Just found out one show had 47 different writers across 8 seasons

I was reading through the IMDB trivia for The X-Files last night and got curious how many people worked on it over the years. Turns out after season 5 the writing team got totally swapped out like 3 times. I counted 47 different names in the writing credits across all 8 seasons I finished last month. Some episodes only had one writer, others had a whole room of 6 people. It kind of explains why some seasons felt totally different from others. Did anyone else notice a big drop or shift in quality around season 6 or was it just me?

2 comments

2 Comments

lee_barnes703d ago

Wait, are you sure about the count being across just 8 seasons? I thought The X-Files ran 9 seasons originally, plus two movies and the revival seasons. But your point about too many cooks in the kitchen is spot on, @the_harper. I remember reading somewhere that after season 5, they brought in a bunch of TV movie writers who had no clue about the show's mythology. That's probably why the alien storyline got so hard to follow around season 6 or 7. The monster-of-the-week episodes stayed solid though, since those were usually handled by a smaller group that knew what they were doing.

the_harper4d ago

Oh man, I actually read an article about this exact thing with The X-Files a while back. It said the showrunner and writing team changed almost completely after season 5 because of contract disputes and movie scheduling. I remember feeling like the mythology episodes got way more confusing from season 6 onward. That 47 writer count makes total sense to me now, the show just had too many different voices pulling it in different directions.