JMS Usenet Posts - 02/16/2004
Dirk A. Loedding
>digest and this one. I was out of work for a while, and had to
>spend all my time looking for a job. Almost 16 years with AT&T &
>IBM, and I was out the door, due to downsizing. However, I wound up
>with a job I like better, for similar pay and benefits, and now that
>I've gotten past the initial frenzy of learning the job, I have a
>little more spare time.
>JMS quotes and answers (This is from back in October):
:Hope the events in New York were fun, and just wanted to see if you
:might put in an appearance at Loscon next month?
No plans for LosCon at this time.
:Oh, and how are the fires treating you? You are not supposed to be
:able to see the air you are breathing, this just sucks.
Far enough to be safe, though you can clearly see ash filtering down
from the sky like tiny snowflakes all day.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
>JOE HELP.....LET US KNOW IF THESE RUMORS ARE TRUE ABOUT JEREMIAH GOING
>OFF THE AIR AFTER EPISODE SEVEN????
This is the first I've heard of it. But there's a message floating
around from Scott Rosenberg confirming it, that the 15 eps have been
broken up in half, with 7 through November 7th, and the rest picking
up early (I'm guessing January) 2004.
I haven't been told this by anyone directly (hardly surprising), but
my *guess* would be that they're moving them out of the holiday season
(Thanksgiving through Christmas). TV viewership goes way down during
late November through January 1, and cable goes down even more. So if
I had to hazard a guess at their reasoning, they're probably acting to
protect their investment, rather than air the show at a time when
nobody is watching, which would kill the ratings and the show.
jms
>JMS on The Matrix:
Just to let fans of the Matrix know...you've got nothing to worry
about with the third film. I was at the premiere screening Monday,
and I have to tell you that the sheer scale and scope of the thing,
the performances, the efx, the story...it's just staggering.
(And for those who want to know how I look these days, there's a photo
-- twice clickable and enlargeable -- at --
http://www.cinescape.com/0/editorial.asp?aff_id=0&this_cat=Movies&action=p
age&obj_id=40036
-- which should definitely drive down any interest in the movie.
Anyway...the brothers W did an amazing job. It's going to be huge.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Definitely one of the better pics of you, JMS. And a tie! This was a
:special occassion, huh?
Well, it was the Matrix, what can I say? It was also one of those
big-deal Hollywood premiere thingies, and I figured I'd better dress
the part.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers, about some comments Sean Astin made about the
>treatment of Jeremiah:
:He obviously had very bad feelings about how MGM was trying to change
:the show, and with JMS gone, surely they WILL change the show however
:they please. (And if JMS didn't like the notes they were giving him,
:I suspect I will not like them either.)
To be fair, there is truth to that. There's no question, to my mind,
that if a S3 is commissioned, they will put in someone more compliant
with notes and their preferred direction for the show, as they did
with Dead Like Me, which is why the second half of the season looks
very different from the first half. They took out one show runner, and
put in another who would do things as directed.
jms
>About Jeremiah:
Sudden thought...is Movie Central in Canada airing the show straight
through, or stopping? If the former, then they'll see the second half
of the show prior to the US.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:Gore's platform included more gun control. Gun control violates the
:Second Amendment, which guarantees the Right to Keep and Bear Arms,
:which is indeed a civil liberty.
Let's be more specific. What it actually says is:
"A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free
state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be
infringed."
First, the rights invoked refer specifically to "a well regulated
militia." Anti-gun law advocates tend to omit that part of the
sentence out, as you did just above.
Second, most of what's been advocated is simple gun registration,
which dose not interfere itself with the ability to keep and bear
arms.
Third, bear in mind that some of the Al Qaeda docs that surfaced
during the campaign refer to the fact that those working inside the US
should purchase guns legally, not buy them off the street, because
they're so easy to obtain here. The resultant theory is that good gun
registration laws could help to prevent the use of such guns by, say,
terrorists.
But the administration is too busy prying into your choice of books at
the library to look into who's buying weapons that can, oh, I
dunno...kill people.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:The worst is the third. Thought it was a good idea at the time, but
:the polls change your outlook. Although I would give them a point or
:two if they could give me a couple real reasons for the change (things
:that actually happened that they hadn't foreseen for instance).
