Not at all. Yes, a character dies...after a season of getting to know him. To say, "Well, you just put in a character to kill him," and citing red shirts, is really...well, a red herring and a distortion. A redshirt, by definition, was usually a security guard who was introduced in the same episode in which he was killed, we knew *nothing* about him, he had maybe 2 minutes of screen time, maybe a word ("look out!", and then he was dead.

By the definition you apply, anyone who dies in a novel is a redshirt, since the author knew he was going to be killed off. If you do a novel about the Civil War, and Lincoln dies halfway through, is that a redshirt? Many of the characters in The Stand don't make it to the end...are they redshirts?

I hate to break it to you, but *everybody* dies sooner or later. For the purposes of this show, some die on camera, some die off, some die during the story, some die afterward.

Nor was Keffer's character useless; through him, we got to see the Starfury pilots and learn more about them, we got our first close look at the shadows, we met the Gropos, and the primary incident that began to unravel the whole thing -- Keffer's gun camera footage -- came about.

And Corwin's character is still very much alive, and useful in the story, so that kinda disqualifies *that*.

jms

Thanks; no plans for Talia for the time being.

I agree with much of what you said. The unexamined life is a real peril, and literature at its best can help us to avoid that trap by asking uncomfortable questions.

I actually tend to think that the day-to-day questions can be more central, more profound, than where to buy a house. Do you tell your friend that his/her spouse is having an affair? Do you intervene when you see someone on the street being mugged? Do you have an abortion? Do you sacrifice buying the boat you always wanted so you can put your kid through college?

At some point in our lives, we have to make a baseline decision about whether our actions will be ethical, or convenient; do we do right, or do we do wrong? Some may seem like small or unimportant decisions, but each one made for the wrong reasons makes it easier for the next bad decision to slip through.

Politicians tell us that we can find lives in which courage and hard decisions are not necessary.

They are, of course, lying.

jms

It's a literary...I hate to say the word trick, but it's the most descriptive. You show somebody the end right off the bat, as we did with the Londo/G'Kar scene. But how do we get there? What happens? Yes, the war is eventually won...but what *was* the price? And what does it mean to everyone involved?

The best magic is when it's right there in your face, and you can't see how it's being done.

jms

"Is that script writing book you wrote considered by some akin to a magician giving up his secrets for all to see? I know I can't wait for it to come out this fall, and I intend to learn all I can from it when it does. I was just wondering if some feel that there is an unwritten rule in the writers guild (or something) that discourages releasing the details of the scripting process to the general public?"

If that were the case, then given the massive numbers of scriptwriting books out on the market on any given day, there would be whole *legions* of writers at whom Guild members were honked off.

So the answer, basically, is no, for many reasons. For starters, the bottom line truth is that there really aren't any secrets, any mysteries, any tricks, any secret handshakes...it comes down to good writing, or what someone in a position to hire considers good writing, in combination with persistence and a certain amount of luck. There's really nothing *to* give away.

Additionally, I've met a number of working writers who broke in and credit the writing book I did with a measure of responsibility for their success. A person has to learn the essentials somewhere, after all.

(BTW, the new and expanded edition of The Complete Book of Scriptwriting is due out in October from Writer's Digest. I can give the full info if so desired.)

jms

The Talia situation likely could've been finessed more smoothly than it was, no mistake. Sometimes there are going to be ragged spots. It's going to happen.

Here's the best comparison to what my position is with this show: Harlan Ellison has, on occasion, done this routine where he'll go into a bookstore and write a story in full view of everyone. As each page is finished, it's taped to the wall unti it's done. This is considered a pretty nifty trick, sustained over maybe 15-20 pages.

That's pretty much what I'm doing here. It's an ongoing story. I can't go back, I can only go forward. As each page (episode) is finished, it's put up on the wall, and I have to go on to the next one. So far I've written 2,400 pages on that wall. Again, I can't go back and change anything, and if there's a bump caused by a real world incident, it simply has to be accommodated as best I can while still going where I have to go.

From time to time, there's going to be a misstroke on the keyboard, or there's going to be a typo that I'll miss. That's inevitable when you're out performing in front of a massive crowd on the high wire without a net. As long as the totality of it all hangs together, as long as the story is told, the trick finally done...then that's what fundamentally matters.

