Writers Return To Work As The WGA Strike Was Averted In The Eleventh Hour

Good news for The Walking Dead fans! Good news for everyone who likes TV, really, and for everyone who writes for TV. The impending writers’ strike — which would affect The Walking Dead as well as several other shows including SNL, late night talk shows, American Horror Story, Jessica Jones, and a lot more — appears to be over before (right before) it was going to start. The deadline for a deal was midnight PST on Monday, and that’s when the deal reportedly went through, meaning a whole lot of writers were up late on Twitter joking/worrying about whether they’d go to work this morning.

Last month, the Writers Guild of America voted 96.3% in favor of a strike if demands weren’t met. They were petitioning the Association of Motion Picture and Television Producers for increased contributions to the Writers Guild healthcare plan and for additional pay for writers who are asked to work more than two weeks on a single episode of a short-order series. The latter request is especially reasonable, considering many series now have fewer episodes per season, yet may require the writers to work longer hours on each episode while only paying on a per-episode basis, effectively reducing their hourly wage substantially.

Variety reports a deal was struck after roughly thirteen hours of tense negotiations. It came right down to the wire; Variety’s sources were “reporting pessimism about the prospect of the sides reaching a deal just two hours before” the deadline.

Many writers dealt with the uncertainty by cracking jokes on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/IssaRae/status/859302992935137280

https://twitter.com/IanKarmel/status/859311797030879233

(Via Variety and The Playlist)