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The X-Files - The Complete Fourth Season

The X-Files - The Complete Fourth Season

List Price: $99.98
Your Price: $74.99
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Do you have to get a disease to win an Emmy?
Review: Season 4 of the X-Files, though still of high quality, marks the beginning of the decline. I have said before that the third season was the best single season of the series. The fourth season features bravura performances from Gillian Anderson as she first realizes and then deals with her cancer. However, the arc of the season before the cancer hits is far more uneven, particularly as concerns the "conspiracy" episodes. While there are quality episodes here, the balance is slowly but subtly tipping. The balance (...) slowly begins to shift away from quality in the following two seasons, and is finally complete by Season 7. Overall, this season is leagues above the detritus that was Season 7. However, it is here that the first chinks start to appear in the armor.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Ah Yes!
Review: Again - a great set for a die-hard fan like myself. By season 4, the series had settled into a rhythm which created some great highs (Home, Memento Mori) and a few losers (The Field Where I Died and that awful Goat-sucker episode). Great video transfer and some nice touches on the bonus disk featuring some more deleted scenes. One of the deleted scenes from Memento Mori is so heartbreaking to watch you wish it had never been removed. Overall a nice package although I have a sneaky suspision that about a year after the last season is released there will be a whole new collector's edition with even more alternate scenes, deleted scenes and interviews. P.S. It would be really nice if the Truth Behind Season . . . documentaries were a little longer with more insight into the creation of the stories. And for god's sake - somebody explain to Duchovny that his film career isn't exactly on fire and he could probably pick up a few extra bucks by doing some interviews on the dvd set.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Season Four - Still the Best
Review: Now that the X-Files is gone from weekly TV (Yeah, I know there is something on Fox that is still using that name, but we all know it's not the same show), we die hard fans can still enjoy the chills, the mind-numbingly dense mythology and the unresolved sexual tension of the real thing through the DVD boxed sets. I've purchased sets 1-4 and will buy Season 5 and 6 (not so sure about Season 7, and don't even ask me about 8 or beyond). It's nice to remember the good times. And the added features are a real delight. This one's a keeper.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Defective discs - a conspiracy?
Review: As an obessive fan of the X-Files, I had season four preordered for months and months. So when my DVDs finally arrived I was ecstatic. You can only imagine the heart failure I had when nearly every one of my discs was defective. During Memento Mori especially, my DVD skips and sputters and stops completely during Chapter nine. These same problems happen in many of the other season four discs as well. At first I blamed the DVD player, but the skips occur on my computer DVD-ROM and my friend's DVD player as well. Drat!

I'm in the process of exchanging the DVDs and hopefully the new ones will work correctly.

As far as DVD content goes, though, these DVDs are great - commentaries, deleted scenes... neat stuff. (If only I could see it without the skips)

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Ultimate X-File Season
Review: Worth every cent, season four has all the great episodes that give the X-Files it's reputation; Herrenvolk, Home, Musings of a Cigarrette Smoking Man, Momento Mori and Gethsemane. The episodes rang from the grotesgue to the amusing. The chemistry between Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny comes out in this season and their excellant acting gives the fan what they expect from a top rated tv series.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: a little dramatic this season, but many gems
Review: Mulder becomes more of a tough guy this season, the smoking man episodes are incredible, and the monster/mutant episodes (are) still pretty much (awful). At times I wanted to fastforward through Mulder and Scullys' speeches that seemed so forcefully poetic and wise (and long), but refrained. At any rate, there's alot of good stuff here and I can't say enough about the smoking man episodes, they're almost astonishing. Many solid sci-fi storylines throughout and there's an awesome two-parter. Definitely worth every penny of the purchase, even if only to miss an entire seasons' worth of commercials.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Serious and dark, but a very important season
Review: I must admit that Season 4 was a personal season for me. My mother died of lung cancer on December 31, 1996. I will always remember returning from Maryland (after the funeral and resolving the estate) and turning to the X-Files for an escape from the grief, guilt and fear (I placed her into hospice)only to discover that my favorite character, Skully, might have cancer (Leonard Betts).

Memento Mori, was a deeply emotional experience. Margaret Skully's response was much too close to home, since I was still working through my own anger over my mother's short diagnosis and death (two months after proper diagnosis she died). I was also very angry at the idea that a life-long non-smoker could contract a disease for smokers.

Looking at the season now, I am able to appreciate the seriousness and quality of each episode.

Kaddish, when first viewed was a reminder of a nighmare I had for several months after her death (In this nightmare my mother comes back to life and I am told that if I hadn't placed her in hospice, she would be alive today). After viewing it again, I am moved by the deep love and longing of the young bride-to-be. I am also touched by Skully's compassion.

Small Potatoes and Musings were favorites when first viewed, the former for its wonderful levity; the latter for its entertaining explination of most important events of the past 30 years. I'm still a little disappointed that the death of Jesus Christ wasn't pinned on a previous incarnation of Cancer Man.

The mythology episodes are often complicated and fast paced. Viewing them again was a treat because answers to questions were finally found.

And finally, what is arguably the most frightening episode of any series ever shown (Home) can be viewed again and again. While terrifying, the banter between Skully and Mulder are humerous and revealing.

This is a very dark season in terms of the subject matter and execution, but there are so many gems that it should be a part of every hardcore fan's collection.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Keep them coming
Review: I was just as pleased with the Season 4 Box Set as I was with the previous three... well, to be honest, since it's my favorite season, I was slightly more excited this time around.

FOX does a great job of packaging these box sets, in a sleekly designed case that follows the pattern of the first three. Altogether, the four sets make a nice little presentation on the shelf. <g> The accompanying booklet helpfully lists episodes from each season, and describes exactly what can be found on each disc.

The nicest aspect of this set, imho, is that all of the deleted scenes can be found on the last and seventh disc *as well as* interspersed throughout the episodes themselves. So if you are a junkie fan like me, you could tear open the package, plunk Disc 7 in the DVD player, and watch all those nifty deleated scenes at once.

I think it's great that X-Files fans are being offered such a nice collection of every single episode, season by season. The earlier VHS "Waves" were frustrating and left too many episodes out; similarly, "The Best of Friends" collections coming out on DVD are also selective. Why not release them all, the way FOX is doing with The X-Files?

On that note, FOX, all I have to say is: keep these box sets coming, at least through season 8!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Still not enough extras for such an expensive package...
Review: I bought the previous 'X-Files' DVDs, though the cost made me whimper. I've been consistently disappointed by the digital crawl of those editions, and annoyed that there weren't enough extras. Although you do get a good 20+ episodes for each box set, a set this pricey should have HOURS of extras/interviews/documentaries/etc. All of these sets are complacent - 'The Simpsons' Season 1 box set is a great example of how to do it right. After 3 previous tries, FOX still hasn't improved value-for-money. If you're a devoted fan, and if you have most of these wonderful episodes on tape, I advise you to abstain and make Fox WORK for your money.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Saga Continues.....
Review: In my opinion, the best season of the show. If you have the previous 3 seasons, and if you're an X-Phile, a great investment (. . .)


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