That this happens on occasion should be obvious; that it happens as rarely as it does is the point of wonderment, I think. Remember, it's all trial and error, because no one's ever done this before. And right about now I understand why. But we're making it work.

jms

[ Summary: The "red shirts" poster tries to clarify his question by asking if characters like Keffer and Corwin aren't "useless" so much as "unimportant." He wonders if Corwin isn't just going to die at some point anyway. ]

But see, not every story has to be about the Important People. We've got that in our nominal "heroes." What tends to get omitted from SF are the grunts and the blue collar guys, the pilots who have to fly the missions called on by the Big Guys. To say "are they important" is, I think, really a question that proceeds from a skewed perspective. Are *you* important to the overall arc of this nation, the history of this country? Am I? Probably not; I'll never sign a constitution or discover radium or walk on the moon, I just write stories for phosphor dot screens; can there be anything more ephemeral? But the repercussions of history are written on the faces and the lives of those who *can't* change it, who have to live with the decisions made by those above. Showing those people is as valid as anything else.

It ain't just the heroes that make the future, Edwin. It's the carpenters and the plumbers and the dockworkers we showed in the first season. Now, you may think they're unimportant. I don't.

jms

Invariably when a freelancer like Tim or someone else writes an issue of the comic, it finally comes through my hands for approval; I have final creative say over the contents of the book, artwork, script, all of it. So far, so good.

I turned in my script for part 1 of the 4 issue arc. It came back substantially rewritten, not always well, in my view. It was somewhat... juvenlizied, let's say. And the impact of what I wanted -- it was a bit on the wordier side, in that it was volume one of "The Book of the War," and intended to read and sound like a prose book -- was jettisoned because the editor felt that there were too many words for what's usually put in a comics panel. (Yes, because it's supposed to feel like a novel, a la the Sandman or Cerebus, it's an intentional abberation that would not persist in issues 2-4, only the first one, to set the tone.)

I indicated, rather distressed over this, that I could always just put it all back, as I have final say. Then I was informed that writers outside DC do not have final say over books, only editors. And that when I was writing for the book, I was functioning as a *writer*, and not as the person who has final say over the book from a corporate standpoint.

Bottom line being...if a freelancer writes for the book, I have final say as per our contract over content. If I write for the book, I'm no longer the approval person, and don't have final say, and get rewritten. It's all a matter of internal DC politics and jurisdictional concerns.

So the only way to maintain control is to *not* write for the book. Rather than have the 4-issue arc rewritten, poorly in my view, I have withdrawn it, and will not write for the book in future, though I will work with DC in terms of maintaining continuity and assigning premises to the writers, and approving all other aspects of the book.

If this sounds a little like the Red Queen's Race to anybody else... join the crowd.

jms

Thank you. Yeah, the critics have been...well, unfair doesn't quite seem to describe it. Some of these reviewers are to legitimate criticism as Auchwitz is to health spas. Still, some of them have actually begun to turn around. They just totally dismissed us from all serious consideration right from the start, some because we were SF, some because we weren't ST.

There's an old saying on Broadway theater: "Nobody but the audience loved it." And that's what counts.

As far as the last five are concerned...they're an interesting and mixed bag. The first two are almost, but not quite stand-alones, each has a couple/three stories going on, and one of each tends to lean toward the arc. But the last three are seriously hardass. They bring you right to the edge, and you can see it coming quite clearly...then drop you.

jms

I've been going over my notes on the show, and just thought I'd pass this along to the newer folks to show just how long this show has been in the works. In looking it all over, I'm already kind of astonished at how large a chunk of my life this thing has consumed already.

1986: Babylon 5 is thunk up.

1987: Pilot screenplay and series treatment written, artwork commissioned.

1987-1991: Five years wandering in the desert of studios and networks, trying to sell B5.

June 1991: We place Babylon 5 with PTEN.

October 1991: B5 announced to the world.

August 1992: Filming begins on B5 pilot movie.

September 1992: Filming completed on B5 pilot, post production starts.

February 1993: Pilot airs.

February 1994: First season begins airing.

It's odd sometimes to consider that though this is the 3rd season of Babylon 5, it's been a part of my life for 10 years, about 25% of my life; trying to sell it, selling it, making it. And this month marks about 5 years since we placed it with PTEN.

