JMS Usenet messages for October 1996. Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:14:56 -0400 Subject: Re: Att JMS: BabPro Responsibilities? WAS Re: Cons and Your Health John Copeland is a producer on the show, a line producer (technical term). Problem is, he's only on AOL. I try to direct people to the right areas in general terms -- if there's a fan club question, go to Jim Lockett at jplb5@aol.com, for instance -- but basically, I'm here, and if a question comes my way, I kinda have to answer it because there's nobody else here to do it. jms Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:13:44 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Writing With the Subsocscious "Do you think that you write at both the conscious and subconscious level simultaneously." I think any writer has to operate at both levels at the same time. You learn to trust your instincts. There's a certain point when you're "in the zone," to use a sports phrase, and the logical part of you is structuring the plot, and the illogical, intuitive part of you is filling in the corners. You have to be open to both voices for it to work. jms Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:16:15 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn: JMS: Writing season 4 Basically, nobody sees anything until it's in first draft form. Harlan functions on an as-needed basis; if I have a question, or if there's an area which could benefit from his input, I call him in, but for the most part, the scriptwriting is a one-person affair. The job of the writer is to listen to the small voice in the back of his head, and too often too many voices just get in the way. jms Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:16:28 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS When are you going to rest? I rest when the series is finished. And I ain't complaining. Believe me, I fought too long and too hard to get this story on the air; I'm not going to start complaining about the hours. jms Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:18:37 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS When are you going to rest? PS...Stephen Furst will direct #8, "The Illusion of Truth," and we're shooting #4 right now, so we've got a ways to go yet. jms Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:19:43 -0400 Subject: Re: Well, WE knew that! WAS JMS on Genie: September Messages sigh...I should never have said anything about this.... I'm doomed. Besides, naked women already *have* ribs...it just takes a little more work to get to them.... jms Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:19:34 -0400 Subject: Re: Cons and Your Health WAS: Re: ATTN JMS: Bizarre Story (enter embarrassed, chagrined mode) Folks, it's okay...I'm fine. I get kinda ragged some days, but it goes with the turf, like I said. I come from a fairly long-lived family, mainly out of spite.... jms Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:18:47 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn JMS: Risky Writing? (Z'ha'dum spoilers) Well, I think you can't do something like that without knowing how you're going to pull the character's fat out of the fire, and it has to make sense. I think people will be satisfied with what they see.\ jms Date: 2 Oct 1996 16:48:51 -0400 Subject: Re: Review of OTHERSYDE by J. Michael Straczynski I think I pretty much agree with the comments, criticisms inclusive. OtherSyde was my second novel, and I was still learning my craft, so it has some rough edges, though overall I think it works. Re: some dangling threads and a hurried sense to the last third...again, I agree. The book was about 100 pages over what the publisher decided what he wanted to put out, and sliced off a lot of threads, and hurried a lot of the other stuff. Which is one reason why I haven't let the book be reprinted since; I'd prefer to go to the longer version...and I'm embarrassed to say I don't know where the draft is. (Or the files.) I think the longer version worked a lot better. jms Date: 3 Oct 1996 03:53:20 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn: JMS:question on the warrior and the spirit That relationship, the warrior, the spirit, and the flesh, is just what's dealt with in very short order.... jms Date: 3 Oct 1996 03:57:56 -0400 Subject: Re: Justice in Genocide? (was Re: Z Ha Dum (* Spoilers *)) Spoiler reply: Lemme put it to you this way, Neely. If someone pointed to an aggressor city (and for the shadows there's no distinction between civilian and military, it's all the same, the only thing that drives them on), which was unified by its desire to wreak havoc and commit massive warfare, and said, "By eliminating that city of 100,000 agressors you will save the lives of 8 billion innocent bystanders," I'd push that button in a hot second, and never regret it. jms Date: 6 Oct 1996 02:18:58 -0400 Subject: Re: Writing policy change (was: Walkabout) "Was there some incident that we don't know about? It seems to me that there must have been. " Nope. No incident. The situation with year 3 was that *so much* was being paid off, and set up, and foreshadowed, and required such intimate knowledge of where the show was going, and where it'd been, that it made it nearly impossible to bring in any outside writers. There has never been any series in television history where every episode was utterly beyond criticism. Some are better, some are worse, some are average. There are many Twilight