X-Files creator Chris Carter has returned to TV - sort of - with The After. It’s a 54-minute pilot that Amazon has started streaming in the U.S. So far, that’s all fans will get of the sci-fi drama. One episode, and that’s it. If they like it, well, there might be more. Or not.

Carter chatted with fans during a recent reddit AMA to talk about the new show as well as The X-Files, which celebrated its 20th anniversary last year. Here are some of the highlights.

What do you imagine Mulder and Scully are doing those days? Is Scully still a doctor? Is Mulder tweeting about the conspiracies of the Government?

The answer to that question, in my mind, is yes. Scully is still a doctor. Mulder is not on Twitter, because he is afraid of social media. He would be on an anonymous social media platform, like reddit. He's become a magician.

Do you ever regret the decision to kill off well loved characters like the Lone Gunmen or even [Alex] Krycek and Cigarette Smoking Man?

I think it's a waste of time to second-guess yourself. But as I said to Jerry Hardin, who played Deep Throat who was killed off the first season of the show, no one's ever really dead on the X-files. It's basically the opposite of Game of Thrones.

If you had the X Files to do over again, what, if anything, would you change or do differently?

…There are two things I would change, but I refuse to reveal them.

Personal favourite scary episode?

I'm going to say Beyond the Sea. Because I think it was in the early stages of the show, one of the best-directed, written and realized stories that capitalized perfectly on the concept.

What is your biggest regret about the X-Files?

That Elizabeth Taylor was never in the show.

I suppose that in some hidden corner of your mind the story for XF3 already exists, in some form or another. If you could describe that story using only 3 words, what they would be?

The second movie could definitely be summed up in 3 words: "don't give up."

The third movie: "Just you wait."