Jeez, but that's a long haul....

jms

Thanks, and thanks again a second time for giving me a GREAT reason for, er, *deliberately* making those little mistakes...yes, that's right, I had to think about not causing the end of the universe, after all...writer have great responsibility, yes, thinking great thoughts, Zathras knows what he is doing...are you going to finish those fries?

jms

The secret of writing: get your character up a tree and throw rocks at him.

I throw big rocks.

jms

Thanks. That was the one thing I just didn't want to do, disappoint the fans, as I'd been disappointed so many times *as* a fan. We'll never be perfect, however much I try, there will always be glitches, and more glitches, and sons of glitches, but we always work to make it as good as humanly possible. It's certainly the story I always wanted to see, and hope that others feel the same.

jms

Okay, some responses. I trust you will allow me to be as blunt in my replies as you were in raising the points initially.

Regarding the Warner Bros. concerns...there really isn't much I can add to what you said, and certainly nothing there I'd choose to contradict. So we'll take that one as read and move on.

To the creative issues:

"Did Sheridan and Ivanova really think that Vir was killing off thousands of Narn while he was on Minbar. Hey, this is Vir, not Josef Mengele we are talking about. Did they really think it was necessary to drag this all out in front of Londo instead of privately."

No, they didn't think he was doing it personally, only that he was expediting the transfer of Narns offworld for this purpose. You think someone like Vir could not do this. But most of the Nazis who send Jews to die weren't Josef Mengele, carving into bodies...they processed numbers from behind wire-framed glasses, and were quiet, sometimes even cheerful individuals with wonderful wives and children. The greatest evil can often wear a benign, smiling, affable face. And remember, people can change on this show. You look at Londo in season one, is this someone you could buy taking part in the bombing of the Narn homeworld and the death of millions of Narns? Yet that's what happened. And their belief was that it was probably Londo who was behind it all...it's Londo to whom Ivanova expressed her outrage, not Vir, who she figured was probably being pushed into it at his behest, so logically she *would* take this right to Londo. She figured, as you did, that Vir certainly wouldn't think of this on his own, but Londo could (and says so in the episode).

"Why didn't the Shadows get on the horn and start screaming that they just made sushi out of Kosh. The alliance is new, shaky, unsure of Sheridan. What a great time to screw over everyone by announcing we killed Kosh."

Because for starters, it's bad form. If you kill somebody else's ambassador, that's not the sort of thing you proclaim proudly, it tends to bounce badly back onto you. Also, this was primarily a personal situation. There's more, but it's a bit further down the road story-wise that might help clarify this further.

"Was it just me, or did anyone stop to think just how Bester got to B-5 space in a Starfury without using the local jumpgate. Who brought him and more important, why?"

He simply tagged along with an Earthforce jump-capable ship, and asked to be dropped off. I considered bringing this up, but it was just dead exposition; it would be easy enough to do.

"Then out of the hundred popcycles in the Shadow transport, we just happen to pick the one guiding light in Bester's life. God, aren't we lucky."

Yes, and how amazingly coincidental that of all the women around, Oedipus would just happen to murder his father and marry his mother without knowing he had done so. Okay, it was a coincidence, I'll own up to that. We have very, very few of them on the show. And the reason the word "coincidence" exists, and the word "synchronicity," is that sometimes stuff like that does happen. You ever pick up the phone to call somebody and have that person already on the line calling you? You ever think of someone you haven't seen in a while and run into them the next day? It happens. As long as it doesn't happen to excess, and become a venue for sloppy storytelling every week, it doesn't bother me, it's a legitimate plot device.

And you misspelled popcicle.

"We have a wonderful security system on B-5. Our monitors will show you everything, except a twenty foot long fusion reactor trigger that was put in the most sensitive part of the station by a certified nut case."

Show me where we ever said our monitors "will show you everything." They don't, they can't, and never have. This is a city, and a quarter million people live here. It would be impossible to monitor it all. As for the fusion reactor...that was a ten foot object attached to a place where only station maintenance people went, which was his job. He was cleared for that kind of access, and until/unless the device was activated, it was electronically dormant, you wouldn't notice anything. Nor did it attract much attention. Even though they *knew* something was there, they STILL had to look long and hard to find it, because it had been made to look just like everything else in the area.