The problem is that the bill submitted as the Patriot Act which was
ramrodded through Congress on the theory that if you didn't vote for
it you were therefore Un-Patriotic...is that it wasn't a complete
document.
It was hundreds of pages of material that largely referenced *other*
documents not included in the package. So you had entry after entry
along the lines of, "amends sub-section A of regulation B to read "may
have" instead of "must have," and unless you go out and get Regulation
B and read it you don't know what it is you just voted on. There were
a lot of senators who wanted more time to read the thing through, but
the Administration wouldn't brook any delays, and anyone asking for
one was marginalized as being against patriotism and self-defense.
The so-called Patriot Act has led to some of the most egregious acts
of the last fifty years, and then some, commited by our government
against its own people.
Jose Padilla, a low-life but still an American citizen, has been held
without access to an attorney, his family or a judge since May 2002
under provisions declaring him an "enemy combatant," a term that has
no legal standing but is buttressed by the Patriot Act (which, by the
way, in phase 2 which is pending before congress stipulates that any
American citizen can have his citizenship *revoked* if he is found to
be giving money to any agency which may have unsavory connections,
even if he didn't know about those connections, where previously only
a citizen could chose to give up his citizenship).
Hundreds of people -- mostly foreign nationals and some citizens --
are still being held as Padilla is being held, without charge,
indefinitely.
No abuses of civil rights?
Tell that to the National Library Association, which reports that
nearly 20% of its members have been forced to comply with government
requests that they turn over information on reading requests.
Tell that to Maher Arar, a Canadian citizen who came to that country
as a boy, went to college, got two degrees, married, went to work for
a tech company, had a wife and kids and was considered a stand-up
member of his community, highly respected...who was arrested without
charge whlie passing through the US on his way back to Montreal and
held for *six months* during which time he was sent to a Jordanian
interrogation facility and subjected to inhumane conditions before
being finally released without charge.
No civil rights abuses under the Patriot Act?
Tell that to Donna Huanca, a docent with the Art Car museum, who was
handling a showing of anti-war art (most commissioned pre-911) and who
found herself being questioned by Terrence Donahue of the FBi and
Steven Smith of the Secret Service, who also wanted the names and
addresses of the artists in question, on the grounds that the art was
Un-American.
Tell that to A. J. Brown, a freshman at Durham Tech in North Carolina
who had agents from the Raleigh branch of the Secret Service show up
because they heard she had anti-Bush posters in her dorm room. (They
had already done background checks on her, including finding out that
her mother is in the military.) She received further calls from them,
including some asking if she were working with the Taliban...this
based on having expressed anti-Bush sentiments.
Tell that to the American Booksellers Foundation, which recently sent
a letter to its member stores saying, in part, that due to the Patriot
act "the federal government expanded authority to search your business
records, including the titles of the books purchased by your
customers. . . . There is no opportunity for you or your lawyer to
object in court. You cannot object publicly, either. The new law
includes a gag order that prevents you from disclosing 'to any person'
the fact that you have received an order to produce documents."
The Patriot Act gives the government unprecedented abilities to pry
into every aspect of your private life. They say this is just for
tracking terrorists, but about a week ago the FBI announced that it
had successfully used the new freedoms gained under the PA to pursue a
regular criminal investigation, and the office of Homeland Security
was invoked to try and find out where the democratic congressmen in
Texas had fled to in an attempt to stop the massive redistricting
under way there.
I could literally go on for another five pages with just the initial
breaches of privacy and civil rights that have already been committed
by this administration, let alone what's happened more recently, and
what is in Patriot Act II that is even more egregious.
There are a growing number of reps in the Senate and the House --
mostly Democrats but also a growing number of Republicans -- who feel
that they were taken advantage of in the days following 9/11 and
co-opted into passing something they would never have passed in the
open, under other conditions, trusting that all the sub-references and
changes being requested were in everyone's best interests.
They were not.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:The folks who wrote the phrase "well-regulated militia" meant that the
:militia would operate smoothly.
Sorry, that doesn't parse. "Running smoothly" is a qualitative
judgement, not an organizational aspect, and the Bill of Rights was
written to be very practical. The idea that "regulated" meant
something different in the 18th century is one of the sillier things
I've heard in a while...that word goes all the way back to the latin
"regulum," and meant then what it means now.
