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The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5
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===========================================================================
| This text is compiled from posts by J. Michael Straczynski on the Usenet
| group rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5. This document contains material Copyright
| 1995 J. Michael Straczynski. He has given permission for his words to be
| redistributed online, as long as they are marked as being copyright JMS.
| This document, as well as other Babylon-5 related material, is available
| by anonymous FTP at ftp.hyperion.com.
===========================================================================
Date: 1 Jan 1995 04:56:39 -0500
Subject: Signal/Noise in B5 and commerc
The signal/noise problem was of particular annoyance during the first
four or five episodes. We deliver on perfect D2 digital masters. We
kept seeing problems on broadcast that weren't there upon delivery. We
did a thorough investigation, and learned that the people contracted with
by PTEN/Warners to handle stuff like closed captioning, and transferring
film, and reformatting for commercials, and adding commercials, were
using ANALOG tape, for starters, and sometimes, we discovered to our
horror, USED STOCK.
It took us some time to fully detail and investigate the situation,
with the result that several people found themselves with new bodily
orifices chewed into their anatomy. By about episode four or five it
began to look substantially better.
jms
Date: 1 Jan 1995 05:03:55 -0500
Subject: Attn JMS Credits cutoff!!!
We're doing all we can on this, but the stations seem to do what
they want.
jms
Date: 1 Jan 1995 19:51:53 -0500
Subject: ATTN: JMS Orson Scott Card/En
Haven't read that one, no.
jms
Date: 1 Jan 1995 19:52:04 -0500
Subject: JMS: Re: B5
What will we do for an encore after the mid-season biggies? Just
what we've been doing all along...just keep cranking up the volume....
jms
Date: 2 Jan 1995 00:21:24 -0500
Subject: JMS! PREVIEW IDEA: Add backsto
Unfortunately, the B5 previews/promos are done in-house by PTEN, and
they jealously guard their authority over them. They'd never let us do
them.
jms
Date: 2 Jan 1995 04:19:06 -0500
Subject: ATTN: JMS
So many questions, so few answers I can give....
1) In theory, yes, Sheridan should be around for the rest of the arc.
2) O'Hare is currently doing network guest-starring roles that will
give him broader appeal (for instance, playing a great bad-guy on a coming
episode of the Cosby Mysteries).
3) Senator Hidoshi is out of office.
4) Background walla is done by the background walla group.
5) You won't see Minbar this season, but you will almost certainly
see it the first part of next season. You will, however, see Centauri
Prime this season.
6) Lots of things will go BOOM soon.
7) The mess hall food is pretty good.
8) The D.Duck poster came from Warners, when we arranged (after much
negotiation) to get the rights to use his character. (This is the first
series, apparently, given the rights to do so.)
jms
Date: 2 Jan 1995 21:52:08 -0500
Subject: Origin of word "Vorlon"
...sounded cool....
jms
Date: 2 Jan 1995 21:52:15 -0500
Subject: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Trekke
First, so there's no error, I appreciate your effort here. But I
still do disagree with your premise that "ST paved the way for B5." You
can "stand by" your feeling as much as you want, but I was the one in the
room with the network and studio execs telling me (and just about everyone
else pitching SF space shows) that there was NO room in the marketplace
for anything along these lines other than ST. Even when PTEN was launching
B5, that was a concern stated by them over and over. There's what one
feels SHOULD be correct, and there's what IS correct. This is the point
where those two conflict.
ST did not "legitimize SF drama for TV." Star Trek legitimizes and
leads to more Star Trek. If people in Hollywood *really* felt the way you
say, why has it taken *25 years* for another serious show like this to get
made (again, leaving out Buck Rogers, which wasn't serious and frankly, to
my mind, was only barely SF).
We had to fight tooth and nail to get this show on the air, to
overcome the ST shadow. We were told, specifically and repeatedly, that
there IS no substantive interest in SF, and that ST isn't SF; ST is ST,
and an interest in ST doesn't generally guarantee any kind of interest in
another SF show. And certainly Paramount has done nothing but throw road
blocks in front of us at every conceivable step of the way.
I understand your feelings, and why you want to believe that your
theory is true. But it simply isn't.
jms
Date: 2 Jan 1995 21:52:23 -0500
Subject: The Hugo Awards: Opinions
Far be it from me to try and influence people's opinions. Well, all
right...six inches away...but I'd tend to agree on the selection of
"Chrysalis" out of all the season one episodes to nominate. I still tend
to think it was the best of the batch (though "Babylon Squared" and "Signs
and Portents" come darned close.) Question, though: are we sure that
"Chrysalis" falls into the eligibility period for nomination? I know
there's a cutoff date at some point, though it's probably the year's end,
so we should be okay.
jms
Date: 3 Jan 1995 01:50:45 -0500
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
Battlestar Galactica really isn't applicable to this discussion
because 1) the "arena" under discussion has always been Earth in its future
with humanity as a spacefaring civilization, which comprises 95% of all
written SF, but had not been done on TV since Trek, and 2) Battlestar
was really more of a Star Wars "homage" (he said politely), that has
nothing to do with ST in *any* event.
jms
Date: 3 Jan 1995 04:20:20 -0500
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
You may want to convey to these individuals that Stewart also invited
Doug to tea, something he wouldn't have done if he were just fibbing about
his opinion to avoid a faux pas.
In point of fact, we have had generally good relations with MANY
of the actors involved with ST in one form or another. Rene Auberjenois
(I know I just misspelled that, but it's late, nearly 1 a.m., and I'm
too tired to go into the other room to get the right spelling) told both
Mira Furlan, myself, her husband, and just about anyone else in sight
that he's seen B5 and enjoys it immensely. We have had several actors
involved with ST come by the B5 stages to look at the facilities and say
hello. The actor who plays Quark (my apologies to the actor, but his name
has just fallen out of my head) invited Peter Jurasik to a party at his
place to comment on how much he enjoys the show.
There is a small, vocal minority of Star Trek fans who hate B5 because
it commits the ultimate crime for a show in Earth's future in space: it's
not Star Trek. In some ways, I find it kind of amusing, along the lines
of those in the 60s who said you could be a Beatles fan, or a Monkees fan,
but not both. These are people who talk about Infinite Diversity in
Infinite Combinations, but choose not to practice it. They are the same
sorts of people who were Lost in Space fans, and derided and insulted Star
Trek because they considered it a cheap knock-off of LiS. (And yes, there
were loads of critics and viewers who said this, and wrote reviews that
said this, and wrote to fan publications saying it.) They are people who
applaud ST because it was the work of one man with a vision, in its
beginnings...and deride B5 which is a different vision.
What the actors, and the writers involved with Star Trek understand,
that this small, vocal minority of ST fans do not, is that COMPETITION
LEADS TO IMPROVEMENT. These are people who want to see their characters
stretched to new areas, given more to do...writers who want to take
chances in their scripts and be bold...who have for much of the run of ST
been held back by the corporate types who don't *want* changes, who don't
want to take chances...and that's why you have a situation where Riker
stays first officer for *seven years*, which fans complain about, and which
would be the end of ANY officer's career in the real military.
Where I come from, science fiction is the literature of open
mindedness. It *welcomes* new ideas, and new approaches, and different
views of our past, present and future. Are they so insecure with Star
Trek that they must attack Babylon 5?
If they are truly Star Trek fans, then they must know and appreciate
the work done by people like Harlan Ellison and David Gerrold and Dorothy
Fontana and Walter Koenig and, lately, Peter David...people who have not
been well treated by Star Trek of late. We have given them the respect
that is due them, allowing the writers the chance they often did not have,
to experiment and to grow. When Walter Koenig did his first Babylon 5
episode, whenever he came to the table at lunch, those in the cast at the
table would stand until he sat...common when junior officers are being
joined by a senior officer.
Dorothy, and David, and Walter, and Harlan, and others who were
involved with the original Star Trek who have visited the set have said
that they have only seen the atmosphere and warmth of this set on one
other set in nearly thirty years...on the original Star Trek.
Mark Hammil has come by the studio to pay his regards for the show;
Leslie Stevens, co-creator/producer for The Outer Limits made a similar
pilgrimage to say how much he enjoys the show, and how he feels that this
is the future of where SF should be going in television.
When we won the Emmy for Best Visual Effects for the first year in
which we were eligible, it was the *first time* in six years that Star
Trek had lost out. Now with a second Emmy, a Hugo nomination, an award
from the Space Frontier Foundation for Best Vision of the Future, another
award from the Cult TV convention in England (beating out NYPD Blue and
DS9 for best new series)...we are being noticed. Even some reviewers who
at first had the same disdain because we weren't Star Trek have begun to
come around, and see us for what we ARE, not complain about what we are
NOT. (Some complained in the beinning that we were just a rip-off of Star
Trek: DS9, which since we were around in development for 5 years prior to
DS9 is nonsense...and then when they tuned in, and saw that we weren't a
ripoff, turned their noses up because we weren't doing things like they
were done in Star Trek. I received mail and email from people complaining
that we used hand-links when everyone KNEW that the REALITY of it was that
in 200 years we'd be using the chest-pin communicators in Star Trek, "and
every time I see you use this other thing, it breaks the illusion for me."
Long story made short...we're *not* going away. We are telling a
story, and we're going to tell that story until it's finished. If a few
wish to be like the Lost in Space fans who refused to watch Star Trek
when it came on, that's their right. Anyone who finds specific fault in
an episode, and it IS a fault, not "Star Trek wouldn't have done it this
way," that's also terrific. To not like a show simply because it isn't
Star Trek is simple bigotry...and to them I can only say that Roddenberry
would be *disgraced* by that attitude in people claiming to be fans of
hsi work.
jms
Date: 3 Jan 1995 04:51:21 -0500
Subject: Re: ST-TNG vs. B5 fans
"And the ACTORS occupy the same universe as you, me, and jms."
Hrmmm...haven't known many actors, have you?
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Novels canon?
Date: 3 Jan 1995 15:50:18 -0500
We're certainly exerting every effort to keep the novels (and the
comic) canon. Ain't easy, but so far it's working.
jms
Subject: JMS: has comic been cancelled?
Date: 3 Jan 1995 16:23:26 -0500
The comic has not been canceled, and is doing very well.
jms
Subject: Re: - JMS on Patrick Stewart/
Date: 3 Jan 1995 17:52:33 -0500
Got no problem with somebody not liking B5. Not a one. My only
problem is when you have a few people so determined to protect the
integrity of their fictional characters and their allegiance to one show
that they must assume Stewart or someone else is lying, which then
DIMINISHES the person's integrity. It seems to me a little like the old
Vietnam idea of burning the village to save the village. I'm perfectly
happy to let ANYONE not like B5 *on its own terms*. It's only when the
clique mentality sets in that I have a problem with it...and again, this
applies only to a fairly small (but *very* loud) portion of ST fans.
jms
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
Date: 3 Jan 1995 18:02:41 -0500
To Laurie Antoniou: many thanks.
jms
Subject: JMS: Season 2 filming
Date: 3 Jan 1995 18:24:14 -0500
We are currently shooting number thirteen, editing number 12, mixing
number 10, doing the EFX on number 11. Seventeen scripts are currently
finished.
jms
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
Date: 3 Jan 1995 23:02:12 -0500
Thanks for reminding me; quite correct, Michael O'Hare was invited to
take (and did take) a tour of the set for one of the Star Trek movies; I
guess it would've been Generations. He went, and was well received, and
Shatner said he liked the show. (Though *there*, I suspect, it may have
been more politeness, given the reaction as it was expressed to me. But
I could be wrong.)
jms
Subject: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Trekke
Date: 3 Jan 1995 23:57:02 -0500
"Do you really believe that the First Run Syndication business as it
now stands would be as big as it currently is if ST:TNG had flopped (and
do you honestly believe that Warner would have given PTEN a second
thought, let alone Babylon 5, if TNG hadn't been such a success in First
Run Syndication?" Phillip Sral
A fair question which deserves a fair response. For starters, the
syndie business is *not* "as big" as described in your message. So the
premise is incorrect on the face of it. The majority of new syndicated
drama series introduced in the last couple of years have flopped and have
either already been canceled, or are shortly awaiting same. The only
shows that have shown success at all have been the various Star Trek
incarnations, Baywatch, and now B5. Virtually everything else has
crashed and burned in syndication.
Second, B5 is not part of first run syndication. It is part of the
consortium formed jointly by Warners and a station group which was then
targeted to become a network. (The new official Warners network will
likely supplant and replace PTEN in a few years, after the contracts run
out. How that will affect B5 is anyone's guess.)
