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| May I take your order? |
For a series whose moniker has been “The Truth is Out There”
the X-files has never delivered clear answers to the alien and government
conspiracies that silently undermine our freedom. Viewers are ultimately
inspired to question what truths are real, what are an illusion and what
consequence those mysteries portend.
This week’s Season 11 episode 7 titled “Rm9sbG93ZXJz”, queries
the role we play in the automated digital landscape. The result is one of the
most entertaining stand-alone X-Files episodes to emerge in the last two
seasons. It is as stylish as it is ironic, and queries our complicity in the
pervasive world of pop-culture/socio-economic techno-conformity.
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| Mulder and Scully are a long way from the Automat |
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| "Nyaah, see, that's right, it's coitans for you Rocky, see?" |
As Mulder and Scully sit alone at the counter of an
automated sushi restaurant, they play on their cell phones - no dialogue spoken
- and order sushi meals off the counter’s touch pad. Conveyer belts deliver their
meals while the agents receive notifications on their cell phones. They are as
irritating to Scully as they are in real life to me. She repeatedly dismisses each
notice with a finger swipe. Mulder decides his meal of blob fish, which looks
like Bugs Bunny’s Edward G. Robinson design, is unpalatable and unsuccessfully
tries to send it back to the kitchen. Unimpressed by the robo-dining experience,
he declines a credit card tip.
That’s
when things get really fishy.
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| My meal is good, Mulder. How is your's? |
Mulder’s snub propels a hive-minded network of digital
intelligence to threaten he and Scully at every turn.
The result is one of the most entertaining stand-alone
X-Files episodes to emerge in the last two seasons. It is as stylish as it is
ironic, and queries our complicity in the pervasive world of pop-culture/socio-economic
techno-conformity.
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| In case you change your mind you have 3.5 hours to leave a tip. |
Uber-ish robot cars, automated personal voice assistants, security
systems, surveillance drones, data collecting Roomba vacuums, GPS trackers and
web commerce aggregators all threaten Mulder and Scully’s sense of control. To
add insult to injury, the agents can’t even listen to their music selections or
access a financial representative on the phone.
“The Truth is Out There,” all right. In fact, it’s right
under our noses.
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| Whipz is reminiscent of the johny-cab in "Total Recall" |
In our myopia we don’t see that we unwittingly give up part
of our humanity, the way we relate to one another, in favor of automation, convenience,
amusement, narcissism, and an all-enveloping compulsion to be part of the
established digital “collective.” We all “need” Facebook accounts for personal
or business reasons, Twitter, Instagram, Linked In, et al.
We willingly give our information to these sites, and the
users that frequent them. But in doing so we don’t clearly realize we are
giving away what we control.
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| Dana Scully's security password? Don't call her Ishmael. |
We are traceable everywhere we drive, everywhere we use our
credit cards, every web site we visit. We are told how much tax we owe, how
much we must pay for health care, and what medicines are allowed.
We respond to the latest software
updates, without which our GPS can’t compute directions or measure how far we
have jogged this morning.
The X-files has reminded us that the truth is indeed out
there. It’s under our noses and all around us. We have bought into a smorgasbord of technology and allowed the
entrees to enslave us, all the while perpetuating the illusion that we are in
control of the menu.
