JMS Speaks (again)

[Wizz]

<font face="georgia"><font color="red">It occurs to me that in some ways you're trying to learn to tell your stories in the fewest possible words. From writing novels (250-350 pages), to plays (? pages) through TV episodes and Movies (50-100 pages) and audio dramas (?pages), you're now writing a fair number of comics with only 22 pages, though I know that the scripts are more with your panel descriptions.

I'm just wondering if this is a progression you've been doing deliberately, to find the perfect balance of verbal and visual maybe, or just how things happened? Maybe your background as a journalist is telling ("specificity is your friend")? Or should I start working on getting telepathic so you can just p'think your stories this way?
</font>

I think (p'think?) it's just the way things have laid out lately. In truth it's very difficult for me to tell a short story; with me, everything's a long russian novel. Even with the comics being 22 pages each, they are still part of a larger story or arc, and the RS and Midnight Nation stories were/are both just plain big for a form that usually measures arcs in 3-6 issues.

Just long-winded, I guess.
jms

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[Wizz]

This is just an aside, knowing that we've got any number of folks out there who can do the math (and/or the biology) on this a lot better than me (which would be, well,pretty much everybody reading this), 'cause it's something I've noticed lately.

Unlikely as this sounds, I'm one of those people who often seems to know when the phone is going to ring. Not always, just often enough so that I'll suddenly look at a phone and think, "It's about to ring," and sonuvagun, it does.

Now, I've always just put this down to synchronicity...after all, how many times would I look at a phone and it doesn't ring, and I don't think about it? In my head, when I knew it was about to ring, the only way I can describe it would be kind of vrrr-vrrr-vrrrrTIK sound in my head.

Well, a few weeks ago, imagine my surprise when I heard that sound coming from outside my head for a change when I knew the phone was about to ring. It was coming from the desktop stereo speakers in my office, where I'd set down my cell phone. (A Motorola v70.) It was that same exact vrr-vrr-vrrrTIK sound, coming from the speaker, then a moment later, the cell phone rang.

Out of curiosity, I used the land-line to dial my cell phone later, and the same sound came from the speakers again, just a couple of seconds preceding the actual ring. GIve it a try, see for yourself. It wouldn't happen every time, I discovered, but a lot of the time it would. I also tried it with a large-ish Nokia cell phone, and the same thing occured.

Now, somebody out there can probably do the math on the electromagnetic impulse that could be picked up by a speaker system from the phone, and I guess what I'm wondering is, can the human nervous system be sensitive enough to pick up something like that? If so, it might provide a scientific answer to how some people just know the phone is about to ring.

Just one of those things you think about when it's nearly 1 a.m. and you really should be writing....

jms

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[AsIs]

One of the unscientific ways to predict Earthquakes in CA is to check the newspaper for pets running away reports, ie, lost pets. When the number of pets running away dramtically rises, a earthquake is imminent.

Animals can sense a change in the force or what have you...

So I wouldn't be surprised if what JMS is saying is true.

[Wizz]

<font face="georgia"><font color="red">With the anniversary of the first airing of The Gathering coming up quickly, do you have any special plans to commemorate the day?
</font>

Plans hell, I'm still trying to get the number of the bus that hit me....

jms

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[Wizz]

<font face="georgia">Just an advisory to those who picked up this issue [ASM 50]...there's a big glitch by way of a missing dialogue balloon at the most crucial part of the story. (It was a production glitch late in the game.)

Since I can?t really do spoiler space well here, here?s a ?tiny URL? to the page with the story info, should you be inclined?
Wizz

http://tinyurl.com/6s90

Just a small thing, the justification for the whole arc....

jms
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<font color="red">Well when you're doing your next comic signing you could always write that on the last page of each book. Or just get a stamp made if you want to save your wrist.</font>

Actually, I was thinking I might just get a stencil of the missing dialogue and bleed through the stencil onto the page....

jms
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Actually, I was thinking I might just get a stencil of the missing dialogue and bleed through the stencil onto the page....

<font color="red">You certainly know your audience! [img]smile.gif[/img] </font>

Then all we need is to get a CGC rating set aside for certain blood types, so it'd be 9.3 B-negative.....

jms
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<font color="red">--wow. That is one BIG glitch.
Wonder how that happened?</font>

It fell off the page.

