Ryan Coogler Pondering ‘X-Files’ Reboot, Creator Chris Carter Says

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever director Ryan Coogler is eyeing a reboot of The X-Files — at least according to the show’s creator, Chris Carter.

Carter dropped Coogler’s name during an interview this week on the CBC radio show On the Coast With Gloria Macarenko. Discussing the upcoming 30th anniversary of The X-Files premiering on Fox, Carter said, “I just spoke to a young man, Ryan Coogler, who is going to remount The X-Files with a diverse cast.”

X-Files producer 20th Television declined to comment.

During the interview, Carter also noted that any update of the show would take place in a world much more steeped in conspiracy theories than when the original series debuted: “[Coogler] has his work cut out for him, because we covered so much territory.”

The X-Files ran from 1993-2002 on Fox and spawned a pair of feature films released in 1998 and 2008. Series leads David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson reunited for two short-run revivals of the show at Fox in 2016 and 2018; Anderson said after the second that she was done playing the character of FBI agent Dana Scully.

In 2020, Fox put an animated comedy based on the series into development — focusing on a B-team of agents working in New Mexico — but it never got off the ground and is no longer active. Since the last X-Files season aired in 2018, the show’s studio, 20th TV, has moved from Fox to Disney — where Coogler’s Proximity Media has a five-year overall TV deal.

As part of the deal, Coogler and Proximity are developing a series set in Wakanda for Disney+. The filmmaker is also an executive producer of the upcoming Marvel series Ironheart on Disney+. Its lead character, RiRi Williams (Dominique Thorne), made her onscreen debut in Wakanda Forever.