f13.net

I can't believe they killed Wash and Book.  :cry:

Book didn't suprise me, because I'd heard he was only in limited amounts of the movie due to othe obligations. Wash on the other hand, wow. Was discussing it last night, and my friends and I agreed, we'd rather they'd killed of Wash's wife - she was probably the most cookie cutter character on the show. Should have seen it coming though, Wash being the one character that was always in the least amount of harms way throughout the series.

I would have normally groaned at the scene where they reveal that River killed all the Reavers rather than dieing, its kind of a typical schlock Hollywood reveal, but the shot of her standing there with the blood dripping axe made up for it.

WTF is wrong with you.  I can't believe I just read that.  You've ruined 2 years of waiting!

Wash's wife seems to be the most overlookable, as she never does anything to attract attention to herself and is always professional and doesn't cause trouble.

This means there are two possibilities: one, that Joss simply doesn't know how to do anything with her and she'll continue putzing around being irrelevant.
Two, that joss is setting her up to be the unsung hero, and she'll grow into a worthwhile character.

I'm sure this was supposed to be green text in spirit. If not, dumbass. Read the thread title next time.

Page 606.

How is Joss setting her up for anything? Is there going to be another movie or something? (Not like I really care, just curious, I'm not a fan)

Bah, you should be. IF the movie makes 80 million total, the'll be a sequal. So go see it, and if you're seen it already, go see it again.

Wash surprised me too. Especially the timing of when they did it. It kinda made me sad cause he evened out the crew character wise. As for book, did they ever explain his past? Or did it just die with this?

They didn't explain his past, but I wouldn't be surprised if he was an Operative himself at one time and then found religion.

It would make sense and explain the other guys whole belief aspect he had going on.

Serenity came in second place over the weekend with a $10.1 million haul.

And got beaten by a hallucinating Jodie Foster. Comeon man, reveal all the details.

Not such a bad thing imo.

Yeah, I'm thinking that's going to nail the last coffin in on thoughts of a sequel. Fucking shame too, as this movie rocked ALL kinds of ass.

Wash dying really hit me hard, because I loved the character. But it made sense. Had they gone through all of that and Shepherd had been the only death, the whole business would have lacked emotional impact. It would have robbed the situation of danger. Having Wash die in such a completely random way just slapped you in the face and made you realize what was at stake.

I never thought of Zoe as overlookable. She was the only other survivor of Mal's squad in the war, and followed him out of loyalty, still calling him Sir as if he had rank. She was professional, that was her character. She was also Mal's conscience, the only one who could tell him he was wrong without it seeming like she was attacking him.

I will say that Whedon has a thing for chicks that kick ass. Zoe and River being the two examples. I'm glad he didn't make the assassin a woman. Book dying was expected, based on his limited screen time. I'd have liked to see more exploration of his character.

Whedon set it up nicely for a sequel, but I doubt we'll see it. $80 million seems like a lot, unless you talk about world release instead of domestic. Such a damn shame, because it really seemed like it was a movie that didn't miss any beats.

Watching the movie a second time, it occurred to me: what happened to the Reavers wanting to capture everyone alive so they could have their fun with them?  Launching giant spikes through the cockpit windows doesn't seem to fit their style at all.

Also, why did Serenity have to physically travel to Mr. Universe to broadcast the report?  If they were able to call him on the phone, they should have been able to transmit the data directly to him from where they were.

Maybe Serenity only had dialup?  

Yea, that thought crossed my mind at the time to, but hey, what's a movie without a few glaring plotholes...

If you look at the run numbers, it got second place in half as many theaters with more tickets per showing sold. Lesson? Um. Hollywood is still retarded?

I'm with Haemish. I went around all weekend telling my wife. "They killed Wash. He was my favorite." And she would say, "I know honey." and then I would say, "Now I have to find a new favorite. I can't believe they killed him." and she would say, "I know". Then 30 minutes later we would repeat the cycle. Then I would think of him playing with the dinosaurs.