The movement into such new networks has nothing to do with the
success OR failure of shows like and including Star Trek. There's this
little thing called the new "fin/syn rules," which recently got changed
drastically. As of the ruling a couple of years ago, networks can now
own more of the product they put on the air. Virtually all of it, in
fact. What does this mean? That CBS can broadcast mainly shows made by
in-house CBS outfits, rather than contracting with, say, Warners or
Universal or other studios.
This frankly scared the hell out of the studios, whose major business
is making TV. So everyone started running around looking for ways to
create venues independent of the networks...i.e., *new* networks, owned
wholly or partly by the studios themselves, who could then create their
OWN monopoly. (Ain't big business wonderful?) Paramount, Universal,
Warner Bros, (and Fox already there)...they're ALL getting into it. That
was the single dominant reason why PTEN was formed. Sheer survival. Same
with the Warners net, Paramount net, all the others.
Networks need programming. All kinds programming. Dozens of shows
were pitched to the PTEN executive committee, including B5. They chose
this out of the rest of the pack *even though they were nervous about the
perception that the market wouldn't sustain more than one such show*.
They picked it for the simple reason that they liked it, and they
believed in what we were going to try and do with the show. Two of our
biggest boosters were the people behind the whole operation, Dick
Robertson and Evan Thompson, who formed PTEN and from the start, really
understood what we wanted to do with B5.
ST was really either a) irrelevant to the process, or b) a hinderance
to the process. I *know* you want to believe otherwise, and I do
understand why, and I wish I could reinforce that because it doesn't
change anything for us one way or another...but it simply didn't happen
that way.
jms
Subject: Re: JMS: Season 2 filming
Date: 4 Jan 1995 00:33:40 -0500
Currently shooting "Hunter, Prey." Then, probably in this order,
"And Now for a Word" (also jms), "Knives" (Larry DiTillio), "There All
The Honor Lies" (Peter David), and then "In the Shadow of Z'ha'dum" (jms).
jms
Subject: JMS-Centauri Jump Gates price?
Date: 4 Jan 1995 00:33:50 -0500
We opened up trade relations with them to partially pay for the
time we leased on Centauri jumpgates, and provided other services (of a
benign nature).
jms
Subject: JMS: Personal re: Chris Franke
Date: 5 Jan 1995 02:32:40 -0500
I genuinely have no idea if Chris is still doing "Mantis" or not; I
know they're flailing right now in the ratings, and that they're making a
lot of changes...basically, anything that ain't nailed down. (And anything
that they can pry up ain't nailed down.) If one of those would be a
change in composers, I wouldn't be at all surprised, given that scenario,
but I honestly don't know one way or another; it's not something we tend
to discuss. We talk B5 with Chris, period. I don't think the rest is
any of my damned business.
One rather wishes other people we both could name would adopt a
similar philosophy....
jms
Subject: Re: - JMS on Patrick Stewart/
Date: 5 Jan 1995 02:30:58 -0500
Re: "...some B5 fans who act the same way," I think there are in
general fewer of them, mainly because we haven't been on 25 years and
become an icon. And I generally discourage it; on CIS in particular, and
here, I've noted that there are good people working hard on ST, but are
being held back from doing all they're capable of doing by the studio's
franchise approach. They should not catch the rap for this; it's unfair.
I should also mention that the most vociferous B5 viewers in terms
of ragging on Trek are generally those who are disenchanted and angry ST
fans who feel they've been let down, and have something now to compare
the other show with. This unhappiness was there a LONG time before B5
ever hit the screens.
jms
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
Date: 5 Jan 1995 04:51:51 -0500
My point sustains; getting a science fiction series on the air at
all is mind-bogglingly difficult. Getting it past one season is damned
near impossible. Of the series you named as examples of how SF has a
market in TV -- Buck Rogers, Battlestar Galactica, V, Salvage, Matthew
Star, Flash, Greatest American Hero -- how many of those made it to or
past a second season? Though I'm kinda fuzzy on Buck (my brain has
mercifully excised most memories pertaining to that one), and Battlestar
had a *revised* show as another season...insofar as I can recall, those
are ALL one-season wonders.
We're still talking apples and oranges. The common question, the
real killer, is "Is the market big enough to sustain two SF shows, and is
there a market for SF at ALL?" *Getting* a show doesn't prove that there
is a market for SF; it only proves that somebody's going to try it again
to find out. If a show doesn't last, dies quickly, then that proves
the market's dead.
This is one of the blind spots in TV logic which pertains mainly to
the two groups you mention, SF and westerns. If a cop show goes on and
flops, nobody says there's no market for cop shows; *that* show failed.
If an SF series fails, the interpretation is that there's no market for
SF. Also, in general, hollywood perceives all SF as more or less the
same; it doesn't take into consideration, if an SF series dies, if it was
a GOOD SF series or a BAD SF series.
Nowhere was this more true than with the V series (not the mini, the
Kenneth Johnson stuff, which was great), where one of the producers told
me, "As long as we have aliens and space ships and ray guns, we'll get
the SF audience GUARANTEED; it's the mainstream we have to work at."
To understand this whole area, you have to stop thinking like a
viewer and start thinking like a network programming exec. (Start by
lowering your IQ about 15 points.) If a series runs only 1-2 years and
fails, everybody loses; the studio and network will never recoup the
expenses of production because these days you generally need 80-100
episodes of a series to syndicate it. Except for bargain-basement stuff
like minimal fees for SciFi Channel reruns, you're dead. You're out
MILLIONS of dollars.
*NO AMERICAN SCIENCE FICTION SERIES OTHER THAN STAR TREK HAS GONE
ON FOR MORE THAN FIVE YEARS SINCE LOST IN SPACE*. We're talking here
twenty-four YEARS of failure (from a network/studio financial point of
view). This does not exactly encourage them to think there's much of a
market. Throw Logan's Run and Amazing Stories and the new Twilight Zone
into the mix.
By entering its 2nd year, Babylon 5 has already beaten the odds. If
we get year three (oh, yeah, and Time Trax also didn't make it), then as
far as I know, we'll be the first nominally-hard SF series other than
Trek to do it in nearly a quarter-century. (I'm excluding X-Files from
this only because I don't quite think it fits as science fiction; I'm not
quite sure what to classify it as other than Really Weird Shit, and a
truly *nifty* TV series. I love it.)
There are an *awful* lot of studio and network people watching us
very closely; if we can be the first to break the curse, proving that
there is a market for SF outside Star Trek that can sustain long enough
for the studio to make back its money, I think you'll finally begin to see
a lot more of it...and frankly, I can't wait; the more competition, the
more SF, the better.
jms
Subject: Cortez- Awesome Ship Name!
Date: 6 Jan 1995 02:57:00 -0500
BTW, just to note a little something you might not notice in the
show...we've adopted the tradition of putting the symbol for a given ship
onto the bar in Earhart's, as many real contemporary officers' clubs and
airforce/naval base clubs put the logos or markings of big planes or ships
that come through there. The Cortez symbol is the most visible among the
various emblems you can see in a shot of the bar in "A Race Through Dark
Places." It comes at the moment we follow *another* old military tradition.
jms
Subject: JMS: Syndication (Was: Re: JMS
Date: 6 Jan 1995 02:57:08 -0500
Your assessment of the situation is more or less correct; it was
the Paramount Theaters chain that was eventually divested from Paramount
proper, since the government decided that it constituted a monopoly and
couldn't be allowed to continue. (Ironically, it was this divestment
that, having made Paramount Theaters an independent operation, later helped
ABC come into reality, as they were able to invest in the fledgling
network during a time it was struggling. This was viewed as a smart move
by many, since common wisdom said that this new TV thing was never going
to take off in people's homes, due to the expense in running land-lines to
individual homes, broadcast being marginal technology then. They figured
there would be TV Theaters, where you could come and pay and see TV shows,
boxing, sporting events, name it. Universal spent major bucks on this,
and even showed a major boxing event just this way as a test. And now,
of course, with satellites, and pay TV, and people gathering at sports bars
to watch pricey events, we've come full circle.)
(Why do I *know* all this stuff, when I can't retain what I ate for
lunch yesterday?)
Because studios had a monopoly, yes, they could force less obviously
commercial films down the throats of theaters. That changed with the
new rules. TV now, though, won't go through the same cycle, I think,
because a) none of the networks are stupid enough to become total
monopolies and invite the FCC in, and b) TV as a mass medium will always
be more easily targeted by special interest groups.
jms
Subject: JMS: Language on Bazaar sign i
Date: 6 Jan 1995 02:57:17 -0500
I'll have to look at it again, but I'm reasonably certain that the
second line in the bazaar sign is Centauri.
jms
Subject: JMS:Question on Production Sch
Date: 6 Jan 1995 02:58:53 -0500
We don't shoot in lots of 6 or 12; we shoot 22 episodes straight
through. The order in which they are run, and the pauses in between, do
not in ANY way reflect the time period in which they are made. We shoot
straight through, with pauses for Christmas break, and to give our crew
and cast a one-week hiatus on either side (usually between episodes 8
and 9, and episodes 15 and 16), which helps keep them from burning out.
You really have to shoot straight through, because of the vast
amounts of money required to rent equipment, pay salaries for crew and
cast, pay staff and other areas. Also, under Screen Actors Guild rules,
if you hire someone for, say, 13 episodes, you must use them within a
particular span of time. If you don't, you must pay them the balance of
committed episodes by the end of that period. If you broke filming up
as you suggest, you'd be in deep hock to your cast.
And you really can't separate out SFX from shooting live-action;
often you need to have the actors work with the effects in composite
shots, and sometimes you need the effects to play on monitors visible on
camera when you're shooting. All divisions are working at the same
time, straight through. You need to have effects people around frequently
while shooting; to make two separate sequences means you double the time
period you have to pay your effects people.
Here is the process of making B5 in metaphor...not only in terms of
each season's production, but the history of this show overall.
You hitch yourself to the front of a train. And you begin pulling.
(In this case, I began pulling in 1987, but for purposes of the current
discussion make that the start of each season.) Slowly, painfully, the
train moves an inch. Then another. Gradually, over time, it begins
picking up speed. For one brief instant there is an allowable moment of
joy when both you and the train are going at the same, comfortable speed.
Then it starts gaining on you, and you have to start walking faster, with
the train bumping your heels, until finally you're running flat out,
because you know that if you so much as stumble once, the train will roll
right over you.
Then the season ends, you get to catch your breath...and start it all
over again.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Future Quest
Date: 6 Jan 1995 02:59:03 -0500
Basically, they asked if they could use our sets for a PBS program,
and we said sure. Not much more to it than that; I think we allowed them
the use of our stages without rental charge, since it's a worthy cause.
They were allowed to choose which shots to use. I wasn't in the show
because I wasn't asked to be. Doesn't matter either way; ain't doing this
to get my mug on TeeVee. The lawsuits over nationally induced cardiac
infarction ALONE would kill our budget....
jms
Subject: Re: JMS on Patrick Stewart/
Date: 6 Jan 1995 02:59:11 -0500
To Ted...unfortunately, syndication does not help gurantee any show's
success, even requiring fewer ratings points. Most of the new dramas
introduced in the last year or so in syndication have fallen by the wayside
and have either been canceled, or are awaiting cancellation.
jms
Subject: Re: JMS:Question on Production
Date: 6 Jan 1995 02:59:19 -0500
RE: "a TV episode usually takes 10-16 days to make," (Kokko), not
quite correct. We do the actual on-stage shooting in 7 days. (Most shows
are shot anywhere from 6-9 days per episode.) Then it takes another week
or so to edit, then the producers re-edit, then you spot the show for
visual EFX and music, CGI is working, you mix the episode...the actual
time required to physically make an episode once you begin principal
photography is closer to 6-8 weeks.
jms
Subject: JMS: a filming question
Date: 7 Jan 1995 03:20:53 -0500
As I recall, Mira was not in prosthetics at the time, and was out of
camera range even for when the shot gets shown in expanded letterbox form.
jms
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
Date: 7 Jan 1995 03:22:02 -0500
Just a note of clarification on the notice that TV frigntened the
movie studios (that should be "frightened")...yes and no. In the beginning
it mainly just frightened radio; Fred Allen (famous for the quote "TV is
called a medium because it is neither rare nor well done") used to sport
a button stating Stamp Out TV. The studios *loved* TV in the beginning;
at the time when TV began to come out, the studios were suffering their
worst years since the Great Depression. Universal Studios and Warner
Bros. practically shut down altogether. The number of films being made
was virtually nil. But they still had all these actors and writers and
directors under contract, chewing up vast amounts of money at a time when
the studios had zip coming in. So they quickly turned many of these
people over toward making TV shows; this is one reason why so many of the
early TV anthology programs had big-name actors...the studios were burning
off expensive contractual obligations.