Zones by Rod Serling that are utterly brilliant. And some that just fall flat. That's the nature of the beast. Sometimes something will look great on the page, and fall flat on the stage. (And sometimes it happens in reverse; you think you've got something that won't work, and somehow the filmed version just takes off.) There's a lot about Walkabout I like; and there's some stuff that just didn't work out. You try something different here and there, and sometimes it works, and sometimes it don't. TV, or any form of writing, is the constant process of trial and error. It's not like one day you forget how to write, or you're writing bad...you very rarely fall below a certain facility once you reach it. There's not a writer alive who has turned out nothing but terrific stuff. Now, one could turn out a lifetime of mediocre stuff, by not trying...but I think it's better to shoot high, and sometimes fall, knowing that you'll get something great one out of every five tries, than not try at all and just do okay. "Grey 17" is the same thing, for me. There are bits in that I like a lot. And some parts of it just fell down dreadfully. That's simply the nature of the beast. I thought I'd try something different in the tone of "Grey" and while most of the writing works (mostly), the production fell down on a couple of aspects. It happens. It doesn't mean anything. On the other hand, the following 3, "Rock," "Shadow" and "Z'ha'dum" are some of the best stuff we've done. The preliminary P5 survey has "Z'ha'dum" as the best episode of the entire series to date. Did I suddenly learn to write better? If there were a problem with being tired, then by all rights you should see a descending order in quality. But these last 3 are some of our best work. The real key here is something I heard someone say a while back about TV: a flaw, or a flop, or a misstep happens by accident as often as by inability; but real quality is never an accident. So the latter is more indicative of the level of the show than the former, since accidents or missteps *always* happen. "Walkabout," for me, is a good episode with a very few clunky parts; for me, it's a middle of the road episode. "Grey" falls a bit short of that, for me. But then, I'm very hard on my shows; a lot of folks have liked "Walkabout" a *lot*. I didn't much like "Infection," but many did; and some shows I love dearly, like "Geometry," don't catch on. It's subjective. And where you say the battle falls short, others like it...so on one level, I'd caution against applying your standard as an objective one that is somehow more true than another, and thus asking "what's wrong with *you* that I had this opinion?" If everyone on the planet shares that opinion, then you've got something. Otherwise.... And there are always some people who don't want the character stuff at all, they want battles...and some for whom the CGI is of secondary interest to the plot...and those who want arc stories *only*...and those who like the stand-alones. Some of it is a function of what you want. Anyway...point being, and I went around the barn a few times to get there, no, there's no "incident" and I don't even know what this could refer to. Some episodes work better for some people than others. That will happen whether you've got 1 person or 50 people writing scripts. I caught a lot of *very* negative comments on Peter David's script, which you cite (as well as many positive ones). The Brits in particular seem to uniformly dislike that one. And in the P5 surveys, the freelance scripts are *all* in the bottom third of the rankings. So it's really not a question of freelancers or no, it's just that TV is variable, as is any kind of writing. Not every episode is going to work for you. Nor should you expect it to. I'm very much an X-Files fan...but there are some scripts that work better for me than others. Doesn't mean anything other than that show didn't quite jell for me. That's the nature of TV. I'm sure somebody will cite this as being defensive about it, but honest and true, I'm not. I'm just trying to explain it from this end of things. My prior exec producer said, "You're doing *real* good if, in a season, you've got one-third that are pretty good, one-third that are okay, and one-third you never want to see again the rest of your natural life." I think we do a heck of a lot better than that, and that's a heck of an accomplishment. jms Date: 4 Oct 1996 17:06:37 -0400 Subject: Re: JMS: Season Four, the HUGO, and the WWWF Grudge Match "1)I've noticed that, according to the Lurker's Guide, you have written the first eight episodes of season four. Are you planning to write the entire season? I hope so. Season three kicked ass. I can only assume that the Hugo must have revitalized your writing spirit." It was a big help, no mistake. "2)How does it feel to be in a class of sci-fi writers that produced such classics as Star Wars, Alien, 2001, and of course old Harlan's classic Trek episode?" Well, that kind of approbation is granted by time and time alone, not by the person doing the work...if the show survives and thrives twenty years from now, as is my hope, ask me again then. Now, it would be presumptive of me to do so. "3)Did you get a chance to read the WWWF Grudge Match a few weeks ago?" No.... jms Date: 4 Oct 1996 21:28:30 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS "Opus 322, blues in VCR-major repair" Yeah, but didn't the hassle just add to the experience? Now you've