JMS on CompuServe (Oct 17, 1996) *POSSIBLE SPOILERS*
Brent Barrett
bbarrett at speedlink.com
Thu Oct 17 22:30:53 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
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the right to revoke this permission at any time.
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[ Summary of subjects in this section: ]
Sb: #593705-#Scripts available?
Sb: #593858-delenn forgot?
Sb: #593943-Valeria & G'lan
Sb: #593934-<Rock> thoughts
Sb: #URGENT! HELP! from jms
Sb: #594088-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Sb: #594093-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Sb: #594149-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Sb: #594156-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Sb: #594295-Scripts available?
Sb: #594378-URGENT! HELP! from jms
[ Summary: Picked up a copy of JMS' new scriptwriting book and is enjoying
it so far. ]
#: 593991 S5/Babylon 5: General
16-Oct-96 21:16:34
Sb: #593705-#Scripts available?
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
What might be interesting, next time you pick up the book, is to fire up
a copy of "The Coming of Shadows" and go through it with the script in
hand...it's a good way of seeing how you lay out a show shot-for-shot. And
since there's stuff there that was cut from the episode, you can also judge on
what was left out, and why, and whether it hurt or helped.
jms
[ Summary: Confusion time. The poster thinks Kosh's statement, "You have
forgotten something," was spoken to Delenn, so she asks if it referred
to a piece of a Vorlon inside Delenn or, possibly, that Delenn was
pregnant. She wonders if this will ever be revealed. JMS didn't seem
to catch the basic flaw in the question, so the answer would be a bit
confusing to the poster, I'm sure. ]
#: 593993 S5/Babylon 5: General
16-Oct-96 21:16:38
Sb: #593858-delenn forgot?
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
No, that replied to his promise to come see Delenn...which in the flurry
of events he forgot until she was already in the chrysalis.
jms
[ Summary: Asks all about Valeria, G'Lan and G'Quon. Who or what were they?
Were they Vorlons? Was Valeria present when Valen arrvied? What was
Minbari religion like before Valen? Were Q'Lan and Q'Quon
contemporaries? ]
#: 593994 S5/Babylon 5: General
16-Oct-96 21:16:41
Sb: #593943-Valeria & G'lan
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
....!....
Unfortunately, I can't even *start* to get into such an elaborate
backgrounding in a message. It would require a lengthy article; the answers
are fairly complex.
jms
#: 593934 S6/Babylon 5: Spoilers
16-Oct-96 19:41:00
Sb: #<Rock> thoughts
Fm: MARA K. MALOVANY
"And the Rock Cried Out" was a wonderful episode. Here are a few
thoughts/questions that come to mind.
First of all, I loved the song. The only gospel music I own is the
recent Sam Cooke box-set, (which has one cd of his earlier, gospel work, and
one cd of his mainstream hits--a great set, by the way). Is there any
particular recording of "Rock" that you could recommend?
Refa's final scene was incredibly perverse--funny, yet chilling. And
how appropriate that the man who said that being "damned" would be a small
price to pay, was killed with gospel music in the background. (And how ironic
that Londo had him killed for the one thing he _didn't_ do).
What troubled me most about this episode, though, was Vir. He truly
believed that his actions were going to cause G'Kar's death, that he had sold
him out to protect his life and his family.
I feel as though he was at an important junction in life, his last
chance to escape being enmeshed in Centauri politics and in Londo's intrigues;
but out of fear and loyalty, he stuck with Londo, and sealed his fate.
Oh, I don't suppose he ever had a chance of getting free, really. (I
know, I know, the prophecy.) But I am haunted by the image of Vir, locked in
that darkened room. I'd like to think that he will become a worthy Emperor,
but can his morality survive 17 more years of being Londo's stooge?
Well, just had to get that off my chest.
Mara
#: 593995 S6/Babylon 5: Spoilers
16-Oct-96 21:16:44
Sb: #593934-<Rock> thoughts
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Yeah, Vir has to be *very* careful...he's on the razor's edge these days.
The higher up you go, the more you know, the higher the stakes and the greater
the risk of choosing badly.
Re: "funny yet chilling," those are the scenes I love most...the ones
where you're utterly conflicted, it's grotesque or frightening on the one hand,
and comic or absurd on the other. It leaves you uncertain which way to jump
emotionally, and I love that feeling...caught betwixt and between.
jms
#: 594066 S5/Babylon 5: General
17-Oct-96 03:39:54
Sb: #URGENT! HELP! from jms
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
HELP! I got zapped tonight! Someone sent me what they SAID was a picture his
kid made of a Starfury, said it'd be great if I could say an encouraging word
or two about it. So I downloaded the file, and it turned out to be a booby
trap. (No, I can't trace back the user, it's off the internet, and the address
was an anon...didn't write it down.)
