INTERVIEW: Joe Straczynski

Ok, I'm there, but I'm not really sure what it is I'm looking at. I think I need a native guide...

check out Wreckamovie by the makers of Star Wreck. Lots of collaborative productions under way and if you don't find one you like, you can start your own. http://wreckamovie.com is where it's at.

Back in the day of pre-internet, some authors (like Raymond E. Feist, of the Riftwar series) sometimes hung out in online forums, and actual normal people could ask them direct questions and get real answers. It really made you feel nice that they were approachable and intimate to us normals. Much of that is missing today, now that filters and buffers are once again in place to remove everyday people from the Names. This was a nice interview I guess, but it didn't seem like he told you hardly much at all, except evasions and denials. In fact, the more I look at it, the more it seems to be a Carvel Ice Cream cake made out of nothings and emptyness. He shot down every single lost idea that you tried to make sound interesting.

Same characters, same names, same premise, same setting, same everything. But we're basically blowing smoke, becuase like I said, we dont' know exactly what it is - it could be a remake, a prequel, a combination of the two, or some fourth option that hasn't occured to us yet.

There is two ways you can remake a movie you can do it overtly or covertly. An overt remake is like Keanu Reeves’s ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’ you use the same name and basic idea. Done that way you run the risk of being panned when you deviate to far from the original movie like they did with this movie.

The covert way is like the ‘Omega Man’ it was a remake or more a reimaging of the ‘Last Man on Earth’ you change the name and that gives you a little more leeway in changes you want to make. Using either way to remake a classic has its benefits and draw backs. Using the original name gives you name recognition but ties you closely to the original, changing the name people might not even know it’s a remake unless you use that in your marketing.

The change the name and no marketing was done with ‘Gladiator’ it was a remake of a 50’s movie ‘ The Fall of the Roman Empire’ they made no big deal about it so people did not compare the two. With ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’ they did make a big deal about it and it helped the movie bomb.

If they remake ‘Forbidden Planet’ it might be smart to go the covert route so fans of the original will give it a chance.

I don't have any inside word on what he's doing, but the word on the street is that it's something kind of new, sort of halfway between a remake and a prequel, that's supposed to expand on some other aspect of the story, or whatever, depending on who you talk to.

You've got a valid point about never recapturing the tone of the orignal movie. A decade or two ago, when I was spitballing the "Lear" sequel concept, you know, just as something to talk about over dinner and at parties and stuff, it was interesting: I couldn't seem to convey to people that I wanted it to have the same clunky look that the original had. They'd look at me like a dog shown a yo-yo trick. "Why would you want to do that?" Because it would be internally consistent. "So...what? It would be on the same planet?" No, the planet blew up . It would be 40 or 50 years later, on a more populated planet, but the planet would have that same googie look that the original had. And we'd film it in technicolor. "Why?" Because - follow me here - this isn't an extension or an extrapolation from our own world, it would be an outgrowth of the original movie, and therefore it should look similar to it, kind of like westerns look similar... "I don't understand."

What I took from that - and I had a lot of those discussions - is that most people don't think in those terms, they don't care if it's inconsistent visually or stylistically, they just want 'cool crap' as 'cool crap' is defined at that exact moment, regardless of whether it fits or meshes or what have you. The Star Wars Prequels proved me right on that.

None of which has anything to do with JMS tackling the movie. I know he's got gobs of respect for the original, I know he's a very talented writer, he made the only SF show of the 90s that was worth a damn, and arguably the only SF show since the original trek to be worth a damn as well, I trust the guy. It's possible that he'll let me down, but I have enough faith in him not to prejudge his work.

Also: think about this: If they're going to be remaking the movie *anyway*, who would you rather have doing it? A brilliant guy who loves it, or some hack like uwe boll?

The thing about Forbidden Planet is you can never recreate the feel of the movie. There was a special synergy that happened when they made that movie that can happen only once. The look of the matte paintings of the planet and the great machine, the sets, the chemistry between the actors the soundtrack all combined to create something that could be imitated but never reproduced.

I am sure that Straczynski will write a good screenplay but for someone like me who grew up watching the original movie there is no way no matter how talented the people working on the project are that they can remake that movie and have it be compared favorably. Like I said before it is like trying to remake Casablanca without Bogart, Rains, Lorrie and Greenstreet it would not be the same no matter how one tried.

We know that some people who looked like Technomages weren't, I take his "nope" comment to mean that the B5 universe is done in any format, and we'll only get what we've already got. I was very surprised by his answer to the Jeremiah question.

As to Forbidden Planet, were it anyone - ANYONE - other than JMS doing it, I'd be dreading it. That's not just hyperbole, the man has earned my faith. I don't believe he'd tackle it just to tag his name on to a classic, I think he must have some kind of specific vision or concept to justify the exercise, or else I don't believe he'd be doing it. He's that kind of guy.

That said, I always wanted to do a sequel to Forbidden Planet: It'd star Anne Francis and Leslie Nielsen, reprising their characters, but essentially it would be King Lear in space, set fifty years later, and still shot in technicolor, in a world composed of googie architecture.

Ron Howard is going to do Lensmen that should be interesting I had not heard that before. I wonder if it’s a planned one movie or a trilogy, one movie would be cramming a lot of story into something watchable.

A remake of ‘Forbidden Planet’ I can do without it’s a classic I wish Hollywood would leave stuff like that alone you would not remake ‘Gong with the Wind’ would you. It is like when they tried to redo ‘Casablanca’ as a TV series magic only happens once.

Good interview but I guess we will have to use a truth serum or mind reading ray to get the unanswered info on B5.