JMS on CompuServe (Aug 15, 1996) *POSSIBLE SPOILERS*
Brent Barrett
bbarrett at speedlink.com
Thu Aug 15 13:32:52 EDT 1996
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WARNING !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The following posts may contain SPOILERS for
upcoming Babylon 5 episodes.
Continue at your own risk.
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THE FOLLOWING MATERIAL IS THE COPYRIGHT OF THE
RESPECTIVE MESSAGE AUTHORS AND CANNOT BE
REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM WITHOUT THE EXPRESSED
PERMISSION OF THE AUTHOR.
Note that JMS has expressed his public permission
that all of his messages may be reproduced freely.
I give permission for my summaries to be reposted in
any form, however I reserve all rights to them and
the right to revoke this permission at any time.
[ Summary of subjects in this section: ]
Sb: #559549-#B5: Time to kick butt
Sb: #559836-New Cast Addition
Sb: #559845-TV Guide Letters
Sb: #559689-Goodbye Old Friend..
Sb: #559731-Lyta--Season 4
Sb: #559848-Babylon TV Guide Letters
[ Summary: A poster tries to kindly tell others that he wants real
discussion and analysis and criticism of Babylon 5, not just the fluff
that he's been seeing. He goes a little hog-wild in his declaration,
however, which is why JMS responds the way he does. :-) ]
#: 559570 S5/Babylon 5: General
14-Aug-96 12:19:13
Sb: #559549-#B5: Time to kick butt
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Yes, Peter, that's very good, now sit back down and finish your broccoli
or you can't have any Neapolitan ice cream.
jms
[ Summary: Asks if actors coming and going has been a problem with
Babylon 5. Also asks if Londo's transition from bafoon to tragic
figure was a result of the actor's input or something that just
"happened." ]
#: 559909 S5/Babylon 5: General
14-Aug-96 23:02:34
Sb: #559836-New Cast Addition
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Bringing actors in and out, and changing their characters, is more or
less always a story issue, so it's never a problem. Londo, which you mention,
was always intended to go on his arc from comic relief to something darker and
more tragic. That's his story; it was his story long before any actors were
ever hired.
jms
#: 559845 S5/Babylon 5: General
14-Aug-96 20:04:32
Sb: #TV Guide Letters
Fm: SYSOP DUPA T PARROT
Joe,
Did you read the Letters section of next week's TV Guide? The first four
letters are very pro-B5. One of the other letters is from D.C. Fontana taking
TVG to task for errors in articles (like forgetting David Gerrold <g>).
-Dupa T. Parrot, Team SF/F
[Tech. Support SysOp]
<OS/2 + GCP> O-
#: 559912 S5/Babylon 5: General
14-Aug-96 23:02:41
Sb: #559845-TV Guide Letters
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Yeah, it was great...the "Babylon Edging Out Trek?" column is quite a bit
away from their initial reaction to B5, to wit: "...they hope will become a
series. Fat chance."
I have this suspicion people are finally starting to figure out what
we're doing here....
jms
[ Summary: A U.K. viewer just saw "War Without End" (Part 2) and really
enjoyed the "new" Sinclair, "so at peace with himself." Also calls
JMS a "sly fox" for the "first kiss" between John and Delenn. ]
#: 559913 S6/Babylon 5: Spoilers
14-Aug-96 23:02:43
Sb: #559689-Goodbye Old Friend..
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Thanks, the Sinclair material was very moving, I thought.
As for the kiss...I knew everyone would be waiting for that first kiss,
so I made sure it was different, that it was a first kiss for one of them, but
not the other, that it was natural and totally unforced and surprising. So for
Sheridan, his first kiss of Delenn was actually his second (by a long ways),
and his second, when it comes, will be her first.
Just can't do anything the conventional way on this show....
jms
#: 559731 S6/Babylon 5: Spoilers
14-Aug-96 17:40:14
Sb: #Lyta--Season 4
Fm: DAVID CERRETA
Joe,
The recent news of the addition of Pat Tallman as a regular for season 4 is
being greeted universally by fans as great news, which, of course, it is.
Someone asked you how adding her will change the dance, so to speak. You gave
a chickens and chainsaws answer which was funny, but made me wonder about story
construction for the five year arc.
