Oswald and Jack at the barbeque

Nobody bearing the name Oswald, in the conspiracy-driven world of the X Files, is going to be anything but a destroyer of all that America holds dear.

It might appear that, after the ‘Anasazi’, ‘The Blessing Way’ and ‘Paperclip’ arc, that things are reverting to normal. The two best X Files review sites on the Internet have it down as either “just a well-done, garden variety episode of a show that could do so much more than that” or "a rather small episode", which "takes a great deal of pride in how small it is.” (cf. A.V. Club and The m0vie blog, respectively). If you watch this episode immediately after the above mentioned three-parter, there is no escaping the feeling of “What? After war-criminal-nazi-scientists and alien conspirators and sister and father dying, this week it’s, what, a boy barbequeing cows? Tell me, this is not happening!"

Well, it is happening - and it’s not.

It is happening because D.P.O. is set in small town America and is about a boy who, well, barbecues cows - oh, and a few people, including his best mate!

It’s not happening because of that name. 

Hopefully, there is not a single American out there for whom that name doesn’t resonate!

Just after a three-part story, we now have a villian with a three-part name, and not just any name!

Lee Harvey Oswald

Darin Peter Oswald

This is the X Files. I’m allowed wild, paranoid delusions!

Elemental forces are to Oswald a mere plaything and he wields them on a whim. And who is his first victim? None other than a boy called Jack. And Jack is sitting in his car when he is assassinated.

Darin Peter Oswald lacks a father and his mother shows him no sign of affection. (cf. Lee Harvey Oswald) 

Oswald is “anchored in the teen angst of the nineties” (cf. The m0vie blog) and all his actions stem from his small-town mind coping with forces beyond his ability to fully comprehend. Even his only friend, Zero, in suggesting that they move away from the dead-end life of the small town, can only suggest going to Vegas where Darin “could do some serious damage.” 

Zero is the only one who comes close to understanding Darin. In judging his friend’s misguided infatuation with his former remedial teacher, the wife of his boss, Zero tells Darin, “You can’t compete with Frank. He’s good-looking, he’s got his own shop plus, he fixes things instead of just smashing stuff up. A woman like that … wants someone special.” Unfortunately, Darin has the perfect reply, “I’m special.” And, of course, he is. But he is special in a way that can only ever instill fear, never respect, and certainly not the love that Darin craves.

Having been struck by lightning, Darin wields the power to manipulate electricity. 

Ever since Italian physicist Alessandro Volta created the first steady flow of electricity and Michael Faraday created his electric dynamo, this awesome power of nature was seen as a possible source of life itself. In 1818, the same year in which Mary Shelley published ‘Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus’ (a mandatory read and probably my favorite novel), experiments were conducted in which electricity was used in attempts to reanimate recently executed criminals. Ignorance and science fiction, right?

Isn’t it done almost daily, with the iconic shout of “Clear” as the paddles are rubbed and applied to the chest?

In his attempt to win Mrs Kiveat, Darin causes her husband, his rival, to have a massive coronary. After ensuring the defibrillator wouldn’t work, Darin performs the task by laying his hands on Mr Kiveat’s chest, telling him not to worry, “I’ve seen how they do it on TV."

This is the central scene to this episode. It centers around Darin switching the lights at a junction, causing traffic chaos. This is when we know that this is a story about more than small town angst and teenagers. Darin has the power to rip asunder the very fabric of American society. If the automobile is the ultimate symbol of American freedom and individuality, Darin is messing with America’s very identity. Society only works if there is order; as we have seen so recently as the last Presidential election, attack the infrastructure and chaos ensues. 

We also see in this scene how it could all have been so different. Darin has the power to heal through the laying on of hands! What he actually does, he does for his own selfish purposes. But it didn’t need to have been that way!

As mentioned above, Darin’s three-part name ties this episode into the three-part story that came immediately before. And it’s an indictment that resounds just as loudly today as it did in 1995 when this episode first aired.

Those with the power to make life so much more for ordinary small-town Americans are so caught up in their own machinations and conspiracies that there is little concern for the “low man on the pole”. If America was truly a meritocracy, there would be hope for Darin, alternatives before him other than petty-minded jealousies and destruction. But power resides with those who can afford it, leaving the likes of Darin no alternative but to lash out and break apart the fabric of a society that seeks only to keep him in his place, with no way of expressing his talents to the benefit of all.

From the very first moment we see him return from the bathroom, we have him pegged, we know exactly who he is and we would dismiss him as readily as Jack - if this wasn’t the X Files. 

Darin Peter Oswald is the dead heart of America that atrophies in its own shell for lack of proper exercise.