In some ways, this episode does feel very much like a “classic” episode of The X-Files. It has your very classic unexplained “spooky” events, some evidence of possible government conspiracies, and an unsolved ending. And it does kind of feel like as a “spooky, paranormal” show, you would expect that at some point The X-Files writers would try to write about/tell a story involving the practices of voodoo.
All things considered, I personally do feel the writers here did a fairly good job of treating traditional Haitian voodoo practices in a mostly respectful way. We have Mulder telling us some of the history and research on the beliefs many Haitians hold about zombies, plus some research into how those myths (and realities) came about. There’s some real science, history, and culture there. It wasn’t just “ooooo, voodoo is creepy and scary”. The writers tried to dig deeper than that, and from my memory at least, they do a much better job here than we will get in a couple of episodes when a story involving “Romanian gypsy practices” is told.
In fact, I really did respect that the real “evil” in this story was the white Marine colonel, who was abusing voodoo practices to keep his own power, essentially, and hide the abuses he was carrying out in the INS camp. The Haitian refugees practicing their culture were not the evil here, which was definitely good.
So, overall, for a story written in 1995 about traditional Haitian voodoo practices and the (very, very) complicated history of US involvement in Haiti, this episode overall was pretty good. On that front. Though, I do wish we could’ve had “X” touch a little bit more on that history of US involvement in Haiti.
However, I will say that while at its foundation, the story here is pretty good and (surprisingly) non-offensive (to me at least, a white woman), I still don’t feel this was a particularly strong episode of the show. The whole story felt rather rushed and a little hard to follow, I kind of didn’t see the point of having the (…ghost???) “Chester” character around (though the child actor playing that role was very good!), and the conclusion/tying together of the various aspects of the episode were just…rather unsatisfying.
Not a terrible episode of the show, especially considering that having white men writing and directing an episode about traditional Haitian voodoo cultural practices could’ve gone very poorly. I personally didn’t really enjoy the more “graphic” hallucinations (???) in the episode, but they weren’t nearly as bad or gruesome as some past episodes have been. Overall, really very much just an “average” episode of the show to move on and forget about—this episode doesn’t stick out in my memory. (Well, except for the iconic (to me) scene of Mulder being confused about that black cat on the docks)
Still, there is quite a bit to get into here. I’ll try to summarize the rather disjointed “events” happening at the INS facility, and I’ll get into some US-Haiti history + research on “zombies” in Haitian culture.
“Suicides”, “Zombies”, & Strange Events at the Folkstone INS compound
As I just said, my main criticism of this episode is that the plot is a bit hard to follow, as the events are very disjointed and we don’t really come to a satisfying conclusion. Now, that very well may have been the writer’s intention, as I’m sure that’s probably an accurate reflection of how both the soldiers and refugees at the INS compound felt as the events were occurring. But still, it made for a less enjoyable watch, for me personally.
The episode opens with us meeting a Marine and his family—Private McAlpin. McAlpin is clearly not doing well mentally, and suffering from some form of PTSD and hallucinations…either caused by lack of sleep from his nightmares/PTSD, orrrrrr voodoo “drugs”, depending on what you want to believe. He has a hallucination of his cereal turning into maggots (🤮), causing him to leave his house in a panic. While driving, he has a second hallucination of his face being covered in pustules of some kind as he looks in the rearview mirror. Aaaaaaaand crashes the car at high speed into a tree because he was so panicked about that he wasn’t paying attention.
So, at first glance, the natural conclusion here would probably be that McAlpin either intentionally crashed his car (suicide), or it was an accident. Except…there’s a strange voodoo symbol on the tree where McAlpin crashed his car, and his son found a (gorgeous!!!) conch shell in their yard with the same symbol. Are these…threats left by some of the Haitian refugees, unhappy with their treatment at the INS facility? Could there really be some “curse” that Mrs. McAlpin should be worried about???
Scully certainly isn’t buying into that just yet, but given that two Marines at the INS facility recently committed suicide, and there was a recent riot resulting in the death of one of the refugees, there does at least seem to be cause for investigation of the INS facility.
I will admit though that I am a bit surprised the military is allowing the FBI to look into their practices/management? I am no expert in military vs. government investigation and jurisdiction, and I suppose that perhaps the military has less say/cause here to reject “outside” investigation since this is an INS facility and not a strictly military one. It happens to be staffed by Marines, but the US Department of Justice is in charge of both INS and the FBI. I guess I’m mostly surprised Colonel Wharton didn’t push back more on the investigation. I mean, he wasn’t the most open or welcoming, but it’s surprising (to me) that he allowed them to even talk to Bouvais. Given that, you know, Wharton was the one with things to hide.
