A Tangled Knot I can no Longer Untie.
Following the “Duane Barry / Ascension” Episodes are : “3” (Mulder struggling with Scully still missing and investigating a holy trinity of vampires), “One Breath” (Scully returns near death), and “Firewalker” (Similar to “Ice” but with a team studying volcanoes).
There is no reference to disability in “One Breath”. In looking at “3” and at “Firewalker”, two commonalities can be seen. One is that in both episodes mental illness is used to explain the crimes being caused by men, but in both cases, the crime is not occurring as a result of mental illness. The second is a tie-in, as there is in many episodes examined so far, in Mulder’s own mental health.
In “3” a confused, traumatized and sleep deprived Mulder investigate a holy trinity of vampires who kill for blood and to become immortal. Mulder does not initially believe these three are actual vampires. In an episode without Scully, Mulder must play the skeptic and believer. Mulder assumes the Scully’s skeptic role in her abduction, as Scully will assume the believer’s role in season eight with Mulder’s abduction. In this skeptic role, Mulder must say the unlikely line for him, “This man is clearly delusional." When the man does die from fourth degree burns when exposed to normal sunlight, Mulder cannot believe the evidence and says "I believe this man's disease was psychological". The man will appear again immortal and still intent on killing, and so, in this case, his disease was not psychological. In an episode that is generally hated by fans, the fact that the abduction of Scully had turned Mulder into a skeptic is never fully explained. The fact that Mulder's lack of belief caused a man's death results in little remorse. Mulder sleeps with a woman, with a significant history of trauma, who has not killed (until the end), but has tasted blood. Sleeping with any woman not Scully, yet alone a suspect, is not in character. None of this is explained adequately. It might be surmised that it is because he is in grief, has experienced trauma, and says he no longer sleeps, but that could be better explained. The last episode before Duane Barry is “Sleepless” which explores the psychological effects of sleep deprivation. It is possible the writers thought viewers would see the link without the need for clarification. It is easier to see this link in a streaming binge today, then it would have been network airing an episode a week with two episodes in between. It does in fact make sense that Mulder is not himself.
In “Firewalker,” the agents are sent to investigate at least one death in a field study of volcanoes with a team that has lost contact. The genius lead scientist, Daniel, is identified as the main suspect and, it turns out, is the murderer. The surprise is why.
The other team members assert that Daniel, “slipped into madness" and started to kill his colleagues. He leaves notes on the project including a journal entry “The mind is a tangled knot I can no longer untie.” His girlfriend shares that he does have a bipolar disorder. In Daniel we are supposed to see a comparison to Mulder. They are both work obsessed geniuses with strange beliefs. With Scully back to play the skeptic role, the familiar dynamic between the agents return. Scully suggests that Mulder is paranoid. However it turns out that a fungal infection from a spore has taken over his colleagues body and are bursting through their throats killing them. Yes, the scientist is mad, but the mad scientist motivation is to prevent the spread to the community at large.
The portrayal of the mental health condition again uses words such as flipped out, paranoid, There is an odd description of bi-polar disorder - "He runs hot and cold.” Additionally it is unclear if his genius is part of the madness. There is a discussion that he sees things other men only see in their sleep and then forget once awake. This episode relies on the genius, mad scientist trope with an emphasis on the mad. On the other hand, one could argue that he was incredibly successful, revered by his colleagues and when he was taking his medication was "ok." The twist is that he was morally justified to be killing his colleagues and his reasoning was based on sound scientific analysis. For the 1990s this makes this a fairly positive portrayal of a person with mental illness within the mad scientist trope.