"I hear you guys are having a tough time on the set."
"Well yeah, we can't seem to get our hands on any writers. Are they on strike?"
"A lot of them may be off putting their reels together to try to land jobs with Bruno on that new Gotham show on Fox."
"But shouldn't at least one writer be designated to stick around the set to see if we need any lines for the characters to say or things for them to do?"
"Technically yes. But you know these creative people, they're all children. Listen if you can't find a writer, you can always do what the actors did last week on the show."
"What's that?"
"They availed themselves of the network's team of para-writers. They're not qualified writers, but in the absence of writers, they're trained to step in and stabilize the episode until real writers can be brought in to move the situation forward, say, next week."
"Para-writers, huh?"
"They have laptops. They know words and the characters' names. Mind you, they're not licensed to prescribe story solutions or pen memorable scenes or create drama, but their work can have a palliative effect on the audience some of whom will even believe they've actually seen an episode."
"Sounds like a godsend. But I don't really know if I feel right about—"
"Remember when Bruno said that Lisbon and Jane would be torn apart so that they could find each other again?"
"Of course."
"Para-writers heeded Bruno's cry by having no scenes in which Lisbon and Jane appeared together."
"Ohhh. So para-writers did that?"
"Simple, huh? Real writers would have written scenes that depicted the schism between the two characters through their words, interactions or lack thereof."
"Wow. That would have been excellent."
"Excellent, yes. But think of the cost, man."