UK Edition
Feeds
If you go down to the woods today, you're sure of one hell of a big surprise if it happens to be the Olympic National Forest in Washington State. For that was the scene of a typically scary episode of the X Files that would make your timbers shiver for sure. Tree huggers beware!
This particular type of foliage might have had a raw deal in recent times, being regularly chopped down for materialistic human desires and all. But ask yourself this – where else can we get cricket bats from? Okay, that perhaps wasn't on the minds of Mulder and Scully as they embarked on their quest to uncover the grim truth about some disappearances.
Amidst the sinister looking trees, a group of 30 loggers - "in the full bloom of their manhood" according to the deadpan Fox Mulder - have gone missing, and our familiar FBI duo are on the case. "Come on Scully, it would be a nice trip to the forest," suggests Mulder, after his colleague sniffed at the suggestion of an investigative visit.
It transpires that contained within the wood of these ancient trees are micro-organisms, not of this planet, that like to descend in a luminous green haze once the darkness falls. Swarming round their victims and encasing them in a cocoon, the bodies of the unfortunate souls quickly decompose. Could the fact that the trees were being felled with increasing regularity have cajoled the bugs into reacting in such a hostile manner?
Mulder and Scully, isolated in the forest, ultimately discover that there is no hiding place out in the wilderness during the night, as the green swarm manage to infiltrate the car they're hiding in through the air conditioning system. A helicopter full of suspicious government types arrives just in time to cut them free from their cocoons, but now knowing that the bark of these tree-dwelling creatures is backed up with a wicked bite.
After viewing this episode, a horde of X-Files devotees were certainly not too keen to head to the woods for a picnic. Let's hope the teddy bears have life insurance.