Anyway. After Mulder and Scully arrive, “strange” events continue to happen…likely primarily due to attempts at cover-up by Colonel Wharton, who we will learn (and I’ll get into in a bit) was actually behind everything:
The dead body of Private McAlpin is replaced in the morgue at the facility by the corpse of a dog
The buried remains of the second Marine who “committed suicide” (Private Gutierrez) has been dug up at the cemetery, the remains removed
Here, we end up having definite confirmation that Wharton dug up the body—his bones and dog tags are found later in Wharton’s office
Private McAlpin apparently “comes back to life”, found wandering down the road by Mulder and Scully as they are driving
He is at first completely catatonic and remembers nothing
He later confesses to murdering Private Dunham
Private Dunham details some of the abuses Colonel Wharton has been ordering him and his fellow Marines to carry out on the refugees held at the facility
Later, we do indeed see a third private (Kittel) beating up Bauvais (the apparent “leader” of the voodoo practices and all the refugees, maybe) in his cell
Private Dunham is found dead (in Mulder’s hotel room for some reason!!!), having been stabbed and left to drown/bleed out in the bathtub
Private McAlpin was found holding a bloody knife and confesses to killing him
Butttttt, the question here I guess is—did he? Possibilities I think include that he did kill Dunham, but he was still under the “zombie” control of Wharton, or that Wharton killed Dunham, but made sure that it was McAlpin found wandering nearby with the bloody knife jussssssst as the zombie “drugs” would wear off and he’d come back into awareness
Bauvais—again, the apparent “leader” of the refugees (he supposedly started the riot)—is found dead in his cell, again from apparent suicide.
Wharton tells us he killed himself by slitting his wrists with…bed springs?
So. There’s my attempted summary at describing all the weird events at and around the INS facility that is holding (primarily) Haitian refugees.
No question that all is not right here. But there’s definitely more to the story than “angry Haitian refugees casting curses on their abusers”. Though, if that were all that was happening, I, uh, would not blame them for doing so given the very real abuses happening at the facility!!!
The Haitian refugees are completely innocent in this story. The real evil, and the man seemingly behind everything that has been happening is:
Colonel Wharton—Abuses against refugees
We don’t get a lot of background on Colonel Wharton, but we are told that he was previously in Haiti (I’m unclear if this was during the 1994 operation I’ll give some history on in a bit, or during some previous time, but it was probably the 1994 one). Two of Wharton’s soldiers also apparently took their own lives while serving in Haiti.
Colonel Wharton also seemingly knew Bauvais while he served in Haiti, though the relevance of this is never quite explained?
Now, based solely on history, I think it is indeed very plausible that the two soldiers who killed themselves while in Haiti did in fact commit suicide. If you are into reading (fairly short) scientific articles, this one goes into some of the possible reasons suicides may have been more common among soldiers involved in “peacekeeping” rather than full combat missions.
Colonel Wharton is very…angry about this? Again, it is quite unclear, but I would hazard a guess that Wharton is angry that he and his soldiers were told to get involved in Haiti at all, especially for a supposed “peacekeeping” mission. It isn’t uncommon for people (civilian and military) to get angry at the very idea of the US sending “aid” to another country, especially when they can’t see any direct benefit of getting involved. Which, uh…I mean, I personally would argue there is generally very little benefit that is ever going to come from getting involved in another country’s affairs, even when the supposed reason given is “stopping communism” (Vietnam) or “stopping terrorism” (Iraq/Afghanistan). I mean, to be clear, I do think that powerful countries should get involved when they can to try to maintain and ensure peace around the world, but I am definitely no expert in how/when that should be done. But I think it is very, very rarely done well/adequately/effectively…
OK, regardless of that (and any of my own personal thoughts about war and military involvement in other countries…especially that the US previously played a role in destabilizing…), I think the idea is just supposed to be that Colonel Wharton is very angry at all of the people of Haiti, and some part of him blames all of them for needing US involvement, without which his soldiers wouldn’t have taken their own lives?
Maybe?
I mean, really, I don’t know exactly why I’m trying to parse this. High up officials in the military letting power go to their head and taking their anger out on the local population or refugees is…unfortunately a very common thing. There doesn’t need to be a reason, and there certainly is no reason that would justify how Colonel Wharton takes out his anger, ultimately.
But anyway, I do think he is angry at both the fact that he and his soldiers previously had to get involved in Haiti, and that they are now tasked with “keeping peace” at this INS facility for refugees, most of whom seem to actually want to go back to Haiti and not remain in the US.
