JMS Usenet Posts - 9/12/2003
Dirk A. Loedding
:On a side note, damn did that thing sell out fast. The only shop I
:could hit Wednesday on the way to work was out at just a little after
:noon.
That's pretty much what I heard from a bunch of other retailers, which
is why I really urged folks to get in their orders ahead of time.
Last I heard this thing is just, like, *gone*....
jms
[Ed. Note: My own comic shop didn't pull a copy for me, despite it
being on my list ever since I heard about it coming out. Any sources
for finding a copy would be greatly appreciated.]
>More about Supreme Power:
Just to follow-up on this...I don't know if I passed along the info in
this forum or not, but the sales on Supreme Power #1, which hit stores
yesterday, the 6th, have gone over 100,000 which not only puts it in
the top five books, but it's the first time (according to Joe Quesada,
who knows these things) that a Max book or other imprint mainly aimed
at adults has broken 100,000.
And the reviews to this point have been great. It's really hit home
in a big way, which is what I was hoping would happen with this one.
Several have commented on the sense that they haven't really read a
story like this before (including the one at bureau42.com), which was
just what I was hoping for.
I just got the pencils in on issues 4 and 5, and the whole thing just
holds together so well, and the art is terrific, Gary's doing a great
job.
In any event...my thanks to all who picked it up, and we're off on
something quite extraordinary, I think, because the issues to come
just go from strength to strength. Issue 2 is an absolute kick in the
head.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Can a series change producers? Could Jeremiah be picked up from MGM
:by someone else, and continued? Has this level of shuttling occurred
:before?
In sequence...yes, yes, and it happens all the time.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:I have no recollection of the B5 actors chronically being forced to
:wait on the set for JMS to come rushing in with the latest few pages
:of his scripts. He works (admittedly very long hours) to keep this
:from happening. He works closely with the studios to know what his
:deadlines are and he makes those deadlines.
I have this kind of antiquated notion that if someone gives you
x-million bucks to make a show, it behooves you to act *responsibly*.
So really it's just a matter of being responsible in how you run a
show.
As a result, in every season of every show I've run, we always came in
under budget, anywhere from $100K to $500K. When I said I'd do that
on Jeremiah, they kind of laughed at me, 'cause it was a big show, big
names, big production values...we came in about $300K under in year 1,
and about $200K under in year 2.
On B5, Crusade and Jeremiah, we never had a forced call on an actor,
never had actors waiting around for pages to arrive on stage. We stay
5-6 scripts ahead at all times, so directors can prep efficiently.
And in 5 years of B5 plus Crusade, we had maybe 20 days of any serious
overtime. On Jeremiah I think we had a total of 18 over two seasons.
Just a matter of being responsible with other people's money.
jms
>JMS replies to a "thanks JMS for a wonderful show" post:
You're most welcome.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
Noted this elsewhere, but just so this is sure to get through...you can
now read the first sold-out issue of Supreme Power for free online at:
http://www.wizarduniverse.com/magazines/wizard/WZ20030815-sp_1.cfm
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:A more important question to ask is: Will JMS finish the series, or
:will he leave us without closure as he is doing with "Rising Stars".
SP is open-ended it doesn't have a "finish" planned at this time. It
could well go on for years.
And I'm not leaving anybody without closure on RS...there are details
that have to be worked out with Top Cow. Once they have corrected
those things, the book can be finished. It's that simple.
jms
>Posted on 8/23:
Just to pass along the following info which was put out today in a
press release from ibooks/Simon and Schuster. Please forgive the
release's rather grandiose phraseology.
jms
-------------------------------
iBOOKS PUBLISHES JMS' PROSE WORK
Press Release
He raised the bar for epic science-fiction storytelling on television
with his syndicated series Babylon 5, then followed it by elevating
the way in which superhero tales are told with his critically
acclaimed scripts for Marvel's The Amazing Spider-Man and Supreme
Power. Now, New York-based publishing house ibooks, inc. is pleased to
announce that it has solidified plans with Hugo, Eisner and Emmy
award-winning writer and producer J. Michael Straczynski to
re-introduce his growing number of fans to some of his earlier works.
