While I'm waiting for permission to talk about some of the big stuff that's
going on, some general news....

As announced today in a press release from the SciFi Channel, the network has
picked up all 13 episodes of Crusade for broadcast this Summer. This will be
the first time the series has been broadcast since its brief, original run on
TNT.

I received an email the other day from Fiona Avery (B5 reference editor,
columnist for the B5 Magazine and script writer for both Crusade and Earth:
Final Conflict) announcing that the first issue of her new, original comic, NO
HONOR, will be debuting next Wednesday the 21st from Top Cow/Image. (I've seen
the scripts/artwork and it's killer.)

On the topic of comics...I will be writing a one-off B5 Graphic Novel for
Wildstorm that will debut later this year. I figure on writing it as soon as I
get out from under my current deadlines.

One aside...as you know, most viruses that go out these days tend to attach
themselves to Microsoft Outlook email address books. Apparently there's an
*awful* lot of you out there that have me in your email address books, even
though you may not have actually used it in that way. Hence, whenever one of
these viruses gets out, as one came out today, I invariably get a bunch of them
in my email box. Just as a favor to me...if you don't actually *need* my email
address in your address book, can you delete it to help me out when this kind
of stuff happens? It ain't like I'm hard to find....

And finally...yes, it's true, B5 will be coming out on DVD starting with The
Gathering and In the Beginning, to be released in July. The series will start
soon thereafter. I've been going over the artwork and related issues for WB
Home Video, and though at this time there's no supplementary material involved,
at least as far as I know, it should be pretty cool. (Don't know yet which
aspect ratio they'll be using, but my *guess* would be widescreen, now that WB
is correcting the earlier versions.)

All of that said...as noted well above, there's some substantial TV-related
news sitting out there waiting for me to talk about it as soon as I'm given the
go-ahead to do so. Suffice to say that one very large deal has now been set
and closed, another is in heavy negotiations (with money now on the table from
those involved), and a surprise third project is also coming up fast and
furious.

More on these when I'm allowed to talk about them. Probably sometime next
week.

jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)

>The only question I have here is... will it just be the SE version of
>the Gathering, or will the original _also_ be available on the disc?

The first disk will have In the Beginning and the SE version of The Gathering.

jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)

>> On the topic of comics...I will be writing a one-off B5 Graphic Novel for
>> Wildstorm that will debut later this year. I figure on writing it as soon
>as I
>> get out from under my current deadlines.
>
><gets off chair and dances a happy dance>
>
>Another question: how many pages?
>
><snip>

My last conversation with them indicated a length of about 100 pages, give or
take.

jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)

>Congrats Joe. Sounds like the hard work's paying off.
>

You just gotta stick with things. That's the hard part. The rest tends to
work itself out.

jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)

>Will this be part of continuity of the show? Is it
>something you've now planned for this or something that might come
>"out of storage". the story of the Telepath War maybe?

I think I'd like to do something in continuity with the series, so that it
feels like an unproduced episode...but I haven't decided yet, and don't want to
go too far down that road until I've talked more to the guys at Wildstorm.
They've been great in all this, they initiated the project, and I want to be
sure that welcome is treated properly.

>Do the B5 rights still hold with DC then (they own Wildstorm right?)
>because they are a WB company? I was surprised that it wasn't under
>the Top Cow imprint when you said it. But then I don't really know how
>the licensing thing works so....

WB owns the rights, which reverted after DC stopped doing the books. They'd
rather not go to an outside company for political reasons.

>Oh and *thanks so much*. Just had to buy yet MORE comics to get me up
>to date on Midnight Nation after hearing such great things. I thought
>I could give them up completely after dropping X-men. Then I read
>"Born In Fire". And bought loads of RS to get me current.
>Now I'm into MN. (when's #5 out?)
>

Good timing. Midnight Nation #5 comes out tomorrow. Get this one, it's a real
corker.

jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)

>What is the expected time frame one hearing back regarding the Rising Stars
>film? I've decided to wait until the series is over before reading them,
>but I've heard great things.

Film-making is a long process. The first draft is in, I'm currently revising
it for a second draft. If all continues to go well, and so far it's gone very
well, we could film this sometime in the fall or spring of next year, so it
could conceivably be in theaters by next fall/winter. Assuming nothing
glitches along the way, and you always have to assume those things.

>Is Fiona Avery's B5-related news, that hasn't been released, related to your
>talks with sci-fi? Is her deal, whatever it is, still in the works?

It's still in the works.

jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)

My logic on ItB was basically this: you can't keep the basic info on the series
a secret forever. Some things enter the common base of knowledge. So you may
as well play into that by showing what folks will pretty much know about over
time anyway, and make the suspense one of, "When are the *characters* going to
find out about this stuff?"

Playing B5 to some extent as a mystery only works when it's first on the air.
After that, the dynamic changes substantially.

jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)

>And before anyone flames me: The Gathering was shot in 4:3 as
>opposed to the rest of the series. Thus, a "widescreen" version
>would have to either be a cropped or vertically panned scanned
>version, and this would be far from the show's correct aspect
>ratio.

No, the DVD of the Gathering would not be in fake wide, it'd be in the original
aspect ratio. As I noted earlier, the way SFC aired it was an error.


jms

(jmsatb5@aol.com)
(all message content (c) 2001 by synthetic worlds, ltd.,
permission to reprint specifically denied to SFX Magazine
and don't send me story ideas)