2 seemingly innocent words in the official description for Ryan Coogler’s X-Files reboot have me worried

I want to believe this reboot can be good

Ryan Coogler’s upcoming X-Files reboot has cast Himesh Patel as one of its leads, in addition to the previously announced Danielle Deadwyler. Both are fantastic actors. Combine that with master storyteller Coogler, and there’s every reason to believe this reboot is going to be great. Yet, there are two words included in the official series description that really have me concerned.

According to Variety, the show’s official logline is as follows:

“Two highly decorated but vastly different FBI agents (Deadwyler, Patel) form an unlikely bond when they are assigned to a long-shuttered division devoted to cases involving unexplained phenomena.”

That all sounds fine, with one exception: The words “long-shuttered” could mean a few different things for this series, and each comes with its own issues.

Variety makes clear that Patel and Deadwyler are not playing Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, the characters that David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson made famous in the original series. Yet it’s unclear if this series exists within the same continuity as the original series. If it doesn’t, my only real concern about the series is the same as it would be for any other fresh reboot: Will it be able to recapture the magic of the original without just copying it?

Also, if this is a brand-new timeline, it’ll be a bit sad to see the door close on the original continuity, as the series never concluded in a way that any fan could call satisfactory. But that would ultimately be a better option than trying to tell a new story in the original X-Files universe.

Much more concerningly, “long shuttered” could mean that this series does exist within the same continuity as the original and that these new agents are picking up the X-Files after Mulder and Scully. Except, in the timeline of the original series, the X-Files division of the FBI hasn't been shuttered for all that long. In the last episode of 2018’s season 11, Deputy Director Kersh (James Pickens Jr.) says he’s shutting down the X-Files unit. Assuming he followed through on that, the X-Files has only been closed for eight years, which doesn’t really seem like it's that long.

There’s also the possibility that the new series follows the original series, but ignores the two seasons from the 2010s. While this kind of selective history has sometimes been successful (see 2018's Halloween, which picked up directly after the original and ignored all the sequels), it can also be confusing, and the last thing the X-Files needs is a more complicated story.

That really is the biggest issue with continuing off from the original series at all. While The X-Files is one of the best series from the 1990s, its biggest flaw has always been its confusing mythology, one that even the most loyal viewers often failed to keep track of. If Coogler, being the die-hard X-Files fan that he is, decides to embrace that continuity, it could act as an albatross around the neck of the series, dooming it to the same convoluted fate as the original.

Maybe this new show can find a balance and acknowledge a continuity with the original without getting in the weeds, but as the '90s series rewrites a lot of real-life history, it's hard to imagine Coogler will be able to avoid all of those land mines without contradicting something in the original series. Instead, he’d be much better off starting fresh, unencumbered by the continuity that so plagued the original — even at the risk of dissapointing some longtime fans.