October 2003 will see the release of Demon Night, Straczynski' first
novel. "What made Demon Night work," says Straczynski in a new
afterword written specifically for this edition, "and the reason that
it has now been picked up for republication by ibooks, is that I wrote
it for myself, out of a love of the form, the genre, and a desire to
be entertained by a story told about characters who mattered to me."
Following Demon Night will be Straczynski Unplugged, to be released in
April 2004, a collection of published and all-new short stories,
including a number of dark tales adapted from his episodes written for
the TV series The New Twilight Zone. At press time, release dates for
the remaining titles, the horror novel Othersyde and the
supernatural-mystery Tribulations, had not been determined.
Demon Night is not ibooks'first encounter with the writer, however:
His best-selling comic book series J. Michael Straczynski's Rising
Stars - published by Top Cow Comics - was novelized for ibooks in two
volumes by author Arthur Byron Cover. Both volumes are still available
from book retailers, with Book 3 to follow after the series reaches
its conclusion.
One doesn' have to look far to see just how popular a writer
Straczynski has become in recent years. At this year's Comic-Con
International: San Diego, Marvel Comics announced that pre-orders for
his upcoming Mature Readers series Supreme Power passed the
100,000-copy mark - a new record for retailer orders on a Mature
Readers title. He has worked as writer/producer for such series as
Murder, She Wrote, Jeremiah and Walker, Texas Ranger, and he has
published over 500 articles and numerous short stories for such
publications as the Los Angeles Times, Time Inc, Amazing Stories,
Penthouse, Writer's Digest, Pulphouse, The Los Angeles Herald Examiner
and Twilight Zone Magazine.
Scheduled for release in October 2003, Demon Night is a trade
paperback-sized novel retailing for $11.95, available now for ordering
through comic shops, book stores, and on-line book retailers (ISBN
0-7434-7522-4).
>Another mention of the read-for-free URL:
As expected, Supreme Power #1 has sold out just about everywhere,
topping 100,000 copies. But that left a lot of folks out in the cold
who wanted to read it.
Happily, because of all the demands to see it, the entire book has been made
available to read on-line at:
http://www.wizarduniverse.com/magazines/wizard/WZ20030815-sp_1.cfm
Enjoy.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Managed to pick up #1 whilst I was in London over the weekend. When
:is #2 out?
September 10th.
:BTW I think it's really really good!!
Many thanks, I'm quite happy with it.
jms
>JMS comments on a report about an attempt at reviving B5 being led by
>Jerry Doyle. http://filmforce.ign.com/articles/435/435444p1.html
A couple of points on this.
There have been no discussions concerning a return of the Babylon 5
series between myself and WB or any other studio or network. Nor do I
think anything is likely in that area.
Jerry took umbrage when, a few years ago, I commented on his statements
that he would be able to put togeether a new B5 series deal. From the
interview, he still seems to be in high dudgeon over this. But the fact
remains: I was correct in my statement, he didn't have the pieces in
place to make it happen. If he'd had the wherewithal to make it happen,
it would've; it didn't, so he didn't. My statement was correct.
Once again, the pieces simply aren't there. He has lined up a radio
guy who feels the show should return. Which is great, it's a terrific
compliment. But that is not in any way, manner, shape or form
anywhere near anything of a serious nature in terms of getting a show
on the air.
I've always been happy to listen to anyone -- Jerry, his pals, anybody
-- who would come to me with a serious proposal and have the moxie,
the money, and the resources to make it happen. It hasn't. That's
the simple fact of it.
Jerry's a terrific operator, he always has an angle going, he's always
working it...but that ain't the same thing as always having the real
deal in hand. If WB were involved in this -- and they'd have to be --
both Doug and I would be in the loop by contract. But that is not the
case. I spoke with Doug five minutes ago as I type this, and he
confirmed: there is nothing happening on this front other than Jerry
talkling with the radio guy.
As for his notion that the characters in Crusade were just B5
characters with the names changed...as the person who created those
characters, nothing could be further from the truth. Nor was Bruce
ever set to be the star of Crusade.
