I want to believe… that NBC’s “Hannibal” will be a good show. The casting of “X-Files” star Gillian Anderson for a multi-episode arc bodes well for the hour-long drama, chronicling the early days of Hannibal Lecter, the notorious cannibal/killer introduced in the Thomas Harris novels “Red Dragon” and “Silence of the Lambs.”

EW reports that Anderson, who had taken a 10-year hiatus from acting in television, will play Lecter’s personal psychologist, Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier. The series is written by showrunner Bryan Fuller, creator of the ABC Emmy Award-winning series “Pushing Daisies” and Showtime’s highly underrated “Dead Like Me.”

Fuller tells EW:

Every therapist needs their own head examined and we are ecstatic that Gillian Anderson has chosen Hannibal to mark her return to American television after 10 years to portray Dr. Lecter’s personal psychiatrist.

Her intelligence and sophistication, not to mention her pedigree of ground-breaking TV, make her the perfect actress to match wits and psychological manipulations with one of the greatest villains of pop culture. I couldn’t be more excited.

“Hannibal” stars Lawrence Fishburne as Jack Crawford, Hugh Dancy as FBI agent Will Graham, Anna Chlumsky as FBI trainee Miriam Lass, Aaron Abrams as forensic investigator Brian Zeller, Caroline Dhavernas as profiler Dr. Alana Bloom and Mads Mikkelsen as Dr. Hannibal Lecter.