At the time the Bill of Rights was written, there was no telling when
we might be attacked, and we didn't really have the resources for a
big standing army. So you called on the citizenry...and of course the
ironic thing is that calling on them in this fashion usually meant
knowing who had guns and who didn't. Which of course is one form of
registration.
Also, you have to put this in context. At the time this was written,
the arms under discussion were single-shot black-powder muskets.
T'weren't much else around.
I think you should be entitled to have all the single-shot
black-powder muskets your heart desires. If they could have foreseen
Uzis and AK-47s and MAC-10s, I think they would've worded that a bit
differently.
(As to the "bear arms" provision, which means to carry them...we've
accepted that people can't just walk around armed, and to follow this
line for a moment further...do you think that someone should be
allowed to own a gun if he's a convicted felon? If he's mentally
unstable or mentally handicapped? If he has Parkinson's and can't
fire straight? Because if the answer to any of those is "no," then
guess what? You just voted for gun control.)
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:That's a good theory, but it just doesn't hold up. If a terrorist can
:construct a pretty decent fake identity -or- steal an existing
:identity, they'll happily be able to register the document using
:either a constructed or stolen identity, completely circumventing the
:intent of those laws. So, since registration is completely useless in
:that respect, why hassle the law-abiding citizen, especially given the
:history of registration?
Except that your premise is false. The terrorists who hit on 9/11
rented apartments, vans, bought tickets all *in their own real names*.
So we haven't seen that happen.
Also, the majority of guns that are used in daily crime were stolen
from law-abiding citizens in household robberies or the like. Being
able to track back a stolen weapon could be of great use in legitimate
enforcement.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:i'm sorry, i forgot, remind me again how many guns were used in the
:combinedattacks of sept 11th? or the wtc attack of 93? or the OK city
:bombing?
None. But we're now in the grips of the pre-emptive administration,
and guns *have* been used to mow down whole schools, there has been
talk among the terrorists about the ease of getting guns here (so that
puts it right on the board), and if the DC snipers don't qualify as a
form of terrorism then I don't know what does. So yes, it is an issue.
But to the point in general that you raise... here's some comedy for
you. When the administration put out the list of things you can't
carry onto an airplane, they made sure that things like nail clippers
were included (even though nobody's used them yet in a hijacking) and
left ON cigarette lighters, which WERE used by the "shoe bomber,"
after pressure was placed by the tobacco industry...which kinda makes
you wonder where the administration's real concerns are, doesn't it?
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:What does bother me are statements such as the one about how many dems
:voted for it. I hear that and similar statements used time and again
:as some sort of vindication. It's not.
You're correct, it's not. And here's one big reason why it's not.
It's funny how quickly history gets forgotten.
Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary
Committee, asked for time to go over the document and he began to ask
for some changes.
Then John Ashcroft announced that Congress had *one week* in which to
pass the bill, warning that further terrorist attacks were IMMINENT,
and that Congress would be held to blame for any such attacks if it
failed to pass the bill immediately.
The only way this could be done was to pressure the Senate leaders to
push through the bill WITHOUT allowing for debate or amendment. And
this is what was done.
Democrats were told that the bill had to be passed IMMEDIATELY because
more attadcks were imminent, and weren't given time or opportunity to
debate the bill. That part of the process was shut out by the
administration's claims that it was needed Right Now or more people
would die.
Further to the point, of the dubious areas of the Patriot Act that
were passed, there are degrees to which they could be used. They
could be used lightly, as needed...or they could be used as a club.
The former was assumed; the latter was the fact.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Paul Harper <pa...@harper.net> wrote:
:: ... now if we could just disabuse Mr Netter of the notion that B5 S3
:: was the "first time in television history" that someone has written 22
:: episodes of *anything* that would be great!
:
:"consecutive" is what is meant. I'm pretty sure he's correct.
:
:You mention Dr Who and Blake's 7, but Blake's 7 is what JMS often
:cites as the previous record, and Terry Nation only did the first
:14 episodes (first season plus 1 episode) straight through. Doctor Who's
:cohesiveness was on the script editor level and up, but rotated through
:many writers even in the Key to Time and Trial of a Time Lord seasons.
:I've never seen a valid counterexample to the claim. Can you produce one?
:I'd be glad to know it.
:
:The closest I can come, poking around, is the first six seasons of
:Red Dwarf (36 episodes) writtten by the team of Grant and Naylor.