Also, I'd suggest that serious SF was done prior to Forbidden Planet,
including but not limited to Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers, The Day the
Earth Stood Still (still one of the finest such films ever made) and many
others.
jms
Subject: Re:
Date: 8 Jan 1995 00:11:19 -0500
In addition to the other good reasons for using Jupiter's moons
that Nyrath stated, there's also the added element of energy (it's near
Jupiter itself), and a base placed off Io would be somewhat more difficult
to target from afar given the massive energy output from Jupiter, which
would help mask things a bit.
jms
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
Date: 8 Jan 1995 00:14:07 -0500
The attribution to Ernie Kovacs of the "TV is a medium" line is
incorrect. Ernie loved TV. Fred Allen hated it with a passion.
jms
Subject: Re: - JMS on Patrick Stewart/B
Date: 8 Jan 1995 00:14:20 -0500
On the other hand, if one follows the logic that a ship traveling is
more likely to encounter danger than a stationary vessel, then one must
now make the leap in logic that a bus traveling from New Jersey to
Connecticut will have more dangerous incidents in 24 hours than New York
City.
Bear in mind the crucial difference here...the Enterprise has maybe
seven hundred, a thousand or so members of the same service, chosen for
compatibility. Babylon 5 has roughly two hundred and fifty thousand
humans and aliens on board at any given moment, many from races where
there is conflict between them. I think the latter is bound to produce
more and broader-based danger than the other.
jms
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
Date: 8 Jan 1995 01:34:32 -0500
This to Frank Springall...we weren't *talking* about shows from
other countries. We were addressing American-produced shows. Yes, we
could drag Dr. Who in here, but that's not really the *point*. Doesn't
mean that nothing produced outside the US is "interesting." Obviously it
is. But that's simply not relevant to our discussion of the American
television series, and how studios and networks *here* view the genre.
jms
Subject: ATTN: JMS Realistic Timescale
Date: 8 Jan 1995 04:46:36 -0500
I took a fairly conservative timeline; as was mentioned in "The Long
Dark," as late as 2150 we were mainly confined to our own solar system,
using sub-light cryogenic exploration ships on one-way missions to go
further. We got to leap-frog several hundred years of technology when we
met the Centauri in 2151, who let us lease time on their jumpgates, and
sold us the tech to make and maintain our own. Had the Centauri or some
other species not tripped over us, I think we'd still be driving around
our own solar system for the most part by 2200, with maybe an excursion
or two to our nearest star.
The space program is currently logjammed, and if it doesn't get
cleared up soon, we're going to be left in the dust, literally as well as
figuratively. We have to get NASA off its image of two guys standing
on a Martian hill planting a flag to communities of people working and
living in space.
The space shuttle was primarily designed as part of a link; space
shuttle builds space station; space station is hub for mars mission and
lunar colony; lunar colony is hub for more mars missions and mars
colony. But we lost that thread, and now it's been relegated to being a
high-tech ferry service.
jms
Subject: JMS: Your views on trading cop
Date: 10 Jan 1995 01:46:24 -0500
I agree with the policy of "Don't ask, don't tell."
jms
Subject: Re: JMS: Patrick Stewart/B5/Tr
Date: 10 Jan 1995 23:53:20 -0500
Actually, there are a lot of resonances between the process of getting
B5 on the air and getting the original Trek on. Both did considerable
recasting after their pilots; both saw the series a full year after the
first pilot (we kinda considered ep 1 of year 1 our second pilot); Trek
ran into difficulty getting sold because of Lost in Space, and we had a
hard time getting sold because of ST; when it went on the air, Star Trek
was slammed by critics as being low-rent, cheesy, suited for saturday
morning kiddie shows and nothing more than an attempt to cash in on Lost
in Space, just as we got nailed by critics and charged with trying to cash
in on ST; Trek was Roddenberry's singular vision, and B5 is another very
singular vision, neither show a "committee" operation. There are more,
but I think the point is there.
jms
Subject: Of Hair And Bone
Date: 11 Jan 1995 00:21:55 -0500
When Delenn's structure changed, the epidermal layer on the head
grew thinner; there is now a gap between the skin, and the bone which
has grown out. Hair can be draped through it, or laid over it.
jms
Subject: Re: - JMS on Patrick Stewart
Date: 11 Jan 1995 00:26:40 -0500
BTW, just as a switch-back to the original thread here...might
intest folks to know that Michael O'Hare was invited by some of Patrick's
Fan Club Members to see "A Christmas Carol," Stewart's reading, went
backstage, met Patrick...and was subsequently invited to make an
appearance at a local meeting of Stewart's fan club, where he was invited
to come up on stage by Stewart, where the two shook hands and lots of
photos were taken.
(At a recent convention, btw, Michael and Avery Brooks hung out
together, had drinks, and discussed the hassles of being the commander
of a space station....)
jms
Subject: JMS: Starfury as logo
Date: 11 Jan 1995 00:26:51 -0500
If we ever need a team name, I'll try to remember this....
jms
Subject: Technomage Symbol
Date: 11 Jan 1995 11:25:48 -0500
No, actually, the technomage symbol (all of them, actually, including
the ones on the wall) are all derivations, specifically altered, of old
runes and the like. In some cases, we removed words and inserted
mathematical symbols. The fiery symbol is all one piece, and is also an
old rune.
jms
Subject: JMS: Has season 2 been sold to
Date: 12 Jan 1995 04:20:13 -0500
I haven't got a clue.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Actor in Eyes?
Date: 12 Jan 1995 04:34:06 -0500
Don't recall off hand the name of the bartender, but it definitely
wasn't Tim Choate.
jms
Subject: Re: Arc. Season II. Big Pict
Date: 12 Jan 1995 04:34:19 -0500
We could not film anything extensive with Michael because we don't
shoot on the Warners lot, where there are facilities available. We went
our separate ways around late April/early May or so, after we had stopped
shooting. We're a small operation; when we make the series, we rent our
equipment from Panavision, our lights from other places, sound equipment,
some props...anything we don't rent goes into storage. Our entire camera
crew -- ALL of them -- were off doing another project.
I understand your feelings, but there are certain realities we have
to work with, and if the cast is gone off either on vacation, out of the
country, or on other projects (as all of them were), all of our crew is
gone, and all of our equipment is gone, it's kinda hard to oblige your
request to do scenes with these characters. We had none of this back in
our hands until we began shooting again in August, by which time Michael
had long been in New York pursuing other projects.
jms
Subject: B5 on WB Network?
Date: 12 Jan 1995 04:34:34 -0500
I would not count on B5 ending up on the Warners network; the two are
very competitive (WB vs. PTEN), and WB is trying to form its own identity.
And the ratings for B5 place it generally third in first-run dramatic
syndication.
jms
Subject: Attn: JMS. counterculture on B
Date: 12 Jan 1995 04:34:46 -0500
By 2259 the "counterculture" as we understand it is absolutely old
fashioned and retrograde. Seems like everybody's working to get In, not
be Out. Sort of an extreme gingrichification effect....
jms
Subject: ATTN: JMS - Is there only one
Date: 12 Jan 1995 04:38:22 -0500
The EA is the only government for planetary decisions; a few don't
choose to subscribe back home, but then they're entirely cut out of from
benefitting from star travel and other EA areas.
jms
Subject: JMS:Season 3
Date: 12 Jan 1995 04:38:34 -0500
We'll probably get official word yes/no come April/May, though we
will probably have some unofficial hints come February/March.
jms
Subject: Diversity of B5 populace
Date: 12 Jan 1995 18:30:20 -0500
Babylon 5 is not like your local community, with as wide-ranging a
bunch of residents, including children. It's more like an airport, and you
don't generally see a lot of kids living at airports (unless you live in a
community much different from mine). There are two kinds of people in
general at B5...those who live and work at the station (security guards,
maintenance, dockworkers, other support staf) and people passing through
en route to other places, on stop-over. It's a place where you come to do
business deals, staying over for a day or two, and then leaving. You
wouldn't tend to bring your kids to something like that, and families
passing through go right from one ship to another, usually in a hurry to
make their flight.
And we've had plenty of older characters, so your sweepin
generalization is inaccurate, as are most sweeping generalizations. From
June Lockhart to Michael Ansara to Walter Koenig to Jane Carr to many
others, we've gone beyond the 35-49 age range you cite. We've also had
many ethnic groups, and featured them; in fact, virtually ALL of the
relationships (with I think one exception) have so far been from different
ethnic backgrounds (Sinclair and Sakai, Talia Winters and Jason Ironheart,
Dr. Franklin and Lockhart's daughter). We've used asian actors (doctors
in medlab, the scientist in "Voice," Taro Isogi in "Spider," Sakai),
hispanic actors (in "By Any Means," Dr. Maya Hernandez in "Believers,"
Wanda DeJesus coming up in "Hunter, Prey"), and a lot of african american
actors. We also populate all background shots with a wide mix of ethnic
backgrounds.
In short, we're already *doing* it. And we will continue to do more
of it. (Why doesn't Ivanova have a Russian accent? Because she was raised
overseas, and went to schools outside Russia, something we'll learn in a
few episodes.)
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Re: B5 on WB Network
Date: 12 Jan 1995 18:54:34 -0500
B5 dropped a bit in the recent ratings you mention because they're
a) our reruns, and b) the Chrismas period, during which everything falls
off.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Spec script guidelin
Date: 12 Jan 1995 18:54:56 -0500
The spec script question is currently moot because we're full-up at
this time.
jms
Subject: JMS: Costume Questions...
Date: 12 Jan 1995 19:28:00 -0500
Argh; just sent my reply here to the wrong thread (read the Diversity
in B5 thread). Brief version: leather all around, red piping to read
better on camera, cleaner cuffs. The other reply is more detailed.
jms
Subject: Re: Diversity of B5 populace
Date: 12 Jan 1995 19:30:02 -0500
My original reply somehow got bumped back; the panels on the uniforms
are always leather. Correct on the red piping and other changes; one of
the problems with last season's uniforms was that they kinda blurred on
camera, and the details went away. The piping helps the details to pop
a bit better on camera. The cuffs were changed because in the old version,
the leather cuffs caused the cuffs to gather, and never looked clean or
crisp, which a real uniform would. So we changed it. I've been told what
the rest of the uniforms are made of, but for the life of me can't recall
just now.
jms
Subject: Re: Attn: JMS. counterculture
Date: 13 Jan 1995 01:51:25 -0500
This to Katherine Teague...you're among the first to pick up on a
deliberate writer's choice in the writing of the series. In looking toward
the period of B5, I tried to construct a society that had to come together
on a planetary scale to fight a war for simple survival. My thinking was,
"Okay, let's assume that formality has come back into vogue; clothes tend
not to be revealing, lines are more streamlined or severe, people address
each other or refer to each other formally ("Mr. Isogi," "Ms. Winters," and
so on).
I suppose a conservative could derive some satisfaction from this
choice...though to quote Mephistophilis in "Faustus"......"Aye, think so
still, 'till experience change thy mind."
jms
Subject: Season 3
Date: 13 Jan 1995 20:58:23 -0500
We'll know on a pickup come about April.
jms
Subject: JMS: Why only one telepath?
Date: 13 Jan 1995 21:21:35 -0500
Actually, since there aren't that many telepaths around, they cost a
LOT to lease. There probably should be more than one on B5, but the Corps
hasn't gotten around to sending anybody else yet...so she's appropriately
frazzled a lot of the time.
Humans rarely do things the way they should, logically....
jms
Subject: I need to know if this is true
Date: 13 Jan 1995 21:19:52 -0500
Certainly, we're all big fans of Mark's work (currently enjoying him
in Wing Commander 3), and should an opportunity come along, and a role
good enough, we'd love to work with him. But at this moment, nothing is
set.
jms
Subject: ATTN:JMS Stupid idea about KO
Date: 14 Jan 1995 01:55:06 -0500
Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnope.
jms
Subject: Enjoying B5 is enjoying Life
Date: 14 Jan 1995 01:58:39 -0500
Thanks; and funny thing is, having seen the next batch of episodes
as many as 20 times in the process of putting them together, I'm still as
excited about them now as in the beginning.
jms
Subject: B5 & ZIMA
Date: 14 Jan 1995 02:24:12 -0500
There's no Zima on the show in BG because we just did it for funsies,
and now having done it, it's over.
jms
Subject: Release of series onto Laser d
Date: 15 Jan 1995 00:56:42 -0500
We do hope to have the (widescreen) disks out by summer or fall, once
we finish re-transferring all the film stock back to its original format.
The pilot can't be released in a producers' cut since it never existed in
film, only in computer-image form on the Avid editing system. To do the
full film would require completely re-editing the film and re-scoring, and
we don't have the resources or budget for that.
jms
Subject: Starfuries on patrol.
Date: 15 Jan 1995 00:56:32 -0500
The starfuries were deployed from lunar bases, also from carriers
that dropped everything they had.
