Espenson drafts - Gingerbread




The next in my series of draft scripts provided to me by Jane Espenson is Gingerbread. Credited as a co-write with Thania St. John, see below for what that really means.

This spooky little number is a great take on mass hysteria, scapegoating and the dangers of being turned into a rat.

Here is the outline to the episode - note the 'embarrassing parents moment': would love to see that revived somewhere.

Draft one is here.

Draft two

and three




Espenson notes in an email to me (the whole transcript of which will be in my forthcoming book, Joss Whedon,  for Manchester Universality Press, the following:

Also, this story has a shared credit. Thania is a writer who had pitched a witch-burning episode as a freelancer the year before I joined the staff. They never did the story. Then I suggested that we do a book-burning episode and the two stories were combined. Since we used ideas she had brought in, she was given the shared credit. I didn't actually meet Thania until 2007, when we briefly shared a writers' room at Eureka. Now I see her out on the picket line, of course [of the WGA strikers].

Also,

I made a long list of other possible acronyms that could replace SPAM, including POO (Parents Opposed to the Occult) and MAW (Mothers Against Witches) and lots of others. Joss selected MOO from the list.

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