:But that's not solo writing. :)
:
:: I guess it's the US-centric view of the universe coming to the fore
:: again! :-)
:
:You may want to check your facts. :)
:
:There's certainly plenty of British and worldwide television of which
:I'm unaware, but it only takes one example, and I haven't seen one yet.
Not that I'm actively interested in records (maybe CDs), but just to
set the record straight...all told I wrote 91 out of 110 eps, and
having written all of S3, S4 and all but one of S5 right in the
middle, that puts it at 54 consecutive scripts (since Neil's came in
halfway through S5).
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning. Also, due to the messiness
:of what was quoted, I trimmed the quote down to the last paragraph
:below.)
:I'm noticing there wasn't a reply with a citation, so I'm going to
:have to assume there isn't one, and it was just (as I noted)
:sensationalist nonsense designed to evoke a emotional response instead
:of a rational one, which is pretty much one of the signs of a very
:weak debating position.
You know, there comes a point where the debate enters the range of
hair-splitting, and this is one of them.
Yes, Columbine is one example of what I was thinking of. Was every
single student "mowed down," was every student murdered where he or
she sat? No. But to therefore take that one word -- whole -- and
totally dismiss the argument is the worst kind of pettifogging. Was
every student at Columbine murdered? Of course not. But they shot
their way down school corridors, through multiple rooms, the library,
the cafeteria, killing everyone they saw, and then blowing up a
section of the library...you may not thing that constitutes "mowing
down" the school, but I'd suggest you try that logic with the parents
of the kids who died that day. I think they would disagree with you.
Strongly.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:Do US planes have a total no smoking policy yet? Because once
:such a policy exists cigarette lighters will have no valid use.
Yes, but the tobacco industry's argument in getting the lighters
on-board was to say that when flyers land, the first thing they want
to do is light up immediately.
Don't blame me, that's what they said.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:And this is suprising exactly how? I don't smoke, but I have been run
:over by people trying to get to the smoking areas after a flight.
Kurt, you're missing the point. I don't know if you're deliberately
missing the point or not, but either way that ain't the point. The
POINT is that the Bush administration, while making a big deal about
keeping off planes things that were NOT used by any real or potentail
enemies (like nail clippers) has allowed ON things that WERE used (a
la a Bic lighter by the "shoe bomber," as silly a sobriquet as you're
apt to find)...which tends to suggest that their concern really isn't
about keeping people safe as keeping people *controlled* while not
annoying friends like the tobacco industry.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:Someone help me out here. IIRC, I *think* I remember reading or
:hearing a news report post-9/11 about a study by the CIA, FBI, NSA,
:or..? ("We're all in the same alphabet soup.") Anyway, it was a study
:that had been done a few years BEFORE 9/11 in which they tried to
:determine ways that terrorists might attack us on our soil. And
:included in that report was the suggestion of suicide teams hijacking
:our planes and crashing them into key buildings.
Further to the point, a few years prior to 9/11, the CIA helped the
French to stop a plan that called for a plane to be hijacked and flown
into the Eiffel Tower. So the idea that such a thing was unheard-of
was simply not true.
Even further still to the point...it would be very easy to know what
the administration knew about the coming attacks, but the Bush
administration has lobbied successfully to keep that part of the
information from the congressional 9/11 probe on the grounds of
nationa security...which is ironic since the whole POINT of the
inquiry is to strengthen national security by finding out what went
wrong.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:I've read stories of numerous people who had cigarette lighters
:confiscated from CHECKED LUGGAGE by TSA employees. I guess the
:"tobacco industry" isn't quite as powerful as you think it is.
Or the employees are taking things into their own hands to be
sensible. Nonetheless, that does not change the essential point:
clippers are on the verboten list, lighters are not.
On the subject of the TSA for a moment -- the Transportation Safety
Agency -- is everyone here au courant about the fact that in 2004 the
TSA -- which has no authority as a law enforcement agency, these are
the guys who find, search, check and lose your luggage -- will be
instituting a screening program for flyers?
Under their program, for which they will draw information from a
variety of sources, law enforcement, plus what they call "soft
resources," a lovely and utterly undefined term, you will be placed
into one of three categories: green, yellow or red. Green, you fly no
problem. Yellow, they may pull you aside and check you out a little
more carefully. Red...you don't fly and you're subject to detention.
