The X-Files Mythology series consists of collections of episodes grouped around certain themes that were central to Chris Carter's gripping, funny, and sometimes impenetrable sci-fi/suspense/horror series. The 15 episodes in the first volume, Abduction, are culled from the first three seasons of the show, and they introduce FBI agent Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson), who has been assigned to keep tabs on her new partner, the eccentric Fox Mulder (David Duchovny). Mulder's specialty is those cases that can't seem to be solved on normal parameters--the "X-Files"--because he believes that many years ago his sister was abducted by aliens. We meet a dizzying cast of supporting characters: FBI assistant director Skinner (Mitch Pileggi); a government informant, code-named "Deep Throat," who offers to get Mulder closer to the truth than he's ever imagined; apparent abductee Duane Barry (Steve Railsback); a trio of conspiracy theorists called the Lone Gunmen (Dean Haglund, Tom Braidwood, and Bruce Harwood); the mysterious Cigarette Smoking Man (William B. Davis); and suspicious agent Krycek (Nicholas Lea). And the theme of alien abduction leads to deeper threads involving experiments with alien DNA, cloning, alien bounty hunters, and more. These early episodes are some of the best the series ever had to offer, and the reasonably priced Mythology sets might be enticing for novices who would like to get a feel for the series without having to wade through all the story arcs and concepts that wandered through the nine seasons. (They're also conveniently packaged, with four discs in two Thinpaks.) X-philes, of course, would prefer the complete seasons, with the multiple arcs as well as the numerous excellent standalone (a.k.a. "creature feature") episodes. The discs include new commentary tracks on five of the episodes by Chris Carter, writer Frank Spotnitz, or director R.W. Goodwin, and there's a new 28-minute documentary that provides an overview of the series and the pertinent episodes that's well suited to novices. --David Horiuchi
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