My Weekend Crush

Smart women dig Gillian Anderson. She embodies a certain quality we all hope to find in ourselves. She represents an ideal, a kind of gold standard. She is, in short, Special Agent Dana Scully. As a loyal “The X-Files” watcher through all but the last few send-in-the-new-guys seasons, I confess that after I first heard about the new movie my heart did an involuntary pitter-patter at the thought of seeing Anderson pantsuit up again. Scully was everything we don't normally get to see on television. A strong, serious, intelligent, independent, rational and respected female hero who was a true equal to her male partner.

Scully was the eternal skeptic, the perfect foil to Mulder's eager believer. She never once traded on her sexuality instead of her smarts. Sure she got rescued sometimes, but she also did the rescuing right back. Even today, 15 years after Dana Scully first entered our collective conscious, a female character like hers is the exception rather than the rule on television. We have Anderson's portrayal, at once so cerebral and centered but also searching and sensitive, to thank for keeping Scully true through all the twists and turns, conspiracies and cigarette smoking men, aliens and abductions. While I'm still not sure I believe in little green men, I know I believe in her. Happy weekend, all.