Note that there is no means in place for correcting faulty
information, no means of veryifying information. One errant typo and
you could be pulled aside and detained. And as for who gets
detained...there have been repeated cases of people who were doing
nothing more than showing up at protest marches being detained or
prevented from flying, at minimum missing their planned flights.
What are the criteria for being included in the red or yellow
categories? They'red not being too specific, again for "national
security reasons," which simply means they can do whatever they want
with impunity and without having to justify anything.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Politics warning):
:I missed this. I read lots of news every day, and somehow I still
:manage to miss some of the horrors. Does anyone know where I could
:read more about this one?
There are two really good sources for info tracking the latest on what
the Bush administration is doing.
The first is: www.smirkingchimp.com
The second is: www.buzzflash.com
Now, I pass those two on with a couple of caveats. What's good about
both those sites is that they don't actually offer content of their
own, they serve as a source of links to news articles appearing in
various real, honest-to-gosh newspapers and magazines, ranging from
the Boston Globe to the Washington Post, the NY Times, the London
Independent, the Chicago Tribune, an assortment of Canadian
newspapers, Newsday, Time, CBS and CNN and on from there.
The Chimp also tends to link to some articles in places that wear
their agendas on their sleeves, and I generally tend to be very
critical of anything I see there. So when linking, notice where
you're going and if it's an editorial or a posting, clearly it bears
less weight than an article in an established publication.
(Interestingly, I have found that I read stories that become of great
interest here in the international press long before they come to
light in the US...the Ambassador Wilson story being one such.)
The caveat on the buzzflash site is that their links -- the intro to
same -- tends to show more of their subjective bias as well, though
they tend on average to link to more actual publications and fewer
blogs or posts than the chimp.
So as in all things, caveat emptor...but on balance, they provide a
terrific clearing house for tracking what the administration is doing.
The thing to bear in mind is that so much goes on in bits and pieces
that it can slip under the radar screens until you start to put it all
under one umbrella, then you see the larger picture.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers - First mention of the new B5-related project
>(B5:TMoS):
:I was reading in another post that somebody was saying that they'd
:read that the Rising Stars matter with Top Cow had been resolved. Is
:this true?
Yes. There were a number of conditions set before Top Cow in order to
resolve this, and those conditions were met. So the final three
scripts will be turned in by late January/early February, and the
Rising Stars story will be complete.
:And also, is there anything else new for all us grateful fans? :)
Well, lessee...the first issue of the Doc Strange mini is nearly done,
and I've turned in the first issue of a new series for Marvel which
will have to await a more formal word from them, I'm afraid, since PR
is properly their venue on things like this, and the next Supreme
Power comes out next week. Spidey 501 came out a few days ago (and
the last page is kind of a goof from what I'd originally
scripted...it's a long story, but it doesn't look like it should.)
On the B5 front, there has been something of rather substantial
proportion that's finally gone from talk to money, such that I'm now
working frantically to meet some deadlines, but there's nothing I can
say about this until after January 15th, probably closer to the end of
that month.
The only thing I can say is that phase one of the new project is a go,
hence the furious writing schedule at this end of things, which is why
I've been silent until deciding to kick up some dust on the political
discusion. I've been writing my little brains out.
I know the immediate result of this will be speculation, but if we
could keep that to a low roar on the nets to avoid precluding
anything, that would be a wonderfulness. But trust me: I wouldn't go
on about something in this way if it wasn't a significant development.
Just trust me on this one for a bit and hold fire until further word.
(Longtime followers of the various news groups know that an eep means
that something significant has happened, but that I can't talk about
it...the eep is just a way of saying, on the QT, that something has,
indeed, happened and it's real, not just speculation or
maybe-gonna-happens. So on that basis, you may consider this an eep.)
And on the topic of fans for a moment...I'm happy to mention that
we've included a thanks to Steve Grimm (Lurker's Guide) and our
resident moderator Jay Denebeim on the Season 5 DVD. Just a way of
saying thanks for years of help and support.
Oh, yeah...and next year you can expect two new DVD sets that a)
include all of the TV movies in one package (with commentaries from me
on "The Gathering" and "In the Beginning") and b) package all 13 of
the Crusade episodes into one box.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:What a weekend! Does all movies include B5LR by the way?
