You ever notice how Krycek never really fought back when Mulder would kick his aztec, but he'd always like scream and grunt and act totally freaked out? I wonder if he was faking for sympathy or if he really was in that much pain.
My take has always been that Krycek is a conflicted man under the surface. He may share a basic personality type with CSM (the strategist and pragmatist, looking at life like a chess game, making moves that will get him somewhere and avoiding those that don't), but unlike CSM who seems to truly believe--perhaps over-believe--in who he is and what he does, I think below the surface Krycek doesn't buy everything he says or does. (Mind you, I speak of Seasons 2-5 Krycek, not the guy who seems to have everything under control, even if we can never figure out what he's up to, in Seasons 6, 7 and 8. A whole other topic/rant.)
From the beginning Krycek shows us very different, sometimes conflicting facets of himself. He *feels* too much for the job he's in. In *Sleepless, sure he's working for CSM and playing a role, but he seems really disappointed at a personal level at Mulder's near-automatic rejection of him. After the car-bombing, his call to CSM reveals a man who's truly shaken. (One could assume that if their positions were reversed, CSM would display more calm.) In *Apocrypha, when Mulder hits him with the phone and then shoves him up against the wall, Krycek definitely seems to have lost all sense of composure. And I don't think this is all for Mulder's benefit, either. At the end of *Apocrypha, when he's locked in the silo, there's nobody around to hear his desperate shouts at being locked in with the alien ship and the Oil. Even though we often see Krycek doing his smooth-as-glass routine (as in his cocky remarks after the militia raid, when Mulder questions him), Krycek's life and safety seem to be always dangling by a thread, and when things go bad, his cool facade is broken and a bit of rawness squirms through. Which is what I see in K's reacitons that you mention above.
I think there's a lot more to Krycek than most M/S-centric viewers notice at first glance, and I say that because for years I was one of them. But at a certain point I started to notice all the little contradictory nuances Nick Lea had woven into this character, and as a writer--and a writer of fic--I find Nick's portrayal intriguing and full of possibility.
bardsmaid, that's an excellent analysis of Krycek. I think I have to slightly disagree with you over Krycek's character from S6,7 &8.
If you look at Krycek's character arc, he goes though enough stuff from 2-5, I mean having to lose an arm, not withstanding the number of times he nearly died or was beaten, or the affair that goes wrong (Marina). I believe it harden him and it's not really all that different from the kind of person Spender / CSM turned into. We only know the hardened CSM as an older man. We have never been given much of a glimpse into what events in his youth that turned CSM into the hardened man we see.
Krycek's character is entirely consistent in the later seasons to someone who becomes hardened from what has happened before.
Just some food for thought, if this is coherent enough.
Good analysis bardsmaid. I see Krycek as someone who craves for power. His ascension over the years is well portrayed.
s2: low-grade henchman of the Syndicate, he's told to shut up by the CSM, M&S don't shake hands with him, he's told to bring coffee... s3: renegade, he works alone, makes contacts all over the world, survives in the world of spies and secret services by selling and trading inormation s4: recruited (or back in the service of) the Russian conspiracy, in which he achieves a good rank s5: after betraying the Americans, he betrays the Russians and works for himself, but circonstances end up with him joining the Syndicate after all s6: he holds a good rank in the Syndicate, an elder-to-be, but continues to work for the ideal of resistance by cooperating with the alien Rebels s7: not much...he betrayed CSM, tried to work with the Rebels (?) s8: tried to kill William and save mankind but finally gave up trying to resist the aliens and was killed by a man he tormented.
With every step, he learns something more of the big picture and despite betraying everyone, his long-term goal has always been to resist the colonists and fight the future, like Mulder. Up until the end of s8.
Another thing is, and I'm probably alone with that opinion, was it really Krycek who killed Mulders father? I mean, c'mon the writters especially in the early seasons wanted the viewers to question what we see. In my eyes it was too obvious that it was Krycek who's been the last person who watched Bill Mulder alive and who showed up at the apartment-building in Alexandria after the incident.
What do we know about Kryceks part in the syndicate about that time? CSM didn't trust him enough to give him more important jobs than to poison Mulders water tanks to keep him entertained and teamed him up with Luis Cardinal, who we first see when they want to finally get rid of Alex. For me it definitely gives out the option, besides that Krycek tried to tell Mulder that he wasn't the murder, that Cardinal was in fact his fathers assassin.
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