Anyway, it DELETED MY DOS DIRECTORY and started to delete my Windows directory
as well before I caught it at the last moment. (Yes, it was a com file, and I
stupidly didn't look to check before activating it with the newsreader's
program.) I've managed to restore nearly all the Windows directory (except for
win.exe which is utterly gone). I used Norton to do that part...but Norton
Unerase only seems to work in a directory that's still there. The DOS
directory is completely *gone*. Is there any way I can restore it? I can try
moving the DOS directory from my work computer to the home one (they're the
same systems, and arrived within days of one another, so they should be nearly
the same), but I'm obviously leery.
When it runs through my autoexec.bat file, I get the following errors:
Bad or missing C:\DOS\SETVER.EXE
Bad or missing C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS
(I figure those'll come back after DOS is restored, but I'm less sure about the
other ones following:)
HMA not available; loading DOS low
Bad or missing COMMAND interpreter Bad command or file name Bad command or file
name
(I'm not altogether sure that's from autoexec. or the config.sys file, by the
way...could be either.)
This isn't the sort of thing I've ever had to deal with before, and will take
ANY advice from someone knowledgeable. I have scripts to write, and this is a
major problem for me right now.
jms
[ Summary: Help offered to recover JMS' home machine. ]
#: 594381 S5/Babylon 5: General
17-Oct-96 18:11:34
Sb: #594088-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Thanks for the info; I was up until 5 a.m. restoring the Windows
directory. Thank goodness it didn't get much further than that. My reflexes
are pretty good.
jms
[ Summary: More help for JMS' home computer trouble. ]
#: 594382 S5/Babylon 5: General
17-Oct-96 18:11:36
Sb: #594093-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
I'm going to take the command.com file off one of my rescue disks that I
made for this computer (alas, they can't restore the dos) and my hope is that
that'll be clean.
And now the kicker.
There's also a text file in that directory that wasn't there before. It
contains 3 words. STAR TREK RULES!
Fortunately, I caught it before too much damage was done.
jms
#: 594149 S5/Babylon 5: General
17-Oct-96 09:27:43
Sb: #594066-#URGENT! HELP! from jms
Fm: GERARD KEATING (IRELAND)
Joe,
>> HMA not available; loading DOS low
You get this because Emm386.exe (part of MS-DOS) is missing.
>> Bad or missing COMMAND interpreter
As others said, this refers to command.com (also part of ms-dos) normally in
the root i.e. "C:\", but check config.sys for a line starting
shell=<path>\command.com, your machine might be looking for command.com in a
sub-directory.
Also check if config.sys is still there.
>> but Norton Unerase only seems to work in a directory that's still
>> there.
Norton should also un-delete directories, what version do you have.
#: 594384 S5/Babylon 5: General
17-Oct-96 18:11:41
Sb: #594149-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
I have the most current version of Norton for win3.1, but I couldn't see
how to make it restore directories, only *sub*directories.
jms
[ Summary: Suspects that JMS was hit by a virus. Offers some help to
restore the system. ]
#: 594385 S5/Babylon 5: General
17-Oct-96 18:11:42
Sb: #594156-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Nope, wasn't a virus, it was a com file.
Thanks for the info.
jms
[ Summary: Wonders why scriptwriters might still accept net profit points
as payment for their work, since everyone knows studios and production
companies will never admit to making a net profit on anything. ]
#: 594392 S5/Babylon 5: General
17-Oct-96 18:19:36
Sb: #594295-Scripts available?
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Yep, they're still offered...and taken...because it's important to at
least keep the *concept* of profit alive, however bastardized the form.
Fr'instance...I don't have a gross profit percentage of B5. I have a
small *net* profit. Which, as we all know, means I'll never see a *dime* out
of it. The only part where I have a piece is an (even smaller) percentage of
the gross is in...merchandising, the one area in which I've dragged my feet
from day one.
My accountant thinks I've got it in for him....
jms
[ Summary: Offers more advice to help JMS restore his computer. ]
#: 594393 S5/Babylon 5: General
17-Oct-96 18:19:37
Sb: #594378-URGENT! HELP! from jms
Fm: J. MICHAEL STRACZYNSKI
Thanks to all for the advice...I'll be heading home in an hour or so,
and will see what works.
jms
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