There's a natural tendency for people to hear or think what they expect,
what they want to hear. I told all the B5 cast members as a group
that there would certainly be opportunities for guest appearances
throughout Crusade, but at no point did I promise Bruce that he would
be the lead of the series, or that we'd simply transplant the
characters. It wouldn't be a new series if we did that.
Finally, in his interview, both Jerry and Bruce seem to blame me for
B5 not being in its 10th year right now. Which is true and not true.
B5 was always meant to be a 5 year story; every actor knew that going
in. It wasn't like this was a surprise at the last minute. We all
knew the deal.
WB had told us to shut down after year 4 because even though the show was
doing well, our network, PTEN, was going out of business. At the last
minute, TNT took on the task of financing a fifth year *in order to
get the end of the five-year story*. They never talked about anything
beyond that, nor did anyone else. So anything else is a moot point.
I don't think that TNT would ever have committed to anything more than
one season in any event. They wanted the end of the story to make the
package complete. If that had been a six-year arc, they would not
have picked it up because two years would've been too costly.
So them's is the facts.
Yes, there's one or two things percolating n the B5 universe that may
be of interest, but neither of them are series deals.
I hate to throw water on this, but I don't want fans to get all
excited about something that's simply not happening anywhere except in
Jerry's interview.
He probably won't like that I said this any more than he did the last
time, but then as now, I have to put out the facts and let the passage
of time validate them.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:But then there is the notion (maybe not the fact) that your word at an
:early stage can make the investors go away: "Joe stated publicly that
:you don't have all the pieces, so why should I fund it?" Or, worse
:(and not true based on what you wrote here), "Joe said you didn't have
:all the pieces, so why would Warner Brothers authorize it?"
One, you make the assumption that WB or anyone else would care what's
written in a newsgroup or in an interview. They don't. And wouldn't.
WB is also in the money making business. If someone comes to them with
the money, wouldn't matter what I said except that I'd look foolish
(which I'm okay with, it's happened before). If the money's there,
the deal is there; if not, not. The rest is utterly irrelevant.
There are two kinds of people, those who go public about things long
before they are even close to reality in order to try and get
something going (which almost never works), which gets all the fans
heated up about something that's as substantive as gossamer...and
those who hold off saying anything until the deal is set and signed,
out of respect, conservativism, experience and a desire not to get
folks wound up about vague possibilities. I subscribe to the latter.
I've very rarely commented on *anything* until I knew it was a
reality, or even some time thereafter. The few times I *have* said
anything before all the pieces were in place, it almost never came to
pass...hence reinforcing lesson #1 above.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:So Joe, on the million-to-one shot that JD does have something going
:with a new Babylon 5 show which would star the original cast members,
:would you support such a thing? Would you become involved as a
:producer and/or writer?
I don't tend to engage in speculation.
:OK, so now if your answer was "yes" to any of the above questions,
:then why don't you join forces with JD and try to get another B5 story
:arc going?
What forces would those be?
If WB were to decide to do more B5, they would do so, they wouldn't
need someone from the outside to come in. TV just doesn't work that way.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:For it is the well from whence thou springeth,
Actually, from and whence mean pretty much the same thing, so that's a
redundency. It should be either "from which" or just "whence" It's a
common misuse of the vernacular.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Oh dear. I'm afraid you've been misled by the "grammarians" who
:insist that English should be more like some other, more "respectable"
:language (usually like Latin or French). "From whence" is used by
:Shakespeare,
Citation, please?
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Do you have any idea where anyone would have gotten the idea that
:Crusade was supposedly going to be merely a continuation of the
:stories of the B5 characters? Or is this something that's "just
:growed," like Topsy, from the irresponsible dropping of vague and
:unfounded comments by certain actors in interviews?
It's unfathomable to me. I think people just had a tendency to assume
this would be the case. Or they saw a certain character and resented
it, wondering "why can't that be me?" to the point where it becomes
"that was SUPPOSED to be me."
:He was convinced that Bruce was supposed to captain the Excalibur
:(never mind that Sheridan was no longer an Earthforce captain by this
:point, but president of the Interstellar Alliance), but that you and
:he had had a "falling out" over his "being fired suddenly after five
:years," and so you quickly rewrote the role as Gideon instead. I
:tried to point out to him that no one was fired -- the show _ended_ --
:and that the show was only ever _supposed_ to run for five years, and
:that all of the actors knew that going in. He was sure he had the
:scoop on some conspiracy that I was just too much of a slavishly
:devoted fangirl to see. :-p
Okay, let me put the absolute and total lie to this right now.
