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The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati

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This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I would like to see it reach FA one day. I feel that the references are all good, but that the prose needs a bit of work.

Thanks, Gen. Quon (Talk) 20:34, 11 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Sarastro
I've had a first look at this as far as the second paragraph of the plot section. Hopefully, I will revisit this later in the week, but I am finding quite a lot of issues so I will give you time to have a look at my comments. Please feel free to disagree with me, and to politely (or not!) tell me to go away and never touch an X-Files article again. Sarastro1 (talk) 20:47, 15 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Lead

"Do we need to link "science fiction" in the lead?
"It was directed by Michael Watkins and written by lead actor David Duchovny in collaboration with series creator Chris Carter. The installment explores the series' overarching mythology and concludes a trilogy of episodes revolving around Fox Mulder's (Duchovny) severe mental reaction to an alien artifact.": This is all a little clunky. The "in collaboration" idea is not really mentioned in the article, and could replaced by a simple "and". Also, "severe mental reaction to an alien artefact" does not really tell the reader very much. Nor does it really seem reflected in the main body.
"was seen by 10.1 percent of the available television audience, representing 16.15 million viewers": Representing seems an odd choice of word; in what way is it representing? Perhaps rework to begin with the number "seen by 16.15 million viewers—10.1 percent of the available television audience"
"The episode received mixed to positive reviews from television critics.": This is basically OR; the reviews were either mixed or positive. Mixed to positive is basically the writer's interpretation from reading the reviews.
"Mulder is a believer in the paranormal, while the skeptical Scully has been assigned to debunk his work.": I'm neither a fan nor a follower of the X-Files, but I would imagine that this is not really that true a description of the series format by the 7th series. It may be better at some point here to explain a little about "the series' overarching mythology".
"In this episode, Scully returns to Washington, D.C., from Africa": Why the comma after "D. C."?
"has been placed in an alien artifact-induced coma": While probably completely correct, this phrasing is a little opaque for the general reader; what sort of artefact? How has it induced a coma?
"Unbeknownst to Scully, rogue former FBI agent Alex Krycek (Nicholas Lea) is using nanobots to force Skinner to betray her and Kritschgau.": Unbeknownst is a little too much; why not just "unknown"? And as this incident is not mentioned further in the lead, and is once more rather opaque and baffling without further explanation for the general reader, I would suggest cutting this whole sentence from the lead.
"Meanwhile, Mulder enters into a dream where The Smoking Man (William B. Davis) offers him a new life and a fresh start. After conferring with a vision of Scully, Mulder awakens from his coma.": Do you enter into a dream? Why not "In a dream" or "Meanwhile, Mulder dreams that…" But again, this just seems impenetrable and not a little baffling. Why is this significant? Why is the presence of Scully in the dream important, and why does it make him wake up? Is there too much plot in the lead? Could it be cut down or made more friendly for non-specialists?
On this point, I think the lead does need more about the production and writing of the episode.
"The genesis for the episode was Carter's fascination": "Genesis"? Why not "inspiration", or "idea came from", which is perhaps less dramatic? And was he really fascinated, or just interested?

