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Aww :(

The fact that Shoehorn With Teeth is such a silly song feels so perfect and sweet somehow though <3

This kind of seems like it could have been part of the inspiration for the idea of Gabriel remembering "Everyday" in S2...

What’s your favorite memory of Terry?

The last time I saw him. We had been left on our own and Terry (who had Alzheimer’s) had sort of drifted into his head. He stopped talking. So I started to sing They Might Be Giants’ song Shoehorn With Teeth. And after a few lines, Terry started to sing along. He remembered more lines than I did. And then he talked with intelligence and enthusiasm about the tour in 1990 to promote Good Omens we did, when that was our tour song, and for a little while my friend was back.

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!!!

Kate Carin, head of costume department for Good Omens, is starting with the S3 costumes!

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actual scene as it happened in the show

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Hah! I hadn't picked up on that before, that's great. He acts like he likes the Sound of Music because that's what he's supposed to like, but either doesn't have the curiosity to find out, or doesn't want to be seen to not know, what music actually is (certainly can't ask someone...)

It has a similar vibe as Michael saying "I knew that!" to Muriel's "you have to wait a few days, because humans are weird and that's how it works"

Neil, I've wonder this for so long but can you please explain why Gabriel doesn't know what music is is season 2?? In season one it's referenced twice that he likes the musical the Sound of Music (by Crowley is S1E1 and Uriel & Sandalphon in S1E6). Does he just happen to really like the Sound of Music without actually knowing what the sound of music is? ☹️☹️

Yes.

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Of course I listen to my readers! So the next book will be: Set in Ankh-Morpork/not set in Ankh-Morpork. With lots of the good old characters/with a whole cast of new characters. Written like the old books, which were better/written like the later books, which were better. With lots of character development/none of that dull character development stuff, which gets in the way of the jokes. Short/long. You want fries with that?

This funny blurb written by Terry Pratchett highlights the impossibility of trying to cater to everyone's tastes and expectations for a writer's next story. It came to mind when I saw @weirdly-specific-but-ok 's post about for whom Good Omens is being written ("It really is true that no matter what you do, some people will be dissatisfied. But what matters is that Neil is writing this for Terry"). Personally, I'm not worried!

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for whom good omens is being written

Hey maggots and the rest of the fandom, it's the Good Omens Mascot here. Today I read a post about this tweet:

The accompanying video genuinely made me cry. And I've been thinking about this for a long while, as far back as February, when I saw a lot of conflicting opinions on what people wanted from the third season. It really is true that no matter what you do, some people will be dissatisfied. But what matters is that Neil is writing this for Terry.

And I was reminded of some paragraphs from the Good Omens TV Companion, which I'd read in Amazon's sample excerpt of the book. I know this is a long post, but I really truly do think you all need to read these, I've done my best to select only the most important parts. Here you go:

'His Alzheimer's started progressing harder and faster than either of us had expected,' says Neil, referring to a period in which Terry recognized that despite everything he could no longer write. 'We had been friends for over thirty years, and during that time he had never asked me for anything. Then, out of the blue, I received an email from him with a special request. It read: “Listen, I know how busy you are. I know you don't have time to do this, but I want you to write the script for Good Omens. You are the only human being on this planet who has the passion, love and understanding for the old girl that I do. You have to do this for me so that I can see it." And I thought, “OK, if you put it like that then I'll do it."

'I had adapted my own work in the past, writing scripts for Death: The High Cost of Living and Sandman, but not a lot else was seen. I'd also written two episodes of Doctor Who, and so I felt like I knew what I was doing. Usually, having written something once I'd rather start something new, but having a very sick co-author saying I had to do this?' Neil spreads his hands as if the answer is clear to see. 'I had to step up to the plate.' A pause, then: 'All this took place in autumn 2014, around the time that the BBC radio adaptation of Good Omens was happening,' he continues, referring to the production scripted and co-directed by Dirk Maggs and starring Peter Serafinowicz and Mark Heap. ‘Terry had talked me into writing the TV adaptation, and I thought OK, I have a few years. Only I didn't have a few years,' he says. 'Terry was unconscious by December and dead by March.'

