I know I've gone to ground a bit lately, so I thought I'd pop out with some
bits and pieces for folks. (One of the reasons I've gone quiet is that I've
undergone a bunch of little surgeries, including some dental work from hell,
but the majority of that is done now so I'm well on the mend. I won't go into
the surgeries, but suffice to say from now on I shall be known as Dorothy.

(Now let's see who actually falls for that one.)

Meanwhile, I'm in the midst of pitching new shows and picking up projects.
There's some interesting possibilities in the works, about which more when they
go from possibilities to realities.

In terms of what's coming up...ibooks/Simon and Schuster has put up the
solicitation for the first of my novels they're going to be reprinting,
starting with Demon Night. You can check out the book at

http://ibooksinc.com/catalog/htm/scifi/straczynski_j_info.htm

And for those who've been wagering on this...I've decided to keep Buddy. The
problem isn't so much that I've bonded to him, though I have, as he's utterly
imprinted on me as the guy who saved his life and he just goes nuts when I'm
gone. (It's a great scam, and he plays his part well.) So Buddy the Miracle
Cat (or Buddy TMC as he's known to his rap friends) is here to stay.

The second season of Jeremiah will debut on Showtime on October 10th at 10:00
p.m. (a much better time slot than 10:45) with "Letters from the Other Side,
Part One," and I commend you to this season whole-heartedly. I think it's
stronger than the previous season. There's more of a clean through-line to the
story, less in the way of stand-alones, there are a lot of changes awaiting our
characters, and the show looks great. Of the 15 episodes this season I wrote
13, so there's a real sense of continuity there. And this year we're joined by
Sean Astin, currently appearing in the Lord of the Rings movies.

(As stated, I've opted not to return if there's a third season, but a) that has
nothing to do with the quality of this season, which is terrific, and b) what
some people, from the postings I've seen, don't seem to quite get is that this
is more the norm than not. Lots of people come on, create a show, get it up
and running, and either leave after the first season or the second, sometimes
even just launching the show and moving away in the first season. That's the
nature of TV. You generally do a couple of years here and a couple of years
there. There are exceptions to this of course, situations where creators opt
to stick around for the duration, but in most cases people move on. So this
ain't a big deal.)

To the many questions that have arisen here of late...yes, as I mentioned
before, there is the possibility of something Babylon 5 related on the horizon,
but again I don't want anyone getting excited until we know if either one of
these two projects is going to actually come to fruition. We should know where
this lands in the next few weeks. The only thing I will say is that they're
not print projects, so if you were to assume it's for TV or film you wouldn't
be too far off...but that neither of them are series. And that's all I'm going
to say about them for now.

On the comics front....

The next Supreme Power, issue 3, comes out in a few weeks, either the 1st or
the 8th of October. There's a preview at:

http://www.popcultureshock.com/reviews.php?id=2474

The cover for SP 4 is at --

http://www.comicbookresources.com/news/preview.php?image=solicits/marvel11
2003/big/SUPREME_POWER_4.jpg

-- and there's a funny in-joke on the cover for issue 5 of SP, which you can
find at:

http://www.comicscontinuum.com/stories/0309/22/supremepower5.htm

And no, I didn't know about this until I saw it on the net.

The latest Spidey, part two of the three-part arc leading to issue 500, hit the
stores on Wednesday last, and the coming finale is 38 pages of story with a
guest series of pencils by John Romita Sr. as well as the inimitable JR JR.

(Having gotten a bit ahead on Spidey and well ahead on SP -- #2 just came out
and I'm about to turn in the script for #7 -- I'm in talks with Marvel to do a
new title for them, so we'll see how that turns out.)

I *think* that's it for now...as always, I'll probably remember something else
ten seconds after sending this, but I'm pretty sure that's all the news that's
fit to print.


jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2003 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)