not only seen the episode, but you've got a great story to tell about it. Take the magic when it comes. jms Date: 6 Oct 1996 06:02:46 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn JMS: HELP!!!! Writers known primarily for TV work are not generally the ones hired for high profile film work. I've done some film assignments (none produced), but for a Heinlein, they'd go to a screenwriter, not a TV writer. jms Date: 6 Oct 1996 01:35:22 -0400 Subject: Re: Walkabout question (spoiler for Walkabout) In "Severed Dreams," the dilemma faced by the Alexander in the teaser is that if they jump, they'll end up leaving their fighters behind. A jump engine rips the area open for that one ship, and closes it again right behind it. What sometimes happens, as in "All Alone," is that *as a ship comes out*, it releases its fighters. But you can't just follow a ship into a jump point formed by another ship. You'd probably get torn apart when space folded back on you, because the field opening the point is primarily around the other ship. jms Date: 7 Oct 1996 01:00:29 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Shadow Dancing assemblage (*SPOILERS*) Simple....you don't bring in the big guns like that until you're ready for the final assault. You don't whistle 'em up when convenient. You can probably go to the well just once with these guys, and you want to do so only when you're ready for D-Day. jms Date: 7 Oct 1996 01:32:09 -0400 Subject: Re: "Walkabout" Enters the Twilight Zone (minor spoilage) Well, that's what happens when you invite a Narn to dinner. jms Date: 7 Oct 1996 15:24:59 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn JMS: Season 3 to 4 transition The events in 401 take place roughly 7 days after 322. jms Date: 7 Oct 1996 16:02:45 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Clarification (WAS Re: Writing policy change SPOILERS) "By "incident", I meant perhaps a Roddenberry-esque communication breakdown between producer and writer" No, I get along with me fairly well most days...someone has to. Of course, there are some days I won't talk to me, stalk out of the room whenever I walk in, and there was that time I locked me in the closet until I forced me to finish a script, the embarrassing moment when we both showed up for a meeting dressed in the same chiffon number and answering to the name Dorothy...but other than that, no, no noteworthy incidents to report. \ jms Date: 8 Oct 1996 15:33:08 -0400 Subject: Re: All that Jazz (WAS: Re: Walkabout Science Nit Pick) Spoilers removed Here's what I think is a bit of cultural short-sightedness. Everybody keeps saying, "well, if they had that kind of music, shouldn't it have been shown to be an oldies bar or something?" Look at classical music for a moment. Goes back to Beethoven, Brahms, Bach and lots of composers whose names don't even begin with B. And earlier. Now, I don't mean to alarm anyone or startle anyone with this revelation, but classical music is *still being written and performed* hundreds of years later. Not old stuff, new stuff, of that school and in that style. The orchestral suites in the Star Wars movies are strongly based on classical compositions...is that "oldies" stuff? You've got one of the longest running musical plays running now in London, in "Phantom of the Opera," a *new* composition (well, mostly, knowing how Webber works). Jazz and blues kinda formally began in the 1920s and 1930s, but its roots run back to spirituals and african-american music in the 1800s. And it didn't just stop suddenly in the 1930s. There's still new material being written in that style now; so should Stevie Ray Vaughn's albums or performances have been labeled "oldies?" After all, it's sixty years later and more. Certain musical styles will stay with us for a long, long time. Not performances based on old stuff, but new material in that vein, for those forms that have shown themselves to be enduring. 200 years from now, in addition to other forms, you're still going to have original blues songs, original classical compositions, original jazz, original compositions in the style of gregorian chants, on and on and on. It's odd when people try to apply illogical rules to the future that don't apply now; no one said, as noted, that a Stevie Ray Vaughn concert should be billed as an "oldies" event, or an oldies bar...even though it's over half a century since serious blues started going...it's just silly. jms Date: 8 Oct 1996 15:35:04 -0400 Subject: Re: How Deep Space Nine creates its special effects... All of which, of course, is why Foundation Imaging, which provided B5's CGI effects since the pilot, is now doing much of the EFX work for ST. jms Date: 8 Oct 1996 16:07:09 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Epilogue Speeches (minor spolier?) The only thing worse than the way I look on camera, is my voice. Eck. No, not a chance. jms Date: 9 Oct 1996 03:09:09 -0400 Subject: Re: How does JMS feel about fan fiction? Bottom line, and real simple: I've asked that fans *not* write any fan fiction set in the B5 universe while the show is on the air. Remember, most ST fanfic began after the show was over, to keep those characters alive. We're still around. Fanfic is a threat to us, in that if someone writes a story, puts it in a fanzine, and something remotely similar is done in the show, that person could decide to sue. It happens; Marion Zimmer Bradley lost an entire *book* over this, when her publisher refused