And so, Wharton apparently takes out his anger and desire for “revenge” by ordering his soldiers to beat the refugees, among other abuses. And, for the most part, it doesn’t really seem like the military or justice department cares about that.
MULDER: You’re saying the military is sanctioning Wharton's revenge? These people are innocent civilians. Some people in Congress might have a real problem with that.
When three of the soldiers (Gutierrez, McAlpin, and Dunham) discover the extent to which Wharton is abusing the refugees and threaten to expose/report him (which, uh, again I’m not sure would’ve really done much good…), Wharton takes revenge out on them.
And this, again, is where Wharton’s actions become rather…confusing? Unclear?
Given the fact that McAlpin ultimately “comes back to life”, it seems that Wharton was using some sort of “voodoo magic/medicine” to “kill” Gutierrez (?) and McAlpin. I’ll get into the “pharmacology” of zombies (though that is a bit controversial) in a little bit, but in the case of McAlpin in particular, my hypotheses of what happened are the following:
Wharton was dosing McAlpin with some form of “voodoo” poison, causing him to have those hallucinations and then…apparently crash his car? And “die”?
What in “fact” happened there was that all of that “poison” built up to such a level that McAlpin appeared dead—heart rate slowed, metabolic processes essentially undetectable, though he was not in fact dead
Since he was in a “catatonic” state rather than actually dead, at some point McAlpin “woke up”, though he was still under the effects of the poison enough that he could be either “controlled” to kill Dunham, or framed for doing so when it was in fact Wharton who did that
Basically, it seems that Wharton was using what he had learned about Haitian voodoo cultural practices against his own men to cover up his abuses.
Now, the other question here though is—when and how did Wharton learn these practices? We see a picture of him with Bauvais in Haiti, so was he on “better” speaking terms with Bauvais then, and learned some things then? Was Wharton holding Bauvais in solitary and threatening him somehow, to obtain that “voodoo poison” to use on his own men?
Very, very unclear. And this is honestly my main complaint about the episode, because I just have so many questions about how Wharton was doing what he did, and how or to what extent Bauvais was involved.
In some ways, I suppose I should be glad that the writers actually didn’t go too deep into Haitian voodoo cultural practices, because I could see it getting much messier and more offensive if they tried to explain what was happening.
So I guess mostly I’m just frustrated that we never get an explanation into how or why Bauvais was involved (was he being threatened? And how, exactly? He was already being held in solitary and prevented from returning home!)
Bauvais definitely knew enough about what Wharton was doing though to prompt Wharton to ultimately kill him and then perform…some unexplained ritual as he buried Bauvais.
Thankfully, though, Wharton finally got a taste of his own “medicine”, as Bauvais (apparently coming back to life very briefly some how) literally used some of that medicine on Wharton. Wharton appears dead, but at the very end of the episode we see that likely what happened was in fact exactly (or very similar) to what happened to McAlpin. The “medicine” put Wharton into enough of a catatonic state that he appeared dead in every sense, though he was not.
Unluckily for Wharton, though, he was buried. Alive. With no way to escape or get out when he “woke up” from that medicine.
And Bauvais and all the other refugees were allowed (or probably forced, in some cases, though most did seem to want to go back to Haiti) home. Free, for now, from the abuses of the US military.
Chester Bonaparte: A helpful (?) ghost (?) child
I haven’t mentioned yet Mulder and Scully’s involvement with the young Haitian boy at the INS facility, primarily because…he doesn’t really relate to the rest of what is happening in the episode?
Genuinely, the only information we get from Chester that could be possibly useful is that he collects the frogs for Bauvais to use in his “voodoo magics”, suggesting that there is definitely some level of voodoo practice happening at the facility. Either by Bauvais, or by Wharton, threatening and using Bauvais.
At the very end of the episode, we learn that actually, Chester is the young boy who was killed during the riot at the facility a few weeks previously. So he has been a very mildly helpful…ghost (?) interacting with Mulder and Scully????
Now, to be clear, I think that in his few short scenes, the actor playing Chester was very good, and I always enjoy Mulder and Scully being cute interacting with and protecting children. But I just really didn’t see why Chester was necessary to the storyline.
His main use seemed to be to add an extra “what the fuck just happened in our time here” to Mulder and Scully as they learned they had likely been interacting for several days (?) with a ghost.
But we had enough people coming back to life and other weird things that a ghost child didn’t feel necessary to add to the episode. And I guess I would’ve appreciated a bit more backstory on Colonel Wharton, particularly how he and Bauvais knew each other, rather than those scenes with Chester.
