Black oil
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| The X-Files character | |
 |
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| Black Oil | |
|---|---|
| Affiliated with | Colonists |
| First appearance | 3x15 Piper Maru |
| Last appearance | Vienen |
| Portrayed by | None |
Black oil is a creation of the TV series The X-Files, starring David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson.
In the series, the Black Oil, also called Black Cancer, Purity, the Oilean, and the Alien virus, represents an alien entity/life force/virus. It appears as a liquid with the consistency of crude oil, which can move on its own, and is sentient. It can hibernate (thousands of years), usually in petroleum deposits. When it comes into contact with humans, it absorbs itself into the host, sometimes appearing to move directly under the skin and over the eyes of the victim. After pooling in the third ventricle of the brain (Vienen), it takes possession of the person and controls them. The oil is able to kill other humans by inflicting massive doses of radiation, though it is somehow able to simultaneously protect its host from injury. According to a conspiracy theorist Mulder encounters, the black oil was used by Iraq during the Gulf War.
The Syndicate, the shadow government of The X-Files, in cooperation with the alien colonists, develop a way to quietly introduce the virus into an unsuspecting public, through the use of bees. The colonists would then be able to use human beings as a slave race. The Syndicate, however, secretly try to create a vaccine to protect themselves, which they codename "Purity Control." While the Purity Control project ultimately fails, a rival Russian shadow group is successful in developing a weak vaccine to the Black Cancer, which eventually falls into the hands of the Syndicate.
Later in the X-Files film, it is discovered that the black oil is able to use a human body as an incubator in order to gestate (and as a result, killing the host) a mature gray alien being. The Syndicate is dismayed to learn this, but continue to pretend to work alongside the colonists, while attempting to strengthen the weak vaccine they have acquired from Russian conspirators.
According to the Well-Manicured Man, the entity first walked the earth before dinosaurs. Then, as told by Cigarette Smoking Man, the oil influenced human evolution, and eventually went into hibernation underground. Cassandra Spender recounts that the colonists are planning to use the oil as part of their plan to repopulate Earth, as they have done before to other civilizations in the universe.
Human alien hybrids have an innate immunity to the virus, so the voluntary abduction of the conspirators' family members is in order to facilitate their future. The entire conspiracy plot to cooperate with the alien colonization plan is implemented with the aim of being given access to the black oil, in order to try and develop a vaccine. This attempt is semi-successful, as the "weak-vaccine" administered to Scully while in the Antarctica alien ship causes the entire ship to depart its underground residence.
First introduced in the season 3 episode "Piper Maru", it is believed that the idea was taken from an earlier episode, "Ice", which features a similar parasite.
[edit] Trivia
- The black oil is served in the school cafeteria in the Invader Zim episode "Dib's Wonderful Life of Doom".
| The X-Files | |
|---|---|
| Canon | |
| Main Characters | |
| Conspiracy |
Cigarette Smoking Man | Deep Throat | X | Alex Krycek | Alien Bounty Hunter | Well-Manicured Man | First Elder | Second Elder
Marita Covarrubias | Conrad Strughold | Knowle Rohrer | The Syndicate | Purity Control | Black oil | Colonists | Men in Black |
| Other Characters | |
| Cast and Crew | |
| Related | |
