PASADENA, CA -- Tension, unease, and paranoia may not be great for America. They’re perfect for The X-Files.

“This is a really exciting time to be telling X-Files-type stories,” Chris Carter told TV writers Friday. Carter is the creator and writer of The X-Files, whose disturbing paranormal tales return Jan. 24 at 10 p.m. ET for a six-episode revival on Fox.

“There’s tremendous distrust out there now,” said Carter. “Of authority, government, even the media.”

So The X-Files, which suggests the government covers up frightening, unexplained, dangerous phenomena, feeds seamlessly off that concern.

“It’s an interesting time,” said Carter, “to be shining a light into the darkness.”

Stars David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson (top) admitted Friday it took them a while to get used to the idea of returning.

Asked whether the popularity of the show during its original 1993-2002 run left them concerned they would be permanently stereotyped as X-Files agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, Duchovny and Anderson both said that for a while it had.

“It took me a long time, a good decade, to start thinking of The X-Files as the gift that it was,” said Anderson. “How fortunate I was to play such an iconic character in a show that was iconic in itself.”

Duchovny said that after X-Files he deliberately went out and looked for different kinds of roles. Finally making his artistic peace with Mulder, he said, “is why we’re able to come back now.”

Carter had no such angst. Asked how he came up with the storyline for this revival, he said he drew on a script he had written for a possible third X-Files movie.

“There was no more than talk” of that movie he said, but he wrote the script anyway, “more as a study.”

Once the TV series was set, Carter said, there were a couple of challenges.

One was crafting a story that could appeal to both hard-core fans and potential new viewers who knew nothing about a show that ended 13 years ago.

He’s done that by opening the new edition with a long sequence in which Mulder summarizes the history of the X-Files while explaining why they’re being revived now. Someone who had never seen a minute of the previous show or movies would, thanks to this monologue, be able to understand the new story.

A second challenge, Carter said, is that the original plan for this revival called for eight episodes, and then it was cut down to six.

That meant, he admitted, compressing some of what he planned to do, which included balancing lighter-toned episodes with darker stories and mythology.

“We still have two mythology episodes,” he said. “As a re-entry, you need to get into the characters’ lives, and you also want a variety of episodes. Eight would have been better, but six is doable. It works.”

“You want to pay homage to the mythology we’ve done as well as introduce new twists,” said Duchovny. “You have to honor the fans as well as serve people who know nothing about it.”

As for where The X-Files could go from here, Carter said he’s “just waiting for Fox to come back and say they want more.”

That’s not out of the question. On a separate panel Friday, Fox Entertainment Co-CEO Gary Newman said he would “absolutely be open” to further X-Files productions.

“The biggest obstacle to this one,” Newman added, “was scheduling. These actors are in great demand. But just the other night at the premiere, Gillian and David and I were joking about doing more. So we’d be on-board if scheduling can be worked out.”