Paper Hearts: Through the Looking-Glass (12/17/96)

Beckie Smith > wrote:
>Being a die-hard Alice in Wonderland fan, I am appalled at the use of
>this great text in this episode..The refrences were strung together in
>such a haphazaed manner that it could have been left out with out
>detracting from the theme of the episode..Just my thoughts on the
>subject...
>
>
>Beckie Smith
>Dedicated X-Phile and Internet Junkie
>" That's why we like you Mulder, Your ideas are weirder then ours."
>Byers..The Lone Gunman
>
>Blessed Be!
Oh, I disagree.  First, as others have pointed out, there's the well-known
theory that Lewis Carroll was a child molester.  Even if he wasn't, he was
undisputably fond of the company of pre-teen girls. (And now this new
theory that he might be Jack the Ripper?!  This evidence I would have to
see for myself.  Shoot, I didn't write down who posted that, but I think
they said it appeared in Harper's).  Anyway, that alone makes it
appropriate for the episode.
But I think they did a reasonably good job of working it in throughout the
episode, too.  Like the first dream sequence (credit Goat of Death for
this idea originally): I don't have "Alice" in front of me right now, but
it opens with Alice kind of dozing in the park, then seeing the
curious White Rabbit, following him, and then falling down the rabbit
hole, right?   Mulder is dozing, sees a very curious red light, follows it
to the park, and sees a girl sinking into the ground.  I thought the
light's little "Follow Me" message was just like all those "Drink Me"
messages that show up in Wonderland.  The perfect heart cutouts could have
come straight off a deck of cards (just like the Queen of Hearts, the Jack
of Hearts, and the rest).
But most importantly, I think this whole episode was "Through the
Looking-glass" for Mulder.  Only in reverse.  Let me explain.  For me, the
central point of the whole series is that Mulder and Scully live in a kind
of looking-glass world -- I called it Conspiracy World in an earlier post.
The things that they have learned in their investigations have given them
a world that is so different from the world seen by all the ordinary
people around them.  You see a price scanner at the grocery store, and you
think of potato chips, or detergent, or coupons... they see it and think
of alien implants that track people's whereabouts in a cosmic inventory.
You think of computer chips, and wonder if you should buy a Pentium.
Scully thinks of computer chips and wonders if she'll die an early death.
All the rules in their world are different, inexplicable, and sinister.
This is what binds M & S together -- they are the only real people in
this world, surrounded by others who are as odd and inscrutable as
anything out of Wonderland or Looking-glass World (whether Bad Guy or
Mysterious Helper -- they're all inscrutable).
So in this episode, Mulder follows the little red light, falls through the
rabbit hole... and ends up in our world.  Where all the rules are
reversed, and sisters aren't abducted by aliens, they're abducted by child
molesters.  This is what this episode does SO WELL -- playing off all the
ironic contrasts between Conspiracy World and our world.  Which one is
real?  Which one is the looking-glass? Which one is crazier? Which one
would you rather live in? What
would you give up and how much truth would you ignore to believe that you
lived in a particular one? (A big THANK YOU!! to Lisa DeFoe for pointing
out the ultimate irony of the child molester teasing Mulder about his
belief in aliens).
So, do you think I'm going a bit overboard with this?
EP