[B5JMS] Smith to pen AMS; JMS to launch new Spidey comic

[b5jms-admin at cs.columbia.edu]

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From: "Richard" <richard at nospam.edu>
Date: Mon, 20 May 2002 22:39:50 -0700
Lines: 58

"Jms at B5" <jmsatb5 at aol.com> wrote in message
news:20020519030153.07085.00000455 at mb-cq.aol.com...
>
> As for the goodwill issue...and please show cause why you should be
entitled to
> speak for "spider-fans" as a group, were you elected, did I miss another
> primary?... as noted above, sales have almost tripled since the
change-over, so
> I don't think the problem is with the fan base, which is only expanding,
not
> contracting.

    As you well should know, the problem with putting things out on an
erratic schedule is that you face the possibility that the fans will
EVENTUALLY lose interest. Out of sight, out of mind.  I would imagine
that you wouldn't have been happy if the stations that were airing
B5 were changing the broadcast time from week to week and not
even showing it at all on three randomly chosen weeks out of every
nine.

>
> It's with a handful of very loud individuals who can't Get Over It, who
have
> never ever been late with anything in their own lives, or else how could
they
> justify bitching about somebody else getting hammered by deadlines so
heinous
> that he missed a couple of deaDlines for the first time in 30 years with
the
> result that they suggest that these people (viz: me) should be fired for
being
> "tardy."
>

    What would you have done if one of the scriptwriters for B5 gave you
a similar sob story? Would you have held off on filming an episode until
he could finish the script?  Would you have told your distributor, "Harlan
was really busy this week working on that V.I.P. script for Columbia, so we
don't have a B5 episode completed for broadcast. Call us back in couple
weeks when his schedule may have cleared up" ? If the distributor and
TV stations complained, would you have pointed at the show's good ratings
and told them to shut up?  What would allowing something like that happen
do to your  professional reputation in the television industry, even if it
happened only once?


> >
> As for the rest, as noted, I'm currently 4-5 scripts ahead.  In another
couple
> of weeks I'll be 5-6 scripts ahead.

  Well good. I guess Spider-Man is no longer at the bottom
of your list of priorities, at least for the moment.


Richard



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Lines: 57
From: jmsatb5 at aol.com (Jms at B5)
Date: 21 May 2002 06:05:57 GMT

> As you well should know, the problem with putting things out on an
>erratic schedule is that you face the possibility that the fans will
>EVENTUALLY lose interest. Out of sight, out of mind.  I would imagine
>that you wouldn't have been happy if the stations that were airing
>B5 were changing the broadcast time from week to week and not
>even showing it at all on three randomly chosen weeks out of every
>nine.

Actually, the schedules *did* change on the stations on a regular basis,
especially in places like Boston, and we just rolled with it...and episodes
were held back and aired in only groups of 3 or 4 for ratings purposes every
year...so there goes that analogy, which was totally not in the same situation
to begin with.  You're comparing apples and oranges.  But for now I'll let you
call oranges apples just to deal with this.

>What would you have done if one of the scriptwriters for B5 gave you
>a similar sob story? Would you have held off on filming an episode until
>he could finish the script?  Would you have told your distributor, "Harlan
>was really busy this week working on that V.I.P. script for Columbia, so we
>don't have a B5 episode completed for broadcast. Call us back in couple
>weeks when his schedule may have cleared up" ? If the distributor and
>TV stations complained, would you have pointed at the show's good ratings
>and told them to shut up?  What would allowing something like that happen
>do to your  professional reputation in the television industry, even if it
>happened only once?

Unfortunately, once again the fact that you don't know what you're talking
about is blatantly obvious.  In a TV series you have a variety of writers doing
a variety of scripts...and I've had EXACTLY that sitaution come up again and
again on various series.  If writer A has a real and serious problem and can't
deliver, you drop in a script by writer B in its place.  Hell, we did that on
Jeremiah this year, when a freelance script came in late and we had to bump up
another to fill its position.

Once again, apples and oranges.  The comic book industry doesn't work that way.
 You can't compare the two.

>Well good. I guess Spider-Man is no longer at the bottom
>of your list of priorities, at least for the moment.
>
>

And THAT'S the line where you reveal yourself as a dickhead.

Spider-Man was *never* at the bottom of my list of priorities.  

You, however, are.

 jms

(jmsatb5 at aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2002 by synthetic worlds, ltd., 
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine 
and don't send me story ideas)