Fialka's Candybox

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Website
Name: Fialka's Candybox
Owner/Maintainer: Fialka
Dates: 2000-??
Type: fanfiction, meta
Fandom: X-Files, Farscape, Xena: Warrior Princess
URL: here
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Fialka's Candybox is a website for Fialka's fiction, meta essays, and other fandom creations.

A fan in 2013 called it a "luscious old school website." [1]

From the Splash Page

What's NEW at the Candybox? Still unpacking from the move to Butcheredart, but look -- new fic! Amazing what you find when you finally get around to cleaning out the closet. A few notes about archaeology: the index page is still the original I put up in 2000, with a few added bon-bons. The rest of the present site design dates from 2004, when the original X-Files section was expanded to include pages for Xena and for Farscape. Some of the Xena stories in the Long Way Home series still haven't made it up here, partly due to time constraints and partly because I'm just not happy with them. Likewise a number of the essays in the Farscape and XF sections, although that's more a problem of time to locate and format the original text (I've had seven computers since I wrote my first fic, 10 years ago this summer, so a lot of stuff has been lost in the various transitions.) Although it all looks overly simplistic now, I don't intend to change the general design. This is not because I think it's perfect, but because it's a reflection of who I was, and what I could do -- technically as well as literarily (is that even a word?) -- at the time. My own fannish history, as 'twere. I've also finally migrated all the fic originally published on my LJ to an appropriate bon-bon (Random Ficage). This includes stories for Bones, Cold Case, Castle, Sarah Connor Chronicles, Stargate, and Firefly. If you find this site and you enjoy what's on it, do let me know. It's always good to hear one isn't shouting into the wilderness (although that might explain that strange echo).

The Meta Essays

The site hosted meta essays by several fans, most of them by Fialka. When its webhost crashed in 2000, these essays were reposted (mostly) on another site, Fialka's Candybox.

A list of some of the original essays is here.

Origin of Fialka's Essays

"The original AnnoX was wiped from the web when NBCI took down its free server space in 2001. This introduction was written in February, 1999, and appears here unchanged."

Later, it was reposted:

Sadly, when the old NBCI server went the way of so many really cool, free things on the net, I never could find another free site with enough space to house the whole Study Guide, and it didn't get enough traffic to warrant paying for 250mb on a server somewhere. Not to mention, I no longer have as much time on my hands as I did back then, so like the UFOs...well, it is another UFO. Some of it still appears to be here, if you can wade your way through all the advertising on FortuneCity. I sure won't be insulted if you don't. These essays are from the original site, and appear here unchanged. Unlinked titles got abducted by aliens somewhere along the way. If you find them wandering dazed by the side of the road, could you be so kind as to send them home?

Fialka's Essays

The Introduction

WHO

This study guide is intended as a gift to those who, like myself, would like to be part of the exciting world of X-Files debate, but - having the misfortune to be satellite deprived in the nether reaches of the globe (i.e. anywhere outside the US) - are not exactly au courant with current events. In other words if you live somewhere that shows the X-Files a year or more behind the US, this is for you. This is also for the children (sigh, sniff), who will only discover the glory that is Scully and Mulder, AFTER the show is done.

To all you up-to-date North Americans - especially those in Vancouver and LA who got onto the set & shared your stories... to the first, the pioneers (sniff, sigh) who created this crazy little corner of the internet....to those who've allowed me to incorporate their work here....and to the OBSSE mailing list - many, many thank yous. Without you all this finely detailed insanity may never have appeared.

WHAT

The study guide is actually an adaptation of my own intranet site, developed from necessity as I pay way too much for internet connection time and thus tend to download reams of material without reading it, which I sort through (well, kind of) at my leisure. It also comes from my own need to know 'WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT???' after missing all of Season 2 and having little idea what was going on in Seasons 3 and 4 due to severe language limitations. (Go on, you try watching the X-Files in Czech.)

After a great deal of trial, error and deletions, I managed to find what I was looking for - namely, good, insightful reviews, coupled with scripts for the shows that I missed (or wouldn't see in the near future - yes, I'm a spoiler slut), the official synopsis guide (still the best of the straightforward summaries, though some of the shipper ones are great fun), some random, deeply thought out essays, even some fanfic that would have made great episodes. About 350mg to be (almost) exact.

Around this time, windfall profits and a 20 hour bus took me home to London for a few months where I was able to see most of Season 5 IN ENGLISH! OH YES! for the first time in years. Unable to face the prospect of listening to Scully sounding like Marlene Dietrich (I live in East Germany now) until the end of the series (believe me, it's less interesting than it sounds) and STILL not having seen Pusher, Never Again or Memento Mori in ANY language, I used the rest of my windfall to purchase the boxed sets of Seasons 2 - 4. A very trusting German friend lent me her English Season 1 tapes, and Season 6 has been supplied by kind friends in America. Thus was I able to feed my fine obssession, the results of which you see here.

WHY

So, I thought, now I too can offer erudite opinions on Scully's faith, Mulder's guilt and where the hell the oilien fits in. I assembled the Study Guide to mimic what is for most philes normal life: see the show, think about it, discuss, read, discuss more, argue, spoil, etc. I wanted more than 'oh wow, wasn't it cool', and detailed descriptions of THUD moments that leave out everything else (though I like those too). Through that was born the Annotated X-Files, the main part of this website. I wanted overall analysis, psychological insight. And I grew tired of friends saying 'well it's just a bloody tv show, innit?'

It's true, it is just a bloody tv show. But we are denizens of the modern age, hovering on the cusp of the millenium. Is it any wonder that critical minds in 1998 would turn their gaze on characters and situations transmitted via television, submitting them to the same scrutiny their forebears might have given Shakespeare? Not that I'm necessarily saying the X-Files is the 21st century's Shakespearean canon, but hey those are just bloody plays, innit? (And we're not even sure who wrote them.)

The critique is out there. A joy to find and a joy to read & think about and maybe even answer. If you are looking for a more scholarly debate and something of an X-Files history lesson, then hopefully you will find your way from here.

References

  1. ^ XF Bookclub, November 13, 2013
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