I've just gone back into my files and dragged out the ORIGINAL
TREATMENT for Crusade, the one written while B5 was still in production,
BEFORE "A Call to Arms" was ever filmed. The treatment, which was
available to WB, Doug, John, and department keys and I know some cast
members got their hands on it, was dated 6/16/98 (that date is still
on the file datestamp).
I quote from a latter part of the treatment, where the characters are
introduced. There are some little variances here and there -- one in
particular that I think will surprise some people -- but this was what
was written at that time...the very first time I put ANYthing down on
paper about Cruade for WB.
One small caveat: I used the terms "infrequently or not at all"
primarily because WB was desperate to make sure that this show was
different from B5, so the "not at all" part was a nod to that, but the
"infrequently" was my planned opening to use the characters from time
to time, which was already in the works when the show was pulled.
Quote follows:
--------------------------------------------------
Whether it begins within BABYLON 5 or outside, the CRUSADE pilot movie
will start with the Drakh attack, and end with the revelation about
the plague. It's important to see this happen in current time, rather
than hear about it after the fact. We need to see first-hand what's
at stake, and how we got here.
As a result, the pilot will introduce not only our characters, but the
full situation and setup for the series to come. Because of the
attack and counter-attacks, it will be primarily action-oriented. The
focus is not on diplomacy, or negotiations...the focus is nothing
less than the very survival of our species, and the acts of heroism
that result when our characters stand against terrible and
overwhelming odds.
As head of the Rangers, Delenn and Captain John Sheridan give the
fleet its mission, and take part in the pilot movie.
After that, once the battle is over and the fleet is on its way, they
will appear either infrequently or not at all. CRUSADE will stand on
its own, except for possible TNT movie cross-overs.
Let's meet our characters.
CAPTAIN MATTHEW DRAKE, Captain of the Excalibur, the high-tech
flagship of the White Star fleet of ships. (The fleet divides into
teams to help increase the odds of finding a cure; when they find a
possible lead, they call in the Excalibur, wait until it arrives, then
they move on to the next destination while the Excalibur does its
work.) In his 30s, dark, brooding, attractive, he's a fighter whose
own Earthforce ship was destroyed during the initial war with the
Drakh. (It wasn't his fault, as we will learn; he was up against
impossible odds and barely managed to save his crew at great risk to
himself.)
Personally assigned to the Excalibur by Sheridan, this mission
represents his chance to redeem himself. Hard-headed and practical, a
man of action who doesn't believe in the mysticism practiced by the
Minbari and the Rangers; if he can't feel it or taste it, it doesn't
exist. A loner whose harsh exterior covers a heart that has been
wounded too many times, and now refuses to let anyone near him.
MARCUS COLE, a Ranger established on Babylon 5 during its third and
fourth seasons. Energetic, bright, literary, with a poetic quote
always at hand when it's needed, and a pike or a PPG rifle when force
is needed. Trained equally in martial arts and philosophy. A
dashing, romantic figure noted for a cheerfulness that belies
something much deeper beneath.
-------------------------------------------------
We had to change Drake to Gideon because of a clearance problem, and
obviously the Claudia situation threw a monkey wrench into using the
character of Markus, as originally planned.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (about the previous quote from the original
>Crusade treatment):
:Joe, may I quote from the quote you append in the Babylon 5 FAQ I
:maintain for the Fidonet Babylon 5 echo,
Sure.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:And presumably Marcus would take the spot that Galen eventually had?
:Interesting.
No, Galen was in there as well.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:>> I know what "the Claudia" situation was: she wanted a full season's
:>> pay for a partial season's work and walked when you and/or WB
:>> rightfully refused.
:Word was she and/or her agent wanted 4 paid but unworked episodes (~30k).
Just to recap: Claudia, after promising to sign the contract
extension, and helping get all the other cast members to do so, chose
not to sign after all. Her people (and she) wanted time off to do
other projects, a movie in particular. She might need 3-4 eps off.
