Mulder and Scully may never have actually escaped their predicament in The X-Files episode "Field Trip." Over their decade-plus run on The X-Files, Mulder and Scully found themselves entangled in many life or death situations, and also famously encountered lots of monsters and creatures that don't actually exist. The fungal threat found in "Field Trip" — which aired between the times the FBI shut down the X-Files department — is something altogether unlike anything the agents have encountered before.
The X-Files monster-of-the-week fungus was massive, spreading for miles underground, and was able to release spores that caused its victims to enter a hallucinogenic state. Once in that state, the malevolent organism trapped its prey underground and placed them in a kind of narcosis, slowly digesting them. The creature's hallucination states were very intricate, and could seemingly make the victim perceive anything the creature deemed necessary to placate them into staying asleep. How exactly it's able to tailor these hallucinations to specific victims, or exactly how intelligent the giant fungus was, goes unanswered by the episode's end — but it's hardly the weirdest X-Files monster, not with "death fetishist" Donnie Pfaster in the mix.
Of course, Mulder and Scully, prove to be the ones finally capable of breaking the "Field Trip" creature's spell and living to fight another day. At least that's what appears to happen at the end of the episode. When examined more closely though, there's reason to believe that the pair of X-Files agents never actually made it out of the creature's lair.
"Field Trip" begins with a rather ghastly setup. Two hikers head home after what seems like a fun day outdoors, but signs appear that something is off. The couple lies down together in bed, only for the scene to then cut to their skeletons lying together in a similar fashion. It's arguably one of The X-Files' darkest moments apart from the infamous episode "Home," and sets the stage for what's to come when Mulder and Scully are sent to investigate what caused the two mysterious deaths. As often happens, Mulder and Scully split up, which turns out to be a mistake, as Mulder is exposed to the hallucinogenic spores released by the underground creature. Scully later goes to find to Mulder, only to also be exposed.
While it's not made entirely clear why they end up sharing the same hallucination — although the couple in the beginning also appeared to be sharing one — Mulder and Scully eventually come to realize what actually happened, and that they're being slowly digested underground by the enormous fungus monster. This revelation seemingly causes them to wake up, then escape, and later be seen filing their report to FBI boss Walter Skinner. An increasingly suspicious Mulder insists that he and Scully never escaped, and that they're still trapped underground, shooting "Skinner" to prove it. He turns out to be right, leading Mulder and Scully to escape for real, being rescued by Skinner and an FBI team, all wearing masks to protect against the spores. Everything seems all right on the surface, and The X-Files moves on as a show from there. Yet, there's good reason to believe their second escape was just as false as their first.
In some ways, the plant-like creature in "Field Trip" may be the most powerful "monster of the week" X-Files heroes Mulder and Scully ever encountered. As seen by its multiple attempts to keep Mulder and Scully under its spell, the creature is highly intelligent, capable of designing and redesigning its hallucinations specifically to fit what it thinks will fool them into a docile state. While it's never clear exactly how much time Mulder and Scully believe to have passed for them inside one of these hallucinations, it seems to at least be multiple days, if not weeks. Thus, the creature can make its prey perceive the passage of a much longer period than has actually occurred. Beyond just the time manipulation aspect, there are some decidedly sinister hints that the ending of "Field Trip" in which Mulder and Scully successfully escape isn't real.
First off, when making his case to Scully that they're still underground, Mulder points out that no known hallucinogen wears off if the person hallucinating realizes they're hallucinating. Yet, that's exactly what happens when Mulder and Scully wake up the second time, and are seemingly saved. During the same speech, Mulder also points out that they were covered by digestive acids, yet have no marks on their skin. The marks are then there during their "real" escape, but could be a case of the plant creature learning from its prior mistake when crafting this new hallucination. Most oddly of all, their rescue from the ground by the FBI just feels off. They aren't treated at all at the scene, but instead shoved straight into an ambulance. Even weirder, the ambulance appears to have absolutely nothing else inside of it, and no paramedics are there to attend to Mulder and Scully. Real ambulances are full of medical equipment, since someone in need of an ambulance may well require treatment on the way to the hospital. The entire final scene rings false.
While the idea that Mulder and Scully didn't make it out of "Field Trip" alive is certainly a sad one in-universe, back in reality, it could serve as a handy way to hand-wave just how bad The X-Files got in its later years. Sure, every season, barring the almost universally awful season 9, had a few episodes good enough to deserve the X-Files name — especially the ones written by Darin Morgan — but most fans would agree that season 7 onward saw a large dip in quality. Additionally, there are many who wish the highly flawed X-Files revival had never even been made, as they believe it served to tarnish the show's image.
If nothing Mulder and Scully experienced on The X-Files after "Field Trip" was real, that could explain the many nonsensical plot twists and out-of-character actions seen in the ensuing seasons. The plant creature is likely piecing together these hallucinations from what it can draw out of the minds of its prey, but what it receives is probably a bit of a jumble of thousands of memories, leading to imperfect recreations that fail to follow a logical dramatic progression. This would explain things like killing off The Lone Gunmen for no real reason other than shock value. It's possible though that the deeper Mulder and Scully were sucked into this hallucinatory rabbit hole, the harder it became for them to notice these inconsistencies. Basically, Mulder and Scully may have died slow deaths, but at least they likely didn't know it was happening and didn't have to live long enough to actually get into fistfights with their own doppelgangers.
from ScreenRant - Feed https://ift.tt/3Eu5MSv
No comments: