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)

>Did you know Amazon has a page up for 'Straczynski Unplugged'? Check out..
>
>http://tinyurl.com/owa2

No, I didn't know they'd already begun taking orders on that one.

>...and if you have *any* idea what's supposed to be depicted on the cover,
>could you let us know?

I think it's my lower intestinal tract after finishing Jeremiah year 2.

> How goes the rest of your project with the feral cats?

All the kittens have found homes, and the remaining adults have all been spayed
and neutered and are living comfortably in the back yard.

>Any chance you can give us more info on definite titles and short blurbs for
>each? Should we all get physicals before this starts to make sure our hearts
>can stand it?

At this point, with the show's debut so near, best to just let the show speak
for itself. But it's pretty cool, I have to say.

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)

>Not to push for information that is really none of my business, but is
>the parting going to be, err, amicable?

No, really, be serious now, what's your question?

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)

Boy howdy, has it been a hectic few weeks.

Okay, where to start? The second draft of the script for Ron Howard
will be going to him next week, and sometime in September we'll learn
where this all lands in terms of production schedules. It's looking
very good at the moment.

Hot on the heels of finishing that script, we've closed the deal for me
to write another feature for Universal, the big-budget
historical/action film alluded to earlier. That deal is now set, and
I'll be starting the writing shortly. So that's two firm done-deals
in feature films in the last few months, and if a recent meeting at
Paramount provides the expected results, I may have a third deal in
hand for the coming year, another big-budget film to be based on a
novel coming out in September.

I've also started in on the writing for the first B5: Lost Tales
script, and we've now spoken to several of the original cast members,
who are on board with the idea. It's still going to be a factor of
what deals can be made and with whom, as well as story elements that
are now being worked out, but things are moving ahead. Because some of
the crew and others we wanted won't be available until October, we've
pushed a bit, which is fine, since it gives me a bit more time to get
the script where it needs to be and start laying out my shot list as
director.

The pilot script for "Borrowed Lives" has been very well received by
Touchstone, and with a few minor notes we should be able to get this in
to the network in a few weeks. Then we shall see what we shall see,
but it looks promising for now.

For the comics fans out there...the solicitations went out this week
for the first issue of my miniseries "Bullet Points" for Marvel. I'm
really, really proud of this thing, and I commend it to you highly. So
if you're interested, let your comic store know to set aside copies,
because I think it's gonna sell out fairly quickly.

I should be receiving the approval CDs containing the final versions of
"The Adventures of Apocalypse Al" this week from the CBC. Assuming no
tweaks are needed, that should be it. I think they're talking about
October for an airdate, but that depends on their scheduling windows.
After that, as noted previously, it goes to Sirius and a bunch of
overseas markets.

Finally, I've cleared out a window of time so I can get the next B5
script book out the door on schedule. It's the only thing that I've
had any flexibility on in terms of deadlines, so it got pushed, but I'm
now in a position to come up for air a bit.

As you can guess, the last few weeks have been nonstop meetings and
nonstop writing. This is the busiest I've been since years 4 and 5 of
B5. It's been pretty breathtaking at times, a lot of deadlines that I
wasn't always sure I could make, but in the end it seems to be laying
out pretty clean. The best part, to be honest, has been working with
Ron Howard and the Imagine folks on the script. When I've heard people
say "Each draft got better than the one before it," I've never believed
it because my experience of studio people was that each draft generally
got stupider. Not this time. It really has gotten better with each
iteration, more filmic, for lack of a less moronic term. I like
learning from people, and the learning curve here has been both steep
and deeply satisfying.

So I'm very happy. Tired beyond description just now, but happy
nonetheless.

jms

Wesley Struebing wrote:

> Perhaps, vindication is the best revenge...
>

Absolutely, I couldn't agree more, it's --

Oh, wait, sorry, I thought you said "vivisection."

Never mind.

jms