Cinematic Disasters: The X Files: I Want To Believe

A retrospective by Brooks Rich

There has been a recent string of new content for TV shows that ended their runs years ago. Shows like Will & Grace and Mad About You returned with new episodes to moderate success. The big one was The X Files getting two more seasons, which as a die hard X Files fan I find average at best. Leave things in the past. Focus on new content and not this devotion to nostalgia. It is never the same. Case in point, The X Files's abysmal return to the big screen in 2008, I Want To Believe.

The worst sin this movie commits is being boring as sin. This film is painfully slow and at times also self righteous and up its own ass. It moves at a glacial pace and the characters just over analyze everything and go over everything we've already seen and heard from the show. Writer director Chris Carter, the creator of the X Files, said he wanted this to be a standalone film for both fans and non-fans but that doesn't work. The non-fans are probably uninterested in anything, nothing happens for long stretches, and die hard fans are frustrated. Why is this so boring? Mulder and Scully are back to the "will they won't they" point of their relationship, which was resolved in the show, and the whole thing feels unimportant. Also a convicted pedophile is seen as a sympathetic figure in this film. What the actual fuck, Carter?

If shows aren't going to evolve when they return, then what is the point? I know nostalgia is a thing and we miss the shows and movies we loved, but it never works. If the characters act the same as they did when the show ended, even after there was development when they ended, then it basically makes the final episodes moot. X Files belongs in the past. I don't need more episodes or content unless Carter does something interesting. Mulder is no long a young naive conspiracy theorist. He's a grizzled former federal agent who has been betrayed by his own government. The writing needs to show that. Avoid this painfully dull and atrocious film. Just rewatch the series main run. Or the first movie, Fight the Future, which is awesome.

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