Film critic Scott Mendelson, writing in "The Huffington Post", cited Scully as an example of strong female characters on television, calling her "one of the most iconic characters in the science-fiction genre". "Radio Times" Laura Pledger also named her as a strong TV woman, placing her at #1. Rebecca Traister of Salon.com opined that Scully had a better character arc than Mulder. She wrote, "The very fact that her character was such a hard sell made her repeated brushes with the supernatural all the more powerful. Mulder's desire to believe was so expansive, his credulity so flexible, that it's not as though he was ever going to have either shaken from him. But Scully's surety was solid, stable, rigid; every time she saw something she thought she'd never see, we saw it crack, sparks fly from it. She was forced to question herself, grow, change". She praised her for being more "rational, resilient, mature" than her partner and for their mature relationship. In a review of "Irresistible", Emily VanDerWerff of "The A.V. Club" wrote that it was a cliché to put Scully in danger, as "Scully is [the show's heart, and any time she's in danger, it feels like the show itself is about to be stabbed through the heart".