Fine, said we, so we'll pay her for all the eps in which she appears,
and not for the ones in which she doesn't appear. That seemed fair.
But they wanted us to commit, in writing, to paying her the full 22
salary for the reduced number of episodes, which would constitute a
per-episode increase in salary when all of the other actors, many of
whom had favored nations agreements, could not negotiate any such
increase. It would, in essence, screw all the other cast members.
We refused. She walked.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Though there are stock phrases that JMS seems to like using.
:"...straight to hell" is one, as in "blow it...", "went...", etc.
"Went" is a phrase...?
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Here are some more: "Folks Back Home" and "So-and-so and I have had our
:differences" Who wants to add to the list?
It's called vernacular or common parlance.
Just like "add to the list."
And I think I have used "straight to hell" a grand total of about five
times in 200+ produced scripts. Much the same can be said of the
other examples. I'm not sure that fits the description of "stock"
lines.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:I always wanted to do a "hell" video collection from the five seasons
:of B5 (of course, being a good boy, I wouldn't do such a thing as it
:would breach copyright etc... Ahem...) with a counter in the bottom
:right of the screen. :-)
That's the result when hell is the only profanity you can use in
broadcast television.
There are any number of far more colorful turms I'd much rather have
used.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:1. What's your favorite word?
Terrific.
:2. What's your least favorite word?
Goodbye.
:3. What sound or noise do you love?
Water.
:4. What sound or noise do you hate?
Leaf blowers.
:5. What turns you on?
A sharp wit.
:6. What turns you off?
Being patronized.
:7. What's your favorite curse (word)?
Fuck.
:8. What profession other than your own would you like to try?
Musician.
:9. What profession would you NEVER like to do?
CPA.
:10. IF there is a heaven, what would you like to hear God say when you
:arrive?
"Okay, your turn."
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Wait a minute, does this mean you turn down the sound when you log off
:AOL?
I've turned off ALL the freaking AOL sounds.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:How about "With all due respect..." ?
In the military, and in politics, people use that phrase when they
want to disagree with a superior officer or person of high rank.
That's what one *says*. That's protocol.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Coulter is the right's Carville.
Not correct. I can't think of any time when Carville has spoken of
Republicans or Conservatives in the terms that she has used, inclusive
of: Liberals hate America, Liberals hate all religions except Islam.
and that even Islamic terrorists don't hate America as much as
liberals do.
jms
>A plug:
I just want to drop into this discussion about Fox a hearty plug for
Al Franken's new book, Lies and the Lying Liares Who Tell Them. The
book is relentlessly researched, and is a massive indictment of some
of the falsehoods that have been perpetrated by those with a vested
interest in doing so. The section on Fox News is worth the price of
admission all by itself.
jms
>JMS replies to someone who was met with disgust after revealing he'd
>bought the Franken book:
The reaction you cite is all to common, unfortunately. And they can't
refute the facts, they just label him an asshole and dismiss him out
of hand, which makes it easier than considering another point of view.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Might I suggest Wesley Clark? I wouldn't support him myself, but he's
:a fair sight more tolerable than most of the Democratic field... one
:of the only two of the possible democratic candidates who I believe
:would have a chance of defeating Bush (the other being Howard Dean,
I tend to agree. Dean is, frankly, the only one in the current pack
who I think can a) beat Bush and b) has the credentials to do a good
job as President. His record shows him as socially liberal in many
respects, but financially conservative, which is a good combination.
His history of running Vermont shows his strong points, and
traditionally governors get nominations and win elections, not
senators.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:We're getting our facts from satire? How can I be sure, reading from
:that genre, that the conclusions aren't hyperbole? The emotion not
:demagoguery? (I suppose it's better to see that stuff in satire than
:in some kind of serious book, tho, and we *do* get our best
:observations from the court jester...)
Actually, though Franken is a satirist, he's also a cogent observer,
and more to the point, a relenteless researcher. He knows full well
that if he got *anything* wrong, the other side would be all over him
in a second. So he (and his graduate class of helpers) went into
excruciating detail to get their facts right...which is why they
weren't able to go after the Rush book.