to put the book out because of the threat of lawsuit from a fanzine with a similar story. When someone posted a basic story idea similar to what was planned for "Passing Through Gethsemane," that script went into cold storage for over a year; only when the fan involved offered (greatly chagrined) to write and sign a legal release, and delivered it to me, could that story be put back into prep. If he had not been this kind, THAT EPISODE WOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN MADE. Roll that one around for a while. It seems to me that if someone wants to write B5 fanfic, it's because that fan likes the show, appreciates what's done, and respects those who created it. And that selfsame fan would not want to jeapordize the continued existence of that show. And would, therefore, honor this request from those who make it for the duration of the show. jms Date: 9 Oct 1996 02:40:48 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Art of Screenwriting The script which, I hope, WB has included, for "The Coming of Shadows," is written exactly the same way I write *all* my scripts, whether for B5 or Murder, She Wrote or any other series. And there's really no one way to do this, which is something I make clear in the book...you find the style that works for you. I've seen, and bought, scripts that were very spare when it came to camera stuff, and scripts that were chockablock with them. Ain't no one answer in this business. jms Date: 9 Oct 1996 03:08:37 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS AND ALL: Interesting article in Chicago Tribune Re: places where B5 isn't mentioned and should be...here's another, which came out this week, and it's hit that point now where I just have to laugh.... The current issue of Cinefantastique has a whole two or three page article about how Voyager is now using story arcs across episodes. They consider it a new kind of storytelling for them, but cite the notion that it *has* been used here and there. The magazine (not the folks at the show) enumerate such examples as Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blue, LA Law...of which 2 out of 3 shows are no longer on the air...but what's the one they *don't* mention? The only one really doing this in SF until lately? Yup. I think the magazine deliberately pre-censored themselves on this, because they suspect that the folks at Paramount grind their gears bigtime if B5 is EVER mentioned as in any way having an influence on their shows. Here's JMS's rule of journalism, which you'll see repeated in 90% of the articles on SF out there: if it's an article on B5, ST is almost always mentioned somewhere; if it's an article on ST, you almost *never* see B5 mentioned. jms Date: 9 Oct 1996 20:19:15 -0400 Subject: Re: All that Jazz (WAS: Re: Walkabout Science Nit Pick) Spoilers removed "But it *would* be nice to hear some Zeppelin, or Beatles, or Blues Traveller, rather than semi-mainstream fare." Yup. Only problem...it costs an arm and a leg, and that's one limb more than we can afford. jms Date: 9 Oct 1996 21:06:26 -0400 Subject: Re: Philosophy ? (SPOILERS for F5) WAS JMS's "old" GEnie posts "When is walkabout a legitimate choice, and when is it a cop-out?" When you're more afraid of what you're running *to* than what you're running *from*. jms Date: 10 Oct 1996 02:06:43 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Profound thanks The pleasure and the thanks are entirely mine; it's been a good run, and the new shows are just spiffy, and one is rarely afforded the chance to grow, and try new things, and push your luck. I'm happy that viewers have stuck with us through it all. It's been great. jms Date: 10 Oct 1996 02:13:58 -0400 Subject: jms in Tampa, also jms book Two quickies.... 1) This weekend, 11-13th, I'll be in Tampa Florida for Necronomicon, a convention being held at the Chamberly Plaza Hotel/Convention Center. I'll be bringing the bloopers, some clips from as-yet unaired shows, and other goodies. 2) My totally rewritten, updated and expanded "Complete Book of Scriptwriting" hits the stands this week in hardback, $21.99, from Writer's Digest Books (ISBN 0-8987-9-512-5). The book can be found at stores, and you can pick up any copy of Writer's Digest Magazine and order from them via their 800 number (which I don't have at hand, alas). jms Date: 15 Oct 1996 22:55:12 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn: MOJO, were there any regrets? RE: the notion of seeing a boat on a lake in the central Garden area...the reason I didn't want to do it was that it's silly. It stretched credulity enough to show the baseball diamond (which I've since never returned to, for that very reason), but to waste water and space like that in a confined location like B5, which is always short, and needs everything to be somewhat functional, struck me as a Foolish Thing. The whole idea here is that they're under stress, locked in a tin can. To do a scene like this would undercut that. Would it look cool? Sure. Would it be right for the story? No. jms Date: 15 Oct 1996 23:00:12 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Inside the mind of the Great Maker Thanks. It's the sort of book -- a retrospective -- that would be useful, I agree. On the one hand, I'm not sure I'd be up to writing it right after finishing the series; I think I'll probably be off in a coma somewhere. But if I wait too long, some details will get lost. I think I'll have to think about this some