Not in the big set, no...that will be a separate DVD since it's really
not a part of what comprised the original B5 movies.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:What about "A Call to Arms"? Will that go with the movies, or with the
:Crusade set?
That will be in the set.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers, in a thread where various folks were
>volunteering to do stuff on the new show or whatever it is:
:Assuming they don't need a fluffer, I can do rights and clearances...
And suddenly the conversation, which had been going along quite
nicely, took a dark and ominous turn....
jms
>JMS asks for help (This post is over 2 months old.. he got the
>answers he needed already):
Since this discussion has turned into a tech discussion (and my first
computer was a Kaypro II), I have a question for the computer savvy
amongst us:
I just purchased a new monitor (the other one committed suicide), and
it has both a regular analog plug and a digital plub. Now, the analog
is working fine...and I've plugged in the digital plug to the correct
part of the monitor, and I *think* I've plugged the other end into the
right part of the computer. But I'm not absolutely 100% sure (insert
laughter here).
Now, the computer settings allows me to now change it to digital...but
my question is this: if I change it to digital, and for whatever
reason this thing *ain't* hooked up right...how do I change it back
again if I can't see the monitor because it's going into a
non-effective cable?
(Yes, I have windows XP.)
jms
>General stuff:
Nothing major, more under the headings of FYI....
1) For those who follow my prose stuff...I've written a new short
story, "The Salvation of Lyman Terrell," which will be made available
for reading for free on amazon.com in the next few weeks (I'll try to
remember to let folks know when it goes up) as part of a series of
such bonuses they're offering to customers.
2) Thanks to a series of industry screenings, I've had the opportunity
to see the final Lord of the Rings movie...and for those wondering,
it's spectacular. I loved the first one and considered it a
masterpiece; wasn't quite as happy with the second one, which I felt
(and despite some corrections made via the extended cut, still feel)
that it suffered where it diverged from the book, and where it
replaced story logic with movie logic.
But "The Return of the King" is magnificent on every level. There are
times you feel you're looking at some forgotten history come to life,
the imagery is almost painfully beautiful at times, breathtaking and
awe-inspiring other times. I remember sitting there, thinking there
are some things one feels priviliged to have lived long enough to have
seen. This is one of them. It's brave, heroic, tragic, moving,
funny, inspiring and wistful all at the same time.
So for those who were hoping for the best...your hopes will be
realized. It's just freaking magnificent.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Anyone want to take bets on the best picture oscar?
It's not likely; the Academy doesn't tend to recognize genre films in
this category. I'm hoping that Jackson will get the award for Best
Director, but even that's a leap for the traditionally conservative
Academy.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:When a showrunner leaves, I assume that said shows owners hold all the
:rights to any outlines/arcs/etc.. you may have provided to them or
:written during your employment with them.
Yes and no. They own what they pay for, meaning scripts and, if
commissiond, a bible. Generally they don't pay for notes, memos,
sketches, that sort of thing...though on the other hand, one could
make the argument that it's all done during the term of employment. I
don't know if this has ever been tested. Either way, if they were to
base a story on one's notes, there would have to be separate story
payments per WGA.
:And so do they have any info in regards to where you wanted to take
:the show after season 2?
No. Studios are remarkably short-sighted as a rule; they only want to
see what's in the pipeline for that season. In the case of Jeremiah,
I did not write any notes for after season 2, which is actually pretty
much pro forma, B5 being the exception to the rule. You have it in
your head, but that's it.
:Regardless of what's been left behind for them to try to work with,
:would you have any interest or desire in letting the new showrunners
:in on any of your ideas?
No. Nor would I think they would want them. MGM would take the show
in a vastly different direction, such that any thoughts I would have
had would no longer apply.
Emblematic of some of the studio's notions is a call made by the
studio to my casting director, stating -- of the paucity of babes --
"I don't care if she can act, I want her cute."
:Would you consider being hired on as a consultant to the show if
:asked?
If there were a third season, the studio would have to pay me a
consultancy fee but there would be no requirement to actually consult.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:Another Charlie Brown moment: Oh Good Grief! Isn't there some kind
:of protocol, though, who the studio should be making calls to/giving
:notes? I'd've thought that sort of direction should only be given to
:the Producer level at the lowest?
Yup. Therein lay the silhouette of the problem.
