From: "John K. Bates"  <[j--n] at [humnet.ucla.edu]>
Date:     27 May 1994 16:27:35 PST
Subject:  Forwarded: Tommy Astor interview



>Please let me know what you think. I am working on an Eword for Wired, so 
>please respect my copyright to this stuff. Beer, Sex, Snogging.
>JB

I am certainly willing to respect your copyright; you'll need to tell me
(and the users of the ftp site) what that means. There are no *physical*
restrictions on who can download stuff (just like there were none when
you posted to a.f.t-g).

I suppose I'd just appreciate some sort of copyright notice and people's general 
goodwill at not using this in articles of their own until mine come out... I'm not 
sure what I mean, but I suppose that's good enough.

:*)

I'll check out your site soon. I suppose just an attachment telling people I'm 
working on articles for several magazines and that this is for their own private 
use would be cool. Thanks. Hope you like the stuff... JB
______
-__________________

Interview with Tommy Astor 3/27/93. 

This is a rough sketch of a quick conversation I had with Tommy Astor, of 
Deadline Magazine. By the way, if anyone in England, London specifically, would 
be willing to help Tommy get on the Internet please e-mail me. I hope this proves 
interesting. 

Once again, I ask that you respect my copyright on this particular stuff and don't 
go reprinting it all over. I am working on articles so I can get paid and quit my day 
job! The following is (c) 1994 John K. Bates.
________________________________________________
TG as well as Deadline, is 5 and one half years old. The first Tank Girl appeared in 
the first Deadline and every Tank Girl is in Deadline first.

James and Alan were just a couple of snotty nosed teenagers when they came up 
with TG and that's just what it takes to come up with something as good as TG. 
Take a kid and then what that kid does is immediately printed. The lack of much 
processing, the immediacy is what I like about comics. TG has a lot more potential 
than just comics. She is a much better answer to the question of how to make 
films exciting again, an inspiration for cool animation and how to make video 
games fun.

Tank Girl is the kind of character you'd like to have virtual sex with.

She's popular with the boys, she's popular with the girls. In fact, in London there 
are weekly lesbian gatherings called Tank Girl nights.

TG is poised to become one of the first real multi-media superstars.

TG lookalike contests, could never find anyone. TG is more interesting and deep 
and substantial than any real person could be.

[Hw can we ever compete with our own imagination.]

Jamie and Alan piss around with her, but that's what's great. We wanted a cover, 
recently, with excitement. We asked for some blazing guns and all that stuff, and 
so they did a cover where she's picking a flower. It seems the more they try to 
undermine her, the stronger she gets.

[About Rachel]

So fortunate. Rachel, thank god. I had all these producers saying, 'oh, we can get 
this person and that person' and on and on, but in the end I kept coming back to 
Rachel. She gets it. She keeps close tabs with Jamie and Alan and myself. She may 
not always take our advice, but at least she's asking and listening.

The Hollywood system is an endlessly compromising system. Collaborative is too 
kind. It is good that Rachel attempts to keep it together despite the system arrayed 
against her.

You cannot set out to create a character like TG. She is what people will want to 
interact with down the road. She's beyond human. Pop stars are flawed, 
somewhere down the road they'll let you down. If your hero is TG, she's never 
gonna let you down.

-23-(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)*(@)
John K. Bates    (310) 206-2004 
UCLA Humanities Computing Facility