Ship of Dreams
Mulder and Scully's romance has always been a siren call for lesbians
The X-Files shippers have always made wanting Mulder and Scully to be together a full-time job. For a show as popular as it was and is (according to Variety, the 2016 reboot premiere had a 3-day average of 20.3 million views), fans are still shocked to find so many other shippers out there. I’m including myself when I say that. Despite knowing The X-Files was a sci-fi phenomenon in the 90s, I feel shocked when I check the “the x-files” tag on tumblr and see posts from the day before about someone starting the show for the first time and loving their dynamic.
Each time this unlikely breakout hit is discussed, someone asks why it has remained so popular. It’s 30 years later, and Gillian Anderson can’t go anywhere without being asked to sign an “I Want to Believe” poster. Academics, interviewers, cast, and crew alike name the continually eroding trust of the American government by its people and the desire to believe in something in a Western society that is not as dominated by religion. However, over and over again, the beating heart of the show remains Mulder and Scully’s relationship.
What is so engaging about their dynamic seems to align with why X-Files fans today are largely queer and neurodivergent: Mulder and Scully are socially inept outcasts dedicated to one another despite the consequences. In tumblr circles, that’s a trifecta of ship material. They yearn so hard, and yet they aren’t together. Logistically, if they want to remain coworkers in the FBI, they can’t be together. However, their relationship lives in the grey spaces.
In the 90s/early 2000s internet, X-Files fanfiction thrived around these grey spaces as much as it does today. In fanfiction, Mulder and Scully often engage in romantic non-dates with UST (unresolved sexual tension). As the summary below of “A Better Fate than Wisdom” suggests, these fics are a lesbian’s dream.
Perhaps the most queer Mulder and Scully-centered content (besides slash fic) from the old internet archives is essays arguing why they simply have to be a romantic couple. There is a subsection of one of my favorite phile sites, Order of the Blessed Saint Scully of the Enigmatic (aka OBSSE), called the Ship of Dreams. Nautically themed, the site focuses on the different aspects of why Mulder and Scully are meant to be romantically, and why it wouldn’t ruin the show.1
The Ship of Dreams has a small section called The Arsenal, which is a collection of essays and arguments for why Mulder and Scully are canon. Among them is the Mulder and Dan Equation. In this piece, the author begins with a question: "If Mulder and Scully were the same sex, yet nothing else about them changed, would Relationshippers still interpret their actions as ‘romantic’ or ‘UST’?”
What follows is a list of actions Mulder and Scully do that when applied to Mulder with made-up male partner “Dan,” reads as way more than platonic. Included in the list are the letters of devotion Scully writes to Mulder during her cancer arc, multiple times when they hold hands to comfort one another, and moments of jealousy expressed by either of them in the show. Their conclusions are that hopefully the FBI doesn’t have a don’t ask/don’t tell policy2 because Mulder and “Dan” are more than just roommates (if you know what I mean).
Rather than using the Mulder and Dan equation for furthering Mulder and Scully’s romance, new X-Files viewers take to the internet to embrace MSR3 as a beautiful example of trans lesbian/bisexual love. Mulder’s yearning for Scully, including memorizing her undergraduate thesis, is a siren call for lesbians all over. Scully in turn is willing to risk everything for Mulder, lying to the government about Mulder’s actions and saving him again and again. It’s easy for new philes to watch an episode and just “get it.”
I’d like to lastly share a couple of queer memes focused on the amazing trio side characters of The X-Files, The Lone Gunmen. Frohike, Langly, and Byers are fan favorites with good reason. They live together, play DND, have meal nights, and spend their days discussing conspiracy (only in person or on secured lines). All of these details lead in perfectly to the memes below by andyrucos on twitter:
As Nic said in 1999, “I’m glad there are so many philes out there!”
notes from the field report:
And These Are Just a Few… by Melvin Dixon
i LOVE eclrrtwo’s fanart of scully as big spoon
Ode to the Midwest by Kevin Young
i saw this alien antonio melanated gnome on etsy, and it made me emotional
This is the main argument for No-Romos, or people who believe Mulder and Scully are only platonic and shouldn’t be otherwise.
Head here for a quick primer on the U.S.’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell military policy. Advocates for Trans Equality has information on the current U.S. government’s recently-enacted trans military ban
Mulder Scully Romance/ Mulder Scully Relationship