::If there were a third season, the studio would have to pay me a consultancy
::fee but there would be no requirement to actually consult.>>
:Ignorant question here: Why?
A very well written contract.
:Must say, Joe, that this second season is just wonderful.
Thanks, I think it came out really well.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
:So, just wondering what your opinion is on the trilogy taken as a
:whole? If seen as the one picture it sorta is, do the first and third
:parts make up for the middle, or does Two Towers drag the whole
:package down?
There's a story about an old woman who's walking her five year old
grandson along the beach one day, and a huge wave comes up out of
nowhere and just sweeps the kid out to sea, disappearing.
The grandmother is frantic, pleads with god to give her back her
grandson, just bring him back and she'll never ask for anything again.
Suddenly there's another huge wave, and bang, the kid is deposited at
her feet, safe and sound.
She embraces the boy, hugs and kisses him, then looks up at the sky
and says, "He had a hat."
To overly criticize the second part is pretty much along the lines of,
"He had a hat."
That the LoTR adaptation has been done this well, or even half this
well, is a boon to everyone who's ever been a fan of the books. Is
the middle perfect? No, there are some bits I'll always kind of fast
forward through...but where was it written that it had to be perfect?
Perfect, to be honet, is the enemy of good.
Part two is quite good. Parts one and three are wildly sensational.
And, to be honest again, if you're watching 10 hours of a story, you
or the story are inevitably going to fade a bit toward the middle.
No, on balance, I think that the LoTR films will stand the test of
time as a true classic, whose importance will only grow as years pass.
It really represents, more than the Star Wars films -- which have
sadly fallen by the wayside creatively -- the Everest of films in this
genre, and it's certainly to be considered one of the major edifices
outside the genre as well.
jms
>JMS's favorite music:
I'm pretty broad in my musical tastes; I like pretty much everything
except hard-ass country music and, at the absolute other end of the
spectrum, most opera (though I love classical music per se).
I have a playlist set aside as "writing music," which has everything
from musicals (JC Superstar to Chicago and Chess and Phantom of the
Paradise and Hair) --
-- to current artists (Aimee Mann, who is just terrific, Moby,
Mariliyn Manson, Fluke, Juno Reactor, and Rob Dougan, whose
instrumental pieces on his most current two-CD set are freaking
brilliant) --
-- to the "music of my people," being the stuff I grew up with...huge
walloping sections of Simon and Garfunkel, Meatloaf, John Lennon, the
Red Clay Ramblers, Creedence Clearwater Revival, the Who, Billy Joel,
the Doors, the Beatles, Elton John, Leon Russell, Leon Redbone,
Talking Heads and so on.
Classically, I'm a Mozart fan, then I go to Vivaldi, Beethoven, and on
from there.
Internationally, I go for Celtic music (Enya, several others...also
saw and loved Riverdance, go thou and do likewise), and Japanese music
(especially Kodo), some East-Indian music (the Buddha Bar CD sets are
a good place to start, as kind of samplers of this style).
So at the end of the day, I'm kind of a mutt, musically speaking. But
it works for me.
jms
>JMS quotes and answers (Link is to Amazon, to pre-order Supreme Power (Max).
:http://makeashorterlink.com/?Y3CA21CE6 I didn't have any trouble
:finding it. Did a search for "Supreme Power" in Books and it popped
:right up.
Hunh...for some reason, it didn't show up when I did the same, but the
link works. It's a conspiracy, I tell you, a conspiracy....
jms
>JMS's short story:
The short story I mentioned, "The Salvation of Lyman Terrell," is
online now at:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/subst/stores/xs/holiday/delight.html/ref
=xs_cal_gw_jstraczynski_31106_right-2/002-5126084-7707203
One small problem...for whatever reason it came through the formatting
without breaks between sections to accommodate time or location
changes, so that can be confusing. Other than that, enjoy.
jms
>The short story moved (and was still there, as of 2/16):
It's been moved. The new address is:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/feature/-/511848/002-4631656-9628832
jms
>JMS quotes and answers:
I just mentioned this in another thread, but in case that one gets held
up...the next issue comes out tomorrow, the 7th, and you can order the book
collected in hardcover (issues 1-6) at:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/078511369X/qid=1072836584/sr
=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-4631656-9628832?v=glance&s=books
jms
>Supreme Power info:
Just a word to let folks know that issue 6 of Supreme Power hits
bookstores tomorrow, January 7th. I continue to be inestimably happy
with how this book is coming out, it's just a pleasure to get each new
copy in my hands every month.
