Lessons learnt from Dr. Horrible - Dr. Horrible

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February 04 2009

Lessons learnt from Dr. Horrible. Joss tells all.

Simon | Dr. Horrible | 23:30 CET | 32 comments total | tags: doctor horrible's sing-along blog, joss whedon

I like this:

Knowledge@Wharton: You've now earned more than twice the original cost?

Whedon: Yes.

Ildeth | February 04, 23:43 CET

Ooh, good interview. And, yay for being able to recoup something like the 'real' cost.

skittledog | February 04, 23:52 CET

Really good interview. I think this is the best I've read in a while.

Simon | February 04, 23:53 CET

Yes, it's right up there with the "knitting" interview. Great find! He's just full of awesome.

korkster | February 05, 00:06 CET

Wow, really deep Joss interview. I'd really like to see where he goes in the future, I'm thinking that after Dollhouse it may be more and more into web-content like Dr. Horrible.

AnotherFireflyfan | February 05, 00:21 CET

Fantastic interview, and he really is full of awesome. I think I'd be a fan even if he didn't write my favorite stories.

jcs | February 05, 00:26 CET

Only half way through the interview, but loving it. Simply one of the best interviews about this.

Numfar PTB | February 05, 00:30 CET

By halfway through I thought Joss was giving up TV to become a farmer so keep reading Numfar ;). It did disturb me when he dissed bobbleheads though cos people loved those dolls.

And angry Joss makes me almost regret deciding on Greg House for my man-crush (partly because he's fictional). Go get 'em Boss Fella, if you ever need a Purple Marauding Horde ...

Great interview.

Saje | February 05, 00:39 CET

We just steamrolled past everybody's idea of how you market and of how long it takes to do these things. We had people [drawing up] contracts in days that usually take months, because we were tired of people sitting around.

I think that should be the name of Joss' new media Roger Cormanesque studio: We're Tired of People Sitting Around, Inc.

The One True b!X | February 05, 00:49 CET

I'm going to quote Joss now to all my friends and family that point out the grey bits in MY beard when I don't shave for a couple of days. You're right Joss, it IS terribly sexy.

Good interview. And good to hear they're in the black and have the problem of working out how to split the profit. It may not be a vast sum of money but it's in the black nine months after principal photography, and how many Hollywood movies can say that?

zz9 | February 05, 00:51 CET

That was a wonderful, in-depth interview.

Knowledge@Wharton: Can you recall the first piece of popular entertainment -- a TV show, a movie, a comic book -- that really made an impression on you as a child?

Whedon: Umm ... all of them?

Let's go with "Help, Help, The Globolinks," a horror opera that I saw when I was five. It terrified me. They drove a van on stage -- which was awesome. And then the van broke down, the Globolinks came, and the only thing that would keep them away was music. A young girl had a violin and she would play the violin at them and they would go away.

It just terrified me. But, at the same time, I adored it.

I think I now understand the directions Joss' life has taken.

UnpluggedCrazy | February 05, 00:55 CET

Joseph Hill ("Joss") Whedon is a third-generation television writer.

Oh, so, like, Joss is his mob name. Didn't they have anything cooler, like Joey the Executioner? (Just kidding, "Joss.")

ETA Yeah! (Or, "Yeah!") for:

They're going to [the webbynet to] look for things that shock and delight and surprise and upset and all that good stuff. They're going for the most basic story.

[ edited by Pointy on 2009-02-05 01:18 ]

Pointy | February 05, 00:59 CET

I never realized that Joss wasn't Joss' name. I feel like I've been adoring wrong fandom all these months.

Of course, it sounds funny to think of "Joseph Hill" as his serf name and "Joss" as his chosen name. ;) Or something like that. "Joss" does command the power that this man has over "Joseph Hill". Maybe one day he'll just be "Joss", like "Cher" or "Beyonce". But then we'd have to rename the black... "Jossesque"?

korkster | February 05, 01:23 CET

Great interview. Yes, one of the best in awhile. Thanks for that, Simon.

palehorse | February 05, 01:27 CET

I think the interview was the BEST we've heard in a long time.