He pauses again. 'His passing took all of us by surprise,' Neil remembers. 'About a week later, I started writing, and it was very sad. The moments Terry felt closest to me were the moments I would get stuck during the writing process. In the old days, when we wrote the novel, I would send him what I'd done or phone him up. And he would say, "Aahh, the problem, Grasshopper, is in the way you phrase the question," and I would reply, "Just tell me what to do!" which somehow always started a conversation. 'In writing the script, there were times I'd really want to talk to Terry, and also places where I'd figure something out and do something really clever, and I would want to share it with him. So, instead, I would text Terry's former personal assistant, Rob Wilkins, now his representative on Earth. It was the nearest thing I had.'

(...) As Neil himself recognizes, this is an adaptation built upon the confidence that comes from three decades of writing for page and screen. But for all the wisdom of experience, he found that above all one factor guided him throughout the process. 'Terry isn't here, which leaves me as the guardian of the soul of the story,' he explains. 'It's funny because sometimes I found myself defending Terry's bits harder or more passionately than I would defend my own bits. Take Agnes Nutter,' he says, referring to what has become a key scene in the adaptation in which the seventeenth-century author of the book of prophecies foretelling the coming of the Antichrist is burned at the stake. ‘It was a huge, complicated and incredibly expensive shoot, with bonfires built and primed to explode as well as huge crowds in costume. It had to feel just like an English village in the 1640s, and of course everyone asked if there was a cheap way of doing it. 'One suggestion was that we could tell the story using old-fashioned woodcuts and have the narrator take us through what happened, but I just thought, “No”. Because I had brought aspects of the story like Crowley and the baby swap along to the mix, and Terry created Agnes Nutter. So, if I had cut out Agnes then I wouldn't be doing right by the person who gave me this job. Terry would've rolled over in his grave.'

And, finally, this paragraph:

"Once again, Neil cites the absence of his co-writer as his drive to ensure that Good Omens translated to the screen and remained true to the original vision. 'Terry's last request to me was to make this something he would be proud of. And so that has been my job.'"

I think that's so heartwrenchingly beautiful, and so I wanted you all to read this, too, just in case you (like me) don't have the Good Omens TV Companion. It adds another layer of depth and emotion to this already complex and amazing story that we all know and love.

Share this post, if you can, please, so that more people can read these excerpts :")

Tagging @neil-gaiman, @fuckyeahgoodomens and @orpiknight, even if you've definitely read these before :)

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Aziraphale getting to fuck shit up with huge swan wings.

Crowley getting a bit of pranking out of his system.

Swans and sneks hissssssyyyy

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Hi Neil!!

How our you feeling right now, working on the scripts of Good Omens s3?

It's like the end of an era (Not really cause it will live forvere 💜) finally writting the ending to the story after all this time. So it must be kindda bitter sweet, isn't it?

Will it be hard to let go on working on GO? Or are you happy about it?

🫂💜

(English is not my first language 😬)

Really happy. I promised Terry I'd finish the story. It didn't really occur to me that it would take almost a decade (so far) at the time. I love carrying this beautiful thing, and I will be delighted when it is time to put it down.

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Good Omens and ancient Rome board games:

I remember looking up ancient board games and came across so many versions of tic-tac-toe within the area of Rome. These are some of the names they had back then!

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Thanks for responding! I really want to see the play now (though it's hard to imagine anyone else as riveting as Ellen Greene must've been live!). iirc the director in the dvd commentary credits "the power of the closeup" for making the audience connect with the characters more in the film version, hence the happy ending feeling more right for it. I like to watch the original ending directly after as an encore though (the "finally I'll be somewhere that's green" reprise is so good)

My faves tend to be Skid Row (Downtown) and the Dentist song, but I'll look up that Jinkx performance!

Neil, do you like the 1986 Little Shop of Horrors movie? If so, what's your favourite song from it, and which ending do you prefer? (Bonus question, have you ever met Steve Martin?) Thanks, hope you're having a good week!

I like it but I do not love it. I love the Theatre Play (and saw it with Ellen Greene in London in 1983 or early 1984) and have seen it brilliantly done and less brilliantly, and always loved it.