It doesn't take much to be able to point to a person making definitive
statement A, then to proof positive that A never happened. But it
takes a satirist to make us laugh along the way...otherwise there'd be
blood in the streets.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers, about the first issue of Supreme Power:
:I got the impression that he doesn't like Bush I very much either from
:this issue. Interesting placement of the crystal, no? ;^)
Actually, that wasn't in the script, that was something that Gary came
up with, I didn't see it until it was in the pencils.
jms
>Jerry Doyle had a few things to say about JMS's response to the
>original information about his attempt to revive B5. Those comments
>can be found at http://filmforce.ign.com/articles/436/436980p1.html
>JMS replies to Jerry Doyle's reply, found at the above URL. However,
>JMS posted with some strange interface, which tried to use italics,
>and later reposted a clean version. Hence, I won't include the first
>attempt in this digest. Below is the second post.
Nuts...sorry, folks, I didn't realize that the italics codes wouldn't
translate. Here's a cleaner version to read, my apologies for the
technical glitch.
So there's a response on filmforce.ign.com from Jerry to the
discussion that took place here about his statements on that system
that he was putting together a follow-up to B5 as a series. I thought
I'd repost what I just sent to the folks who posted his reply, as well
as Jerry's comments, unaltered.
My comments are prefaced by the > character.
---------------------------------------
To quote from the note from Jerry, and respond.
I'm not one for chat rooms or newsgroups, but this was brought to my
attention by numerous people, and here's my response:
F*** Joe and his typical controlling bull****.
>Well, at least we've defined the terms of the discussion.
I guess Doug Netter hasn't been talking to me or the "radio guy" or whoever.
>Doug returned Jerry's call, yes. We do that when our cast members
>call. But to my knowledge there have been no talks between Doug and
>the "radaio guy." Which is exactly what I'd said.
I guess Doug didn't send demographics and related data to the "radio guy".
>Jerry asked us to send information, information was sent. That
>doesn't have anything to do with anything that I said in my notes on
>the newsgroup.
I guess Doug is lying when he told me he's had conversations with the
"radio guy" and that Joe already has some ideas on paper.
>It's clear that someone has their wires crossed, yes. But to go back
>to what I'd said: if someone has the clout to make a deal, I'm here to
>talk to them, whilch again is what I'd said. But no one has yet come
>to either Doug or myself with anything close to that. I've never done
>any work based on some guy in Chicago who thinks he can make something
>happen with Jerry.
I guess I didn't fly out to Chicago to meet with the "radio guy" in
the middle of August.
>I never said he didn't. What Jerry does or doesn't do on his own
>time, with his own dime, is Jerry's business. This is a case of Jerry
>defending himself from an accusation that I never made. All I've ever
>said is that nobody has yet come to us with anything resembling a
>deal, or shown the potential to make a deal happen.
Oh by the way, the "radio guy", he's the NUMBER ONE syndicator in the
country and has strong ties to the head of Fox. I guess that's
something else I made up.
>Again, this has nothing to do with what was said. I didn't say this
>guy wasn't a syndicator of any level, and never said he didn't have
>ties to Fox. So once more Jerry is setting up a straw man argument to
>defend something that was simply never implied or stated.
Joe can say what he wants. He can spout his crap about how "he's the
man" around which all things B5 spin.
>Well, yeah, I did create the series, executive produce it, write 91
>out of 110 episodes, and I do control many of the rights. And no deal
>can go forward without my involvement. By contract, if it doesn't
>happen with me, it doesn't happen. I still don't see what that has to
>do with anything, however.
At least I'm still trying to bring back what should never have been
taken off the air. The fans deserve the show.
>I've never said anything to the contrary. I've said, and I'll say it
>again here, that I'll listen to anybody who has the wherewithal to put
>a deal together. So far that hasn't happened, despite Jerry's
>pronouncements. I pointed that fact out. That is the only fact that
>Jerry hasn't dealt with here, apparently finding it easier to respond
>to things I didn't say than to things I did say, which is odd, but
>there you go.
Joe's ego deserves a much bigger person.
