After convincing the Academy of Motion Pictures and Arts and Sciences that vampire movies are the most Oscar-worthy movies of all, for his next trick, director Ryan Coogler is going to prove that the truth is, indeed, out there. Following through on his desire to believe, Coogler has cast genre and drama heavyweight Danielle Deadwyler in an unspecified role in his upcoming X-Files reboot. Hulu has already given the show the greenlight, with Coogler himself writing and directing the show’s pilot.
Per The Hollywood Reporter, the show also has an official logline, which deviates ever so slightly from Chris Carter’s original series. “Two highly decorated but vastly different FBI agents form an unlikely bond when they are assigned to a long-shuttered division devoted to cases involving unexplained phenomena.” Back in the ’90s, the FBI assigned Special Agent Scully (Gillian Anderson) the unenviable position of debunking Special Agent Fox Mulder’s (David Duchovny) crackpot theories, which often turn out to be true. As of now, it’s unclear whether Deadwyler will play the skeptic or the conspiracist, but with a long history in genre movies and TV, including a role in Jane Schoenbrun’s ode to the ’90s sci-fi TV of their youth, I Saw The TV Glow, she should fit in nicely.
In October, Coogler told Variety that he was making the show for his mom, who was a big fan. “Like my relationship with Rocky with my dad, The X-Files is one of those things with my mom,” Coogler said. “My mom means the world to me, so this is a big one for me. I want to do right by her and the fans. My mom has read some of the stuff I wrote for it. She’s fired up.” The stakes couldn’t be higher for Coogler, whose relationship with his mother now hinges on who he casts as The Lonegunman.
The last, and seemingly completely memory-holed, season of The X-Files aired in 2018.
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