J. Michael Straczynski Quotes

The sky was full of stars, and every star an exploding ship.

Whenever you can bring your chops in as a reporter to unearth a cool story, that's always a good thing.

When the mob and the press and the whole world tell you to move, your job is to plant yourself like a tree by the river of truth, and tell the whole world - No, you move.

In every other science fiction series, humans are at the top of the food chain. In the 'Babylon 5' universe, they're in the bottom third.

Science fiction shows are traditionally about the gimmick or the gadget and tend to be emotionally cool to the touch.

All love is unrequited. All of it.

We know that if memory is destroyed in one part of the brain, it can be sometimes re-created on a different part of the brain. And once we can unravel that amino chain of chemicals that is responsible for memory, I see no reason why we can't unlock it and, essentially, wipe out what's there.

Anyone who sets foot into the Watchmen universe and isn't just a little nervous should be given a few days of electroshock therapy. I've always considered Watchmen to be one of the best graphic novels ever written, and when it came out back in 1986 I was as blown away as everyone else. Just masterful.

I've always been a science fiction fan since I had understood the conception of what a story was.

We are dreamers, shapers, singers, and makers. We study the mysteries of laser and circuit, crystal and scanner, holographic demons and invocations of equations. These are the tools we employ, and we know many things.

The American Way is an amalgam of our compassion, our strengths, our failings and our attempts to build a better world, a more perfect union.

There are people in life, who show you how to live. There are people in life, who show you how to die.

It was the dawn of the third age of mankind.

A changeling is one child substituted for another. I couldn't find anything more apt. We had to kind of fight that supernatural element in the publicity, and I offered to try and find another title, but Clint liked it, and it stayed.

I'm all for crossovers if they benefit the individual books.

Faith and reason are the shoes on your feet. You can travel further with both than you can with just one.

People in a cluster are bound to each other automatically, and can see each other automatically.

Never follow somebody else's path; it doesn't work the same way twice for anyone.

What are the purposes and priorities of teaching? . . . First, to inspire. Second, to challenge. Third, and only third, to impart information.

Every time I got 'Amazing Spider-Man' or 'Fantastic Four' or another book firmly on the rails, we got pulled into some big event book or crossover and it cost momentum and messed badly with the pacing and structure of the book.

I am a huge zombie fan. I have probably seen the George Romero movies 100 times each, without exaggeration.

I've made a decision and now I must face the consequences.

I am a control freak. I will admit that freely.

When you walk into a movie theater, you don't walk out half-way through, and then come back the next day to watch the rest of it.

I want to have time. When you're doing a monthly book, you're like a man racing after a bus. You're breathless and red-faced. I want to build in quality control.

I was very clear that I wanted to keep 'Thor' out of the rest of the Marvel universe for no less than the first six issues. And the success of the book, I think, speaks well to that decision.

When a book of mine comes out, I instantly go hunting the net, not for praise, but for criticism, because that's how you learn, from people who don't have to be polite to you.

The whole point of Superman, as originally created, was to be the ally of those who had no other allies. It put that magnitude of power, the most powerful guy in the world, in the service of those who had no hope, no chance.

I've changed my mind. I've decided that at the end I want to be cremated and my ashes scattered over someone I don't like.

The more important the emotion is, the fewer words required to express it: Will you go out with me? I think I like you. I care for you. I love you. Marry me. Goodbye.

Doesn't matter what the press says. Doesn't matter what the politicians or the mobs say.Doesn't matter if the whole country decides that something wrong is something right. This nation was founded on one principle above all else: The requirement that we stand up for what we believe, no matter the odds or the consequences. When the mob and the press and the whole world tell you to move, your job is to plant yourself like a tree beside the river of truth, and tell the whole world -- "No, YOU move.

There is a greater darkness than the one we fight. It is the darkness of the soul that has lost its way. The war we fight is not against powers and principalities, it is against chaos and despair. Greater than the death of flesh is the death of hope, the death of dreams. Against this peril we can never surrender.

I'm a big believer in the idea that while we are the sum of our tears, we are also the product of our choices in how we deal with those tears.

I like writing. It's partly control freak, and partly I really like what I do for a living. I have the luckiest job in the world. I can get up every day and do what I love for a living.

It is not for the gods to decide whether or not Man exists - it is for Man to decide whether or not the gods exist.

My house looks like it was decorated by a 14-year old with a platinum American Express card.

On a purely personal level, it's very strange, because as a kid, Superman informed my personality. Now I've been given the job of forming Superman's personality and, in some ways, drawing on my own background.

If sacred places are spared the ravages of war... then make all places sacred. And if the holy people are to be kept harmless from war... then make all people holy.

As kids, we spontaneously sing and dance and tell stories, and along the way, someone comes and says, 'No. You shouldn't be doing that.' And we slowly begin to unlearn our passions. I think you have to hold on to those things.

The past tempts us, the present confuses us, and the future frightens us. And our lives slip away, moment by moment, lost in that vast terrible in-between. But there is still time to seize that one last fragile moment.

As an atheist, I believe that all life is unspeakably precious, because it’s only here for a brief moment, a flare against the dark, and then it’s gone forever.

For me, growing up in a ridiculously poor family living in dead-end neighborhoods, Superman was a deeply personal icon, one that said you can do anything if you put your mind to it. What he stood for formed the core of who I wanted to be as I grew up, and informed how I view the world and my responsibilities to other people.

I don't need to write comics for a living. I have movies and TV for that. I write comics for one reason and one reason only: I love comics. I love the form, the structure, the storytelling process, I love everything about it.

When writers don't know what to do with a character, they build up the supporting cast and universe to kind of hide that fact. After a while, you can no longer see the character for the underbrush. When that happens, you need to bring out the weed-whacker to clear some of that away so you can focus on the main character.

Life isn't about the final moments, it's about the journey, it's about process. What makes Rocky work as a movie is seeing him working his way up from the streets to the arena and the fight of his life. You could just show that fight, and it would be great, but seeing that journey illuminates that fight and adds profound meaning to it.

A lot of television tends to assume that audiences don't have the attention span or the IQ to follow a lot of stuff.

We are in a tech-heavy society, plunging headlong into an unknown future. Science fiction is what allows you to stand back and analyze the impact of that and put it in context of how it affects people.

There's a rule of writing: if everything is funny, nothing is funny; if everything is sad, nothing is sad. You want that contrast.