ATTN JMS: How do you feel TV show creators should treat fans?

[B5JMS Poster]

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From: Chris Huston <huston at autobahn.mb.ca>
Date: 7 Nov 1999 16:10:12 -0700
Lines: 23

I've noticed that most of the time when you describe an upcoming event,
etc, whether it's for Crusade or Babylon 5 you usually tell it like it
is. In the past you've said certain upcoming episodes would be huge or
monumental, and they usually always were, or you'd hint at things which
would happen in the future, which lo and behold, did happen.

However, creators such as Chris Carter (of X-FILES fame) are notorious
for "teasing" fans and then either not delivering or deliver something
totally different altogether, sometimes being more disappointing than
not. Or saying "we'll never do this on our show" and then a season or
two later, do it.

How do you feel about this? Do you think this way of "teasing" the fans
is good or would you rather be upfront and truthful? And are your fans
important enough to you that you know if you cry "Wolf!" too many times
they won't believe/respect you?

Thanks for your time.

--CH

(Canadian B5 fan)


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From: jmsatb5 at aol.com (Jms at B5)
Date: 8 Nov 1999 18:35:48 -0700
Lines: 54

>However, creators such as Chris Carter (of X-FILES fame) are notorious
>for "teasing" fans and then either not delivering or deliver something
>totally different altogether, sometimes being more disappointing than
>not. Or saying "we'll never do this on our show" and then a season or
>two later, do it.

Well, I don't really know if that's necessarily true of Chris, I think he
always tries to be straightforward with folks.

>How do you feel about this? Do you think this way of "teasing" the fans
>is good or would you rather be upfront and truthful? And are your fans
>important enough to you that you know if you cry "Wolf!" too many times
>they won't believe/respect you?
>
I think you have to be careful to always be as accurate as possible.  (And bear
in mind that one of the whole reasons for this exchange is to provide an
accurate transcript of how a show is made, to help folks better understand the
process and thus get better TV and have more input into that process...and that
process is compromised if bad data is entered into the system.)

I take some small pride in the fact that in 6 years of having this on-line
conversation, when it comes to talking about this show, I have never once been
caught out in a prevarication.

Which is why I was kinda frustrated when the whole Claudia Christian situation
went down, when she was saying she was fired when in fact she walked away over
money.  People said "Well, who should we believe here?"  At that moment, to be
honest, it felt to me like, "Why have I bothered to establish this reputation
and conversation all this time if suddenly my word doesn't mean anything?" 
Later, of course, Claudia came out and said, well, yeah, she did walk away, and
it was over money, which is of course utterly her right, I just wish she'd said
that at the start rather than much later...since the situatoion led to threats
against me and abusive email and the like.

So really, some people will believe what they choose to believe no matter how
straight you've been with them in the past...that's been a hard lesson that
I've had to learn.  All I can do is to keep doing what I've been doing, talking
straight about the show to the best of my knowledge and ability.  And if I'm
wrong about something, I cop to it instantly.

What's good about that is that if I think a show didn't live up to
expectations, I'll *say* so...quite bluntly sometimes.  But that way, when I
say that show X is really, really *good*...fans know I ain't blowing smoke up
their collective butts.

 jms

(jmsatb5 at aol.com)
B5 Official Fan Club at:
http://www.thestation.com




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