Literally.

jms

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[AsIs]

Hmmm, fell off the page...

That takes me back to my layout days. You run the bits and pieces that you are adding thru a machine that coats the back with wax. Then stick it where it goes. It is a handy non-permanent way to line things up. But the down side is that if you are not careful they do fall off. Not the most adhesive surface, but damn effective most of the time.

[Wizz]

<font face="georgia"><font color="red">Quick question though. I thought JMS had told us last year that he could not resolve the Peter/MJ separation, that Kevin Smith insisted that he be the one to do that. So what changed?</font>

I quote Kevin Smith in an interview given to popcultureshock.com:

**********

"I could be wrong, and maybe folks are just lying all over the place to Poor, Misinformed me, but I was told JMS had no real concrete plans for Peter and Mary Jane. He cleared the decks of all the supporting characters on his Amazing run to concentrate on that first storyline with the guy who wants to eat Spider-Man - whose name escapes me at the moment. I realize his intention was to slowly work the supporting cast back into the book, but I was always led to believe that Mary Jane wasn't his primary concern. If she is, then Good Lord, he's welcome to her.

"JMS, if you're out there reading, and you want to handle the Mary Jane/Peter "We're married, but not really" hot potato, brother: do it with my blessing. Because the shit-storm that's gonna rise out of that cluster-**** is gonna be big. Like when the word "Kike" showed up in the pages of Wolverine-uproar big. Like "The Clone Saga"-uproar big."

***********

I *was* reading, he gave his blessings, so I did it.

And, oddly, I haven't seen more than one or two mildly critical messages anywere about this. Most everybody seems quite happy to see them together (and at no time has anyone at Marvel ever told me not to say they were/are married).

So I"m really at a loss to understand why Kevin felt he didn't have the wherewithal to make this work. It really hasn't been a problem.

I guess most everybody thinks it was done right, that's all.

So thanks, Kevin. Couldn't have worked out better.


jms
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<font color="red">Hey Joe, when are we going to see the Squadron Supreme book?
</font>

The first three scripts are in, have been for a while, and we're now well into pencils on issue two. The book is set to debut July 16th.

It's really pretty spiffy so far.

jms

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[Wizz]

<font face="georgia"><font color="red">Do you know yet if your busy schedule will allow you to go to the San Diego Comic Con (or any other such event) this year? After all, I'm not sure I want to fly out from NYC unless there is hope for a "JMS Sighting." </font>

Yeah, I do plan to be there. I'll also be at WonderCon in San Francisco around the end of April.


jms
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<font color="red">A friend recommended Kevin Smith's movies to me, which I'm plowing through (along with the 4-hour "An Evening with Kevin Smith" DVD). I'm struck by the similar origins of you both (comics, New Jersey) and of course found out you're both writing Spider-Man projects.

So my question is, how much opportunity have you two had to get to know each other? What do you think of his work? What does he think of yours? On one of the DVDs filmed at his comics store the B5 figurines were arrayed on the shelf in the background, which would suggest some passing knowledge of your work.</font>

I've only spoken to Kevin once, at a con, where he was signing. I came up and introduced myself. He blinked at me for a second, then said, "Huh. You're taller than I thought you'd be." And that was about it.

jms

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[Wizz]

<font face="georgia"><font color="red">If the bombs start falling in Iraq and some CNN reporter opens a report with the words, "And so it begins..." I wouldn't leap to the conclusion that an hommage to either Tolkein or Straczynski was intended. </font>

Y'know...three thousand missiles set to hit in 48 hours...they call it "shock and awe."

Call me old-fashioned, but I liked it better when they called it a blitzkrieg.

Oh, wait, those were the bad guys. Sorry. Wrong war.

jms
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<font color="red">Just speaking for myself, I *like* the stories of carpenters who understood what you were doing. Who else would write entire columns about the other people who made B5 happen? Can't say I've ever seen that before. </font>

I just feel more comfortable talking about that stuff, about the contributions that the rest made, because for one thing, they tend to get overlooked because I'm kind of the one whose name is fronted all the time. They deserve the recognition.