Since this was a last-ditch effort, there was no point in keeping
reserve starfuries on-board, and the big ships still made huge targets.
This was almost entirely an offensive maneuver, not defensive. You pop
everything you've got, figuring that probably nobody will make it back.
jms
Subject: ATT JMS: Instantaneous Communi
Date: 15 Jan 1995 01:31:30 -0500
Tachyon-based transmission systems.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
jms
Subject: Re: - JMS on Patrick Stewart
Date: 15 Jan 1995 01:42:38 -0500
To the best of my knowledge, NONE of the ST actors have any problem
with any of the B5 actors, and vice-versa. Much as some divisive fan
would, as you say, like their characters to reflect their own feelings,
the reality simply isn't there.
jms
Subject: Murder, He Wrote? (Re JMS)
Date: 15 Jan 1995 01:46:59 -0500
Correct; I was a writer/producer on MURDER, SHE WROTE for two years,
and wrote something like 10-12 episodes (I don't remember exac
offhand). For the last 2 weeks or so, USA network has been hitting the
seasons I worked on, so my name has been there a lot lately.
jms
Subject: Re: B5 & ZIMA
Date: 15 Jan 1995 01:47:14 -0500
Tagging this here because I don't know where else to tag it...I just
got a GEnie note saying that approximately 100 letters from the Internet
gateway never got to me; many are just rec-arts, but there's also on the
list headers from a4jinna, roland@festival, TrboTurtle, dd36+, northrup@
chuma, anewton, brauchfu, and others. Just a warning...stuff does get
munched sometimes.
jms
Subject: Three Edged?
Date: 15 Jan 1995 19:50:13 -0500
The metaphor functions on several levels: 1) in any argument, there
is your side, and the other side, but if you're ever going to get past
that and find agreement, or understanding, you must be open to a third
idea, a compromise or intercession. 2) a real three-bladed or three-edged
sword creates a wound that does not close again; knowledge, once received,
and understood, is permanent and changes you forever.
jms
Subject: JMS: Do Doctors Still Speciali
Date: 15 Jan 1995 19:56:33 -0500
Negative; your assumption is incorrect. Dr. Franklin is chief of
staff of the medlab facility, and has been introduced as such. We have
seen many other doctors, from Dr. Maya Hernandez to the asian doctor
brought in to help save Garibaldi in "Chrysalis." There are probably
about 100-150 doctors on B5, and we'll be showing more of them as we go
on in the show.
jms
Subject: JMS: Jovian moons
Date: 15 Jan 1995 19:54:53 -0500
I think we'll probably get around to showing more of the Jovian
moons one of these days.
We're also taking advantage of some of the recent Hubble photographs
to scan them and use them as backgrounds in some far-space shots; there's
one in "The Coming of Shadows," for instance. Real space is *very* nice
looking in places.
jms
Subject: Attn JMS -- "Producer's cut" S
Date: 15 Jan 1995 20:23:49 -0500
The various drafts of the script have all the missing scenes, and may
in time become available directly through Babylonian Productions along
with other scripts. The computer images are too grainy to ever be used
in any kind of laserdisk or tape, very low-res.
The whole issue of the pilot still rankles me, on a personal level.
I was still fairly new to executive producing, and was more prone to just
accept the word of the director or the editor that this was as good as the
cut would get, this was how it should stay. I didn't speak up on some of
my concerns, didn't just go in and re-edit the whole damned thing the way
I felt I should have. It was my error, and there's no one else to blame
for it.
I've learned since to trust my instincts. So when John Copeland and
I go in to edit the episodes, we edit these things so tight they scream.
In retrospect, I probably could've fit in about 18 minutes of the 20
or so minutes we ended up cutting, by judicious editing, line-cutting,
and just picking up the pace of the thing in every scene. It's one of
those, "If I knew then what I know now..." situations.
If we had the budget to re-edit the damned thing, which alas we
don't, I can assure you it would be a VERY different-looking movie.
My fault. Nobody else's.
jms
Subject: Re: Murder, He Wrote? (Re JMS)
Date: 15 Jan 1995 22:25:11 -0500
We had one of the M,SW directors over recently, and he mentioned that
Angela, as with you, considers "The Committee" to be the best episode of
the series. I'm inclined to agree that it was probably one of the best
scripts I did for the show, though I'm also particular toward "The Wind
Around the Tower" and parts of "Incident in Lot 7."
jms
Subject: Re: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 15 Jan 1995 22:23:25 -0500
"Not to cast aspersions on the physique of JMS, but he's not the
youngest buck in the forest, forest, nor the sveltest. What if he dies?"
HEY! I'll have you know I'm just 40 years old, and at 6'5" I'm maybe
ten pounds more than I should be. Granted it all seems to have settled in
one or two places, but I attribute that to the gravitational influence of
a pinhole black hole that must have drifted past recently.
As to the question, "What if he dies?"...what happens is that they
come and pick me up, bring me to the nearest mortuary, I'm autopsied,
needles are inserted in my heel and elbow, the blood is removed from my
body, embalming fluid is subsequently pumped in, I'm dressed in an
ill-fitting suit, displayed briefly (against my wishes), shoved into a
crematorium, my remains are transferred to ash, and I spend THE NEXT TEN
THOUSAND YEARS HAUNTING YOUR ASS FOR ASKING A MORBID QUESTION LIKE THAT!!!
All my notes are triple-encrypted. Only I know the password. So it's
in the best interests of EVERYBODY to keep my ass ALIVE for the next 3.5
years.
jms
Subject: Personal Query from JMS
Date: 15 Jan 1995 23:14:49 -0500
For a while now, I've been trying to find some old friends with whom
I've lost all contact. Given the resource here, and the theory that we
are all only 6 people away from anybody else...I thought I'd try it here.
If anybody should know how to contact the following people, if y'all
could send me a note I'd be greatly appreciative.
Liz or Elizabeth Ochoa. Last known to be in San Diego. Red hair,
Basque background. Rose tattoo on left wrist. Resided in San Diego from
1978 through 1981, had a 4-year old son named (I believe) Justin (who
would now be about 19). Liz would be roughly 39-40 years old.
Colleen Carnevale, also from San Diego, same age range. Blonde, and
formerly, through her father, a member of the San Diego Yacht Club. She
worked at the Whaley House up through about 1979, and worked as an
Orientation Counselor at SDSU through about 1978. May be married now.
Joanne Massie, formerly a high school teacher at Chula Vista High
School, 1972. Last I'd heard she had moved to Texas around 1975.
(Mrs. Massie was the one who got me into writing when I was just a
kid, gave me the chance to follow my abilities.)
Joe or Joseph Trez, 40-41, resident of Matawan, New Jersey in about
1970. Nothing since.
Sherily Mattarocci, roughly 34, may now be married with a different
name. Formerly from Bonita, California. (Oops, make that Sherilyn, not
Sherily.)
Marcus Manecke, former cult member (Children of God), 42-44, lived
in religious commune (unrelated to CoG) in Chula Vista through 1978, may
now be living in the New England area. He was also a musician.
Any info should be sent via private email. These are all friends,
just would like to find out whatever happened to them. Thanks.
jms
Subject: Re: Attn JMS -- "Producer's cu
Date: 16 Jan 1995 04:50:59 -0500
It's a wonderful idea, and a kind suggestion, but it would have to
come from Warners; a fundraiser wouldn't work. Maybe someday....
jms
Subject: Outer Limits on Showtime: Whic
Date: 16 Jan 1995 21:28:02 -0500
The Outer Limits series will not be remakes for the most part, though
I hear they may consider one or two. Demon will definitely not be among
them. I had great hopes for OL, because I'd like to see some good SF
being done on cable, but I don't think so...first, they dumped Joe Stefano
and Leslie Stevens, froze them out of the show, pretty cold thing to do
to the producer/writers who created the thing (legal maneuvering now
complete, I understand, and they'll finally get their proper credit on
the show)...Michael Cassutt finally bolted from the show as primary
writer/producer a while ago, wanting nothing more to do with it....
When B5 went on hiatus over the summer, the new OL team -- the same
people who brought you Space Rangers -- called me in to become a consultant
or producer on the show, even though they knew it'd mean dividing my time
(which was why consultant was better). I met with them, and saw a
breakdown of the stories they were planning to do. I can't remember the
last time I was so completely appalled. I felt I could have nothing to
do with the show in any way, manner, shape or form; I felt they had NO
understanding of what the Outer Limits was supposed to be.
Here's just ONE example of the stories they were putting forth (and
I feel that I can quote this one because I know it didn't get used, for
the singular reason that Cassutt, when he came aboard, insisted that it
NOT be done, having the same horrified reaction that I did. But it's
nonetheless emblematic of the rest of the stories.
A guy's hang-gliding. Caught by a wind, he rises higher and higher
until he passes out from lack of oxygen. Comes to descending toward a
military base. He's captured by American soldiers, put in a cell...and
in the cell across from him...is John F. Kennedy, who *didn't* die when
the assassin's bullet hit his head. He was cryogenically suspended until
he could be fixed up. Now this has been done, but Kennedy insists that
they won't release him. Together, the two manage to escape...at which
point the guy discovers that the reason that they had him in a cell was
that Kennedy came through the surgery a homicidal maniac determined to
destroy the world...and now it falls to this guy to kill Kennedy a
second time.
Go ahead...guess what the guys' last name just *happens* to be.
Yep. Oswald.
I told the producers, "If you do this story, the entire american
viewing public will descend upon your offices, drag you out into the
street, slap two telephone poles together and crucify you. And I will
personally hand them the nails."
So we'll see...I don't know how much Cassutt was able to deter them
from their path, especially since he bolted, which means he probably
wasn't able to do much. I'll take a look at it, because hope endures in
the face of reason...but I think this is gonna be problematic.
jms
Subject: Attn: JMS
Date: 16 Jan 1995 21:24:46 -0500
We'll work this into dialogue to make it clearer....
jms
Subject: Intelligence at the "rim"
Date: 16 Jan 1995 21:55:43 -0500
You won't have to wait for future seasons to find out what's going
on out on the rim; you'll have a pretty good picture of it before the
end of THIS season.
jms
Subject: Re: - JSM & The Arc -
Date: 16 Jan 1995 21:55:30 -0500
Wow, what a detailed analysis....
Okay, some good thoughts here. Quick responses.
The best way to approach this is to discuss my approach to writing in
general. I've now written two published novels, and have a third ready to
be written as soon as I have six months to a year to spare (i.e, not for
a while yet). My structure is always very tight on these things, in the
sense that I plan out the basic *spine* of the novel. I know I'm starting
at point A, I want to end at point Z, and I want to hit a certain number of
spots along the way. Then I start writing. Once I've committed to that
STRUCTURE, everything else becomes expendable or fluid. I've ha
background characters suddenly lurch into the foreground, and major
characters (or characters I *thought* would be major) fall into the
background. Sometimes, while chugging along the structure highway, I'll
see something interesting just off the main road, and I'll go poke around
in there for a while.
Basically, I like being *surprised*. And I think, in general, that
readers do as well. At no time do I diverge from where I want to go; the
spine never alters. But the details are absolutely fluid.
When I write an episode, I do exactly the same thing. I *HATE* to
outline; I think it freezes the story too much. So in general I just sit
down at the keyboard, knowing the title of the episode, the primary
incidents that have to happen, and a few character moments, and stgart
writing. And things suddenly occur to me, I get surprised by moments when
the characters turn to me and say, "Hey, stupid, don't do THAT, do *THIS*."
And I go where they tell me. The result is that the scripts I write tend
to be VERY tight: they go where they're going, and move like a house
afire...BUT there's the real sense that ANYdamnedthing can happen at any
moment, because I'm not locked in.
The same applies to the series overall. I know *exactly* where the
series is going, the final denouement, the benchmarks of each season, and
have brief synopses on most of the episodes. But you have to be open to
surprises, have to allow yourself to be pulled one way or another on the
details, otherwise you get predictable, and you lose the spark. Also,
the reality is that actors are human; there can be contract disputes,
health problems, any number of things...so there have to be trap doors
built into the storyline for *every single one of the characters* without
exception.
The closest comparison, I suppose, would be doing a story about
World War II. The individual pieces can move around, people can come and
go, live or die, suddenly be revealed to be counterspies...but the basic
progression, the storyline of the war, is not changed. (Unless you're
doing alternate history, which we're not.) When I write, I basically
carry the whole storyline in my head, and I run the episode through that
to make sure that it all parses.
It's as if you've flashed back in time to WW II, and you're in a
battalion going into Normandy Beach. You know that in the long run, the
Allies will win the war...but you look around at the other people in
the landing craft with you, and you have no idea which of them is going
to make it through to the end. One is set. The other is fluid.
