John and Craig compare the romanticism and reality of writing. They discuss why inspiration is overvalued, why ‘bad motivations’ aren’t necessarily bad, and the rare bliss that occurs when inspiration and motivation align.

We answer listener questions on act breaks, cover the phenomenon of show-runners as promotional vehicles, and John attempts to manifest a Van Halen movie.

And in our bonus segment for premium members, we talk creepy crawlies.

Links:

• Starbucks Seam Life Hack
• John Scalzi’s Blogpost: Find the Time or Don’t
• Happy The Last of Us Day! Check out this trailer.
• Whisper by Open AI
• Tick Tock the Game
• Sign up for the Inneresting Newsletter for more writing resources!
• Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!
• Gift a Scriptnotes Subscription or treat yourself to a premium subscription!
• Craig Mazin on Twitter
• John August on Twitter
• John on Instagram
• Outro by MCL Karman (send us yours!)
• Scriptnotes is produced by Megana Rao and edited by Matthew Chilelli.

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You can download the episode here.