for the FBI on Lary King whose detail was satanic cults. He said he hadn't found one ounce of truth in any of those things. But i found it ineresting that they had somebody specificaly investigating something like that. And Silence of the Lambs had come out, which i thought was beautifully done, and i actually studied that movie pretty carefully. So it was scratching at mind; the FBI was fresh in my mind. Kolchack, FBI - that really helped form the concept."

Where do the story ideas come from?

- He's constantly reading - (magazines, journlas, Science, Discovery, Scientific American, anything with a good science section) "These ideas really come from anywhere, newspapers, magazines, journals, scary things rattling inside my and my writing staff's heads." "Something i will suggest something that will become a story" - He came up with the idea for an episode called DPO  about a kid who could control lighting from hearing a song called Ring The Bells by James. It felt to him like that song was heart attack. That was what a heart attack must feel like. So hethought it would be interesting if a heart attack is actaully an electrical malfunction , it means you could  actually use the song to...trigger heart attacks, actually use the electricity to do it. - He gets inspiration through the parnoina. He has a basic mistrust of government. He said that he thinks he is " adding static to  the collective awareness, that's a good thing." "Paranoina is a good thing."

Paranoina?

- He is very paranoid in that he is acutely aware of fear and betrayal.

Are there any story ideas that seem to far-fected?

"I think I'm pitched about ideas, by people, that just don't fit. I don't know what it was - has not flown. It's often  times who poeple try to do everything at once, in a UFO story. You know, they all want to do Independence Day and you know you have to throw in all-- those things are too far-fechted . This is oftentimes what happens as people come in and they want to do the thing where the, you know--- a city is taken over. You just can't do that on an X-Files. It's unbelievable. These things don't happen. ....I strive hard to do something that is believe."

How Does Science Work On The Show?

- "The show is built on a solid foundation of real science. It's one of the secrets of the show." - "Well, Scully's point of view is the point of veiw of the show. And so the show has to be built on a solid -- a bedrock foundation of science. In order to have Mulder take a flight from it. So if the science is really good, Scully's got a valid point of view. She's got an argument. And Mulder has to then convince her that she's got to throw  her arguments out, she's got to accept the unacceptable. And there is the conflict." - "...Herrenvolk is being used as a teaching aid at the Indiana University. So that's hard, good, gentic science. That i went over very carefully with a friend of mine who's a profesor at UMass/Amherst. She went over the gentics with me, and what was possible. What actual protein strings -- those were accurate. And it's very important to the show that they are accurate, because scientist are big fans of the show. And they would call it "Bulls**t". My proffesor friend helped me also with the Erlenmeyer Flask. I'd read David Suziki book on genitcs, it was very difficult to understand. You really have to think... i think...immerse yourself in gentics, to understand it completely. But that is one of the secrets of the show." - "We try to be as accurate as possible. For example in the E. Flask, i checked all my science research virlogist from the Amherst U. Then i got nailed because i referred to chloroplasts as plant cells. ...We try"

FAQ II

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