I think the reshot ending is a better ending for that movie than the original version. (It always works onstage because these are actors and we know they didn’t die. In the movie they are our heroes and they can’t die.)

Favourite song, depends. Today it’s Somewhere That’s Green because I watched a video of Jinkx Monsoon performing it last night.

I met Steve Martin in 2007 at the Town Hall in New York when we were both reading at the PEN America Event. I remember hanging out with him and Don deLillo and Salman Rushdie at one point but no longer remember whether we were doing anything more than making awkward author small talk.

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big good omens fan me. just wondering were there anymore seconds or minutes of the s2 intro that didn’t air? any deleted scenes or extended scenes you might be able to share one day, or at least explain, please? or any ideas you had surrounding that scene with angel crowley and younger aziraphale?

:)

There was one bit of their conversation that we cut for pacing. I'll let you find it here:

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I wouldn't mind Discworld Death personally, only because I know him so well - I wouldn't be scared of a seven foot tall skeleton knowing he likes people and cats :) Sandman Death is also really special though so it would be a tough choice if I had to choose ... (I gotta say, it's quite awkward when I realize I'm thinking or saying the phrase "I love Death" whenever I think or talk about my favourite scenes with either of them)

Hey mr Neil.

Feeling kinda bummed out so I will ask a linda bummed out question.

When (and/or if) you die, which Death would you rather meet on that day? Your own version from Sandman, Terry Pratchett's Discworld version, or the both of you version from Good Omens?

Mine please.

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oh hey, human department angel! are you joining us for better food and a suggestion box?

(idea started with @cassieoh's angel crowley in a battle kilt)

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For the Star Wars Day (May the Fourth / May the Force Be With You) there was shared (with the permission of the Pratchett Estate ) a Terry Pratchett story from the Star Wars Universe that was only published in a newspaper 45 years ago! Very excited to read a new Terry's piece! :)❤ (tweet)

Also, Terry Pratchett writing fanfiction 45 years ago, can I hear a wahoo? :)

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You say weird, but this makes sense to me! Fairness all around, for the retailer and publisher and author (attempted fairness at least). Thanks! Past attempts at googling this never gave me such a comprehensive answer.

I understand the concept of royalties, and that authors get them after earning out their advance, but how is it all kept track of, year after year, book after book? Is there a big database that keeps track of every retail sale? (that bookstores would submit their sales stats to...?) Do publishers let authors look at the sales figures, or do you just have to trust what they say they owe you?

The publisher keeps track of what they sell, and then they send you a statement, annually or twice a year. You can audit their figures.

In the UK the Society of Authors would randomly pick some members of the society and audit that publisher on their behalf. They would almost always find a little money owed to the author.

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Oh, so are the royalties calculated based on wholesale numbers? The number of books sold to bookstores, not the number that bookstores sell? (But I guess if your contract says you get, say, 10%, it'd be based on cover price times wholesale units sold, rather than 10% of the wholesale price...?)

I understand the concept of royalties, and that authors get them after earning out their advance, but how is it all kept track of, year after year, book after book? Is there a big database that keeps track of every retail sale? (that bookstores would submit their sales stats to...?) Do publishers let authors look at the sales figures, or do you just have to trust what they say they owe you?

The publisher keeps track of what they sell, and then they send you a statement, annually or twice a year. You can audit their figures.

In the UK the Society of Authors would randomly pick some members of the society and audit that publisher on their behalf. They would almost always find a little money owed to the author.

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Yeah, doing a little solo spin on the spot with no music, vs full choreographed ballroom dance with a partner is quite different, I thought, so "You don't dance" doesn't seem like a writing/continuity mistake to me ...

In Good Omens S2, when Aziraphale invites Crowley to dance, does Crowley say "We don't dance" or "You don't dance"? He kind of swallows the word, so it's hard to tell. Many people think it's "you." I hear "we," which makes sense to me because Crowley has seen Aziraphale do the apology dance several times. But if he means "we have never danced together," that wouldn't contradict anything already established. Thank you (for all of it)!

We.

Edit to add, that's me misremembering from the wrong subtitles. I checked the script and it was You.