So - Time to pick a new favorite.  Here are my initial thoughts.

Simon - nah.
River - a bit too unstable.
Mal - anyone else think of Jason Bateman when they look at him? He's a bit too something for me. I can't place it. Maybe one liney.
Zoe - Does she have a personality?
Inara - she is pretty. But no.
Jayne - I loved him as animal mother in full metal jacket. But, he's such an ass. Then again, he does have a song about him.
Kaylee - I'd read she had put on like 40 lbs for the TV show as to not take from Inara's prettines. I'd have to stomach her liking Simon though.

Jayne and Kaylee seem to be in the lead - any thoughts?

Jayne.  (If Book was still alive, I'd have gone with Book... but he's not.  Cuntweasels.)

Couple of thoughts

Wash hit me hard, but his death fit, and was perfectly Whedon.  If anyone is being setup for the emotional punch, it will be Mal if Zoe bites it.  She is his anchor as much as Wash was hers.

Books death felt cheap and I wonder if something greater will not come from it if a sequel happens.  I think a sequel will happen though, even if the 80mil domestic does not happen, the movie is getting a lot of good critical reviews.  I went to the show twice this weekend in Austin in two different theaters, both of which were at the 90% plus capacity.

Best line involved the vibrator and the best scene was the large FUCK YOU to Lucas for being a pussy.

My favorite has always been Mal. But then I like characters like that, very flawed, tragic, guilt-ridden anti-heroes like Louis in The Vampire Chronicles (as opposed to the shittiest character in literature since the Scarlet Letter, Lestat). Jayne is a close second.

And frankly, I always thought Kaylee was much hotter than Inara.

The Alliance forces were at Mr. Universe's place, and the crew seemed to know that they were there--why else would they have dragged all the Reavers along, unless they knew there would be a fight?  Broadcasting it to him would have accomplished nothing under those circumstances.

It pretty much had to be Wash that died; if *someone* had to go, then at that point in the plot he was the most expendable.  And he is/was (IMO) the most likeable of the bunch besides Kaylee, who hadn't had her moment with Simon yet.

How much does it take to create a movie such as this??  It seems to me that if a creator/director has vision then the movie would not need to gross as much as say, something like Alien 13 or Terminator 9.  What I mean is since he is shouldering his creation and not some suits, wouldn't the chances of a sequel be greater (I would use The Matrix as an example but they made a gazillion dollars then fucked it up with the sequels.  But I digress). 

Also I would assume word of mouth would help boost the movie in the long run.

movies are dying

It's true, on that level it made complete sense - but why did the Alliance expect Serenity to fall into the trap unknowingly?  If Mal thought everything was on the up-and-up, the first thing he'd have done would be to transmit the data to Mr. Universe, and then he'd be able to sit back and verify that it went out on broadwave, without ever leaving Miranda.

And speaking of Miranda, if it was such a heavily populated planet before the Pax, why weren't there any beefy transmitter towers there?  To say nothing of other hardware or goods that might have been useful?  Hell, in the Firefly pilot episode the first thing we see the crew doing is picking a wrecked ship clean of its valuables - but in the movie they come across a wrecked planet and don't take anything but a floppy disk?  The Reavers obviously didn't pick the entire planet clean.  Hell, they could've hid there for months while the Alliance sat and stewed on the other side of Reaver territory.

(Ordinarily I wouldn't harp on plot holes so heavily, but I'm still grieving here.   :-()

Mr. Universe was the only thing close, and maybe the only thing.  Why would the Alliance expect Serenity to fall for it?  Because that was the only avenue that made sense... still a hole though, your correct, but at least a semi-believable one.  Also, as can be seen with empires here, the lower one is or even outside the dominating society, that society or organization general trivializes the abilities of those they consider inferior.  Of course, the Operative got his ass and plan handed to him twice, I have no understanding why he would underestimate them, except maybe that would explain why he had the whole fucking alliance armada there.