The final destination of the story, and the chief points along the
way...none of that has altered so much as an inch. Within that structure
I may move some elments up, push some back; you have to find the *feel* of
the story as you write it, something you can't prepare for until you're
actually writing it. But the structure remains, giving me freedom to
roam where I want...if I decide to kill off one of the three really major
human characters in year three (and I'm NOT saying I'm planning on it, I'm
just discussing hypotheticals), I can do it, and the overall storyline
isn't touched.
A destination may be fixed on the horizon...but sometimes the most fun
you have is getting lost from time to time on the way there.
jms
Subject: Intelligence at the "rim"
Date: 16 Jan 1995 21:55:43 -0500
You won't have to wait for future seasons to find out what's going
on out on the rim; you'll have a pretty good picture of it before the
end of THIS season.
jms
Subject: Attn JMS: Have You Read Pohl's
Date: 17 Jan 1995 02:20:12 -0500
I've missed a fair amount of Pohl's work, including the "heechee"
stuff...but in any event, the shadows are all mine.
jms
Subject: Re: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:23:55 -0500
Re: writing "The Quality of Mercy" while half-dead with the flu...my
staff knows well enough to *never* get between me and a script. As Vir
says, the consequences would be *profoundly* unfortunate.
jms
Subject: JMS: Sinclair leaving B5
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:28:46 -0500
That story is absolutely, 100% bogus, and is one of a number of
destructive, false rumors floating around right now. When we were
contemplating what to do with the role of Sinclair, we called Michael
in, and we talked about it. Nobody sent anybody a letter saying
you're outta here. That's a flat-out lie, nothing less, and whoever
told you (Chris) this is either misremembering or deliberately giving
out false information. Nor have there been any problems between the
company and Michael. This is claptrap, nothing less.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: UK con appearance
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:30:33 -0500
Unfortunately I don't have the info on the UK con in April in
front of me, it's at the office. I can remember such things for only
about 20 minutes when my brain seizes up and flushes the info. There
have been inquiries about attending the Wolf 359 convention later in
the year, but thus far I've heard nothing formal from the convention, or
specifics on how this would be worked out. Be assured that there will
probably be lots of info on this other con well before the April event
(I keep thinking it's not far from Stratford-upon-Avon...).
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Londo's Spots?
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:35:20 -0500
Insofar as I know, the spots are still there; sometimes theyre
(they're) more visible than other times, depending on lighting.
jms
Subject: Re: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:23:43 -0500
I'M FINE! DO YOU HEAR ME!? I'M ABSOLUTELY, BLOODY, BOLLICKY,
BUGGERY JUST PERFECTLY AND ABSOLUTELY ****FINE!!!**** I'VE NEVER BEEN
BETTER, I'M FINE...I'M....I'M.....AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHH.......
....................................................<thunk>
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Sheridan's name: Bla
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:48:44 -0500
Just coincidence in the name; he destroyed the Black Star, hence
Starkiller.
jms
Subject: Re: Outer Limits on Showtime:
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:48:32 -0500
Basically, I hated everything about the story...it was one of the
old "three word endings" that are symptomatic of bad SF ("The killer's...
OSWALD!"), it destroys the Kennedy image for NO reason, it's a dumb
idea, it has no dramatic progression of any kind...it's just a dumbness.
I like alternative history stories as much as anybody; this one just
was awful.
jms
Subject: JMS: Death and Dyin <reprisal>
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:58:07 -0500
Re: the fate of any possible actor on the show...like I said, I've
built in trap doors for everybody on the show with one fairly obvious
exception. (Viz: me.)
Hey, I've *read* Scherezade (though I can't spell it for squat); I
ain't no fool.
As for "all this attention"...you're still talking mainly about the
online community; the majority of the American public still doesn't know
the show even *exists*.
But we're getting there.
jms
Subject: B5 mention in Akron Voyager Re
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:58:17 -0500
Would love a copy of the clip; can you send it to me via:
14431 Ventura Boulevard, Suite 260, Sherman Oaks, CA 91423? Much
appreciated.
jms
Subject: Request: Rowan Atkinson on B5
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:58:27 -0500
Would *love* to see Rowan do the show sometime; also Tom Baker,
Meatloaf, Alice Cooper, John Cleese.....
Maybe someday.
jms
Subject: Episode list for winning new c
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:58:39 -0500
I'd omit "War Prayer" and put in "The Parliament of Dreams."
jms
Subject: Re: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 18 Jan 1995 01:58:49 -0500
(To Jim Batka...thanks.)
jms
Subject: Stun Settings?
Date: 18 Jan 1995 02:23:11 -0500
Yes; a PPG shoots superheated helium at high velocity. You coul,d
(could) lower the heat on the plasma, but still kick it out at the same
velocity, so it wouldn't do as much damage, provided it didn't hit any
exposed skin.
jms
Subject: Re: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 18 Jan 1995 05:21:08 -0500
"Do we play taps now, or just space 'im?"
(Go ahead, laugh...my hard disk gets cremated WITH me!)
jm<thunk>s
Subject: Re: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 18 Jan 1995 20:07:43 -0500
I hope to make this my last message on the subject, in hopes that this
topic will finally...er...die off. It's really kinda morbid when you're
on this end of the modem.
Bottom line...it ain't a matter of making sure somebody gets my notes
on the overall storyline. If you're a painter, you can give someone your
notes on how to finish the painting in case something happens, but it won't
be done *exactly* the way you would want it. So better to leave it
unfinished, with that part which *is* finished being 100% what you wanted
it to be, than let it be completed by others, and not necessarily as well.
This show has to be done exactly, a certain way, or it won't be what
I *want* it to be. My notes are for my own use. Maybe that sounds selfish
or self-indulgent. Maybe it is. There are lots of writers out there as
good or better than I am. That ain't the problem. Give 10 writers the
same basic parameters and you'll get 10 different stories. This is my
story. And where I go, it goes.
jms
Subject: The Crucible: ST vs. B5
Date: 18 Jan 1995 20:08:11 -0500
Bruce's thoughts in this thread are about the most cogent analysis of
B5 (theme and direction) I've yet seen, insofar as these elements are
concerned. Very precise.
jms
Subject: JMS: PTEN contact info?
Date: 19 Jan 1995 02:18:06 -0500
Correct; Dick Robertson is President of Domestic TV for Warners, is
at the address noted in your message, and is the one to continue to
receive any good wishes for the show.
jms
Subject: Re: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 19 Jan 1995 03:25:59 -0500
"How about if I found out I have terminal cancer and am going to die
in one month. Will you tell me how B5 is going to end?"
My condolences to your survivors.
jms
Subject: JMS: Inspiration???
Date: 19 Jan 1995 22:38:50 -0500
I'd have to say no, the Prisoner didn't inspire me in creating B5. I
enjoy the show, and nod toward it as a milestone in SF history, maybe the
best show made to date, but inspiration on this....no.
jms
Subject: Re: B5 CREATOR COMMENTS ON VOY
Date: 20 Jan 1995 02:14:37 -0500
"If memory serves, this is the first real praise (jms) has for ST.
I think he is gaining real confidence about his own show."
I think you're trying to connect two unrelated things. 1) I have
always had confidence in my own show, or I wouldn' be here. 2) Up until
now, minus some good things in TNG, there hasn't been very much noteworthy
(imo) *about* ST that I could say. Now there is.
jms
Subject: ATTN AWK:Starfuries the only E
Date: 20 Jan 1995 04:35:41 -0500
Obviously humans and the EA have other kinds of attack vessels; but
the Starfuries are the ones most apt for protecting the station; it's a
general purpose craft...not much use around Epsilon 3 for bombing runs.
jms
Subject: Attn JMS: did show concept cha
Date: 20 Jan 1995 11:14:27 -0500
There was never any intention whatsoever of doing B5 within the
context of the Star Trek universe. It was always intended as a wholly
original concept. It was taken to a half dozen or more studios, and
that included Paramount, yes, but Paramount doesn't just do Trek. I never
wanted to tell this story in the ST universe because it *couldn't* be told
there; the rules that confine story areas simply wouldn't let it happen.
jms
Subject: ATTN: JMS 2 questions.
Date: 20 Jan 1995 17:36:34 -0500
I've picked several middle-names for Sheridan; now I'm waiting to see
which he grows into. And to send stuff, send it along to me via:
14431 Ventura Boulevard, Suite 260, Sherman Oaks, CA 91423.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Props question.
Date: 20 Jan 1995 17:46:10 -0500
Links are held on in the real world with a non-abraisve chemical
used to hold prosthetics; comes off fairly easily, doesn't pull hairs,
doesn't cause long-term problems.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Book?
Date: 20 Jan 1995 18:10:54 -0500
What I'll do years down the road is beyond my contemplation; I know I
have enough material for several books, but whether they get written is
anybody's guess.
jms
Subject: JMS: Will you sign my B5 comic
Date: 20 Jan 1995 19:59:29 -0500
With a SASE, just to make it more guaranteed that I'll send it back,
yes.
jms
Subject: Attn JMS: irony is our friend
Date: 20 Jan 1995 20:34:50 -0500
Yeah, I don't doubt that Majel took some swipes at B5 (which show was
that, btw?).
She's long been very frangible about the whole issue. I think she
doesn't like having her monopoly in any way threatened.
Here's an example of how Majel is, which can be confirmed by others
online who were there: when I went to debut the B5 pilot at Wishcon, she
had the presentation right before mine. I had just under two hours to
show the pilot, with maybe fifteen minutes of intro and technical setup.
She was due to leave the stage at the top of the hour.
After me, was scheduled the auction to raise money for terminally
ill children, the purpose of the whole con. Remember that.
So the top of the hour came. Majel didn't surrender the stage. Ten
minutes after. Fifteen. Twenty. People began indicating for her to
leave. She refused. She looked in my direction, said, "I see him back
there, I know he's here," and kept *right* on talking. And talking.
Finally, round about the half-hour mark, she finally stopped. So
now there was NO time for any discussion from me at all, and even if we
ran through the tech setup as fast as possible, we would still cut deep
into the auction. It was a clear and obvious attempt to sabotage the
showing, in front of a couple hundred witnesses. Though she has been
known to go a bit over from time to time at other cons, her reference to
me, and the length of the overage, clearly showed it was intentional.
I told the convention people that I would be willing to only show the
first hour of the pilot (its first screening anywhere), maybe try to find
a time in the evening to show the rest. They insisted: show the whole
thing, and we'll just take it out of the auction. Nonetheless, I kept my
introductory comments as brief as possible, showed the pilot, and rather
than keep the room tied up longer, crammed everybody who wanted to talk
about it into a smaller room down the hall.
Later, several people from the con confronted Majel with this, as
she was signing autographs. They asked her point-blank if she'd done
this *deliberately* to try and screw B5. She just smiled. Didn't matter
that in the long run, her actions would just end up hurting the cause of
aiding terminally ill children. Later, due to a lot of people being very
upset by her behavior, she offered to write a note apologizing. Suffice
to say it was never written.
jms
Subject: NetGhoddess Meriday's Portrait
Date: 20 Jan 1995 21:45:49 -0500
That's a great portrait, Mike. BTW, I very much enjoyed Wizard of
Speed and Time, and wish things could have gone better over the long
haul.
jms
Subject: JMS: you knew this was coming.
Date: 21 Jan 1995 00:25:57 -0500
I understand the reason behind such suggestions, but at the same time
I don't want to be getting hundreds of these things in the mail to sign.
So case by case.
jms
Subject: Defense Grid: big PPG's or pro
Date: 21 Jan 1995 03:52:48 -0500
A current reply on the makeup of the defense grid would be obsolete
within the next 3 new episodes, so I'll defer until then.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Diplomacy questions
Date: 21 Jan 1995 03:52:37 -0500
There are various embassies and diplomatic missions on various
worlds (Earth has the most; Universe Today had a story about a Minbari
embassy being bombed). Because space on B5 is so tight, complete offices
for every single ambassador would kill most of the available space; so
they have access to the station's facilities for business rooms, meeting
rooms, conference rooms and the like.
jms
Subject: ATTN, JMS: DEMON GLASS HAND II
Date: 21 Jan 1995 19:50:45 -0500
Right now, we're moving fast toward accellerating and escalating the
events of the overall arc, and having a hard time determining how to fit
in a stand-alone in the last batch of episodes, so this may hav to wait.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Starfury Model Kit?
Date: 21 Jan 1995 19:49:04 -0500
I keep waiting for a deal to get made for models...I think it'd be
great....
jms
Subject: JMS: Season 2 Finale title?
Date: 22 Jan 1995 01:29:21 -0500
I have several titles for the last episode of this season; won't know
which fits best until I get there in the writing. One possible title is
"A Fall of Night," but I may not go with that one.
jms
Subject: Attn. JMS: Flashbacks?
