Hulu has unveiled the first trailer for the director's cut of the thriller "The X-Files: I Want to Believe — Doctor Frankenstein." The new edition of the film will be released on August 14 on Hulu and Disney+ and will receive an R rating ("adults only") instead of the PG-13 rating with which the film appeared in cinemas in 2008.
Chris Carter said that the new version will allow the film to return to the darker version he originally envisioned. According to the director, Fox management asked to soften the picture during production to maintain a broader age rating:
"I made a movie that was too scary, and Fox management told me directly — they needed a PG-13 rating. Now I have the opportunity to go back and make the scary movie I intended. This is not a director's cut for the sake of a director's cut. I am finally bringing to the screen what was in the script but didn't make it into the film."
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, the director also noted that he initially considered the film a modern interpretation of the Frankenstein story:
"We were going to make a realistic version of the Frankenstein story, but due to a number of circumstances, our Frankenstein never left the operating room. The opportunity to re-attach electrodes to him gave me particular pleasure."
The original "The X-Files: I Want to Believe" was released in 2008, six years after the main series concluded. David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson reprised their roles as Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, who investigated the disappearance of women and encountered a case involving a disgraced priest plagued by mysterious visions, as well as illegal medical experiments.
The film received mostly negative reviews and grossed approximately $68 million worldwide. For comparison, the first full-length installment of the franchise, released in 1998, earned about $189 million.
The release of the director's cut coincided with preparations for a new stage in the franchise's development. Ryan Coogler, director of "Sinners," is working on a reboot of "The X-Files." Filming of the pilot episode with Danielle Deadwyler and Himesh Patel has been completed, but a full season has not yet been ordered.