I am betting the PAX was still in the atmosphere and could be a consideration.  As for the pillage and looting, I think at the point they touched down on Miranda, it was more of a LETS fuck with the Alliance instead of find a paycheck.

They had suits, the ship, and an infinite supply of fuel once they were able to find it on the planet (had to be functioning power plants somewhere for those public screens and the beacon to still be working), so the atmosphere thing would have been negotiable even if it was a threat.

As for fucking with the Alliance, when having fucking with the Alliance and finding a paycheck EVER been mutually exclusive?   :wink:

It doesn't matter if there was a transmitter on Miranda; I should think what they needed Universe for was his access to everything.  Pumping out one signal that might or might not make it through to a channel somewhere pales in comparison to guaranteed blanketing of the information networks simultaneously.

Also, they may not have been able to beam that much INTO Universe's hideyhole thanks to the ion cloud, but he could sure pump it out of the cloud.

If they could beam an audio/video signal into his hideyhole in realtime (which we saw them doing), they could definitely beam that two-minute Miranda report into his hideyhole in less time (and with MUCH less risk) than it'd take to fly there and deliver it by hand.

Of course, magical data that can't be copied off its physical storage medium and/or transmitted to a remote location has been a sci-fi plot staple ever since A New Hope, so I can't blame Joss too much for using it here.

"Warning! Plot complication off the starboard bow! Warning! Plot complication off the starboard bow!"

I must be misquoting it somehow - no matches for what was a pretty popular National Lampoon skit for the time.  My google-fu is weakening...

"Snot here!"
"What's not there Snotty?"

Maybe special security data storage system that you need an expert hacker to retrieve the data from? 

Favorites, hmm.  Hard to say.  They work so well together.  That said, Jayne kicks ass.  Women who work on engines are hot.  I don't know what to do without a smartass pilot, though.

Was anyone else momentarily fearful that the operative was going to sign on as a crewman?  WHEW!

Totally - I thought he was going to do the "Well - I don't have anything else to do, so you better take me onboard."

And I was thinking... you won't wear a floral print shirt and play with dinosaurs. You're no Wash...

Come to think of it. What did Zoe see in him? Innocence?

According to this review (http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/moviestory.mpl/ae/movies/reviews/3375553), the movie cost about $50 million to make. Unfortunately I don't think the suits are completely gone in this. The Universal suits took a chance on Serenity because they saw it had a pretty good cult following. In a sense, you can think of it as a sequel and you know movie execs can't pass up a chance on a sequel.

To be honest, I hope there aren't any sequels to the movie. They told a good story, had some things go boom, made people laugh, and yanked a few heartstrings. I'd rather see Joss go create something new than try extend the story. It won't feel like Firefly/Serenity with Wash gone. I especially hope that someone else besides Joss tries to make a Serenity sequel.

I wish they had something in the movie about the men with "hands of blue". When my wife and I were getting ready to go to the movie, I saw she was bringing along her jacket which just happens to be brown. I said if she got to be a browncoat, I could wear some blue dishwashing gloves. She didn't like that idea...

Except that Mal was able to play the recording just by popping it into a slot on what looked like a standard playback device; I didn't see him providing any sort of key or doing anything like that to "unlock" the data.

And even if the data was encrypted (yet somehow decryptable by any common VCR), they could have sent it to Mr. Universe in its encrypted form for him to crack, or in the absolute worst case scenario they could have "cracked" it themselves by using the player in the Miranda lab and taking an analog recording off that, like a bootleg movie - we know they have recording equipment on board because Mal was watching home movies of Inara earlier.

There's no filling in this plot hole, I tell you. 

They had a cameo, I think.  During the opening scene when Simon broke River out, she said "they know you're here" and then we saw a shot of two scary-looking suits at a control panel.  I'm fairly sure those were the blue hand guys.

Dude, did you read my post?  Walk down to your local radio station, then try to plug in your iPod and try to simulcast to the entire world.  See how far you get...