Date: 22 Jan 1995 01:29:40 -0500
I don't like loose threads hanging around, so all this will get tied
up. In some cases, we'll see flashbacks to stuff that happened "around the
corner," so to speak, and in others we'll have dialogue explanations. WE
get the scoop on what question Delenn asked Kosh (via Lennier) before this
season is out.
jms
Subject: Re: Outer Limits on Showtime:
Date: 22 Jan 1995 01:29:06 -0500
The season of Twilight Zone that I story edited and wrote for (about
11 episodes or so) is in syndication currently, so may be showing up in
your area somewhere. We did some nifty stuff, I think....
jms
Subject: Chicago Convention from jms
Date: 22 Jan 1995 03:16:11 -0500
For those who haven't haerd...there is going to be a major convention
in Chicago on June 24th and 25th; particularly major for Babylon 5. Guests
appearing at the convention include me, Michael O'Hare, Mira Furlan, Bill
Mumy and Richard Biggs. This is the biggest gathering of B5 people since
a surprise appearance at the San Diego Comic Con the summer we went on with
the series.
It's called The Big Bang Convention, and the other guests include Mark
Hamill, John deLancie, Robert O'Reilly and others. Admission is $35 for
general attendence (per day), $150 for VIP tickets, and $250 for Deluxe
VIP. I'll be giving a seminar as part of the program for prospective
television/film writers...a Q&A structure, not a workshop where scripts
will be evaluated.
The hotel is the Courtyard By Mariott in Elmhurst, with the con held
at the Odeum in Villa Park. The VIP pass includes the writing seminar,
an acting seminar (both are, I believe, also available to non-VIP guests
for a small fee, around $20), a gambling riverboat outing with con guests,
hotel accommodations for both nights, and other stuff.
It's my understanding that the tickets for this convention are now
available through Ticketron. They expect something on the order of
15,000 people to show up for this one. I understand they're also doing
some performance stuff between guests, and are working hard to make this
a real Event.
jms
Subject: X-Files win is good for B5
Date: 22 Jan 1995 07:41:58 -0500
X-FILES won the Golden Globe for Best Series?! No shit!? That's
absolutely terrific. I hadn't heard this. Definitely deserved.
jms
Subject: Question from a Trekker
Date: 22 Jan 1995 07:38:06 -0500
Jeffrey...this is just a question, not a flame. You say you wrote
off B5 after one episode. How long did you give the first two ST series
to get their sea-legs?
jms
Subject: Licensing & merchandise questi
Date: 22 Jan 1995 09:08:51 -0500
B5 stuff has been selling well for all our licensees. I've been told
that Creation has come back to license more stuff. I don't know how much
ink All-U has been getting on its shirts, but I haven't head anything.
jms
Subject: Suger Ray Robinson on Babylon
Date: 23 Jan 1995 00:49:34 -0500
It was Larry's idea to name the character Walker Smith, after Sugar
Ray Robinson.
jms
Subject: Re: Chicago Convention from jm
Date: 23 Jan 1995 00:50:18 -0500
Nothing slated for the Detroit area that I'm aware of.
jms
Subject: JMS: Sinclair in Twilight Zone
Date: 23 Jan 1995 00:50:39 -0500
Actually, the doctor's name was St. Clair, not Sinclair, but it
sounds like that...it's visible in the credits, though.
jms
Subject: Re: Chicago Convention from jm
Date: 23 Jan 1995 00:49:57 -0500
I'll probably bring the blooper reel, a music video or two, and an
unaired episode.
jms
Subject: Re: Chicago Convention from jm
Date: 23 Jan 1995 04:18:40 -0500
To Howard Shubs...the Big Bang Convention is most emphatically NOT a
Creation Convention, has nothing to do with Creation, and has stated an
intention to do a very different kind of con unique to their approach.
The one is totally unrelated to the other.
jms
Subject: Re: Homosexuality argument
Date: 23 Jan 1995 04:16:51 -0500
ARE YOU PEOPLE ALL STILL ARGUING ABOUT THIS STUFF?
OKAY, THAT'S IT. EVERYBODY CLEAR OUT. EVERYBODY OUTTA THE POOL. I
DON'T WANT THIS JOINT BASHED UP AND BEAT UP EVERY TIME SOMEBODY DRAGS THIS
ARGUMENT OUT OF THE CLOSET! THERE'S GOTTA BE AN ISSUES FORUM SOMEWHERE!
IT'S LIKE THE GODDAMN DRAZI...EVERY FIVE YEARS YOU DIVIDE UP INTO TWO
CAMPS AND BEAT THE CRAP OUTTA EACH OTHER! AND AS IVANOVA SAID, "GRANTED
THE OTHER RACES WOULDN'T *MIND* IF YOU KILL ONE ANOTHER, EVEN THEY WOULD
PREFER YOU DID SO *QUIETLY*."
Okay? Take it outside, people.
I don't care who's wrong, I don't care who's right, I don't care
who had the last word or who got offended last. Take it outside.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Please verify about
Date: 23 Jan 1995 04:51:37 -0500
Keffer wasn't added because fans thought that sending the commanding
officer into battle was inappropriate. We will still continue to send our
COs into battle when necessary. Throughout the season, we've tried to
flesh out the command levels. We started with 2 starfury squadrons on B5,
and added a third in "Survivors." Logically, those are going to have
squad leaders. Adding in all three would be a stretch budget-wise, but we
could at least add one, to show a different aspect of the crew. And, in
truth, you wouldn't have command personnel leading every single routine
mission. We'd kinda wanted to do this in the first year, but we didn't
have the money for it. In year two, we did, and thus added him.
Everyone who advertises on a show would like their products to be
shown. Likewise, everyone advertising on B5 wanted their stuff shown.
The good thing about this, for a show with a limited (non ST) budget is
that you could have access to their products without having to pay a
license fee. For fun, for instance, we stuck a Zima sign on the back of
a couple of bars. When Kawasaki came on as a sponsor, Larry kinda got to
wondering how on earth you could ever work in a motorcycle...and got a
fun idea. So we went ahead and did it. We never had to do either of
them, or ANY of them. My feeling since is that it probably wasn't worth
doing it, best to leave this stuff out, and in year two we haven't done
ANY of it. Basically, it was a whim.
You'll note that SFU's description of the O'Hare situation doesn't
quote anybody. There are several questionable conclusions in the article,
though overall they did a good job. This, though, is one of them. They
also mis-labled about 4 or 5 photographs. It also kinda bugs me just a
little that they attribute all the setups on the visuals to the directors,
when in nearly every case the script *specifically* describes how the shot
should be set up. I don't mind sharing credit with directors on some of
this stuff, because it's a collaboration...I just don't like it when ALL
the credit goes to the director, who used a beam of stark white light in
a scene, because it said in the script, "Sinclair stands in a beam of
stark white light."
jms
Subject: ATTN: JMS - Christianity in 23
Date: 23 Jan 1995 17:09:18 -0500
Many religious types in 2259 feel that god has appeared to other
worlds in different forms; others feel that it is their obligation to go
out into the galaxy and bring the *right* word; in other cases, whole new
schisms and belief systems sprouted once alien contact had been made,
including Foundationalism, which Dr. Franklin belongs to (you'll hear
more about this from Franklin later this season).
jms
Subject: UK: B5 coverage in `The Indepe
Date: 23 Jan 1995 17:27:34 -0500
And from his statement "My theory is that the programe's a duffer,"
he tells you right there that he's never seen the damned thing.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Scheduling
Date: 23 Jan 1995 17:28:11 -0500
Year 2 is 22 episodes. I don't think any of the breaks will be as
long as year 1 since we started at a different time.
jms
Subject: Reasons why Bab 5 is crap
Date: 23 Jan 1995 17:30:24 -0500
The majority of "flaws" you point out are, I'm afraid, rather
inaccurate.
1) Doors that swing up. There's nobody just upstairs to be bothered
by this; the levels are very well isolated from one another. Also, they
don't go straight up, they're cantilevered, so they swing up and *sideways*
out of the way. Also, from a technical standpoint, this is a better way
of ensuring pressure door integrity. If there's a hull blown out, and
your doors move sideways or meet in the middle, you're going to lose air.
If the door drops down into place, and is held by inertia, no holes or
lines, it's *solid*. (It's a solid seal, which is why you can hear it
close.) It's got nothing to do with trying to not be like Trek; it's
finding what's most accurate and doing it.
2) No, we're not borrowing ST's ideas. You say their communicators
know automatically when you're talking to them. Ours don't. You have
to physically toggle them. Then, once you've done so, you say, "Sheridan
to Garibaldi." This verbally activates the system, and rings Garibaldi's
Link. He toggles his Link and says, "Garibaldi, go." No AI is ever
involved, really; it's a routing system. (And you'll note that Garibaldi
doesn't hear the "Sheridan to Garibaldi" part, only the stuff after it
beeps.) This is not only consistent with the rest of our tech, it's
actually close to being workable *today*.
3) Re: aliens knowing about Earth...remember please that you're
talking about AMBASSADORS here whose JOB it is to know all they can about
their host. So they study. They don't know all of it; Londo and Vir got
cats and ducks confused, and there's holes in their knowledge. That's
why they keep studying, as with G'Kar reading Earth writings. If I
am assigned as ambassador to Russia, I'd damned well better know as much
as I can about the culture, the people, their history, their language,
you name it. Same here. We have not yet to date shown non-ambassadors
with this level of interest or knowledge about Earth.
A lot of the "problems" you cite could simply be worked out by doing
a little thought on the reasons behind such things, rather than just
assuming that it's an error. About 90% of the criticism I see is
kneejerk response, which when you point out how it makes sense if you
just fire a few synapses, gets "Oh....yeah..." as a reply.
4) Zima was a gag. Zima be gone now.
jms
Subject: JMS on Homosexuality argument
Date: 23 Jan 1995 22:53:53 -0500
If this argument hadn't come through here ten times before this, I
might not have minded; but this is something like the 11th go-around on
this, and the fact is that I have not yet seen ONE person change his or
her views on the subject one way or another. It's NOT a dialogue; it's
a series of monologues. People hit their marks, scream at the top of
their lungs, while somebody on the other side does the same.
The result is that it makes BOTH sides look like jerks, and the
important information that needs to be communicated gets drowned in all
the noise and vitriol. Once the conversation has descended to that
level, NO good cause is served.
Ironic thing is...the two sides have one thing in common. I've
received angry and abusive letters from BOTH sides in the debate for
my message. I've been called a fag-lover in one, and a right-winger in
another.
Anybody here remember an episode called "Infection?" Aside form its
(from its) problems, there was one line in particular I'd like to cite for
you: "You forgot the first rule of the fanatic: when you become obsessed
with the enemy, you BECOME the enemy." All I hear around here is
screaming, and y'know, you all sound alike after a while...and when both
sides begin using the same tactics, the same flames, the same instant
condemnation...congratulations, you have become the enemy in whose use of
those same techniques you find such disgust.
And this will probably get me *more* hate mail from both sides; which
means I must be fairly close to the truth. If I can offend BOTH sides,
then I'm doing my job properly.
I wouldn't mind so much if this was new...but we're now in our ninth
rerun of this conversation, and it's poisoning the well without changing
one person's mind about much of anything. Enough is enough. It not about
getting the truth out any longer; it's about who gets in the last word,
and who's the most indignant, and who's a butthead and who's an asshole.
This, to me, does not edify, ennoble or explicate the topic at hand.
We are rapidly becoming a nation that is polarized along every
possible line; gay vs. straight, feminist vs. conservative, pro-choice vs.
anti-choice...in a nation of laws we have started to resort to acts of
terror on large and small scales on either side of the spectrum. For two
hundred years we prided ourselves on the idea -- sometimes flawed, and
with occasional interruptions -- that we solved our problems at the ballot
box, not with bullets or trunchens or muggings or firebombings. But now
more and more both sides are frozen in concrete, opposing opinions are
no longer tolerated or are proof of disloyalty or stupidity or cupidity
or bigotry or immorality, people are reduced to stereotypes and jingoisms,
everybody's demonized and nobody *listens*. We don't talk with each other,
we yell AT each other. We are two steps away from madness and one step
away from Beirut.
In theory, people are here in this forum because they feel strongly
about Babylon 5, and the optimistic (despite many obstacles) view of the
future that we portray. Well, if you feel that way, I suggest you ALL
damn well start BUILDING the future instead of TEARING APART the present,
start talking TO one another not AT one another, because the future ain't
gonna GET here otherwise.
If people want to discuss this area in calm, measured tones, with some
measure of respect, fine. (And this applies to ALL areas of current hot
debate, not just this one.) If all you want to do is yell, over and over
and over...frankly, take a hike. There is a line between doing something
for a cause, and saying you're doing something for a cause when you're
just doing it out of ego, bruised or otherwise. Parse your soul and act
accordingly.
jms
Subject: JMS: B5's Epsilon 3 in SQ6?
