Babylon 5 posts by JMS for Oct, 1992 This file includes a compilation of posts on GEnie by J. Michael Straczynski in the Babylon 5 topic. The posts are copyright by JMS (and compilation copyright is by GEnie). NOTE: This is when the GEnie category was being reorganized. Undoubtable there were more posts in October... but they have apparently been sacrificed to the bandwidth gods. ---------- Category 18, Topic 22 Message 681 Thu Oct 01, 1992 STRACZYNSKI [Joe] at 01:23 EDT In my copious spare time, and obviously unofficially, I've been laying out the first season or two, sketching out which episodes would hypothetically go first, where to lay in the saga, and I find that I keep getting dragged more to saga-episodes rather than the stand-alones. It's as if, having had this thing waiting to be told for so long, there's the overwhelming desire to just GET IT ALL OUT...sort of projectile storytelling. But you can't do that, you've got to parcel it all out a bit at a time, just like the information here (which, he reminded himself, I've generally released far more quickly and in more detail than I'd originally anticipated). What interesting is how some things expand in your mind once you've filmed a pilot like this. Here's Character X, who you always saw a certain way, had a few stories in mind...and suddenly the *performance* and the casting makes you realize that there's a MUCH broader potential here than you'd originally thought...a character likely to steal the show...and now suddenly you begin spinning out new stories for that character...but if you emphasize THAT person, how does it affect a) the over-arching storyline, and b) the other characters? My first impulse is to give every major character an episode right up front, give everyone a chance to establish him- or herself. But on the flip side of the argument, that means (since we have 9 regular or recurring characters) spending as many as 8 episodes with our PRIMARY character, Sinclair, less involved or held at some remove. Which seems counter- productive. Telling the stories...that ain't hard. Putting it all in the right sequence, now that we have the benefit of having cast, THAT's the challenging part. BTW, for those who are curious, there are two photos of Yr Obdnt Srvnt in the new Hollywood edition of WRITER'S DIGEST. And if, as they say, every picture tells a story, these tell quite a story (though one I just can't look at any more, it's too painful). jms ______