You need A) the equipment, B) the technical expertise, and c) the access to get into the system.  They may have been able to find A (doubtful, too many channels to cover) & B (dunno about their l33t skillz), but there's no way they could get C) without help.

*edit - let me try to make the scope of this plain.  We're talking about hijacking every single broadcast media outlet (tv, radio, internet, whatever the hell it is they use), secure or unsecure, at the same time.  This is not a job for a bunch of petty criminals flying around in an old transport, this is a job for specialists.

Sounds like they should have gotten help from Razor and Blade.

Dude, did you read mine?  I'm talking about getting the data to Mr. Universe, not them necessarily broadwaving it all over the universe from Miranda (I'm willing to accept for the sake of argument that some dork living in an ion cloud has greater transmitting power than an entire planet).

Suppose you have a picture you want me to host on my website.  Do you put the picture on a disk, get in your car, and drive to my house so you can deliver it by hand?  Or do you just email it to me?

Again, keep in mind that Serenity obviously was able to transmit data to and from Mr. Universe, because we saw them talking to him on a video phone, without even any noticeable signal loss (even if there was, that's very easy to deal with, and it doesn't take a l33t h4xx0r to do it).  If everyone was operating under the pretense/assumption that Mr. Universe was willing and able to help them, why did nobody suggest just using that data link to send him the file, rather than flying there in person?

It's like the floppy disk full of evidence in that shitty movie The Net.  Or the Death Star plans in ANH.  Magical data that can't be copied.

That unit on the planet was running VHS their old busted ship only supported BetaMax, FUCKING SOLVED :D

The two guys with the blue hands got whacked in the comic, which took place before the movie.

A $10 million opening weekend.  Ruh-roh.  You'd better all go see it three or four more times.

Exactly.  Glad to see you are utilizing common sense!  What a trooper.

I just really like it when the plucky underdog gets his ass kicked.  Speaking of which, business for this flick actually declined from Friday to Saturday.  The rabid fanbase shot it's load, and nobody else cared.

It was mentioned in the thread on corpnews that the 80 million figure also includes DVD sales.  Not sure how accurate this is, since its all word of mouth hearsay, but thats a big help if true.  And hell, movie studios are basically relying on DVD sales to make them the actual money for movies now a days, so I can believe that.

Sometimes I get the idea that you are jaded, or unhappy.  Whats wrong guy?  Need a hug? [hug][/hug]

The answer is obvious. The disk has copy righted material on it and was CDM'd to not allow you to copy information off it. That's hardly a SF thing, mearly a product of the early 21st Century.

Proof: I bought the music for the series off FoxMusic. Same problem.

The movie was marketed horribly.

From what I can tell, this is what it is about: Some goons in space find some skinny chick who looks 12 but for whatever bogus reason can totally kick ass in a completely contrived, utterly fake looking way.

That shit got old on Buffy. I have no problems with chicks kicking ass, as long as they seem like they could actually kick some ass. Gellar looks like she would have her hands full with an 8-year-old boy, and if they ever got her any sort of martial arts training it doesn't show at all. Same problem here. My suspension of disbelief has limits.

Summer Glau is much more believable at kicking ass than Sarah Michelle Gellar.  She's got ballet legs.

Does anyone remember that movie The Great White Hype?  Throughout the entire movie they show Damon Wayans smoking cigarettes and eating like a pig, until he finally shows up for the weigh-in looking like he's in his third trimester.  Meanwhile, Peter Berg has done his training and is there to win.  So he runs confidently toward the ring as the crowd, and one little boy in a wheelchair, cheer him on.  Damon Wayons, for his part, drags his fat disinterested ass into the ring to a chorus of boos.  Everything is set up for the "uplifting" Rocky-type ending.

The bell rings, and Damon Wayans promptly knocks Peter Berg out in the first round.  As his unconscious head plummets toward the unforgiving canvas, they cut to a shot of the wheelchair boy, looking down in shock and heartbreak as he drops his little flag.

