x-files: a third movie on the horizon?

David Duchovny was quoted last week as being supportive of the idea of a third X-Files movie:

As far as the X-Files movie I’d like to do next, if we get a chance to do it, would be a return to the heart and soul of the mythology, which is the alien-oriented conspiracy. I think it’s natural for The X-Files to have another movie in 2012, so we’ll see if we get to do it.

This makes me simultaneously happy and also angry.

Happy because HELLS TO THE YES. Even though I am basically convinced that the Cigarette Smoking Man’s prophecy about the Mayans predicting the alien invasion and we’re all going to be killed at the hands of extraterrestrials the day after my 26^th birthday, I could totally get behind a movie about the subject. And not just because you KNOW that Scully and Mulder would totally find a way to STOP the alien invasion and then I wouldn’t have to live in constant fear of having my face pulled apart by little pinchers or being infected with the black oil or having my arms cut off or being physically bested by a supersoldier or having all of my orifices sealed off or any of the other terrifying capabilities that the X-Files aliens have had throughout the years.

And angry because they kind of screwed the pooch on the whole “let’s make an epic X-Files movie.” Because the second movie SUCKED.

I’m sorry, but it did, and you know it.

They should have made an epic alien movie the first time 20^th Century Fox gave Chris Carter the go-ahead to revisit the series.  But it was poorly marketed, got bad reviews, and barely turned a profit.  There’s basically no reason at all why Fox would want to greenlight a third movie.

I said the first time around that to make money off of The X-Files, all you have to do is make a movie that nerdfaces like me are going to go see three times and then buy the DVD.  You just have to sell it to the nerds—I mean, look at Star Trek, for crying out loud.  Do you think J.J. Abrams went into those meetings and was like, “Yeah, we’re going to make a standalone Star Trek movie that has no effect on the canon whatsoever and pays no attention to the years and years of backstory that’s been written for these characters”? Hell no, he didn’t do that. Sure, it had its devices to bring in new audiences, and technically it did dispense with a lot of the canon, but it was still true to the heart of the series.  I Want to Believe wasn’t.

Why the producers and the writers decided to make an X-Files movie without aliens is just so beyond me it’s not even funny.

It’s really not funny.

So when they say they want to do a mytharc movie for 2012, I’m glad that they realize the potential there, but I’m also frustrated by the fact that they didn’t just make this movie the first time around.

Because, yeah, what I want to see is Mulder and Scully kicking alien ass and taking alien names.  I want explosions and government conspiracy and unmarked tanker trunks and scenes that take place ON A SPACESHIP and all of those things that kept this freaking show on the air for nine seasons.

A car chase wouldn’t be bad either.