If they exist any more, that is….
Address: 46th Street, New York City – the smoky gloomy room they hang out in – seen first in “Blessing Way.”
This is presumably just the American branch of this global organisation. We also see them meeting in London – in Kensington.
Name (perhaps): “Roush” is the name given to a shadowy group who funds the baddies in “Redux II.” Is this the Consortium, or just a consortium? The same name appears in “The Beginning.”
Phone Number: New York, 555 1012 – though this number is changed after Mulder discovers it in “Apocrypha,” by using his “finely calibrated piece of investigative equipment.”
Members: As well as Cancerman and Well-Manicured Man, there is a whole room full of Consortium men. The only other one who has done anything notable is the large one called only by the name “Elder” who shows Scully the boxcar in “731,” and the Second Elder notable only really for being killed by an alien, who then assumes his face, in “Two Father.”
The movie introduces Strughold, who seems to be the boss of all of them. According to CC’s track on the soundtrack, “they” take orders from no-one but Strughold, a German industrialist who had fled his homeland to Northern Africa. The mine in Paper Clip, with all its secret files inside, is owned the Strughold Mining Company.
More on him if he comes back in season 6….
The Pentagon warehouse: The place where evidence is stored away is seen in the Pilot and the “Erlenmeyer Flask,” in almost identical scenes. The implant from the Pilot goes into box 100041. The door reads “Know your exits” as a fire warning.
For more on the Consortium and its cunning little plans, see the whole Conspiracy section.
The end for them: At the end of “One Son,” pretty much the entire American branch of the Consortium are burned to death by the rebel aliens. CSM escapes, as does Krycek. Strughold wasn’t there. Everyone else, though…. Dead.
Well-Manicured Man
Appearance: Grey-haired and distinguished. He has an English accent.
Personal Life: He has a large estate in Somerset, England. (This is in the south-west – nice and rural with lots of rolling hills. Several hours from London.) He seems to have a large family of grandchildren romping around on the lawn, all in English-stereotype starched clothes and with uniformed nannies. Ever the nice, friendly family man, looking after a hurt grandchild is far more important than plotting with his colleagues. (He rushes to look after a child, just after CSM calls him and tells him of the new developments, and is late to a Syndicate meeting as a result.)
He also has some sort of country estate at Charlottesville, Virginia. He tells Cancerman pointedly that he comes here because it is out of the way and he won’t get distrurbed. There are horses there, and he is seen fondly watching a girl ride one.
Dr Bonita Charne-Sayre is his personal physician and probably his lover. She was also conducting experiments into finding the cure for the black cancer until she was killed by a Russian assassin in “Terma.” WMM was upset at her death.
Background: He also appears on the 1972 or 1973 photo of the mine so was also an old colleague of Bill Mulder’s. Apart from this his background isn’t known.
Feud with Cancerman: Whenever we see the Consortium at their base, WMM and Cancerman seem to be at odds with each other. In “Paper Clip,” WMM calls Cancerman’s methods “ridiculously ineffective,” and in “Apocrypha” calls him arrogant accuses him of mishandling everything and being too ready to use murder and violence. In “Terma” Cancerman retaliates with some wonderfully cutting pretend sympathy with WMM for his doctor’s death.
Given that the attempted murder of Scully in “Blessing Way” was done by Cancerman’s own men (“Apocrypha”) WMM’s warnings to her could be seen as an attack on his colleagues violent methods.
Opposing the rest of the Consortium: In “The Red and the Black” he opposes the other Elders in the Consortium. While they want to go along with the plans of the colonists, out of fear, probably, and the belief that it’s suicide not to, he wants to join the rebellion. The First Elder goes behind his back and returns the captured rebel to the colonists.
In the movie, he helps Mulder, but seems to pay for it with his life. He tells Mulder that he has been sent to kill him, but, when he doesn’t do it, he claims that his driver will kill him. He kills the driver, but is still not out of danger, but his car explodes just after Mulder gets out of it. Is he really dead? Did he fake his death? Was Mulder the target really? Is some enemy within the Consortium behind it? Will we ever know?