That little boy is you, Browncoats.  Suck it down.  Your tears of anguish are sweet nectar to me.

What exactly are you smoking?  The movie was great, that’s all that matters.  If they had fucked it up, that would be a horrible let down, but that’s not what happened.  Everybody in this thread is thrilled, not crying.  Besides, the movie will probably sell a shitton of DVD's, which will help the prospects for a sequel.  Your analogy better fits the Star Wars franchise, horrible let down as that was.  I'm sorry nobody likes Episode 3, UO, or all the other horrible things your the sole fan of, but trolling this thread isn't going to change that.

The new Star Wars movies sucked.  All of them.

SWG sucked too.  Hugely.

Sorry, just thought I'd mosey my now Star Wars hating head in for a second....

Looking forward to seeing Serenity when I can.

Wow, anti-Browncoat backlash! That didn't take long at all!

I suspect we'll see another Serenity movie; it garnered good reviews and will no doubt do far better in DVDs, because, well, grownups are starting to avoid theatres now what with all you kids jamming up the works. Tysons Corner here in DC was just a madhouse.

Other points:

Wash was written out because the actor's been busy. He's got a nice Broadway career going (one of the leads in "Spamalot" I believe). Plus it did have an impact.

Book was an Operative. It's stated pretty plainly in the parallel conversations with Book and the Operative about the nature of belief with Mal, and supposedly a scene in the book which was cut from the movie (a moment of recognition between Operative and Book when Haven is laid waste) makes the connection explicit.

George Lucas wishes he could make a movie this good. Good special effects.... AND fight scenes! AND actual character development! NO WAY! See what happens when you use actual directing and acting instead of throwing more CGI mascots at people?

Yep, Serenity kicked ass.  If you haven't seen it, get off your ass and go. 

So very, very true.

Kids still go to the movie theater?  I thought they were way over-priced for kids!  What else has happened in the world since I became a recluse?

Anyway... I'll wait for it to hit the DvD store.  I'm a recluse, you know.  But I really do want to see it... and that last Indiana Jones film, too.

Don't worry about WUA, UO keeps touching him in a bad place and he like to share the pain.

"That shit got old on Buffy. I have no problems with chicks kicking ass, as long as they seem like they could actually kick some ass. Gellar looks like she would have her hands full with an 8-year-old boy, and if they ever got her any sort of martial arts training it doesn't show at all. Same problem here. My suspension of disbelief has limits."

Ha!  Well, I do know that Summer got training for Serenity.  Unknown about Gellar, but she improved as the series went along.  Guess my suspension of belief is not as limited as yours Mar.

Summer Glau was prima ballerina. Speaking as someone with some dance training and a lot of martial arts training, the principles are sometimes very very similar.

I'd trust her to kick a helluva lot more ass than I'd ever trust SMG.

Damned skippy.  Us adults also have in-home theaters or close approximations of, can drink alchohol while watching and hit 'pause' when nature calls.  There's really no reason to go to a theater except as an excuse to get out of the house for a few hours and blow $60+ on the family.

Going to watch it again tomorrow afternoon.  I loved it so damn much.  Bittersweet it is.

I want to hug Fox and then shoot it in the stomach with my pistol.

Next time your in Austin, check out the Draft House goodness for your movie viewing pleasure.

Draft House Plug (http://www.drafthouse.com/)

What's the Draft House like up there in Austin? The one down here in Houston (West Oaks) is kinda crappy. Its an old mall movie theater so the seating, projection system, and sound system aren't that great.The last time I went they were also out of Shiner Bock which is mortal sin in Texas. I do like the old 70s-80s commercials they were showing before the movie started.

I'm just curious as to how crazy the reavers really are. They're psycho killer cannibals yet they seem to be able to maintain their ships decently well. Hell, some of those reaver ships were damn huge.

