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A great, comprehensive interview with Jim Wong courtesy of the the X-Files Diaries podcast! There’s a lot here about his work on the revival. Frankly, looking back, his work resulted in the revival’s most solid episodes, especially his episodes “Founder’s Mutation” and “Ghouli” that make up a sort of “parallel mythology” and a preferable alternative to Carter’s “Struggles”. Highlights and [own comments] below:

The early years:

• The writers were given accounts by Fox on alt.tv.x-files, he posted a bit
• They wanted to reverse the Mulder-Scully dynamic towards the end of the first season, but they ended up doing “Beyond the Sea” earlier because of fan criticism of Scully’s skepticism.
• In the early years they didn’t want to do the relationship bullshit, not to do what “Moonlighting” did, what Fox was telling them to do, what everybody did. A non-romantic relationship was something to be celebrated back then. But Duchovny-Anderson had such great chemistry, you wanted them to. What’s right is how it ended up happening, over the years. [I like how he expresses this, I agree on both the noromo beginnings and the long-term evolution]
• Standards & Practices were more on them during the first seasons, they could push back after they were a big success. Editing for “Home” was down to frame by frame. Jim & Glen were planning to do a sequel with the Peacocks in “Millennium” for the sweeps period, Fox TV head Peter Roth said no. The V-Chip [blocking TV set based on violence ratings] was passed in Congress because of “Home”. [It possibly had an influence, but the timing doesn’t quite work: “Home” aired in October 1996 and the Telecommunications Act was voted in January 1996, but started getting implemented in 1997.]
• “Beyond the Sea” is his personal favourite. In San Diego, a local channel Z had “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” on repeats, he saw it thousands of times with Glen Morgan, hence Brad Dourif. Dourif’s audition didn’t go well but (casting director) Rick Millikan and he and Glen pushed for him, Jim & Glen even paid an extra fee from their pocket, and Dourif did it.
• “Clyde Bruckman” is another favourite.
• When they returned in season 4 Carter asked them if there was anything they wanted to do, he asked to direct an episode. He was very nervous, he had only done 2nd unit directing in “Space: Above and Beyond”, he was more prepared for “Musings” than anything else before or after (shots lists, camera angles). He attributes his whole directing career to TXF. So he said yes to the revival. [“Musings of a CSM” is one TXF’s best for directing and photography, amazing that it was a first effort! ]

“Founder’s Mutation“:

• He hadn’t followed the show after he left [back in s4!] but he knew that William was a mystery, that’s what excited him.
• It was meant to lead into the finale. [The episode airing was reordered at the last minute]
• He remembers shooting with kids in make-up: show as little of the monster as possible, a lesson from “Alien”.
• Approaching the show all these years later, he found he had grown older together with the characters, he wrote the characters to be emotionally in the same place as he was, at a different age.

“Ghouli“:

• It was born out of the idea of the final scene, to have Scully interact with her son without her knowing. [A highlight of the revival!] He wanted both to allow Mulder and Scully to grieve for their son [their son!], and to connect with him.
• There was no writers’ room, there were no discussions, it was just him. [A method that has given both good and bad results!]
• It was a kitchen sink episode, throw in ideas and do fun cool things: he wanted a crazy teaser, he saw the rotting ship and thought it would make a cool set, let’s get Scully shot.
• He gave much thought in how do we find out about William, what do we see in his room, important for him to have the Asian man. 
• There were no discussions with Carter about William, he became what Wong wanted to tell the story. About William’s character: kids do stupid things with their powers. [I find it nothing short of incredible that it happened like this, with Carter clearly wanting to do something with William for years, and did reuse Wong’s William in “My Struggle IV”. But you could argue that it’s a creative process like any other, have one person write part of the story and come in and continue it with your own ideas.]
• His own ghost story! He went through sleep paralysis while shooting a film in Mexico. [Most likely for “Dragonball Evolution”, which filmed in Mexico.] He felt there was somebody in his hotel room all night through. In the same hotel, Rob MacLachlan [director of photography in Millennium] felt the same! There was a plaque next to the hotel, about a nun during the war who fell in love with a French soldier, committed suicide, people see her ghost every full moon. He discussed with Ghouli director of photography Craig [Wrobleski] on how to show sleep paralysis, to get one plane in focus and the rest out of focus.
• He talked to Carter about what had happened with William, he gave him the cliff notes of season 9, there is a connection with Scully, he gave him carte blanche. Everything else (adoptive parents moving from the countryside to the city, Project Crossroads…) is all Wong’s.
• About the intervening years since s9, he agrees with fan theories about: William/Jackson’s parents must have figured out something was going on with him, they could have sought help, enrolled him in a program, exposed him inadvertently to forces looking for him. [We can find traces of all of this background story in Ghouli.net, so maybe he did have some input to that. I still find the Wyoming/Virginia move to be a stretch, and Project Crossroads to be an unnecessary complication on top of an already complicated status for William’s powers.]
• He wanted to write a poetic ending to the episode, he would have been satisfied if it was the last we see of William. He didn’t know what Carter wanted to do. [Looking back, I would have been fine if Ghouli was the end of William’s story, but during s11’s airing it was already clear that we were going to see him again. Somehow Carter short-circuited Wong’s intentions.]
• Design of Ghouli: this was all Bill Terezakis.
• Ghouli.net was Fox’s idea. Julie Ng and others did the writing, he didn’t. [More kudos to her! So many good ideas in there.]

“Nothing Lasts Forever” [Wong directed only]:

• Last scene: he doesn’t know what Scully whispered to Mulder, he thinks she said “it was always you”, the candle was an affirmation of their relationship.
• Kate McKinnon was an XF fan, they tried to cast her as Barbara Beaumont, but it didn’t work out.
• Glen Morgan also hung out on newsgroups back then, it was really new to have live reactions from the audience then, there was criticism but no trolling or personal attacks. He didn’t go online after his revival episodes. [Understandable. Here’s to constructive criticism.]

https://xfilesdiaries.libsyn.com/143-james-wong-interview

(Photo from PhileFest by X-Files News)