Date: 24 Jan 1995 02:28:03 -0500
I doubt very much that's Epsilon 3.
jms
Subject: Re: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 24 Jan 1995 02:49:22 -0500
"..it's still unfinished. A shame if B5 were to turn out the same
way."
(sound of meaty fists clapping together) Yeah...nice place y'got
here...drapes, yeah, I like dat, real purty...be a real shame if something
were to, maybe, *happen* to it, y'know? So...you wanna put these jukeboxes
in your diner or not...?
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: Why Accelerate the A
Date: 24 Jan 1995 05:03:35 -0500
I may not have been clear in my meaning when I said "accellerating
the arc." This doesn't mean doing anything ahead of schedule; it just
means that now we begin cranking the story into a higher intensity level.
We've been kind of floating toward our destination...now we begin the
process of accellerating. If you recall Literary Structure from English
Lit 101, there's the Introduction, the Rising Action, the Complication,
the Climax, and the Denouement. Year one up through about the first
eight episodes of year two are Introduction; we are now in Rising Action
stage. Remember that this is structured like a novel, and you'll
generally have some idea of where you stand in the progression.
jms
Subject: Bruce Boxleitner at MOC in Jul
Date: 24 Jan 1995 05:03:51 -0500
Cool...that's quite a lineup of guests.
jms
Subject: TKO and Ivanova
Date: 24 Jan 1995 05:20:32 -0500
If the deceased has been dead for quite a while, the period during
which one must sit shiva is greatly reduced to a day or so, I'm told.
jms
Subject: Re: Reasons why Bab 5 is crap
Date: 24 Jan 1995 05:20:45 -0500
I would suggest that this whole discussion kinda misses the point, as
tends to happen. Sure, I could stick in lots of references to ancient
stuff...but why is it on Trek nothing of cultural value seems to have taken
place after Shakespeare? Doing antiquity is easy. Modern is harder.
But the whole POINT of the exercise goes to the heart of the show's
philosophy: I'm trying, rather desperately, to connect our present to our
future, to say that's US out there, building the future, recognizeably us.
We've lost the thread of continuity that ties us to the future. I'm trying
with this show to tie the two pieces of the string together again. We
have lots of ties to our ancient past (and I try to work those in as well,
cultural and literary references), but it's the *future* that we seem to
have lost touch with today, in our present. So I'm trying to knit those
together.
jms
Subject: ATTN: JMS - CANADA
Date: 24 Jan 1995 05:20:58 -0500
"Have you ever mentioned Canada in B5?"
No, but I've mentioned San Diego. Would you like me to extend the
honor up north?
("Okay, Rudy, load up another one of them five-hundred megaton jobs.")
Just kidding...I'm pleased that it's going over well in Canada, and
will see what I can do to nod in that direction without irradiating the
place.
jms
Subject: Re: Reasons why Bab 5 is crap
Date: 25 Jan 1995 01:04:06 -0500
How they know the person has finished talking is a) we either have
our characters physically toggle off their Link, or b) when you drop your
arm, it senses the change in gravity and orientation like a phone being
hung up, and closes the connectoin.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: reading SF
Date: 25 Jan 1995 01:45:02 -0500
One of the drawbacks to producing/writing a series is that it leaves
you no time for...well, for *anything* else. Thus I haven't been able to
do much reading of late, though I keep buying books for when I have free
time. I love reading other authors; I like to be amazed.
I'd certainly recommend the works of Jonathan Carroll, particularly
THE LAND OF LAUGHS if you can find it, or any of his later novels (VOICE
OF OUR SHADOWS is also quite nice). He's a contemporary-dark-fantasy
writer who is *breathtakingly* good.
Most of the reading I do now is nonfiction, just to give the brain a
break from storytelling. I *strongly* commend THE LETTERS OF NORMAN CORWIN
to anyone out there. Also currently reading Hunter S. Thompson's new book,
BETTER THAN SEX, just finished a book (alas I've just forgotten the title)
by a woman raised in the Mormon church about her life in that world. Also
working my way through Ed Morrow's GRIM REAPER'S BOOK OF DAYS.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS Is there a Canada in
Date: 25 Jan 1995 01:45:41 -0500
Actually, the Blue Jays were sold to the Mars Consortium in 2200, and
are currently vying for the Worlds Series.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS:Cameos
Date: 25 Jan 1995 01:45:56 -0500
The only cast member to make a non-prosthetic appearance in a show
is Caitlin Brown, who will appear as a lawyer in an upcoming episode.
jms
Subject: JMS: Babcom '95 & blooper reel
Date: 25 Jan 1995 01:45:22 -0500
I do plan to bring the reel, yes.
jms
Subject: JMS: how much of story was pit
Date: 25 Jan 1995 01:52:36 -0500
Generally speaking, I didn't have to reveal much of the arc at all;
the show was sold on the strength of the characters and current stories.
jms
Subject: CGI Sinclair/Ivanova/Delenn/Lo
Date: 25 Jan 1995 01:57:36 -0500
We'll be seeing more planet stuff shortly.
jms
Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Why Accelerate t
Date: 25 Jan 1995 02:15:01 -0500
I actually didn't go to any of the major film/sports schools; not
UCLA or USC. I attended (in order) Kankakee Community College, Kankakee,
Illinois; Richland Junior College, Dallas, Texas; Southwestern Junior
College, Chula Vista, CA; and finally San Diego State University. Loved
all my writing and literature courses.
jms
Subject: JMS: Thoughts on second issue
Date: 25 Jan 1995 03:32:01 -0500
Thanks, we're getting there....
jms
Subject: Blast from the present
Date: 25 Jan 1995 03:59:50 -0500
Thanks, and welcome.
jms
Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Why Accelerate t
Date: 25 Jan 1995 05:20:13 -0500
"What was the spark that ignited your desire to create B5?"
It was a number of things, actually, that all came together at the
same time.
1) I'd just gotten off an SF series (Captain Power) where the budget
was out of control half the time. It made me nuts. I come from this very
old fashioned school of thought that says if somebody gives you X-million
dollars to make a series, it behooves you to act RESPONSIBLY. Then I
looked around more and found that virtually ALL sf series had gone and
were going over budget, mainly because they weren't planned out properly.
The emphasis was on just selling the idea, who cares what happens next.
Whatever one might think of the episode, the 1/2 hour "Nightcrawlers"
installment of the new TWILIGHT ZONE cost a tick over ONE MILLION DOLLARS.
That's nuts. I kept thinking, "There has to be a sensible way to do an sF
series that's responsible, and by virtue of showing it CAN be done
responsibly, help to create MORE sf from other people, since the industry
overall is afraid of it."
2) I'd interviewed and known too many SF producers who knew absolutely
NOTHING about the genre, didn't respect the genre, just wanted to collect
the bucks and get out.
3) As a lifelong SF fan myself, I loved the sagas, the huge cycles:
Foundation, Childhood's End, Lord of the Rings, Dune, and kept wondering,
"Why hasn't someone done this for TV?" To which the only answer is,
"Nobody's tried."
Those elements just kept niggling at me until finally I sat down and
worked out first how to design a series responsibly, then came up with the
concept for the storyline. (Learn from mainstream TV: don't go in search
of new worlds, building them anew each week, create a place where the
stories come to YOU, as they do in a hospital, a police station, a law
office. This led me to a space station.)
Once I had the locale, I began to populate it with characters, and
sketch out directions that might be interesting. I dragged out my notes
on religion, philosophy, history, sociology, psychology, science (the ones
that didn't make my head explode), and started stitching together a
crazy quilt pattern that eventually formed a picture. Once I had that
picture in my head, once I knew what the major theme was, the rest fell
into place. All at once, I saw the full five year story in a flash, and
I frantically began scribbling down notes.
I spent the next couple of years just expanding upon what I saw in
that flash, building out the characters, the conflicts, the changes in
alliance, shoring up the thematic elements which will only really become
apparent over time. In a way, in the midst of this, it was Tennyson's
"Ulysses" that more surely pointed me toward the heartmeat core of the
story, which is why I've quoted it in the pilot, in the series, and in
issue #1 of the comic.
I knew, instantly, that this show might well be impossible to sell;
that I could invest years of my life into the task, only to fail in the
end. And, in fact, it took *five years* to finally get this anywhere.
During that time, had I dropped it, I could've likely sold two or three
other more conventional series. But like Sinclair, I strapped myself
into this particular Starfury, pointed myself at my target, and swore not
to flinch, no matter what. (In discussions about this with Michael, we
agreed that only he and I were really entitled to wear the patches from
the Battle of the Line.)
For a long time, a lot of people told me to drop it. My agent said,
"Kiddo, you know I love the project, but I think you've got to face
reality. It's not going to happen. I have several other gigs you could
take if you'd drop this for a while. Maybe later you can try again."
Friends, family, acquaintances, network suits, studio suits, Major
Agencies...everyone said let it go. It's been four years, going on five.
How much longer are you going to DO this?
As long as it TAKES, goddamn it.
I knew that there was a story I wanted to tell, something that I
wanted to SAY. And there is nothing more essentially deadly than someone
who believes, rightly or wrongly, that he's on a mission, grandiose and
possibly stupid as that sounds. I also wanted to make this show because
I wanted to SEE it as a viewer. Several years ago, I was looking for a
particular kind of book to read. Couldn't find it. So I wrote it, then
shoved it in a closet. My agent heard about it a year or two later,
dragged it out, read it, and sold it. Go figure.
Also, you have to understand...when I was a very young kid, I went to
visit my grandfather's grave. My grandfater was an alcoholic who died in
the gutter. Literally. And was buried in a pauper's grave. Ever been to
a pauper's grave? Lead pipe. Brass number. You check the roster to find
out who's buried. No name, no date. He passed through his life without
leaving footprints. It terrified me beyond the capacity of words to convey
to you. I swore, at that moment, that I wouldn't go down like that, that
I'd leave a mark, somehow, that I'd been here. And on one level, that's
what Babylon 5 is to me. See, that's why nothing stops me...it's not about
money, or fame, or merchandising...there's nothing they can use agains]
me. Whether I stand or fall doesn't matter. If I write hard, if I work
hard, what I have created will survive me. Even when I'm forgotten, this
will go on. I will have left my mark.
That, at least, is the conceit I allow myself in the Hour of the Wolf,
when everything looks futile, and I doubt myself the most.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: *what* kind of speci
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:10:58 -0500
Minbari are mammals, definitely; structural and skeletal variations
(horn-like bone growth on the head, a slightly more raised and obvious
spinal structure, different blood type), and probably in many ways the
most biologically similar.
jms
Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Why Accelerate t
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:34:00 -0500
Yes, we'll see the rings in time. And no plans for a book down the
road...one crisis at a time.
jms
Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Jerry Doyle, Sto
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:35:50 -0500
Correct: Jerry Doyle was at one point a stockbroker. He has since
reformed.
jms
Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: reading SF
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:37:43 -0500
"Why bother with the vasectomy?"
Who can remember...?
jms
Subject: JMS: Your Show is Number one w
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:39:33 -0500
My regards to your wonderfully discerning organization....
jms
Subject: JMS: THANK YOU FOR B5 FROM HA
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:46:59 -0500
Thank you. Have had only passing experience with Robotech; I've just
never been able to get into Anime. Glad to hear that 38 supports the
show; I hear they're okay people.
In any event...thanks again for the encouragement. It helps.
jms
Subject: JMS: Richland College question
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:50:34 -0500
I remember little of the classes at Richland College except for a few;
one was a History of English Literature class, which introduced me to Keats
and Yeats and Tennyson and Shelley through an instructor who *loved* his
work and the writers in question. He just breathed life into the words,
and he encouraged me strongly to pursue my writing.
Beyond that, there were mainly classes in psychology, sociology,
some math stuff, and philosophy. One was a History of Greek Philosophy
course (Thales to Aristotle), which I just loved. By virtue of taking a
LOT of electives over the years in areas that interested me, I kinda ended
up with a classical education. It's more breadth than depth, but it gives
me the tools I need (over the course of four colleges/universities and
a couple of degrees) to find whatever more is necessary for stories or
scripts.
The best thing about the year or so I spent at Richland was that at
this time (around 1973), beat poetry was still in vogue (well, it was OUT
of vogue everywhere else, but trends always start and finish first on the
coasts, then work their way inland from there), and every day at noon by
the commons there would be performances of beat poetry, which led me to
explore Ginsburg and Ferlinghetti ("This Life Is Not A Circus Where"
and "Christ Came Down" being two favorites) and other contemporaries.
