{"id":33923,"date":"2023-06-16T08:18:11","date_gmt":"2023-06-16T12:18:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/?p=33923"},"modified":"2023-06-16T08:18:11","modified_gmt":"2023-06-16T12:18:11","slug":"straczynski","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scottedelman.com\/wordpress\/2023\/06\/16\/straczynski\/","title":{"rendered":"Join J. Michael Straczynski for breakfast on Episode 200 of Eating the Fantastic"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wait, what? It’s Episode 200 of Eating the Fantastic? Really? That number shouldn\u2019t seem so unbelievable, because Eating the Fantastic is, after all, my<\/em> podcast, and I’ve been responsible for every episode, and yet \u2026 it still is. My guest for Episode 200 is J. Michael Straczynski<\/a>, who took time out of his extremely busy schedule to chat and chew with me just as last month\u2019s Nebula Awards weekend was kicking off.<\/p>\n

Straczynski is perhaps best known as the creator of the television series Babylon 5<\/em>, for which he wrote 92 of the 110 episodes. His roles in TV prior to that include acting as story editor on\u00a0Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future<\/em>, executive story editor on the new Twilight Zone<\/em>, co-producer for\u00a0Murder, She Wrote<\/em>, and many others. And after Babylon 5<\/em> came\u00a0its spinoff\u00a0Crusade<\/em>, as well as the series\u00a0Jeremiah<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Sense8<\/em>. He also wrote Amazing Spider-Man<\/em> from 2001 to 2007, plus extended runs on Thor<\/em> and the Fantastic Four<\/em>. In recent years, he’s published the autobiography Becoming Superman<\/em> (2019), the novel Together We Will Go<\/em> (2021), and Becoming a Writer, Staying a Writer<\/em> (2021). He is also the executor for the\u00a0estate of\u00a0Harlan Ellison, someone whose name popped up frequently during our conversation.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

We discussed his appearance on one of the greatest convention panels I’ve ever been privileged to witness, why Superman stood out above all the other superheroes of his youth, his epiphany which occurred the night before the premiere of Changling<\/em> at the Cannes Film Festival, the low boredom threshold of Harlan Ellison, how Norman Corwin’s ability to overcome bitterness about the Blacklist helped him deal with his own demons, his realization there was something more important about writing than either plot or characters (and what that something is), the tendency of humans to sleepwalk through our lives and what can shake us free from that, the life-changing nature of the “shoelace moment,” why DC Comics would never have dared publish anything as political as Captain America<\/em> #1, the reason you don’t ever have to worry about him eating off your plate, the early encouragement he received from Rod Serling, and so much more.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how you can join us — <\/p>\n

1) Subscribe at Apple Podcasts<\/a> — where I hope you’ll be tempted to sample a few of the 199 previous episodes.<\/p>\n

2) Listen via the RSS feed of http:\/\/eatingthefantastic.libsyn.com\/rss<\/a> on the device of your choice.<\/p>\n

3) Or simply use the embed below.<\/p>\n