The X-Files (TV Series)

My Struggle III (2018)

William B. Davis: Cigarette Smoking Man, True Name Carl Gerhard Busch

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Quotes 

• [first lines] 

  Cigarette Smoking Man : My name is Carl Gerhard Busch. But I've been known by many aliases during my long career with the U.S. government. It's been a humbling job, though I'm hardly known as a humble man. I've been a witness to history, much of it violent, much of it an abomination of the values Americans hold dear. I've had a privileged seat at the centers of power, held the reins of that power, making sacrifices few are capable of, of which even fewer are willing. If people knew the truth, they'd riot in the streets. Too much is made of the will to power, as if our will is free, our choices our own. Our destinies are forged in our bones, made real by a raging impulse to self-destruct. I'm not a bad man, more a practical man. I've taken certain gifts I was given and made good men great. It is my greatness. I'm a father to two men who have figured more in the future than they might ever know. Both would end up working for the FBI, both complex but dedicated men who sacrificed dearly, and in their dogged pursuits would end up paying a terrible price, searching for truths as I parceled them out, truths held only by the few who knew the levers of power and the invisible hand controlling them. Is there life out there? Good heavens. To doubt it is a failure of more than the imagination. It is a failure to recognize the limits of our own stupidity, the nascency of our science, the rudiment of our tools. We listen, we search. We hope for a sign, as if our eyes and ears are good enough, our brains large enough, our egos small enough. I'm an old man now. I will leave my own mark upon history, more than presidents or tyrants. I don't ask for loyalty and trust, the fleeting bonds of men. I ask only for the years to show my sons and their sons I was right. What their father did, had to be done.

• Cigarette Smoking Man : You'll be pleased to know, Mr. Skinner, I'm here to offer you a deal.

  Walter Skinner : I don't make deals.

  Monica Reyes : This is a waste of time.

  Cigarette Smoking Man : You're still a fairly young man. Years to live, by my estimation.

  Walter Skinner : Try me, you son of a bitch. I'm the one with the gun.

• Cigarette Smoking Man : We've thrown science out the window in favor of scandal and opinion and cant and all manner of ridiculous untruths.

• Monica Reyes : But suddenly everyone knows everything of you and your plans.

  Cigarette Smoking Man : My plans are airtight. And even if they were to get out, they would be dismissed as so much fake news. That's the world we live in, Monica. Everyday a new disaster, when the one thing no one is prepared for will wipe the slate clean. We refuse to imagine our impending extinction, the acceleration of the cataclysms. We've thrown science out the window in favor of scandal and opinion and cant and all manner of ridiculous untruths. Civilization a joke, and my plan merely the punchline.