>Some things deserve a response, some things don't. This is one of the
>latter. He hasn't refuted anything I said, which was that Jerry has
>talked a lot about a lot of prospects, but to date none of them have
>materialized. If I were wrong, then something would have been put
>forward. That's simply a statement of fact, ego has nothing to do
>with it.
Feel free to post this from where it came. I'm tired of all the bull****.
>I'm glad that Jerry has taken this opportunity to vent. Clearly, he
>misses the show and wants it to come back. We all miss the show. But
>at the same time, it's not fair to the fans that Jerry mentions to get
>people excited about something that doesn't exist. I'm glad that he
>is trying to get things going, for himself and with others, but
>talking about things doesn't make them so, and pointing this out is
>not inappropriate when, based on those statements, I find my email box
>filled with inquiries about things that simply aren't happening. I've
>worked with the online community for ten years now, talking about B5
>and being painfully honest about what's going on.
>If there were something going on involving a return of the series that
>was real, I'd be the first person to talk about it and let people
>know. But there isn't. I have to be honest with people, because I
>have ten years worth of reputation and credibility with the fans to
>protect. I see that Jerry doesn't like that, but I can't change that
>now because he's offended. And again, at the end of the day, it comes
>down to this: Jerry says he's got something going that's real. If he
>does, and makes it happen, then I look like a fool, which I'm okay
>with, it wouldn't be the first time. Then he's right to be offended.
>If he doesn't, and he can't...then on what possible basis can one be
>offended?
>Just a thought or two for anyone looking on.
>Joe Straczynski
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:I'm not so sure I agree with you here Joe. I have seen more than one
:show revived from the dead by viewer voice. Maybe getting a lot of
:people excited about it and writing in to the powers that be is the
:answer.
This is to an extent true, though fan campaigns have kind of been
devalued with the studios over the years because it seems that almost
any show can get such a campaign going.
That issue aside...the situation here is that there *is* no big Bring
Back B5 campaign going on, because the series was meant as a five year
series, minus any sideline ventures into MOWs and the like. Nor was
this any part of what Jerry was talking about. Just FYI.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
>Oh - but there's this: "Thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court, you'll be
>able to use public money to send yours kids to General Beauregard
>Bigot Private Academy, Fundamentalist Football and Frequent Drug
>Tests. They have these religious schools that teach these kids
>insanity like the earth is 5,000 years old, where the pope is a demon.
>I don't want my tax money going to that kind of crap. You can practice
>religion until you fall out. I don't want to pay for somebody else's
>bigotry." So Christians are bigots who want to use tax money to
>perpetuate that bigotry in their children.
See, you lose arguments when you restate something to make your point
that contradicts or flies in the face of what actuallly said.
When you say "So..." and restate it, you add things that were simply
never said nor ever intended. Carville was referring to a specific
institution, for starters, and adding that he didn't want public money
to go to religious schools, which is in line with the separation of
church and state.
He didn't say "Christians are bigots who want to use tax money to
perpetuate that bigotry in their children." YOU said that in order to
set up a straw-man argument. YOU applied it on a broader scale, and
YOU were the one who said that Christians as a class were bigots, not
Carville.
If you have to twist statements to make your case, you don't HAVE a
case.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:there was a cute story JMS told about how, while writing the scene
:where Lyta and Byron make love he paused and wrote (paraphrased) "I
:wonder which is more embarrassing, writing this or reading it?".
:Several years later (and long after I'd've thought I'd forgotten the
:story) I read the script and there it was. Joe could have easily been
:forgiven if he'd made up that story but he hadn't-it was true.
I'd totally forgotten about that until you posted it here. Which is
probably one of the big reasons I don't tend to stretch the truth as a
rule...to be an effective fibber, you really need a good memory, and I
don't have one.
(Funny aside about that scene...I made it clear, to protect Pat's
privacy during the love making scene, that it be a closed set, only
essential camera crew, nobody else. It's just something you do to be
respectful, since there would be a lot of skin flashing. Even I would
not be on set out of a desire for her privacy. So I'm out at editing
that day, and come back to find that, during that scene, Doug had
brought some studio guys and financing guys by for a set tour...and
walked them right in on this. Suffice to say words were spoken.)
jms
--
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