The X-Files is an American science fiction television series first broadcast in September 1993 and followed by two feature films: The X-Files and The X-Files: I Want to Believe. The characters defined the overarching mythology of the series. They appeared in a range of episodes across several seasons. Overview The first seven seasons of The X-Files star Gillian Anderson as Dana Scully, a medical doctor and hard-line scientist assigned to work alongside Fox Mulder (David Duchovny), an esteemed FBI profiler who left his coveted position to head up a unit that investigates the paranormal and the unexplained. Tasked with debunking Mulder's work, Scully eventually comes to question her own faith, while Mulder continues to search through the archives of the Hoover building in order to find out what happened to his missing sister. The first seven seasons feature recurring appearances by Walter Skinner (Mitch Pileggi), conspiracy theorists The Lone Gunmen (Tom Braidwood, Dean Haglund, and Bruce Harwood), and secretive informants Deep Throat (The X-Files) (Jerry Hardin) and X (The X-Files) (Steven Williams). The eighth season and the ninth season represent a change in the direction of the show: Duchovny departs the regular cast and thereafter takes the role of intermittent lead. Scully, now a reluctant believer, is partnered with Special Agent John Doggett (Robert Patrick), a former NYPD detective and a strict skeptic who is still grief-stricken over the death of his son, Luke. As Doggett begins to work on the X-files, Scully continues her search for Mulder, while also carrying his child. At the end of the eighth season, Scully departs the X-files, accept a teaching position at the FBI Academy. Thereafter she acts as only a consultant to Doggett. Annabeth Gish (as Monica Reyes), and Pileggi (as Skinner), join the main cast during the ninth season after recurring previously. The tenth season once again stars Duchovny, Anderson, and Pileggi, while Patrick is notably absent. Gish guest-stars in the finale as Reyes. Starring Also starring Recurring Notable Guests Main cast and characters Fox Mulder Fox William Mulder is played by David Duchovny, a trained FBI profiler who believes in the existence of extraterrestrial visitors and a government conspiracy to hide or deny the truth regarding extraterrestrial life. Mulder and his partner Special Agent Dana Scully work in the FBI's X-files office, which is concerned with cases with particularly mysterious or possibly supernatural circumstances that were marked as unsolvable and