Plot

I'm really struggling with the plot section. I get the impression that this is not written with the general reader in mind, and requires background knowledge of the series to understand it. While this is perhaps to some extent unavoidable in a series like this, I think this may go too far, and I do not really understand what is going on in the story. (Perhaps that is a fault of the episode rather than the article!) It needs to be more accessible. On a more prosaic level, I don't think it really flows, and I cannot follow the chronological order of the story, or where everything takes place, or who the characters are. And perhaps parts could be more concise.
For the benefit of those who are not regular viewers, do we need to explain the format of the series, and introduce the characters, in this section? (Not suggesting here, just asking)
"visit Fox Mulder who remains paralyzed in a hospital": Was he paralysed in a previous episode? If not, "remains" does not seem the best word.
"The Smoking Man reveals that he is Fox's father": reveals to who?
"visits Michael Kritschgau": Who?
"and claims": Scully claims? Was this her theory, and why did she go to him with it?
"contact with the shard of an alien": With the what?
"has reawakened the extraterrestrial black oil that he was infected with three years prior": The what now?? I think these last points suggest that the plot background needs further explanation. Do not assume that the reader understands the series history. But I'm not sure of the best way to accomplish this.
"Mulder is now proof and carrier of alien life.": And to follow, I'm not sure how this follows from the previous sentences.
"With Mulder gone, Walter Skinner tells Scully": Gone where? From where? Where is Scully? Where did Skinner come from, and who is he?
"that his mother signed him out of the hospital": Whose mother? This is rather confusing now.
Three "meanwhile"s in the plot section. More variation, perhaps?
"who offers him a fresh start at life.": In what sense? And "at life" seems unnecessary.
"He is brought to a new neighborhood and given a new home, finding Deep Throat inside.": Repetition of "new", and starting the second clause with "finding" is not quite right grammatically. Also, the wording suggests this took place over a long period ("given a new home" does not usually happen instantaneously) but this cannot be the case if a man was waiting inside. What about "Taken to an unfamiliar neighborhood, Mulder is shown a new home [was it explicitly to be his home? If not, maybe just "shown a house"]; inside, he finds Deep Throat."
"Deep Throat claims that he faked his death": So I assume, that DT was presumed dead?
What burden was he under?
"Mulder is met by Diana Fowley soon after": Who?
"Scully checks the video tapes at the hospital and spots Mulder's mother talking to The Smoking Man in one of them": A bit messy. What about "On the hospital [security?] tapes, Scully sees Mulder's mother talking to The Smoking Man"
"which describes how one man will prevent the impending apocalypse, becoming humanity's savior.": After the comma seems a bit redundant.
"Scully believes that Skinner gave it to her, but he denies it.": Do we need this at all?
"Scully goes to see Kritschgau and notices he has a stolen copy of her information on the alien spaceship.": What information? What spaceship? Notices how?
"After he admits hacking her computer, she deletes the files from his laptop." And he just let her? Sarastro1 (talk) 20:47, 15 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I've done some massive clean-up on this. For the most part, I think the confusion in the plot section can be cleared up by the addition of a "Background" section, which I added. See if that helps at all. If not, I'll try to fix it up more, but as for all the other issues, I believe I've fixed, addressed, or made note of all of them. I appreciate very critical reviews, as it makes the articles much better in the end!--Gen. Quon (Talk) 05:07, 16 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Changes look good, and the background section helps tremendously.
Maybe say somewhere which episode(s) are covered in the background section?
"Scully unsuccessfully tries to contact her. She receives a package that contains a book on Native American beliefs": Who is "she"? Scully or Mulder's mother? And is there an explicity connection between the Native American book, and the Navajo writing? Sarastro1 (talk) 21:31, 18 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I think I got these taken care of too. The connection between the Native American book and the writing, however, is never blatantly spelled out.--Gen. Quon (Talk) 00:23, 19 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

More comments: I've now read down to end of "Writing" section.

Was the dream induced by the drugs/the Smoking Man?
"Mulder confides in Scully, revealing that she": The last sentence was about Fowley; which "she" is this?
"Duchovny worked on the script for "The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati" while Carter wrote the preceding episode": Does "while" in this sense mean at the same time? If not, this is a little misleading.
"The tagline for this episode...": The what?
"which is an important concept in the work of the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.": Was the actual phrase used by Nietzche? Or just the concept?
"In the context of the episode, the subtitle has been interpreted as a reference to the love of a pre-determined life, in this case, Mulder's false reverie": Interpreted by who?
"or to the idea that Mulder must "love his suffering and passively accept it [and] actively embrace his journey ... and release his spirit to find new vigor."": Requires intext attribution.
"to the love of a pre-determined life, in this case, Mulder's false reverie": "Pre-determined fate" seems a slightly contrived phrase. And "false reverie": is there any other kind? Why not just "dream"? (And to be honest, this all seems a little nebulous, vague and contrived, but that is not a criticism of this article or its writers)
""The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati" contains allusions to Nikos Kazantzakis's novel The Last Temptation of Christ. Duchovny, a fan of the novel, found parallels between the story and Mulder's ordeal and incorporated many of the book's concepts into the episode": Fair enough, but why not explain what these were? Spell it out a bit; this would be more interesting than reading about Duchovny's take on the character which follows this sentence.
"He believed that this would help emphasize the episode's themes of science and religion.": We're getting into some pretty heavy repetition of "episode" now. And this sentence does not really mean anything. Given the last sentence before this, the sentence effectively says "the parallels emphasise the episodes' themes." Perhaps it is meant to say that the allusions rather than the parallels do this, but this would require some re-organisation. EIther way, this does not really say anything. What are these themes, and how does the link to The Last Temptation of Christ emphasise them? And is emphasise the correct word?
"Duchovny was drawn to the fact that Christ's struggle in the novel was "not only godlike, but also profoundly human."[18] In the episode, he attempted to answer the question about whether or not Mulder would develop a personal life, noting that "Mulder is a guy who's been given the same problem ... What I'm doing is using the very human model of Christ".[18]": Right. Why was Duchovny drawn to use Christs "profoundly human" persona? The only way this would work was if Mulder was in some way God-like. What is the "problem" that the two share? Presumably "work" getting in the way of a personal life, or personal life intruding on a "struggle", but this should be spelt out. Again, this may be a problem with some rather loose analysis rather than the article, but I think this needs better presenting to the reader.
Third paragraph of "Writing" seems a bit loose. What is its focus? The Smoking Man, Davis or Anderson?
"proved difficult for Anderson to believably present": Split infinitive: I'm of the camp which considers this a crime against humanity!
"Anderson later stated that she had trouble with her lines in the episode because of her character's previous encounter with an alien shipwreck.": Which lines? Why were they a problem? The quote which follows does not really make it clear. It merely says "all this". All what?
"Carter explained that there must be "conflict between the two characters" for the show's dynamics to work.": Which characters? What conflict?
"A large portion of the episode concerns the ancient astronaut theory, which proposes that intelligent extraterrestrial beings visited Earth in antiquity or prehistory and made contact with humans": Really? This does not really come across in the plot section, so maybe spell it out explicitly here.
"suggested that aliens developed the notions of God and religion": Ditto.
"In 'Amor Fati' we treated the religious side with respect": Which religious side? Again, not clear to what this refers (even though it's a quote, it should be clear) Sarastro1 (talk) 21:31, 18 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I think I've cleared up most of these issues. How does it look now?--Gen. Quon (Talk) 00:23, 19 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Looks fine from a quick glance. Sarastro1 (talk) 22:29, 21 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