BTW, he's the ULTIMATE diplomat, talking about FOX.

Could have been a great politician, except he's got those pesky morals that politicians DON'T have.

whedon is GOD | February 05, 01:52 CET

Yeah, he always skirts around his feelings about Fox after Firefly was cancelled very nicely.

I just had a random thought. Any chance Joss would do a continuation for Firefly and Serenity and release it on the internet? Because that would be SO COOL! (and the actors would probably be up for it, too!)

pancakegirl | February 05, 02:05 CET

There was talk about that at some point I think, pancakegirl.

I remember seeing websites dedicated to getting "season 2" as an online-only thing up and going, but that was also before Dr. horrible made everything web-related seem so reasonable and viable, its made so many people who didn't believe in the web completely believe in the web!

:) I'm with you, that would be ultra-cool.

ef | February 05, 02:49 CET

There was no actual serious talk about it at all. Just random fan chatter.

The One True b!X | February 05, 02:54 CET

Hee hee. I'm a random fan chatterer. ;)

pancakegirl | February 05, 03:19 CET

Missed the random fandom memorandum.

Pointy | February 05, 04:28 CET

I don't think he's being all that diplomatic. He was angry at the network, not the production company (where his deal was). The network wasn't the same network months later, so why hold a grudge against a name now when none of the people you were angry at even work there?

zeitgeist | February 05, 04:34 CET

Very cool that Gian Carlo Menotti's Help Help, the Globolinks was an early influence for Joss. (I performed in the show a few years ago...and it's odd, crazy, modern and really hard!)

ivy | February 05, 04:58 CET

who knew you could still find great, in-depth interviews in this day and age?

CrystalSC | February 05, 05:20 CET

"So, five years from now, we will all have antennae. I got nothing."
LOL
I would only accept the antennae if Joss is doing the broadcasting (of course I'm STILL recording on a VCR). This was a very good interview, but I'm disappointed that they aren't seriously thinking about taking Dr. Horrible to Broadway!

embers | February 05, 07:48 CET

Commentary is sophomoric?

Let Down | February 05, 08:44 CET

Well I'm a little angry, too. Joss promised us the iHole, and now he says he don't know nothin' 'bout no technology?

Actually, I'm only angry about the previous interview alluded to. Where was that?

[ edited by dreamlogic on 2009-02-05 09:18 ]

dreamlogic | February 05, 09:17 CET

Actually, I'm only angry about the previous interview alluded to. Where was that?

Which one? The knitting one?

The One True b!X | February 05, 09:36 CET

No, the one with this interviewer. Googling got me nowhere.

dreamlogic | February 05, 10:07 CET

I missed that allusion dl, quotage ?

(not boasting or anything but apparently I may be Google Latitude so I might have an in with the en-zeroed ones ;)

Saje | February 05, 11:28 CET

Knowledge@Wharton recently spoke with the 45-year-old Whedon about the lessons learned from "Dr. Horrible" and what he believes needs to happen for the Internet to serve as a platform that can sustain original creative content. An edited version of that conversation follows.

Okay, now I want to read the UNEDITED version. Unless edited just means they just took out the random 'umms' etc.

Nice interview: actual content, new info, accuracy, opinions, candor, and a tiny bit 'o funny. Civilized.

The template of interviews.

BreathesStory | February 05, 13:54 CET

There may be more in the unedited version, but I don't think it was ever published.

Septimus | February 05, 15:39 CET

No, the one with this interviewer. Googling got me nowhere.

Because there was nowhere to go. Madness again.

Even if I weren't crazy, though, the absence of a byline would still bug me. It's always bothered me when writers who aren't on the old newswires don't give their name. If I'd been alive when the news networks started that practice, it would have bugged me then. Anyway, the Wizard of Oz thing is very old now.

dreamlogic | February 05, 17:05 CET

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