We covered that.  The alliance was *at* Mr. Universe's pad, pointing things that go 'boom' at him.  Transmitting the data to him would have achieved exactly nothing, since the alliance troops would have just prevented the re-broadcast. 

And Universe's ability to tap into all the existing channels still trumps one broadcast station on one planet.  Sure, you can set up a pirate radio station; a few people might even be listening.  When you take over every cable channel and radio station on the dial, that's a different story.

So, recap time:

Sooper-sekrit message needs to get out to as many people as possible before the Alliance can fuck thngs up.  Heroes on are on a planet in the middle of nowhere, behind Reaver space, wondering how to get said message to the masses.  Where to go, what to do?  Try to beam one little signal out into the Cortex (sp?) which appears to be the combination cable system/internet/phones/whatever and is probably at least somewhat secure, or go to the l33t hacker dude who's already shown he can get the job done with the press of a single button?

Problem:  You call him up, and suspect there's a trap--a reasonable assumption, considering the Operative already seems to know about all of their contacts and that he's killed most of them, and already tried the trap thing with Inara.  So:  can't send him the message, got to go there and rescue him, foolishly not realizing he's as good as dead already.  Lucky for them he has a backup, eh?

How to get through the trap?  Hmm, lots of Reavers around, might as well make them useful for something...

It's not nearly as big a plot contrivance as Mal not being affected by the Operative's magic Ninja paralyze attack thingamabob.

To give a parrallel: Zhang Ziyi actually had no formal martial arts training. She was a trained dancer. Worked pretty good for her.

As much as Im sure Windup would like us to jump on his trolling, please don't. Those of us that saw the movie are the lucky ones to have enjoyed it. 10 mil is a bit dissapointing, I was expecting 15. Then agaain, it only opened in 2/3 as many theaters as a typical wide release.

Correct - and that's the only reason not to just transmit it to him directly. 

So how come the Alliance even bothered trying to set it up as a "trap"?  Shouldn't the fact that Mal didn't suggest the obvious thing of "here, I'll just beam this to you" have tipped them off that he knew Mr. Universe had been compromised?  And if Mr. Universe was supposed to be playing along, shouldn't HE have suggested just beaming it over?

Oh, and how come Mal looked surprised when he got to Universe's lair and found him dead with his equipment smashed up?  If he knew that the Alliance was right there pointing things that go boom at him, shouldn't he have expected that?  From the way he was acting, it seemed like he expected the Alliance blockade but not their presence in Mr. Universe's room, in which case, again, he could have just beamed the data to him.

And how come someone like, say, Jayne (someone smart enough to see obvious solutions but not necessarily subtle enough to detect a trap) didn't just suggest the obvious thing of beaming it to him?

All signs point to Joss (like Lucas before him) completely overlooking the fact that if you can communicate between two points, you can transmit any arbitrary data between those two points you want.

You forget, the report was in 1080p-SuperBit3D which takes a special converter to broadcast across common communications laser frequencies, which are in 1080i2D. Obviously, they couldn't afford one of those doo-hickies on Serenity.

The thing is, you can almost always come up with a "reason", if that helps make it more believable.

What's wrong with just enjoying it for what it is?

I'm more inclined to think that Mal knew Universe's pad was a trap, just like with Inara, and so did not transmit the data to the place it would be scooped up and buried, i.e. the Alliance trap. Also, I think the surprise Mal showed when he found Universe's body was probably more that Universe was talking through the Lovebot as opposed to the fact that Unvierse was dead and all his shit was smashed.

I'm glad to know Wash got killed because the actor is well-employed.

Turning trivial technical problems into epic heroic feats is just one of my pet peeves, is all.  (Another one is taking a very difficult technical problem and trivializing it, like the magical cross-platform computer virus in Independence Day.)

I enjoyed the movie, I'm just noting that toward the end the plot started to tear itself a couple of holes.