And it's not like everybody *knew* he was a "certified nutcase" at the time. He didn't have an identicard that said CERTIFIED NUTCASE on it. He worked in station maintenance. Nobody knew Tim McVeigh was a nut until he blew up a building. Nobody knew that quiet little man in Boston was out strangling women in his spare time.

You seem to operate in blacks and whites; this show is about greys. And most of the concerns you raised are, I think, easily addressed.

jms

"Joe, you are already *known* for B5 and, given two more seasons and the repeat deal on TNT, you will only become more noticed. Maybe this will change in the future, but as of 1996 when people think of you they will probably identify you with B5. Knowing that you have accomplished much besides B5, I'm wondering how you feel about being tagged as "Joe Straczynski, the guy who created Babylon 5?""

It bothers me not at all.

Every writer has one seminal work for which he or she is most known. For Heinlein, STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND; for Herbert, DUNE; for Smith, the LENSMAN books; for Tolkein, LORD OF THE RINGS; for Bradbury THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES. I don't put myself anywhere NEAR that league...I'd be doing good just to carry their pencils...but my sense is that even though I've done a lot of stuff prior to B5, and will likely do a lot more after, this is almost certainly the one work for which I'll be most known, and remembered. (Which is also why I'm working so hard to make it right.)

Doesn't bother me at all; I'm proud and pleased to be associated with this show, and always will be.

jms

"You hand this woman a script and say to her, "Miss C., everyone around you is dead and you are in command. The station is falling down around you and you're in terrible pain, about to die by decompression or laser burns or crushing--or worse, you could become a Morden and be controlled by the Shadows the rest of your life. You have no hope of rescue. You may not know where you are." And then you say she was a tiny bit on the hysterical side?"

Hey...from where I sit, that's just another day at the office.

Don't know many producer/writers, do you?

jms

[ Summary: Points out that JMS previously said Sinclair wouldn't have a lot to do until season five. Asks if this means Sinclair will return or if this was just an alteration of the overall arc. ]

The arc is a fluid creature when she needs to be....

jms

[ Summary: Asks JMS how the growing popularity of Babylon 5 has affected him. ]

What an interesting question....

I don't think it *has* affected me, but that's my my subjective point of view, and that's a self-serving analysis, so let's start from the assumption that that may be flawed, and proceed from there.

Main reason I think it hasn't affected or changed me is that I haven't had *time* for it. Once we got the go-ahead for the series, I stuck my head in a B5 shaped hole in the ground and haven't had time to come up for air yet. Once I've finished the show, and can take a moment to look around, will I become a complete butthead? Possible, but I don't think so.

My problem is the same as it's always been...I'm *extremely* self critical. The doofus in the mirror today, 3 years into B5 is the same doofus I saw there 3-4 years ago. I know the areas in which I'm a jerk, and the areas in which I'm golden...they haven't changed much. I also have a hard time applying the reaction to *the show* to myself. The show is a thing apart, somehow. Whenever someone thanks me for the show, I tend to get kinda abashed about the whole thing...which is why you don't tend to see messages from me elaborating on someone's appreciation. Usually it's just a "thanks" and we move on. If I wanted to feed that, or keep it going, I could do so. But for me, the Babylon 5 universe has a certain reality about it, somewhere deep in my brain, and I'm just writing down what happens there. (No, I can still tell fact from fiction...but I've just been living in that fictional place so long that it becomes second nature...imagine your best friend walking across the den late at night, and banging his/her shin on the coffee table. It doesn't take a great leap of imagination to figure out what your friend will say in reaction...it comes naturally. So do the events in B5, by virtue of knowing the characters and the universe as well as I do.)

I will tell you a terrible but true thing: when I go to a convention and take the stage...I never hear the applause. I'm so concerned with what I'm going to say, the need to find some way to appear even *remotely* interesting when I know the reality is far from it, to make sure these good people get their money's worth, a performance...that I don't hear it, try as I might. I want to, I would like to...but it's as if it's intended for someone else, and he or she couldn't make it, and I'm being thrust out onto the stage to substitute for someone interesting.

