this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2025
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Oh no, filler is a good thing. Filler gives you time to know the characters, and adds depth and color to the world. Filler is where writers actually get to stretch and try out ideas. Filler is what makes a show feel full.
Imagine the X-Files with no filler. We'd lose the Jose Chung episodes, "Home," "the Post-Modern Prometheus," and so many other great episodes. Without the filler, it's just an endless slog through Chris Carter's poorly planned mythology. Just the smoking man and vanishing babies for ~~eleven~~ nine seasons.
Filler can be good, it can also be bad, and perhaps most strangely it can be "bad" but also "fuck you I want to see Goku scream 'give me your energy' for four episodes before he releases the spirit bomb. Again."
I think your opinion is by far the more popular view right now. I completely disagree though. Almost every mini-series I see I'm left dumbstruck as I feel like any decent editor could have gotten the same story across just as well with a 2 or 2.5h movie instead. I feel like they are just wasting my time.
And then you end up with a 6 hour story chopped to shit and get a very disjointed movie that feels like you're watching what was left of the film stock after Bubba Sawyer had a turn in the editing room.
No. Good movie editing has been happening since shortly after movies were a thing. Huge books have been made into really good movies. Streaming has opened up new outlet for mini-series like content and some of it really takes advantage of the format to deliver new kinds of story telling that can be worth the time investment. However, most of it is just about generating content with minimal editing and borrowing hook techniques that evolved from TV drama series in the 80s and 90s.
i mean i haven't rewatched xfiles since the 90s but isn't that more of a victim of being a transition between monster of the week episodic and season long story arcs?
Exactly. Watching just those episodes on a binge is going to be... okay, at best. You really need the time in-between those plot beats to let it marinade a bit. Let the conspiracy and shadow-government machinations grow in your head. It lets you get real hungry for the next morsel of "the truth" that eventually comes your way. Then you savor it while you watch Mulder out-think a Genie or whatever.