Mulder running after Chester did give us one of my favourite scenes though, when Mulder gazes at a cat, wondering if the boy he was just chasing somehow turned into a black cat:
So, not a total wash to have Chester in the episode. He’s a fine character, and the young actor did a really good job in his few scenes. I just felt we could’ve cut out those scenes to dig into other aspects of the episode’s plot a bit more.
Wade Davis + the “Pharmacology of Zombies”
Now time for a couple of shorter “fact checks” or notes on some of the science and history behind this episode. I am not at all an expert on any of this, but because I am me, I could not help doing a little research into aspects that likely contributed to the writing of this episode.
First, we have Wade Davis’ research directly referenced by Mulder as he discusses the possibility of “zombies” with Scully. My own research has shown that Davis’ research (particularly his methods) and “findings” are controversial, but I still want to discuss them a little bit. Mulder referenced them, so, might as well dig in a little.
It is a very real fact that the existence of zombies is a very real, deeply held belief by many native Haitians. And there has been a lot of academic interest in this cultural belief, looking for possible explanations of how people could appear dead but in fact be able to apparently come back to life.
ZORA NEALE HURSTON, on a visit to Haiti in the 1930s: “It is not a case of awakening the dead, but a matter of the semblance of death induced by some drug known to a few: some secret probably brought from Africa and handed down from generation to generation. The bocors know the effect of the drug and the antidote. It is evident that it destroys that part of the brain which governs speech and willpower. The victim can move and act but cannot formulate thought.”
Wade’s theory was indeed that the tetradoxin poison (yes, found in pufferfish) was used by voodoo practitioners. Ingestion of this poison can be fatal, but in lower doses may indeed induce a state similar to catatonia. But, there is mixed evidence regarding to what extent tetradoxin was actually found in “zombie poisons” created by voodoo practitioners, and further questions about whether this (possible) poisoning could explain all of the Haitian cultural beliefs about zombies (such as the ideas that they could be controlled by others, or that zombies could really come back to life years after being pronounced dead).
And, of course, I do feel the need to mention that Wade Davis is a white Canadian man doing research in Haiti. He did speak directly with voodoo practitioners and supposed zombie victims, but still, he does not have the cultural background to understand fully or really draw conclusions about how “zombies” are created or what is the cause of their foundation in Haitian culture.
But, his research probably was exactly what influenced Howard Gordon as he wrote this episode, so what is described in the episode is not completely outside the realm of “science” or historic research.
Brief note on other theories about zombie “myths”
Genuinely, a much briefer note 😉
Just wanted to note that there are other possible explanations for how zombie myths came about in Haiti and other cultures. One of the most likely explanations, actually in the case of a lot of “human monster” type myths, is that these myths took hold due to misunderstandings and fear of mental illness.
In the case of zombies in particular, people perceived/believed to be zombies may have been suffering from schizophrenia, as it can indeed induce a catatonic state in some individuals. Another cause could be brain damage, I think in particular when someone might seem to “come back to life” but no longer be quite themselves.
US + Haiti: “Operation Uphold Democracy”
I have even less knowledge about US involvement in Haiti than I did/do about the Vietnam War, so this really isn’t going to be a huge fact check or anything.
But I did just want to note that this episode was based on Howard Gordon reading about the 1994 - 1995 “Operation Uphold Democracy” in Haiti, and yes, there really were extraordinarily high rates of suicide among soldiers serving in and returning from that operation in Haiti.
The goal of this operation was to remove the government that had been in place since a 1991 coup d'état which overthrew the (first democratically) elected president, with the goal being to reinstate that president and restore some sort of “peace” in Haiti.
On the surface, sounds like a…fine enough goal, but from what I’ve read, I’ve concluded that the US and UN didn’t decide to get involved in Haiti for purely altruistic reasons, to restore peace and democracy for the people of Haiti.
Instead, it seems the H.W. Bush administration was finally spurred to get involved due to a crisis number of Haitian refugees arriving in the US. So, it wasn’t really a “let’s get Haiti stable again” it was more “let’s get the country stable enough again so we can finally send all these people back there”.
Now, all things considered, as far as military interventions go, this one seemed to go…about as good as one can? There were few civilian deaths, and the diplomatic element led by former President Jimmy Carter were ultimately able to get the coup president to step down (through various threats of violence and US takeover of Haiti but…) without troops really needing to invade.
Not that uh, that really did much to actually stabilize the country of Haiti. That same first democratically elected president was later overthrown again in a 2004 coup d'état, and Haiti has continued to suffer from very chaotic government, including the most recent assassination of Jovenel Moïse in 2021.