more.... jms Date: 15 Oct 1996 23:09:57 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS - Necronomicon To the thread in general...thanks. It was a great convention. Kinda blew out my vocal cords a bit, but other than that, it was terrific. Thanks. jms Date: 15 Oct 1996 23:13:28 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS (Z'Ha'Dum spoilers) WOW! & the Tea Set The props department found the teapot, and found it very suiting to the environment, so they went with it. jms Date: 15 Oct 1996 23:14:17 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Love that title... Thanks. I labor over titles a long time...I can't actually begin writing an episode until I have the title worked out; dunno why, it's just one of those glitches. And yeah, it's a good and in this case, very apt title. jms Date: 15 Oct 1996 23:15:33 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: wasting Wayne Wayne Alexander plays Lorien, a character you'll see throughout the first six episodes of season 4. We wanted to give him more to do.\ jms Date: 18 Oct 1996 19:15:01 -0400 Subject: Re: JMS gets a Trojan Just to jump in...I've now got most of the disk restored, still working on the windows system directory (logging on to AOL from work), but it's almost in hand, so there's no urgent need for email instructions at this time...it should be okay soon. Thanks. jms Date: 18 Oct 1996 19:16:14 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Future Episodes (no spoilers, I think) Yes, a substantial amount of the S4 storyline takes place off B5. jms Date: 18 Oct 1996 19:16:32 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Your "virus" problem Alas, I didn't write down the email address, as the sender said that it was on the supposed jpg image. And then my system went kablooey, so there's no way to backcheck it. jms Date: 20 Oct 1996 01:53:42 -0400 Subject: Re: Sci-Fi Universe Awards-Congrats to Mira Furlan & Peter Jurasik Peter Jurasik won for Best Supporting Actor, and Bruce won for Best Actor. The web site got it wrong; B5 won for Best Series, not X-Files...an error which was repeated onstage, as one of the presenters read the name X-Files, which was on the prompter, even though the card in his hand read B5. This led to a very embarrassing moment for a poor X-Files fellow who went up there to accept, only to have it taken away. Mira, btw, was never notified of her nomination, or invited to the awards. jms Date: 20 Oct 1996 02:28:16 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Where Credit Is Due? WB determines and tells us how the credits are to be displayed; we have no latitude in this. jms jms Date: 20 Oct 1996 01:51:15 -0400 Subject: And the Rock Cried Out No Hiding Place (* Spoilers *) (* Spoilers for And the Rock Cried Out No Hiding Place *) Re: the rabbi singing the gospel song...a couple of points. First, if you're visiting someone's church, it's only considered polite behavior to go along with what's there. I have a number of Catholic friends who would sometimes go to temple with Jewish friends...and when it came time to sing, would do so. Why should it not work the other way around? Second, as I seem to recall, the line about "no hiding place" is taken from the Old Testament, which forms a substantial portion of Judaic teachings (but not the whole of it, a mistake many make). Yes, there's some later stuff worked in, but the heart of it is from a common ground. jms Date: 20 Oct 1996 02:10:41 -0400 Subject: Re: And the Rock Cried Out No Hiding Place (* Spoilers *) Waitaminnit...I retract part two of my reply...I think I just stooged the origins of that song. (whaddyawant from me, I just spend 12 hours putting my hard drive back together....) jms Date: 20 Oct 1996 02:31:24 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS And The Rock Question ( * SPOILER * ) I don't think she was so much withholding the information, as they just weren't ready yet, and the need for them wasn't there yet. jms Date: 20 Oct 1996 20:03:27 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS - Your Druthers Without commercials is always a preferable format for one-hour. It's just more intense that way. (But for something longer, some kind of break is good, even plays break up by acts and intermissions.) \ jms Date: 20 Oct 1996 19:09:29 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN:JMS And the Rock... (spoiler) Not sure it was so much a look of disappointment as..."Okay, I know something here isn't on the level...but he's got it very well surrounded...and is it worth sticking out my neck to get into this?" And yes, Refa was his last name/family name. jms Date: 21 Oct 1996 21:13:17 -0400 Subject: jms scriptwriting book info (This is the last time I'll be forwarding this info for a while; I got requests from several nets for more info, since the prior notice was fairly brief, and now that I have a minute to spare, I'm passing it along, but I don't want to monopolize this overmuch with what is, in essence, a commercial....) As I mentioned in my earlier note, bundled with the Tampa convention info, the new edition of my book, "The Complete Book of Scriptwriting," has just come out from Writer's Digest Books. It has chapters on breaking in as a writer for film, TV, stage and radio, which have been rewritten stem to stern from the prior edition, fully updated, old info trashed, again completely revised...plus new chapters on animation, the Writer's Guild, Warning Signs, altogether about 100,000 