More comments: To the end of "Casting and effects" now, and I apologise for the slow progress.

"Casting director Rick Millikan saw the episode as a flashback": Did he really see it? Maybe "visualised", although I'm not sure that works either. There is something a little off with a casting director having such a sway. Were these characters not in the script beforehand?
The second sentence in the first paragraph of "Casting and effects" is very long; I would suggest three separate sentences on each actor.
"Casting the boy who Mulder meets on the beach was challenging for the producers": Not quite sure about this sentence, either grammatically or factually. The last paragraph describes the casting director as having a major influence, but suddenly the producers are casting? Leaving that aside, I'd prefer something like "The producers [or whoever] encountered difficulties in casting the boy whom Mulder meets on the beach." But it may be better to cut this sentence entirely or replace it with another.
The part about Rogers realising she was going to be killed off seems to be unnecessary padding; presumably she had the complete script so would have actually read about her death a very short time after her "premonition"?
"He later jokingly stated that": Any reason this could not just be "joked"?
"A scene in which Mulder watched himself age was filmed, but later cut.": Why?
Effects seem to be tacked onto this section. Is there nothing more to say on this?
Similarly, are there any details on filming: dates, locations? This would appear to be quite important, and is currently missing completely. Sarastro1 (talk) 22:29, 21 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, similarly, I believe I have patched up this section. There isn't a ton of info on the filming, unfortunately, but I got a couple more sentences of info added. As for the slow progress, take your time! I am grateful that you are doing this at all!!--Gen. Quon (Talk) 16:46, 22 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

And a few more comments':

"he is placed on a cross-like table, symbolic of the cross to which Jesus was nailed": Do we need to specify here that the cross-like table is symbolic here? Maybe better to leave it to the reader? Not too sure here: asking, rather than suggesting. Also, not too sure why "Christ-like figure" is linked to Crucifixion of Jesus.
"Mulder is similarly challenged when he is enticed by The Smoking Man and overcomes temptation by sacrificing himself for the sake of humanity.": Does this "sacrifice" occur in the episode? If so, not really obvious in this article.
"Scully shares many elements with Kazantzakis' version of Judas Iscariot, as both are able to call the heroes out of their respective trances.": Many elements? If so, given how central this character is, perhaps more should be given. Also, we have an echoing of the previous sentence ending with "both..."
"Scully, representing the more rational one "who must anchor herself in the certain of scientific facts"...": Is this quote correct; should it be "certainty"?
"discovers the aliens shards and deduces that they hold the key to "every question that has ever been asked"": Again, does this happen in this episode? Sarastro1 (talk) 21:03, 22 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
These issues have been fixed, I believe. I'll try to clarify some of them, though.--Gen. Quon (Talk) 01:26, 23 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Last batch of comments