Again, I don’t want to go too much into history here (especially because I really, really do not have a lot of background knowledge myself), but there are a lot of reasons for Haiti’s instability and poverty, stemming back to their successful slave rebellion against France and the debt payments France forced on their former colony. If you are really interested in reading more explaining Haiti’s history and current state, I personally think this article is really good and (mostly) unbiased.
The X-Files is a comedy
Our second episode in a row involving toads/frogs! Scully makes a cute little joke about trying to find their second missing dead Marine:
Scully doesn’t miss a beat when Mulder mentions zombies, just makes a joke about not telling the grieving wife her husband could be one
Our “Completely Platonic Coworkers”
We don’t have too much here, but there are two very cute moments of Mulder trying very hard to care about Scully when she could be sick or injured. Even when he’s the one who is actually injured.
Mulder wants to look at Scully’s palm after she got stabbed by that vine (?). He looks so sad when she brushes him off.
“I just got weirdly attacked by a colonel practicing voodoo and I’m lying on the ground, but I better check to see if my partner is OK before worrying about myself”
The 90s™
I don’t really have anything here. I mean, in some ways, the focus on Haiti was very appropriate/timely, because the US was directly involved militarily in Haiti in 1994, when the episode was being written and filmed. But, uh, unfortunately, the situation in Haiti has not improved at all in the 30 years since this episode aired. And the US and UN are still trying to get involved there (for better or…probably worse).
Also, the conditions at that INS detention facility felt far too real, and prescient of our current detention facilities holding primarily refugees/asylum seekers from Central American and Mexico (but also still Haiti).
So. This episode could’ve been written and filmed today, and probably nothing would’ve really needed to change. 🙃
Goofs/Bloopers/Fun Facts
Mostly just a couple of goofs/questions about certain things:
Why oh why does Scully leave Chester alone in the car? Mulder was just fine talking to Dunham himself, and Scully definitely should’ve stayed with the young child
More broad of a complaint, but I really did not need Scully to have those hallucinations or whatever after she was infected by the thorn. I guess I kind of get that they needed to have the agents “experience” the effects of voodoo, but come on guys. You already had Wharton using his “magic” against Mulder, and you put Scully through enough. I really, really, really did not need to see Scully hallucinating a hand emerging from her own hand wound and, and then being choked by some mysterious Haitian man.
Scully deserves better! Give her one episode without torturing her!!! 😭
If they were going to have McAlpin come back to life, why did they have the military coroner imply that his neck was broken? If he was just apparently dead, it would be more feasible that McAlpin could come back to life. But broken neck…nope, you’re definitely dead, and not just because of “voodoo poison”!!!!
Geography/filming goofs:
Pretty sure coastal North Carolina doesn’t have snow-capped mountains
“Vancouver Cemetery”
Now, for a single “I just think this is fun about this episode”, LOOK, guys! Mulder let Scully drive this episode!!!!
Overall Thoughts/Summary
Episode rating: 6/10. Immediately after I finished the episode, I thought I was going to rate this episode lower. But one of the reasons I’m enjoying doing these slow rewatches is that it makes me really stop and think about each episode. And while I still don’t think this is a great or even “good” episode, it’s perfectly fine. All things considered, I felt they treated the “voodoo” part of the plot mostly with respect, though again I say this as a white woman, and people from that cultural background may feel very different. I did very much enjoy the slight “twist” that the real evil behind all of the events was the white Marine colonel, and indeed, the Haitian refugees were completely innocent in all of this.
I do just wish we could’ve gotten a bit more historical background, and a bit more understanding of the “relationship”, to whatever extent there was one, between Wharton and Bauvais.
Some parts of the episode felt rushed, and the conclusion was unsatisfying, but really, that’s probably exactly how the Marines and refugees felt during all of the happenings as well, so that’s pretty realistic.
Not the most memorable episode of the show for sure, but a fine enough one at the end.
X-files cases “solved” to date: I mean, I guess Mulder and Scully technically kind of uncovered Colonel Wharton’s abuses at the INS facility, but given that Wharton was killed (…buried alive) and the refugees were all being sent back to Haiti, I…uh, don’t really know what good any of their investigation ultimately ended up doing. And they certainly didn’t actually solve any of the suspicious deaths/suicides at the facility, or figure out exactly what Wharton was up to.
So, sorry Mulder and Scully. You did some good work here, but case left unsolved.
Still at 10/15 for the season, 30/39 overall.
For the next two weeks we get back into the alien/government conspiracy mythology of the show, with our second two-parter in “Colony” and “End Game”. Most of my memory of these episodes is that we meet the Alien Bounty Hunter (who will become part of the show for most of its run) and that we get our first really annoying/confusing storyline about Mulder’s “sister”. But, we’ll see how these mythology episodes hold up!