Slow evolution: ‘First time fics’ and The X-Files porn parody

Chris Carter once said that he ‘didn’t want [The X-Files] to be another Moonlighting. [He] didn’t want the relationship to come before the cases’, ruling out the possibility of a relationship between the two main characters. While this did, ultimately, change by the end of the show’s run, the unresolved sexual tension that existed through the course of the series, particularly in seasons one to seven, gave fan fiction writers fuel with which to create their own erotic adaptations of the show. For a fandom that coined the term ‘shipper’, it is not surprising that a large amount of fan fiction concerning Mulder and Scully’s relationship has been written. It is less surprising that a high percentage of these deal with the first sexual encounter between the two agents. But this is also a subject that The Sex Files: A Dark XXX Parody (Hain, 2009) has chosen to explore. In this article I explore the interaction between the canon text, the fan fiction that has arisen from it, and The Sex Files, to examine the appeal of first time fics and the ways in which prior readings of the text(s) led to the fan readings of the porn parody.