"In the US, the episode earned a Nielsen household rating of 10.1, with a 14 share, meaning that roughly 10.1 percent of all television-equipped households, and 14 percent of households watching television, were tuned in.[40] It was watched by 16.15 million viewers": Is there a way to make this a little more reader-friendly and less technical? And possibly combine it all: as a general reader, the number of viewers would be the most important thing here, so maybe that could go first?
"In the UK, "The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati" was viewed by 840,000 viewers, making it the third-most watched program for that week after episodes of The Simpsons and Friends.": I think it should be made clear that this is not on all channels: the main viewing channels would have had viewing figures far in excess of this, but this sentence suggests that it was one of the most watched programmes in the UK. And the reference is a deadlink.
On that point, why is information given for the UK only; presumably other countries broadcast the episode?
Sales figures for the DVD?
"a DVD collection that contains episodes involving the alien Colonist": Involving who?
Why is purple prose linked in the quote? Links should generally not be given in quotations, and I don't see the need here for a link at all.
"He highly complimented the scene": Why "highly"?
Who is Sarah Stegall?
"Since its original airing, "The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati" has appeared on many lists of the best The X-Files episodes.": Maybe make this seem less like it is the episode which has chosen to do this! Maybe "Since its original airing, critics have listed "The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati" among the best X-Files episodes."
I think there is a slight problem with that last paragraph. The first sentence suggests that it classed among the all-time best episodes, but apart from the first example, the others are "best of season" or "best of this-type-of-episode" lists. And I think we are getting into "list every list in which this has been named".
That last section overall is a little quote heavy; I'm not sure all of the quotes really tell us much about the reception, and perhaps anything interesting could be moved to the analysis section.
Also, it would be quite useful to read some more general reviews which are not connected to X-Files or sci-fi fans; what did the general public think? Are there any general reviews from, for example, newspapers.
Some dates for the reviews would also be useful: which (if any, and if not, are there any) came out after the broadcast, which came out years later, which are "looking back" reviews, etc.
I think that is about everything. I may have a last visit in the next day or two, and maybe another quick copy-edit. But it is looking much improved generally. Sarastro1 (talk) 12:58, 23 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I tried to fix all these issues. I left the purple prose link in the quote, but cut down the amount that the quote contained, as I feel that the term purple prose is something that a potential reader might want to look into. I also tried to reorganize all of the reviews chronologically instead of all over the place. Unfortunately, I couldn't find very many reviews from newspapers and the like. Also, as for the last paragraph, I tried to reorganize it so that the first three or so are calling it one of the best episodes, whereas the last two are talking about the episode in regard to a specific parameter.--04:01, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Final readthrough: Looking pretty good now. I've done some copy-editing, any of which you can revert if you don't like it or if I have messed anything up. Just a few last points I noticed on reading through once more. Sarastro1 (talk) 16:03, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"In this episode, Scully returns to Washington, D.C. from Africa and discovers that Mulder has been placed in coma by shards from an alien spaceship wreck. Scully joins former government employee Michael Kritschgau (John Finn) and her boss Walter Skinner (Mitch Pileggi) to search for Mulder.": "has been placed in" is awkward, and suggests awareness for the shards. Maybe "exposure to shards from an alien spaceship wreck induced…" but that's not too comfortable either. Also, this part in the lead does not state that Mulder is missing. It jumps from his coma to Scully searching.
"The inspiration for the episode was Carter's interest with the possibility that extraterrestrials were involved in ancient mass extinctions on Earth. Much of the episode was inspired …" Inspiration…inspired. Also, maybe something like "Carter was interested in the possibility … on Earth, and used these themes in the episode. Much of the episode…"
How do we know the Smoking Man's motivations? To whom is he revealing this?
"Scully, having been visited by Albert Hosteen, awakens in her apartment": Why does he visit. This seems a little throwaway as it is not explained, and suggests that it could actually be cut unless he did something important.
"When she talked to Carter and said "'I don't know if I can do this anymore.' How can I be arguing against all this when in the last episode we shot this other storyline happened?", Carter explained that there must be conflict between Mulder and Scully in order for the show's "believer versus skeptic" dynamic to work.:" Something wrong with the quote here. What did she say to Carter? The rest should not be in the quote.
"making it the third-most watched program for that week after episodes of The Simpsons and Friends." Still not clear, and still looks like the most watched programme in the UK, rather than on that specific channel. Sarastro1 (talk) 16:03, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
How do these changes look now? Thank you ever so much for doing this; now this article looks wonderful!--Gen. Quon (Talk) 16:23, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good. Ping me when this goes back to FAC. Sarastro1 (talk) 16:29, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]