And I just find talking about what I do just...awkward, that's all. Not fishing for compliments, just saying it 'cause it's true. Because of a lot of requests, last time I did San Diege Comic Con, I tried talking about myself what I do for the first half far more than usual, and I don't think I've ever spent a more difficult half-hour. When we turned to questions and could throw it to the show overall, I was substantially happier and more comfortable.

And I *like* telling stories about what other people do, about the show overall, because it's often a lot more colorful and interesting than what I could tell on my own behalf. I come in, I write, edit, cast, write, go home, rinse, repeat.

Blecch.

jms

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[Wizz]

RE: Jeremiah
Last I heard, year two is set to debut in the US around the first week of August. They want to be able to debut their new series "Dead Like Me" in June/July or so, let that get its sea-legs, then we come out in August.

We're currently in the last phase of shooting our two-part season finale "Interregnum."

jms
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<font color="red">So, just out of curiousity, how does it feel to see your pronouncements of fictional doom and gloom coming true in such a dramatic, world-impacting fashion?</font>

It's a weird bit of synchronicity that has always been the case with my work when I'm kind of riding the right waves, for lack of a better term. Riding the synchronicity wave might be a better one. They went through B5, echoing now, and they continue with Jeremiah.

In our story, we're moving toward a truly massive conflagration, a major war, and in the course of filming one particular episode, as the shit hits the fan, one character says, "Let's go kill some of the enemy and make some noise."

As it happened, by yet another weird coincidence of timing, at the moment we shot that scene, the bombs started falling in Baghdad.

Some of the cast are becoming increasingly creeped out by this....

jms
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<font color="red">Will there be more Babylon 5 and what are your new projects?</font>

To part one of your question, one never knows.

To part two...season 2 of Jeremiah is just about finished in terms of production, and will go on the air sometime probably early or mid August.

Spidey continues to come out regularly.

My new comic, Supreme Power, also from Marvel, debuts July 16, with art by Gary Frank.

Now that Jeremiah is done, I'll be turning my attention to finishing off Rising Stars.

I have a new television series currently in development, we finalized the contract with the company last week, and we'll see where it goes.

The director of Daredevil has said he wants to make Midnight Nation his next film, so we're taking meetings over the next few weeks to see if we can make that happen.

Just finished the commentaries and interviews for the B5 Year 3 DVD set, and I think it's a bit better than the year 2 commentary I did, which I think kinda sucked. Year 2 comes out in April.

I'm doing a new audio drama series which I can talk about more later. We should go into production as soon as I've finished the last of the scripts over the next week or so.

I know there's some other stuff, but I've just forgotten it. (There may also be some strong interest in Polaris from another studio.)

jms
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Re: Kevin Smith
<font color="red">My girlfriend Carol and I watched "Dogma" last night. (If you've seen it, I'd be curious to hear any thoughts you have, as this movie is pretty much the Catholic Church as SF.) One running discussion we have is comparing/contrasting your work to Kevin's, given your common background, tastes and interests. She made the observation that "Kevin is very self-indulgent," which I guess is true. You have those "self-indulgent" moments, as all creators do, but Kevin's largely seem to be the core of his art. </font>

I think I pretty much agree with this assessment, though I would, since I kind of come out better in it and it would be in my interests to agree (standard disclaimer).

<font color="red">But if you have a few moments, I'd like to know what you think about "Dogma" from the perspective that you're an atheist while Kevin claims to believe in God. </font>

I saw it an awfully long time ago, and to be honest it's a bit fuzzy to me now. I do remember that I enjoyed it, in a dopey kind of way, and that it was entertaining and made some good points along the way. It's certainly not for everybody (but really, what is?), but it does seem to have teeth in all the right places.

jms
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<font color="red">How many installments is the column you've written/are writing for TVZone, JMS?</font>

Five in total, one per season.

jms
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<font color="red">I'll second that one Joe.

Getting O'Hare involved would make most fans I know very happy indeed. For a guy who was only the lead in one season his popularity has endured.</font>

He was asked if he wanted to participate in the DVDs in general, not just for season one, and declined. WB isn't going to keep bugging him if he doesn't want to do it.

jms
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<font color="red">So which year 3 episodes have you done the commentaries for?</font>

Severed Dreams and Z'ha'dum.

jms


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and don't send me story ideas)