As a lot of us are still trying to comprehend the sheer magnitude of the loss the fan community suffered in the passing of Jon Schnepp, myself included, I have been absolutely inundated with tweets, comments and emails from people asking me why I wasn’t on the Collider Jon Schnepp tribute video. Initially, I decided to just not comment on the situation since it wasn’t important and I wanted the attention of the moment to be where it belonged… on the tremendous loss the world suffered.

However, the amount of questions coming in has only increased, and with Robert Meyer Burnett revealing that he was not invited to participate in the HEROES Jon Schnepp tribute, precipitating a bunch of (unfair) accusations that Collider didn’t invite me to be on their main tribute video… I decided to address this, if for no other reason than to give a little clarity and allow the attention to return to where it should be.

First of all, Collider did invite me to be on the Jon Schnepp special. Any accusations that they failed to invite me are just untrue. Just prior to Comic-Con (remember, a number of us knew about the extent of Jon’s condition prior to the public knowing) Kristian Harloff gave me a call (we had been speaking frequently since Schnepp was hospitalized) and told me about the plans Collider had to do a special video about Jon and that I should be there. I thanked him for inviting me, but that I didn’t think it would be practical to do so. That was the last we spoke of it.

As for the question “why?”, I won’t go into details, but I will say that while I still have a great deal of respect and affection for a number of people at Collider, there are also elements there that I do not feel that same way about. The mere thought of being physically at Collider elicits extremely strong negative emotions in me that I can only describe as a mental image of a Dementor sucking the life out of an unsuspecting Hogwarts student. Perhaps I’m right to feel that way, perhaps I’m wrong, but nonetheless it is the way I feel. As such, being around Collider in any way is simply not healthy for me. We need to make choices in our lives that are healthy ones for us. So while I still speak and hang out with some individuals there, the notion of physically being at, or being in any way associated with, Collider, is just simply unhealthy for me. I choose to be happy. I choose to be healthy.

I should also point out 2 massive falsehoods that I hear some people saying:

1) Collider needed me to be there in order to properly honor Schnepp – Absolutely false. Any of you who saw the tribute video they did know Kristian, Mark, Dennis and Co. did a wonderful, heartfelt job of remembering and paying tribute to Jon. My presence there was absolutely not required in order for them to do that. It was a special video and done with a lot of grace and class. It could not have been any better.

2) I needed to be there in order to properly honor Schnepp – Absolutely false. I decided to honor Jon on my own and in my own way. Judging from the responses I’ve gotten from all of you, you appreciated it as much as I appreciated being able to share my feelings and thoughts on the big man’s passing. Screenjunkies did their own tribute video, Reel Rejects did their own… just search on YouTube and you’ll see a lot of people paid tribute on their own. And I did too. Holly, whose herculean strength and grace through the entire ordeal with Jon is an inspiration to us all, actually reached out to me about the video I did remembering Jon, and that was probably the most special thing for me in all this.

So, with all that said, it would be great now if we could return 100% of our attention to the tragic loss of someone who was the best of us. As a reminder, Holly Payne and Jon’s family are going to be facing a catastrophic medical bill that Jon incurred while in the hospital. Any help you can offer to offset these crippling costs would be doing a great service to Jon. Please donate here: https://www.gofundme.com/getwelljonschneppfundraiser

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