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This will go into a few spoilers, so if you haven’t seen The X-Files: I Want to Believe… well, there’s no need to trouble yourself.

If you’re going to bring back two beloved characters from a popular TV show that ended six years ago, then the premise had better be good. Instead, Mulder and Scully are in something that could pass as an extended TV episode.

The X-Files creator Chris Carter had wanted to make a second movie while the TV show was still running, and again right after the series ended. The reason it took so long for another X-Files film to come about was a legal issue about profit participation between Carter and 20th Century Fox. It eventually turned into a very long lawsuit that prevented filming, and wasn’t resolved till early 2007. Once production was underway, the plot was kept secret, with the script supposedly kept in a safe while the majority of actors had only read the scenes that they were in. David Duchovny built a bit of buzz, as he revealed in interviews that the film would be “the horror movie of the week aspect,” of the show, saying, “It’s like one of the classic episodes from the first couple of seasons.”

The FBI is in Somerset, West Virginia searching for one of their own agents, Monica Bannan (Xantha Radley), who recently went missing. Led by agents Mosely Drummy (Xzibit) and Dakota Whitney (Amanda Peet), their investigation is a little strange when a former priest, Father Joe (Billy Connolly), contacts the FBI, claiming to be receiving visions of her, and that she’s alive. He eventually leads them to a man’s severed arm, which happens to have her blood on it. Weird. This is the point when you call Mulder (David Duchovny) and Scully (Gillian Anderson), so Agent Whitney sends for them, believing that Mulder’s insight just might help them track down their missing agent.

With a modest production budget of $30 million, The X Files: I Want to Believe opened in the US on July 25, 2008. It reached #4 with an opening weekend take of $10 million. The film had the misfortune to open during the second weekend of The Dark Knight; not the best move. Duchovny and Anderson, as well as writer/producer Frank Spotnitz, blamed the release schedule for its poor box office. “The only thing worse would be to open with Batman,” said Duchovny, “and nobody would’ve done that.” On its second weekend it dropped a huge 66% down to #9 with $3.3 million. The film took just $20.9 million at the US box office. It did a little better overseas, taking $47.3 million. Finishing with a tidy worldwide sum of $68.3 million, it certainly wasn’t a flop, but it was a was a major step down when compared to the previous film, Fight the Future, which opened to $30 million back in 1998 and ended with $83.8 million in the US. It also finished with $189 million worldwide.

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