I know the story is outlined, with trapdoors galore to deal with the vagaries
of episodic television and situations with actors, etcetera which are beyond
your control. However, I must assume there are certain milestones that must be
met for the story to reach its predetermined conclusion. How you get to those
milestones is dependent on who you have to play with at the time, true or no?
I can assume that you saw in the character Lyta (and obviously in the talent of
Patricia) potential to further energize your story and add depth and tension
that would not have been there (or been there in a different way). Still,
Season 4 has certain turns and twists that will lead us all down the path to
the end. Do you look with anticipation these unexpected opportunities? Do
they make your work more exciting because it keeps you on your toes?
Because you've stated yourself that this is a novel (and I agree), is it a
second draft?(said with no sarcasm intended). What I mean is that you've
outlined it and know when and where things have/will happened. But I wonder if
you've experienced the same thing you've experienced in writing your novels,
that is new characters ask to be born, others ask to die and others ask to have
their fates changed? I assume that is the case with adding Sheridan and
killing off Kosh, but was that the case with Marcus? Was he planned all along?
Did Lyta's appearances in Season 3 and Patricia's availability make Lyta's
character *demand* more time?
Finally, has it ever gotten to the point where you literally have to rein in
your characters before they make a shambles of your carefully designed and
laid-out plot? Seems to me that it could happen, and a disciplined experienced
writer knows how to cope with that. Just wondering if it has happened yet with
B5.
Best, Dave
#: 559914 S6/Babylon 5: Spoilers
14-Aug-96 23:02:47
Sb: #559731-Lyta--Season 4
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Actually, the progression of the B5 story has been almost exactly the
same as the way I write my novels. I start off knowing where the story has to
go, what benchmarks I need to hit en route to the end, what my repertory group
of characters consists of, and then I start writing.
As someone said of a battle, an outline never survives contact with the
enemy, which in this case is the actual writing. The outline, for me, is a
safety net whose purpose is to keep me nominally on track while allowing me the
freedom to bounce around the landscape, adding new threads, broadening out the
storylines, fleshing out the characters, and reorganizing how the characters
move in and out of the story. That makes the work organic. I still end up
exactly where I wanted to end up, but the road there is much more interesting
than if I'd just hewed to a very rigid structure.
It's like driving from LA to San Diego...you can just jump on the
freeway, or knowing the freeway is there, jump off from time to time to grab
lunch at Pea Soup Anderson's or a quick ride or two at Disneyland.
And yeah, sometimes I have to work to keep the characters in line.
Londo's the worst. He's always going off and pulling me in one direction or
the other, he's very peripatetic...and getting him talking for dialogue is
never hard...getting him to shut the hell UP for two minutes so somebody else
can get a word in, tha's hard.
Writing is a very schizophrenic business.
jms
#: 559848 S5/Babylon 5: General
14-Aug-96 20:04:40
Sb: #559768-#Babylon TV Guide Letters
Fm: RAE AUGENSTEIN
That one letter, though...
``````
I'd like to point out that in a TV Guide article three years ago on the show's
premiere, the producers said their motto was "No Kids or Cute Robots -- Ever!"
The very episode mentioned in the July 27 issue, "Believers," completely
revolved around a child. An intriguing story, but for continued success they
should stick to their battle cry.
--Sharon Powell, Fayetteville NC
``````
For one, if I'm correct I've seen Joe quoted as saying "No cute kids or
robots, ever." That's different than no kids.
As far as the success, this person seems to be implying that "Believers"
wasn't a success. In fact, this has been one of the most loved (and hated) and
talked-about episodes of the series still. I know its one of the first episodes
we made all our friends watch (again and again...)
For God's sake, Joe killed the kid in the end. (OK, the parents killed the
kid, but Joe wrote them that way <g>). Now if the show was all about cute kids,
or a cute kid or robot saved the day consistently (whoops, did I say Star Trek?
sorry.), that would be different.
Just venting to you cuz I can't vent to Ms. Powell, <g>
Rae ^^^^
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Rae_
#: 559930 S5/Babylon 5: General
14-Aug-96 23:08:48
Sb: #559848-Babylon TV Guide Letters
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Two quick notes...what I said was that we wouldn't have cute kids (or for
that matter ANY kids) in as regular characters a la a Wesley or the kid from
SeaQuest. We have, on rare occasions, had cute kids in one-shot episodes...of
course, they've generally ended up shipped off or conveniently deceased....
Also, just a correction: David Gerrold wrote "Believers," not me.
jms
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