“You can't just pick up a gun and become a gunfighter, or go off and explore for a new world, or pull a sword out of a stone, or rescue a damsel in distress, or-- so we play games and we read books because the world isn't the world we thought we were supposed to get, the world we thought we'd been promised by somebody. Because things didn't turn out the way they were supposed to. So we go someplace else.”

American writer, filmmaker, and producer

Joseph Michael Straczynski is an American writer, filmmaker, and producer. He is best known for creating the science fiction television series Babylon 5, and later Crusade, Jeremiah, and Sense8. He has also written many comic books and founded Synthetic Worlds Ltd. and Studio JMS. He serves as executor of the estate of Harlan Ellison, a role that reflects his long connection to the wider world of speculative fiction and entertainment.