I think that if I've changed at all, it's to become a little more cautious and introspective. (Witness this message.) As that famous Greek philosopher Peter Parker once pointed out, "With power comes responsibility." Because of this show, I have an unexpected platform; so I have become more wary in how I use it in order to avoid abusing it. With that comes the desire to find ways to use it in a positive fashion...to encourage other people to find their own dreams, to ask questions and put out good information on how TV works, so that people can better influence what they see and hear in this medium, and get what they want, not what somebody *thinks* they want.

Finally, I think I'm fairly aware of my relative position in society; can there be any lesser celebrity than a producer, anything more ephemeral than a television writer? Between writing, prep, shooting, and post, it takes us about 3 months to make one episode...which is gone in an hour, phosphor dots sent cruising toward Andromeda at the speed of starlight. It's been debated here before, but I still hold fast to the notion that the really important people, the ones doing the work that will influence the next hundred years, are the teachers and the builders and the researchers who are creating the *real* future, not writing about a fictional one. I can write 1,000 episodes of B5...and it won't cure one person of polio, that took Dr. Jonas Salk.

Television as a medium is too important to turn over to the visigoths, can be used to great purpose...it can ignite controversy, entertain, educate and ennoble; it can propel us toward the stars or bring down a president. But it is always ephemeral, of the moment; it does not last, does not endure. If you're very lucky, your show can last 10 years before it becomes dated, out of style, behind the times. Where it can inspire people to do more with their lives in ways that make a permanent difference, then it is of greater value, and that is my hope for this show.

But that's the show. Not me.

I'm still the doofus in the mirror.

jms

The storyline began millions of years ago.

We're coming in in the middle of the story.

But then, that can be said of all of us.

jms

[ Summary: Asks if JMS will ever put Babylon 5 into a novel form. ]

This is probably the most commonly asked question, and the answer remains...I dunno. Right now, the sheer task of getting this show made now, for TV, is sufficiently daunting, that the idea of telling it again in print is enough to make me tip over. Also, this show was *designed* for TV; if I'd wanted to write a nove, I'd've written a novel.

So for now, the answer remains "I dunno."

jms

"Would YOU categorize Babylon 5 as a Science Fiction show, or a Drama? I know that it is set in a Science Fiction setting, but the storylines and such are really, I think, in the Drama category. What do you think?"

I have no problem calling it a science fiction, or SF (which also includes speculative fiction) show. I know a number of writers in TV who hate the term, deny that what they're doing is SF, but I'm proud that it's SF, and would definitely classify it as such.

jms

Thanks, and I remain happy to be here.

On the writing and the scenes you cite...a story, *any* story, should be designed not just to take you through the mechanics of a plot, but to make you *feel* something. Those, for me, are the elements I look for when I watch something, and when I write something. If I'm not on the verge or tears in writing Kosh's fate, you won't be that way watching it.

jms

Thanks. Yes, I sometimes do get notions for stories with our characters outside the B5 arc. Earlier stuff, later stuff...you just sorta file it away. I'll probably never get to telling any of it, but it helps add truth to the writing because I know what they're doing elsewhere and elsewhen. Those tales will probably never be told.

jms

Thanks. The Television Thing to do would've been to have that moment of victory, Sheridan saying the crisis is over, then fade to black...but it was absolutely *vital* to go to the lower sections and see the human cost of that victory. War is never a bloodless game.

jms

[ Summary: An elderly viewer pipes in that he thinks storytellers are special people and that what JMS is doing is special and, while it may not cure any disease, it touches thousands and thousands of people. ]

Thank you, I appreciate that. That's really all I've ever wanted, to tell a good story.

jms

"I was wondering if, in the writing of your scripts, you follow the odd-number beat rule?"

Nope. Don't even know what that is. I hate rules and generally avoid them. TV writing has too many of them, used by too many people, creating formulaic writing.

jms

Thanks. It's primarily an effort to integrate the real world into the series. So much of SF on television tends to take place in a vacuum. The leader of the Federation is always the leader of the Federation, we rarely hear about squabbling, elections, economic problems, dissident groups breaking away...and when we do it's usually a misunderstanding or basically good people with a different agenda that can be quickly resolved.

I think that integrating all of those elements lends an atmosphere of verisimilitude to the story, making it all the more *real*.

jms