Agreed.  For the hardcore there is always something like this. (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0060977108/qid=1128445815/sr=8-10/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i10_xgl14/102-6139877-7366569?v=glance&s=books&n=507846)

Wasn't the video clip a hologram?  Serenity is an old ship, does it even have anything that could read a holographic clip on what's probably a newer storage device?  With a ship that decidedly low-tech, it could be explained by something as simple as having data on a flash-rom but having an old computer with just a 3.5" floppy drive.  So the data had to be hand-delivered.

I actually do own The Physics of Star Trek, as well as the NCC 1701-D Technical Manual.   :wink:  One of the things I always liked about Star Trek was that they made a pretty decent effort at preserving verisimilitude.


Even if that were the case, there was obviously equipment in the Miranda lab that was able to read the data.  At best, they could have cannibalized that hardware, which they've obviously pretty good at doing - if Kaylee can repair an engine with spit and elbow grease, I'm pretty sure she can install a new "disk drive". 

At worst, they could have taken their nice hi-res camcorder down there and made a "bootleg" 2-D copy off the image to transmit to Universe (and maybe some of Simon's terrorist friends while they were at it).  Wouldn't be quite as good as the real thing, but it'd make a lot of sense to hedge their bets by transmitting and copying everything they could before making that risky run through Reaver space with the only known copy of this vitally important data.

Yeah this little plot device is the one that usually breaks immersion for me.  Just another straw proving to me "Hollywood" really doesn't get the concept of digitized information.

(http://www.princessleia.com/images/starwars/LeiaR2/r2leia.jpg)

How can you say that about Hollywood when they've produced fine movies like Hackers and The Net?

Which wasn't originally the case.  I recall reading that Gates McFadden was the one who actually pushed for some sort of logic and coherency to the sequences, otherwise it would have still been just a bunch of random buttonpushing.

Also:
I agree that in this day and age not being able to make a copy is a pretty crappy plot device.  In '77 when data rates were so much slower and capacity that much smaller, it was an understandable lack of foresight.   Even the original ST had silly things like droping ships logs in escape buoys, and computer 'tapes' vs the isolinear chips of TNG.

Hehe actually it was The Net that was in my mind as I typed that... not that I mind any opportunity to watch Bullock be cute.

I think it boils down in part to Mal just wanting a fight.  He's got a lot of anger and grief boiling over, and sees the opportunity to make stuff go smash.

There's shitloads of 'what-ifs' that could be asked (like, what if the Operative only had one ship in the trap and the Reavers wound up steamrollering over them and Mr. Universe and the Serenity crew).  Sometimes shit just happens the way it happens, so if there's nothing *too* glaringly illogical I'm willing to overlook it.

In this case, the basic logic and behavior seems sound, they just have to stretch coincidence a bit to make the big conflict resolve in the desired manner.  Not a major issue to me.

Sam, just let it go.

And you deserve a kick in the nards for even refferencing Independance Day in the same thread.

NEVAR!!!1111

Serenity:  An 80% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and a 10.1 million dollar opening.
Episode 3:  An 82% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and a 108.4 million dollar opening.

The only people who didn't like Episode 3 were opinionated internet dweebs, and if there's one thing both Lucas and Whedon have proven in their own different ways, it's that opinionated internet dweebs don't really mean shit.  But don't worry, I'm sure Fox is rushing to pump out the sequel to a flick that got it's ass kicked by the second week of some shitty Jodie Foster movie, and barely squeaked past the third week of Corpse Bride.

Watch out everyone, WUA HAS THE HIGH GROUND!

Ya, gives us geeks hell. Such a Stoic Warrior for Pop Culture, you are.

Thread:  OMG Serenity = luv, I hope there's a sequel!

Me:  Phew, not with these box office numbers.  LOL n00bz.

Thread:  Um... well.. that last Star Wars SUCKED, yo!

Me:  Say what?  It got equal/better reviews and ten times as much money.

Thread:  Well... um... well...  You're a POOPFACE!!

