What Chris is trying to say is that The X-Files: I Want To Believe, will not be the load of old tripe we’re expecting; this despite the reoccurring cast of David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson apparently being past their pin-up days and Billy Connelly appearing on screen for more than five seconds.

The plot, for all the spindly details we shall divulge, revolves around Connelly’s Father Joe character, the two tarnished former FBI agents reuniting (in the sack!) and something excitingly weird going on in the snow. There’s kidnapping too, we’ll tell you that much.

Pity then that after eight, long years of not waiting and happily getting on with our lives, this X-Files re-boot is a bigger disappointment than parenthood. Except Ms Anderson – she still looks fine enough to spread on toast – but even she can’t save this mess. Everything appears to happen via staggering coincidence or ‘just because’. Carter’s motto must be ‘If in doubt, write it anyway’.

To call the movie an extended episode would be an insult to the memorable episodes out there. Remember how good Tombs, Nisei or The Host were? Yeah, well they’re nothing like I Want To Believe. The central (DON’T LOOK KIDS! SPOILER!) ‘body harvesting’ theme is interesting, yet skimmed over during the climax and never properly explained. Now, the show has made its bread and butter out of not explaining things, but rarely to the point of incoherence as it does here.

(SPOILER DO STOP NOW!)

On the plus side, there’s sexy Anderson again, a nifty pursuit through a deserted building and maybe one good scare every half hour. Ultimately though this film ends up like masturbation; enjoyable enough while it lasts, but in the grand scheme of things, a complete waste of time.

So it was always inevitable that an X-Files sequel would be on the cards. And it just so happens that one's coming out in a few months. But nobody has the foggiest clue about what it'll actually be about.

But that's where X-Files sequel director Chris Carter and screenwriter Frank Spotnitz come in. They've decided to spill the beans about the X-Files sequel without actually mentioning anything that's going to happen in it at all. Still interested? Yes? Well that's fairly depressing.

Once you've been in a show like X-Files, you're more or less promised geek adoration for life. While that can be a good thing – it means that you've got a guaranteed audience for your dire forays into sub-erotic trip-hop – it can also stop you from ever doing anything popular ever again.

Look at the two main stars of X-Files, for instance. Gillian Anderson went off to have a baby, develop an odd British accent and star in a film about pushing shotguns up people's bottoms, while David Duchovny now just spends his time annoying bad funk-rock bands. And they've tried to distance themselves from X-Files, either by making spoof sci-fi movies like Duchovny or just saying that they hated X-Files like Anderson.

But despite all that, a sequel to 1998's X-Files movie – you, know, the one about all the spooky bees – is coming out in July. But plot details for this X-Files sequel have been scant so far. Sure, there was the leaked X-Files sequel trailer, but that just convinced us that it was going to be a film about some spooky snow featuring a guest appearance from Billy Connolly as Father Christmas. And that can't be what it's about, can it? Can it?

Never fear, for the two creative brains behind the X-Files sequel Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz have decided to reveal all. Well, we say 'all'…

"While this is not a mythology movie, it's true to everything that's come before," Spotnitz said at the William S. Paley Television Festival. "It's true to Mulder and Scully, who they are and where they would be this point in their lives and all of the experiences that they've had."

So that's that all cleared up. Thanks for your time, Frank. No really. 

Alright, so we can appreciate that Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz want to keep plot details for the X-Files secret close to their chest, because once they finally reveal that it's just going to be two hours of the same old hokey shit that everyone got sick of at some point 13 years ago, then the movie's just not going to have the same pull, is it?

But still, it wouldn't hurt to tell us what the X-Files sequel is going to be called, would it? Unless it's actually going to be called X-Files 2: Look Out, Santa's Got A Spooky Banjo! then the title won't give too much away. So it's over to Chris Carter to make the big reveal:

"I can't tell you. I know what I want it to be, but Fox has some ideas of their own."

Wow, the X-Files sequel really is top secret, isn't it? Everyone's probably just hard at work coming up with a movie title that will get the biggest audience possible to pay to see it. And if that's the case, we've got just the right title for them that they can use free of charge.

Indiana Jones 4.

Read more:

`X-Files' Creator Spills Film Details – Reuters