When have Mulder and Scully met him?
Scully meets him at Bill Mulder’s funeral, where he warns her of the assassination attempt.(“Blessing Way”)
Mulder and Scully both meet him in Victor Klemper’s greenhouse. (“Paper Clip”) WMM tells Mulder all about the project, though he says there’s a lot more untold. Scully thinks WMM’s just manipulating Mulder.
Mulder meets him in “Apocrypha” when WMM tricks him and manages to get lots of information from him while giving none.
Mulder talks to him in the movie, in his car. WMM tells him useful things and helps him, but is then killed.
First Elder
Name: This is the name he is given in the cast lists. Fans are still trying to settle on a good name for him, since this one seems far too boring. Well-Fed Man has been used.
But, whatever… He’s dead now. Killed February 1999, along with most of his colleagues, by some scary rebel aliens and their flame throwers.
Appearance: Rather large and square looking. Some people call him the “Italian-looking guy,” while others are having fun criticising his dental hygeine.
Interests? Well, he also seems to share the Themish interest in horses, meeting Cancerman at a race track in “Redux” and seeming very interested in the horses.
Role: He often seems to be the leader of the group. He is the one Cancerman complains to when he feels left out of the surveillance of Mulder (“Redux”) and is the one who orders that the situation be taken care of – which results in the shooting of Cancerman. Earlier, he has been seen trying to get the group back to business when Cancerman and WMM are all too ready to let it dissolve in mutual attacks and shifting of blame.
In “The Red and the Black,” when WMM wants to support the rebels against the colonists, he opposes this, saying survival depends on co-operating with them. When it comes to handing over the captured rebel alien, he acts unilaterally, not consulting WMM until after the fact.
When have Mulder and Scully met him? Scully met him in “731” when he took her to a boxcar like the one she remembered from the abduction, and told her the story about illegal experiments on humans that would become the truth she believed, over Mulder’s claims of aliens.
Minor Thems
Dr Alvin Kurtzveil: Seen in the movie. He worked with Mulder’s father, and appears in an old family photo, attending a family barbecue. Kurtzveil lives at Dupont Circle in Washington DC. He a typical “I used to work with Them but don’t like it any more” person who helps Mulder, and pays the price. He is probably killed by WMM’s driver, and stuffed into the trunk of WMM’s car.
Blue Beret UFO Retrieval Team: Secret government group assigned to be dispatched to any UFO site crash. Had orders to kill unauthorized persons at the site. “Little Green Men”
Luis Cardinal: (aka Hispanic Man) Along with Alex Krycek, he was involved in the death of Scully’s sister, Melissa. In “Apocrypha” the rest of the Consortium tell Cancerman he is “one of yours.”
Crew-Cut Man: Government assassin who kills Deep Throat in “The Erlenmeyer Flask.” He ends up being killed by the sheriff in “Red Museum.”
Grey-Haired Man: Who tries to frame Skinner (“Avatar”) and causes his wife’s accident; kills X; and shoots at Mulder in the clinic (“Memento Mori”).
Colonel Henderson: He leads the UFO retrieval force in “Fallen Angel.” He is probably a military man rather than a Consortium man.
Dr Ishimari: (alias Dr Zama) Japanese doctor from “Nisei” – supposedly died in 1965 but Scully recognized him as one of the doctors who was a part of her abduction.
Red-Haired Man: Who doesn’t have red hair. This is the assassin with the piano wire on the train in “Nisei” and “731” He dies in the bomb at the end, already having been shot by X.
Scott Ostelhoff: The man living in the apartment above Mulder, who was spying on Mulder through his ceiling. He was funded partly by the DOD, and partly by “Roush,” and was making reports to someone in the FBI – later revealed as Blevins. He was the man Mulder killed, and passed the body off as his own.