new words. (The book is huge, 424 pages, one stop shopping for the script-inclined.) It's basically the book I wish someone had written when *I* was starting out in the biz. It also contains the *complete* script for the Hugo-award winning B5 episode, "The Coming of Shadows," with material deleted from the actual episode for time. You can order the book via your local bookstore (ISBN# 0-89879-512-5), or via www.amazon.com, or direct from WD (800-289-0963). It sells for $21.99 in hardback. It took me about 3+ years to finish the rewrite on this, because I wanted it to be right. Now it is. jms Date: 22 Oct 1996 16:05:35 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Third age no longer mentioned? By not mentioning it, now you're mentioning it, so to get something mentioned maybe it's better not to mention it, or mention not mentioning it, or by not mentioning that you've not mentioned it let someeone else mention that you've not mentioned it. By the time you finish the preceding sentence, the word "mention" will have lost all meaning. And we'll get back to this issue in season 4. jms Date: 22 Oct 1996 16:06:30 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Thanks and public apology Thanks in return...and the intent of your message was clear, I'm not sure you have anything to apologize for, but lobbing one out there on general principle will rarely cause distress. jms Date: 22 Oct 1996 22:11:18 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS jms scriptwriting book Thanks; I'm glad the book is of use (when you can pry it away); that's what I was hoping for, to do some good with it. jms Date: 23 Oct 1996 04:59:31 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: When? (B5 novel with Anna Sheridan) It's due to come out as the first of the next batch of three from Dell. jms Date: 23 Oct 1996 05:02:36 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS (Re: And the Rock ) You gotta understand...nobody touches my computer. It's a thing with me.... jms Date: 23 Oct 1996 21:40:11 -0400 Subject: Re: Fanclub Problems -- how does one get a respo I copied your note to Jim Lockett's account; this will expedite things. jms Date: 23 Oct 1996 21:47:44 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn JMS: Shadow Dancing Director (!Spoilers!) You're right; no one should have made a big deal out of her walking past; that was indicated to the director, but not followed through on. Kim's done a lot of other shows, but after this one wasn't available again due to committments. jms Date: 24 Oct 1996 03:24:29 -0400 Subject: Re: "ATTN JMS:A ratings question" No, nothing new, and I'm really kinda bugged about it. Because of the TNT/WB merger, most of our people over at WB who used to give us the ratings aren't there anymore or have been shifted over to other divisions...they don't like taking the time to give each individual show they work on the ratings breakdown because it takes up too much of their time. The only figure I've heard so far was the overall national (final) rating on the first new episode, which was a 3.2, which is great for coming back. The station by station figures I've seen for the second week are higher, so the overall should be higher, but until they see fit to tell me, I can only guess, and the trades don't usually publish comprehensive lists. jms Date: 24 Oct 1996 23:35:20 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: the hype for Star Trek-Voyager I agree. I've more or less reconciled myself to the reality that this show is only going to get its proper recognition once we've finished it, and it's running in long term syndication. Such is life. jms Date: 25 Oct 1996 03:04:34 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn: JMS -- New B5 Cards -- what were you thinking?! :) We're limited to what WB has in stock; WB only sends a photographer to the set 1 day out of every 7 we shoot. They usually send someone on days when there are action sequences. So very often, guest stars don't get shot. The Fleer folks have to make do with what WB chooses to shoot. jms Date: 25 Oct 1996 03:07:13 -0400 Subject: Re: SHADOW DANCING (spoilers) >...and the BIGGEST bitch of all about the episode (and JMS - pay >attention) was the "miraculous" recovery of Marcus. I like him as a >character, and enjoyed the further development of his unrequited love >for Ivanova (along the Lancelot/Gueniviere parallel). But, two >episodes ago, he had the freaking SHIT beat out of him (remember the >bloody Minbari staff anyone???). Yes, I do remember. But for starters, we're talking about more than two weeks of story time. Between Grey 17 and Rock was several weeks, then you've got about 2 weeks from Rock to Shadow Dancing. That's five weeks, and now you've got the issue of medicine 250 years from now...and you can be sure that these kinds of injuries will be fixed much more quickly. It isn't like he showed up the very next day like this, we *did* allow for proper amounts of time. jms Date: 25 Oct 1996 14:55:49 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Shadow Dancing Jungian Psychology... "Is Sheridan to meet his shadow next week?" Well, now that you mention it... jms Date: 25 Oct 1996 16:02:51 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn JMS: Shadow Dancing at Avalon (Spoilers) "When I saw "A Late Arrival at Avalon," Marcus's line asking "Who is Morgana La Fey" got me to begin speculating that Anna Sheridan was alive and that she was working for the Shadows. My