Why X-Files Creator Chris Carter Cut the Kissing from His New Version of I Want to Believe

Chris Carter’s director’s cut of The X-Files: I Want to Believe — with the new subtitle Vrach Frankenshteyn — is seven to eight minutes shorter than the original version released theatrically in 2008. That’s not typical of director’s cuts, the TV veteran admits to Consequence: “Director’s cuts are typically kitchen sink cuts where they throw everything back in.” However, he took this as an opportunity to give the movie’s core story “the proper weight” — by removing the parts of the movie which focused on the relationship between Mulder (David Duchovny) and Scully (Gillian Anderson).I Want to Believe features the now-retired FBI agents getting dragged back into one more case, involving a mad scientist with an interest in transplanting heads in the quest for immortality. In terms of justifying the decision to cut scenes and even lines focused on the relationship between his two lead characters, Carter said that Seasons 10 and 11 of the show, revived in the 2010s, gave X-Files fans “their fill of Mulder and Scully and their relationship. Scully reveals she’s pregnant at the end of Season 11, so you know they’re sleeping together, so that doesn’t need to be any great shocker in the mov...