Entertainment
A Sci-Fi Series Predicted 9/11 Months Before It Happened, And It’s Now Been Erased From Streaming
By Jennifer Asencio
| Published
The X-Files was famously about two FBI agents who investigated alien encounters and other cases popular with conspiracy theorists. It was only a matter of time before some turned up on the show as characters.
These conspiracy theorists were collectively known as The Lone Gunmen, a trio of nerdy misfits who published a conspiracy theory magazine. Eventually, the Lone Gunmen got their own show, called The Lone Gunmen, and the very first episode wound up accidentally predicting the only foreign attack on United States soil.
The Lone Gunmen Episode That Predicted The World Trade Center Attack
In the episode with the double-entendre name “Pilot,” the trio discovers a plot to use remote controls to crash a plane into the World Trade Center. Bad actors within the government would then use the false flag attack as justification to go after anti-American countries and organizations. With the help of a whistleblower, the heroes manage to save the day before the World Trade Center goes down.
If only it had been that way in real life. Six months after the episode’s March 4 premiere, the World Trade Center was actually struck by planes. Coincidentally, The Lone Gunmen was long off the air, having been cancelled due to low ratings.
Was The Lone Gunmen a victim of its own conspiracy-mindedness? Had 9/11 been the result of the kind of plot in the episode, its cancellation would look highly suspicious to the type of person who would subscribe to the trio’s newsletter. The Lone Gunmen actually got positive reviews from critics, but did not enjoy a very good time slot, airing adjacent to the equally doomed Firefly. The show had already fizzled out by June 2001.
The Creatives Who Came Up With Its 9/11 Prediction
The writers who came up with the story included Chris Carter, the creator of The X-Files, and his protege and eventual Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan. Both writers have proven themselves to be successful storytellers whose ideas have a significant impact on the public conversation.
The X-Files tinkered with the conspiracy theories The Lone Gunmen embraced and provided a socially acceptable way to talk about them. Breaking Bad and its spin-off Better Call Saul are both deep character studies into the lengths of depravity its protagonists were willing to embrace.
These are properties that became popular because they were well-crafted stories with compelling characters, even when those characters were villains. It is no wonder that they could accidentally predict a terrorist attack because they are good at making up the kinds of villains that would unleash such evils upon the world. They just weren’t expecting anyone to try it in real life.
Vince Gilligan’s latest show, Pluribus, is on Apple TV. Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul are available with a Netflix subscription. The X-Files streams on Hulu. The Lone Gunmen is mysteriously unavailable on streaming.