question is whether or not Marcus's line was intended that way--i.e. as foreshadowing that a significant female figure not presently on the scene (Anna?) would arrive at B5 to play Morgana to Delenn's Lady of the Lake?" yup. jms Date: 26 Oct 1996 22:45:07 -0400 Subject: Re: Attn JMS:What does the signed card look like It's similar to the regular jms card, with a seal/imprint, my signature, and a blue area for the signature itself. jms Date: 26 Oct 1996 23:06:02 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Captain Power question I'm pretty sure the song was "Little Brown Jug." Or was it "Little Brown Bag?" The first two words are correct. jms Date: 26 Oct 1996 23:07:56 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN: JMS...your updated Scriptwriting book I definitely agree; the well-done 30 or 60 second spot is a true rarity, and requires just as much attention to detail, the story involved, it has to move you or touch you at some level...it's a *very* tough business. jms Date: 26 Oct 1996 23:31:51 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: ratings --- here's some. And here's some great info: I've mentioned that we've been consistently growing in ratings, and the second episode back, "Grey 17," hit #19 in the ratings, so we're back in the top 20 for the first time in quite a while! I've mentioned before the slow upward tracking, from 60s to 50s to 40s, and then to 30s...and now we're right smack into the top 20 (as per this past Friday's Daily Variety). We're very pleased. jms Date: 26 Oct 1996 22:48:58 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Anti-male joke ruined my enjoyment of Shadow Dancing (*SPOILERS*) "I gritted my teeth tighter when the dialogue launched into some anti-male paranoia about "What if the male demands the female stay a second night?", and the various "vengeances" she could take for a custom that is, after all, steeply in her favor. I could accept all that in an anthropological sense: "Look what anti-male customs the Minbari have. Isn't that fascinating, if you put the moral judgements aside?". But then... Yeesh!" The "vengeances" she cites, should the male insist she stay another night, are "she can leave once he falls asleep, complain to the elders, even cut off his access to her family." These hardly sound like anti-male rhetoric, but rather precautions taken to deal reasonably *should* someone get out of line. It doesn't state that all men do this, but sets in place what to do should *some* men do this. This is not a problem of context. It is a problem of perception. It has nothing to do with the scene, and everything to do with how you perceive the role of males in society. jms Date: 26 Oct 1996 23:35:21 -0400 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Awful sound problem on Shadow Dancing We've been running this down, and we suspect that the tapes are being transmuted from digital to analog and back again when they insert the commercials after we turn over the eps to WB. We're working to fix this, it happened before and we beat the crap outta some people at the subcontracting company. We may have to do it again. jms Date: 27 Oct 1996 02:10:16 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Your health I eat fine, and in general am fine. It's always a risk, though, going to conventions, because the odds of catching something from 2000 people in close quarters, with considerable contact is fairly high. And the flu's running around this season. So I got hammered just at the end of the last con I did in Tampa. Probably caught it the first day of the con, 'cause it hit by Sunday. But them's the breaks. jms Date: 27 Oct 1996 02:12:51 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Back Home? It's a good question, to consider just how much Earth knows about all this. jms Date: 27 Oct 1996 03:02:20 -0500 Subject: Re: Shadow Dancing Q: Audio Dropped? No, we just figured we'd let the music take it. jms Date: 27 Oct 1996 19:43:25 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Suggestions for SF marathon? "I'm the SF Marathon Director for the MIT Lecture Series Committee, and was just wondering what you, Joe, would recommend... what are your favorite SF movies of all time?" For starters, I'd include "Seconds" on your list, the only marginally SF film done by Rock Hudson which to this *day* scares the hell out of me. John Frankenheimer was never better. I'd also include "Fail Safe," "Dr. Strangelove," "Seven Days in May" and "The Manchurian Candidate" which (for my money) do have some SF aspects to them...if "Alas, Babylon" is SF, then "Fail Safe" and the others can be included in that. It's also a grouping that gives newer audiences a sense of where this country was at a very precarious point in its history. Of films more definitely in the SF area...Forbidden Planet, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, The Rocky Horror Picture Show (stop staring at me like that, it's got aliens and...and space ships...and...and mad scientists and stuff like that, and it's got a beat and you can dance to it), Aliens, High Plains Drifter (fantasy), Terminator 2, The Road Warrior, The Princess Bride (fantasy), On the Beach, Night of the Living Dead, Brazil, Alien, The Haunting of Hill House, Blade Runner, First Men in the Moon, When Worlds Collide, Village of the Damned, Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers, Phantom of the Paradise and Day of the Triffids. jms Date: 27 Oct 1996 20:02:09 