I've always been naturally curious about stuff, and to me the college
experience was the chance to find out about *anything*. So I just dived
in and took it for all it was worth. If I'm going on about this a bit,
it's because I know there are lots of folks here who are currently in or
entering college. If you only see the parking lot and the cafeteria and
the bathrooms and the classrooms of the courses you have to take...you're
missing the point. It's an *amazing* opportunity that will likely not
come your way again in such plentitude. Take courses in areas outside your
major, even if just to audit them. There are amazing opportunities you
can mine if you're a writer, also...college newspapers, magazines, low
power local/college radio and TV stations, theater department productions,
on and on and on.
Granted...a lot of college was a pain in the ass. I took a lot of
stuff I didn't want, didn't need, and have never used because they were
required for my major. (One semester, just to get RID of some of this
stuff, I took 24 units -- crashing classes over my 16 unit limit in order
to sneak past the rules -- at one time, while working part time. It was
a profound mistake, since it included 8 units of German and classes in
Statistical Psychology, Biology and other stuff. Major brain-fry.)
But overall, the experience was rewarding, and I encourage a
generalist approach to others. If you're going to be there, ENJOY it.
jms
Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Why Accelerate t
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:50:06 -0500
The story is still going where I wanted it to go, but in general it
is even better than I'd hoped it would be.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: What finally sold B5
Date: 26 Jan 1995 04:50:19 -0500
What made all the difference was finding people who *understood* what
we were trying to do. In general, you know instantly if an exec Gets It or
not. Most didn't. The first one to Get It was Evan Thompson, head of
Chris-Craft Television, who put us onto Dick Robertson at Warner Bros.
We didn't know at the time that PTEN was in the works (a joint venture
between the two), but when it appeared, we were in line to get on.
We did multiple pitches to the station group's executive committee,
and were pleased to see that they, too, Got It. Once we proved that we
could a) do the pilot, and b) do it for the budget, we got the Go for
series.
jms
Subject: Of Zima and Kawasaki
Date: 27 Jan 1995 03:52:20 -0500
Correct. We received not a dime from Zime or Kawasaki. And believe
me, if we had, I wouldn't be bashful about saying so. Anybody wants to
help finance this show and make it even better, bring 'em in. Just
hasn't happened.
jms
Subject: Attn: JMS...the best laid plan
Date: 27 Jan 1995 03:52:33 -0500
I'm awestruck...simply awestruck.
We should all wear white for the duration of the convention. I'll
send a memo on that at once.
jms
Subject: Off Topic?
Date: 27 Jan 1995 03:52:05 -0500
Sci-Fi Channel has indicated many times that they would like t
acquire Captain Power, but (in what I must say I think is a doofy move)
the producer won't release the show unless SFC agrees to finance new eps.
Cart before the horse, if you ask me. Get the show on first, create the
need, THEN do more.
Doofy, I tell you. Doofy, doofy, doofy. Maybe even doofiest.
jms
Subject: ATTN: JMS Big Bang con
Date: 27 Jan 1995 05:00:47 -0500
I'm *terrible* at gambling. I might as well just pile the money on
the coffetable and put a match to it. Which is why I generally stay far
away, or allow only small amounts of money (have actually only gambled a
couple of times, been to Vegas only once). I'm basically an obsessive-
compulsive personality, and the LAST thing you want to do is hand someone
like that a drink, a cigarette, a joint or a pair of dice (which is why
I don't generally drink, smoke, do drugs or gamble). I'd rather direct
that obsessive behavior toward writing.
jms
Subject: JMS: What about alien doctors
Date: 27 Jan 1995 05:13:19 -0500
As it happens, I'm writing a script right *now* that deals with the
question of alien doctors.
I live to serve....
jms
Subject: "Shadows" request from jms
Date: 27 Jan 1995 05:15:10 -0500
A request for those who'll be seeing "The Coming of Shadows" on the
satellite uplink tomorrow. There's a lot of stuff in that episode, and
it's probably the best one of the series to date. It has a lot of sudden
twists and turns that even "WARNING: SPOILER" in message headers won't
keep from accidentally spilling out.
Thus, I'd like to make a request I don't generally make: if those
who get the satellite feed could hold off on ANY plot revelations for a
few days, until it starts airing, I would *very* much appreciate it.
After you've seen the ep, you'll understand why I ask this. General
comments (liked it/hated it), or private email with questions or
responses...all terrific. I'd just like to try and keep this one as
close to my vest as possible for a bit.
jms
Subject: Run Thru Dark Places -spoiler
Date: 26 Jan 1995 19:23:06 -0500
Two corrections: Talia did not walk off with Bester; they took two
different routes away. Check the tape. Also, there was no reason for
Ivanova to object to Talia taking off her gloves; she wasn't going to be
scanned.
jms
Subject: Re: A Race Through Dark Places
Date: 26 Jan 1995 19:29:18 -0500
B5 operates on EST, Earth Standard Time, as noted in episodes. So
they do have day and night cycles. And it's the fear of what psi might
do if they DID join together that worries people, and why we have a
Psi-Corps. Which is what Talia says.
jms
Subject: JMS: Babylon 5 and new watcher
Date: 26 Jan 1995 19:30:57 -0500
I'm not sure I understand what faces you have to recognize to follow
"Race." Bester is re-introduced with an explanation, as is Jason. You
don't have to recognize the guy from "Chrysalis;" if you do, great, it
adds a level. If you don't, it still tracks. The only other characters
are our reglars; so I'm confused as to what there was left to confuse them.
jms
Subject: Religion and First Contact....
Date: 27 Jan 1995 03:27:44 -0500
First Contact did factionalize or even destroy some religions; others
sprung up afterward. Others assimmilated the notion. Franklin belongs to
one that came up after First Contact.
jms
Subject: Re: A RACE THROUGH DARK PLACES
Date: 27 Jan 1995 15:57:33 -0500
You can generally squeeze 20-25 pops out of a standard PPG energy
cap. It won't need to be recharged for quite a while. And there you
just slap a new one in and drop the old one in a recharge bin.
jms
Subject: A fan letter, or THANKS JMS!
Date: 27 Jan 1995 17:58:27 -0500
You're very much welcome, thanks.
jms
Subject: ATTN: JMS on publicity
Date: 28 Jan 1995 05:54:07 -0500
Let me be clear on this: we will take ANY opportunity, any help in
getting the word out. In many ways we are treated with a "stealth
publicity" campaign by some within the studio; keep a low profile, or
else god forbid somebody might write an article. So all aid -- putting
the word out, asking local papers for coverage, writing to magazines,
anything and everything -- is appreciated.
jms
Subject: Minor UK publicity for B5
Date: 28 Jan 1995 22:13:53 -0500
I'd love if I could get copies of those two clips sent to me at
14431 Ventura Boulevard, Suite 260, Sherman Oaks, CA 91423. Many, many
thanks.
jms
Subject: JMS: episode SKIPPED IN DENVER
Date: 29 Jan 1995 01:03:42 -0500
Apparently the station mixed up the two tapes.
I am *profoundly* bugged.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: When did you go to r
Date: 29 Jan 1995 01:39:57 -0500
Okay...Kankakee in 1972-73; Richland 1973-1974; Southwestern
1974-1976; SDSU 1976-1977.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: O'Hare presence = s
Date: 29 Jan 1995 03:51:48 -0500
I have never stated, at any time, any specifics about the amount or
duration of Sinclair's presence in the B5 storyline yet to come because
a) there are things I wish to withhold, and b) some things must remain
fluid because if Michael should get, for instance, a major role on a big
network series offered to him, and with no guarantees of B5 next season,
he would have to take it. There are certain things planned, but I don't
generally pin this stuff down until I'm absolutely sure I've nailed down
all the corners. We *will* see him briefly this season, and we will see
more of him soon. Beyond that I haven't commented, and won't comment.
jms
Subject: A NOVEL
Date: 29 Jan 1995 06:09:46 -0500
"I WILL WRITE A SEQUEL TO THE POPULAR MOVIE & NOVEL BABYLON 5."
Nope.
jms
Subject: JMS: Switched Episode Order? [
Date: 29 Jan 1995 06:14:32 -0500
Yes, originally, "Soul Mates" was to air after "Race." At that
time, PTEN was initially going to show just 6 new episodes, and we would
have come in after the rerun break with "Race," then "Soul." When the
ratings came in and looked good, they didn't want to interfere with
the growth, and indicated they wanted to show 7 new eps in the first
batch. "Race," as you can see, was a very complex episode visually, and
the only way to get it ready to run #7 in the first batch would've been
to compromise the integrity of the show, and we simply won't do that for
ANY reason. "Soul Mates," on the other hand, required very little in the
way of post production, so that was moved forward into the #7 slot.
jms
Subject: BABYLON 5...AFTER THE METAL WA
Date: 29 Jan 1995 06:14:41 -0500
Yes, I worked on CAPTAIN POWER, and stuck the reference to Babylon
5 into one of my scripts as a nod to the future; did the same in one of
my novels, OTHERSYDE. Sort of a Tuckerism-before-the-fact. (One good
thing about this is that it inadvertantly ended up helping make it clear
to people that I was working on this sucker since 1986/87 or so.)
jms
Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: Why Accelerate t
Date: 30 Jan 1995 01:59:38 -0500
My first novel was DEMON NIGHT, published in hardcover by E. P.
Dutton, and nominated for a Bram Stoker Award by the Horror Writers of
America.
jms
Subject: Attn. JMS S.EFX error in RTDP
Date: 30 Jan 1995 03:02:31 -0500
The doorbell *is* there. Recently, though, the satellite uplink
company used by PTEN changed some of its audio feed channels; if your
local station or whoever downlinked it didn't catch it, some audio got
missed.
jms
Subject: Bester, Our Favorite Storm Tro
Date: 30 Jan 1995 03:03:00 -0500
Bester's name was my idea.
jms
Subject: How Many *** To Screw In A Lig
Date: 30 Jan 1995 03:03:18 -0500
Q: How many telepaths does it take to scew in a lightbulb?
A:
(Also, what do you call a Minbari floating dead in the ocean? A
minbuoy.)
jms
Subject: KCOP 13 (Was: Re: IMHO's on A
Date: 30 Jan 1995 03:17:45 -0500
In editing, we always left black and let an act end properly; we
were aghast at the clipping at the end of various acts. We think some
of it happened at the firm that drops in the national sponsor's
commercials.
jms
Subject: Something amusing waiting for
Date: 31 Jan 1995 01:08:59 -0500
"Who's the K?"
Easy...the Kook who came up with this idea.
jms
Subject: ATTN JMS: New PPG effects perm
Date: 31 Jan 1995 01:31:24 -0500
Kevin kind of got overtaxed with stuff; however, he is doing a few
things for us now here and there, and we're now using the same techniques
for the new PPG blasts, so it should look normal next time you see them.
jsm
Subject: ATTN JMS:What goes through you
Date: 31 Jan 1995 17:42:34 -0500
"What goes through your head?"
Wolverines, mainly.
Sundays we get possoms.
jms
Subject: JMS: Sheridan's lightbulb joke
Date: 31 Jan 1995 17:43:05 -0500
Actually, a number of people hit on the basic idea of the Minbari
surrender; there was some of this over on GEnie as well. It's really the
obvious joke. I went for it as well, and appended the last part to set it
apart.
jms
Subject: Race through dark places comme
Date: 31 Jan 1995 17:46:24 -0500
Also, bear in mind that Bester's parting shot in "Mind War" was
exactly that, in essence an "Up yours" but subtle. There was no reason
for that to be given to anyone in "Race."
jms
Subject: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 31 Jan 1995 17:57:44 -0500
All TV series are in essence owned by the studio that produces them.
Hence, B5 is copyrighted and owned by Warner Bros./PTEN.
jms
Subject: JMS: Military model for Earthf
Date: 31 Jan 1995 17:58:06 -0500
Your analysis is not far off the mark. There's some of the
Stalinist approach, also some of the early Roman approach, where there
was a great deal of overlap between senators and the military. Because
of having to pull so many different traditions together, I also figure
it's kind of a hodge-podge, each division pulling for its own identity
which may or may not be somewhat obsolete by now.
jms
Subject: JMS: Repeats and Canonical Ep
Date: 31 Jan 1995 17:57:24 -0500
All episodes will tend to be repeated in original airdate order; but
this doesn't bother me particularly, since if the series can't survive
being viewed out of order, then it's flawed.
And yes, I believe they'll be picking up season 1's last reruns after
the end of season 2.
jms
Subject: Att'n JMS: Death and Dyin
Date: 31 Jan 1995 17:57:44 -0500
All TV series are in essence owned by the studio that produces them.
Hence, B5 is copyrighted and owned by Warner Bros./PTEN.
jms
Subject: Ellison, guns and breaking win
Date: 31 Jan 1995 22:20:25 -0500
The PPG is a jms addition, dating back to before the pilot.
jms