At last year's BAFTA Awards, when the public was invited to vote for their favourite TV programme, the 'X-Files' beat 'Pride and Prejudice' into second place!
As a cultural phenomenon this TV show should raise questions for us. What is its significance? Why is there this tremendous interest in what was never really intended to be a massive series? It was a very low-key enterprise using some B-movie ideas and was meant to be fairly short-lived, but it has become enormously popular.
The X-Files seems to be sustained by public interest and public opinion. This is not just being created by the media. In fact, Newsweek conducted a poll and discovered that 29% of Americans believe that there has already been contact with aliens.