Because the book has a tendency to sell out, Marvel will be reprinting
all of the issues to date in hardcover, which can be ordered at:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/078511369X/qid=1072836584/sr
=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-4631656-9628832?v=glance&s=books
jms
>From a thread called "The naming of cats:"
For reasons unknown, in looking at the gray tabby, the only name that
seemed to fit was Ralph.
I have no explanation for this.
jms
>About DVD commentaries:
For S5 I did commentaries on The Fall of Centauri Prime and Sleeping
in Light. The latter was the hardest, since it was the first time I'd
seen the episode since it aired. (I just couldn't, it was too hard.)
I should have done so, though, because when we got to B5's
destruction, I'm ashamed to admit that my voice broke, it just hit me
so hard. After we were done, i wanted to go back and do it again, to
fix that, which I thought was unprofessional, but the WB boys
prevailed upon me to leave it alone. I just hope it doesn't come
across as dumb or something.
jms
>An update on Buddy. Warning: Do not eat or drink while reading this:
For those who've been inquiring about the latest on Buddy....
Well, I've finally answered one of the questions I've had about the
whole of the Boo clan (named for the first cat adopted out of this
group, Boo, the cat with one blue eye and one green eye). I suspected
that one of the two progenitors of this group was a siamese, givens
ome of the markings, a suspicion recently confirmed when one came out
with all the siamese recessive genes....
And now Buddy, the king of the recessive genes, has answered the other
half of that question. The other progenitor was a Maine coon
cat...which is what he is, in spades.
Maine coon cats are big, very funny, very predatory (in a cute way)
cats that can get to be 25 pounds or better. Not only does Buddy have
all the markings, inclusive of the big sweeping tail that's as long as
he is...at 8 months he is already 12 pounds without an ounce of fat
there anywhere. By the time he finishes growing -- and Maine coon
cats can grow into their third year -- he will be big enough to have
his own zip code.
I have let a furred Godzilla into my home.
They are also known as the clowns of the cat species...as evidenced
pretty much every day, inclusive of the day he found the bag of
plastic peanuts, rolled around in same, until static electricity had
covered him nose to tail in phosphorescent green styrofoam peanuts
until you couldn't see a trace of fur...and went parading around the
house as proud as if he'd just discovered radium (which, given the
green color, seemed about right). I scraped them off, and they kept
flying back onto him drawn by the static, but finally got them all
off...he ran off...I turned around...and he had done exactly the same
thing again. This time the pursuit went all over the house, leaving
little bits of peanut over every square inch.
He doesn't meow, he chirrups and trills, Maine coon traits. So he
wanders the house, just talking to himself all day. I think he's
worried about the economy, but I'm not sure.
He's also the poster child for attempted suicide. Leaving out how he
was found, every day he does something to elicit a shriek of horror
from me. In a ten minute span of time, for instance, he went from
trying to chew through a power cord at the socket (sticking his claws
into the open socket below for leverage), to wrapping the mouse cord
under my desk around his neck like a noose, and finally, when chased
out of my office, I looked out to find him sticking his paw into the
toaster.
It's like that every day with him. Every. Day.
I don't know where he came from, but he does seem in an awful big
hurry to get back there. Whether he or I survive this process only
the universe knows.
If anyone sees a mushroom cloud rising from the Los Angeles area
someday, you will know that Buddy finally hit the big time....
jms
>JMS quotes and answers, about scene selection in promos, and the
>apparent addition of effects not seen in the actual show:
:That is NOT in the show itself, at least not on the DVD. I realize
:that the people doing the teasers take liberties, but it seems strange
:to me that they would try to "improve" on the program with their own
:effects.
Seemed pretty weird to me at the time, too.
jms
>JMS's contribution to a thread titled: What have the Pagans done for
>us?"
Just to respond to this header for a moment...pagans are, by
dictionary definition, polytheists (among other options). So that
being the case, then pagans would be the pre-christian romans, greeks
and egyptians who gave us the very foundations of society, culture,
science, philosophy, literature and drama.
Other than that, not a damned thing.
jms
--
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| Dirk A. Loedding <*> ju...@america.net |
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