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Z'ha'dum Question...Spoilers Yes, Justin is the man in-between...the "middle man," as he describes himself. jms Date: 28 Oct 1996 00:12:13 -0500 Subject: Re: I bought a book today, oh, boy! That's a GREAT story, thanks. jms Date: 29 Oct 1996 01:27:18 -0500 Subject: Re: Babylon 5 Licensed Kits <> Revell 1997 Releases. They only got the license a couple/three weeks ago, long after the kit would've gone to press. It's way too early to expect anything in print. jms Date: 29 Oct 1996 01:30:31 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: You and the Cast... Except for tone meetings with directors, no, not really. The cast are very happy with what's going on, so there isn't that much to say. jms Date: 29 Oct 1996 15:40:38 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Z'ha'dum inquiry (SPOILERS) Justin thought he had some influence...but perception and reality are often at odds. jms Date: 29 Oct 1996 16:06:55 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Confusion about ratings I don't think those were the actual neilsens, but someone's assemblage of info. jms Date: 29 Oct 1996 15:43:32 -0500 Subject: Re: Attn JMS: Z'Ha'Dum Double Whammy (*No* Spoilers) That's terrific, hadn't yet heard the details. Thanks. jms Date: 29 Oct 1996 16:05:27 -0500 Subject: Re: Captain Power Question No, you're correct, that episode, "Retribution," was the last one produced. jms Date: 29 Oct 1996 20:52:20 -0500 Subject: 402 Spoiler Warning I just got a copy of the ad that's going to run in TV Guide for "Whatever Happened to Mr. Garibaldi?" in two weeks. It's a great ad, well composed, well done, but it's also a major spoiler for something you will NOT want spoiled. So avoid the ad if possible. jms Date: 30 Oct 1996 04:03:22 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Election Day (bryoung2@vt.edu (Brian De Young)) Not that it does or should matter...voting is an individual act and how one person votes should not have influence or bearing on anyone else...but I plan to vote for Clinton. For my money, Dole has shown himself to be a mean, venal little man who thinks that he should get the job because he earned it in the Senate. He doesn't have any real plans for it, he just wants the pointy hat; he thinks he deserves it. Feeling you're next in line for promotion, for me, isn't sufficient reason to be given the mandate to run the country. The only thing he's ever put on the table was the 15% tax cut, which strikes me as nothing more than a bribe. Frankly, my gut -- which has almost always proven correct around election year -- tells me that Dole is gonna get whomped *badly* come November. It may be the most punishing loss a republican has taken in years. Which, I suspect, will not be a surprise to the republicans. I think they figured, on some level, that Clinton would probably be re-elected -- very few sitting presidents have been booted out of office while running for a second term -- and they decided to hold off on their big guns until the 2000 election, rather than fritter them away in 96. "Dole wants the nomination so bad, let him have it and get pasted; we'll be over in the bar, wake us when it's over." In 2000 you're going to have Gore running hard on the democratic side, again with an "I deserve it" attitude, though Veeps have traditionally not done that terribly well when going for the Big Chair. He'll likely get it unless someone comes charging out of the corner with a dynamic program and personality, which is, of course, always a possibility, though he'll have the democratic establishment on his side. On the republican side, you're going to see Kemp and Pete Wilson scrabbling for the nomination for certain; who else, we'll see. (Don't laugh re: Wilson. Lemme tell you a story I heard back when I was a reporter in San Diego, at a time when Wilson was just mayor. And an unpopular mayor at that. One day one of the other reporters came into a restaurant we used to hang out at, and he was...well, he wasn't plastered, but he'd been knocking them back. Very quiet. Finally, we got him to talk. He said, and this is pretty much verbatim, "Wilson met with the kingmakers today," he said. "They're going to run him for senator, then they're going to run him for governor, and they're going to run him for president." This was the most absurd thing we'd ever heard, and said so...again, he was barely holding on for *mayor*; prevailing logic was that he'd be lucky to be elected dogcatcher next time around. He shook his head. "They'll run him for senator, then governor, then president." And after they ran Wilson (and won) for senator, then governor, and started poking him out the door for president (stopped only when his throat went out)...I stopped laughing.) jms Date: 31 Oct 1996 15:54:45 -0500 Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: When the writer's block cometh.. "What I want to know is, when the muses fly away and bring the dreaded monster of writer's block on you, how do YOU deal with it?" You're going to kill me when you hear this...but since I started writing and selling at 17, I've never, ever had writer's block. It's finding time to write it all, and deciding which thing to write, that's always been hard. But (not to tempt the universe here), I've never had writer's block, and can't imagine it. Even if it ever did hit, I've got so much outlined and premise'd out in the files I could work off that for literally *years*. jms