The X-Files: Season 10

"[Chris Carter has] brought back and distilled the show into six hours of pure X-Files, good and bad. Duchovny and Anderson are entertaining and reliably classic (if unsurprising), conspiracies are discussed in clandestine secrecy (if confusingly), flashbacks reveal exciting truths (that feel more important to the characters than maybe to you), and Mulder's extraterrestrial friends feel tantalizingly closer than ever (and then they aren't, again)."

"After a skittery and slightly tedious start, which is heavy on Carter's need to keep infusing Mulder and Scully's world with a convoluted master theory, The X-Files settles in and starts to relocate some of its creepy vibe and playfulness."

"The new run of The X-Files may well, in time, encompass some more up-to-date conspiracies. If so, they'll be welcome. Nobody is likely to grieve long over the absence of the latest on Roswell and invading aliens from space."

"At a minimum, wait until Monday when the series airs a second episode that's a marginal improvement on Sunday's dispiriting premiere.... Things do get better in Monday's episode, which dumps the mythology for stand-alone horror, and with next week's comic outing as the series continues its tradition of mixing in the three forms. But "better" is not "good"--and nothing shakes the depressing sense that time has passed the series and the characters by."

"After a sluggish start in the opener, which dived too deeply into the murky swamp of alien-human conspiracy.... Things pick up the next night with spooky-icky generic manipulation. Now, at the midpoint: "Mulder & Scully Meets the Were-Monster," by Emmy winner Darin Morgan at his whimsical best."

"Mulder's suspiciousness feels, now, like a dull stating of something close to conventional wisdom, and the show's mysteries lack the spark they once had. The great success of The X-Files's paranoid vision may be that its popularity made a series revival feel, ultimately, behind the times."

"The first episode is called "My Struggle," which aptly describes the experience of sitting through it. It lumbers. It plods. The actors chew sawdusty mouthfuls of expository dialogue.... Thankfully, the second episode shakes the dourness and gives Mulder and Scully more room to breathe. But it's the third--a comic palate-cleanser in the "monster of the week" vein--that finally recreates the show's oddball delights."

"What we're left with is a very underwhelming hour that will force even diehard fans (and yes, I was one of them) to consider whether pushing onward is really worth the time."

"Those expecting a return to form should not be disappointed: Both for good and ill, The X-Files is back, and in essentially the original packaging."

"The three episodes represent what was good and maybe not so good about the original series. They also remind us that, somehow, even when Carter and company went off the rails, The X-Files was usually worth watching."

"The writing is alarmingly clunky, less a coherent story than a pastiche of beloved catchphrases, iconic images, and exposition dumps, as well as blatantly gif-ready moments."

"It starts well enough, with effects-filled flashbacks to Roswell 1947 and a call from Assistant Director Skinner (Mitch Pileggi) that brings the old team back together--Scully in her scrubs helping put ears on earless children, and Mulder an Internet-perusing recluse who dresses himself from the Travis Bickle Catalog for Men. But it collapses into poorly motivated, out-of-nowhere speechifying, accompanied by stock footage of old puzzling phenomena. Fortunately the other two episodes push the right buttons."

"The look of the new X-Files may be familiar, but as a whole, it feels rote and unintentionally dreary."

"Even when stripped down to its bare bones, The X-Files has plenty to offer its audience."

"What’s striking about watching The X-Files in 2018 is just how rejuvenated it feels. While it’s never going to hit the heights of the third or fourth season from the original series (which aired from 1993 to 2002), the 2018 iteration is a damn sight better than the 2016 one."

"The X-Files is the most paranoid, subversive show on TV right now...Filled with florid dialogue (''You've seen things that weren't meant to be seen!'') and not-bad special effects, X-Files is a hoot about hooey."