This, from the guy who thinks UO is the second coming of Robot Jesus?

...

WUA, stop trolling in this thread.

Did you ever see the movie Outbreak? Where they magically develop 80 bajillion gallons of 'viral anti-serum' from one Rhesus Monnkey?

Yeah. Your technical quibbles bore me. When someone achieves that level of reckless abandon with reality in film, I'll let you know.

NooooooooooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!111!1!1

Don't get me started on the "we have to find the magic monkey" bit.

Outbreak - the same movie where the heroine gets the bad disease that destroys all of the cells in your body - is minutes from dieing from it - gets the 'viral anti-serum' - and gets better in about ten minutes, suggesting that the cure regrew all of her liquifying organs...

The magic monkey made everything better.  Duh.

Don't make me invoke Total Recall...

(http://gamera.unas.cz/pix_celebs/films_totalrecall/total25.jpg)

/sigh

Seriously, Episode 3 and all the other Star Wars Prequels sucked.  Bigger gross because the grown ups kept expecting something decent (heh - owned) and the kiddies actually, you know, GO to the cinema, as previously mentioned.

Seriously, mate, they sucked.  Awful.  Total Poop, the 3 of them.  God.

Really.

Oh, just so, so bad.  Like, Moronic bad.  Awful tripe.

Urg.

And the acting, Jesus.  The script, the romance, too many effects.  Oh God, I'm being ill here.


Oh and those shoes with that dress, Jeeesus...

As someone who'd only ever seen one episode of the show, but who is a Joss Whedon fan nonetheless:

- overall, a pretty intelligent and entertaining story, but not enough to want to see again; I was hoping to be interested enough to want to rent or borrow the TV series DVDs, but no, it just didn't engage me more than at the surface level

- I felt a lot like an outsider -- it was obvious there was more to all of these characters than what was on the screen; what was on the screen was mighty pitiful from character development standpoint (so little so that, as I said above, I'm not finding myself wanting to check out the TV series). There was just enough to give me a flavor of who these people were and why they were together, but it felt really one-dimensional. The budding romance between the engineer and the doctor was, from my view, based on nothing more than a couple of exchanged glances. Jayne was a one note character, in fact they all felt pretty one-note.

- BIG problem for me from a story perspective: the film went so quickly from flashback to present, I got no sense that much time had passed between the time River was rescued by her brother and when they were on the ship. Seemed like a couple of weeks at most. Especially because the flashback stops before we see what ship River and brother escape onto -- it was clear there was a ship above them that helped them escape from the Alliance and I assumed it was Serenity. The friends I saw the movie with said 8 months (the TV series, basically) passed between the rescue and the movie. This was not clear at all to me.

- Biggest gripe for me is watching the tough assassin kick the shit out of the captain and the captain seems to be made of some
Buffy-like indestructibile material. He was pummeled to a pulp, took a bullet and sword wound to the gut, and the assassin just can't finish him off?

- Another gripe: he shoots the assassin in the chest (on the buddhist planet); the guy says he is wearing body armor; then he doesn't just take another shot to the guy's unarmored head? Same in the final fight -- I thought for SURE he would just have shot him in the head and said something like "should have worn body armor on your head". After all, the captain was shown to be accurate with a pistol when rescuing Jayne by shooting the reaver harpoon out of his leg (and also by shooting the "take me with you" guy in the head, and also by shooting the alliance soldier who was surrendering at Haven).

I didn't think the movie ended with any sense that another sequel was planned. It felt very "over" -- though I thought maybe Whedon was hoping the movie might cause a revival of the TV series.

IMHO, they should have done with Serenity/Firefly what they did with Family Guy -- brought it back to TV rather than go the movie route.

For what it's worth, I'm still amazed at what has been done with the new Battlestar Galactica TV series. Despite a couple of "Hollywood-take-on-networking-technology" moments this season, it's the only must-watch show for me these days.

Ha ha I liked that movie.

That said, I don't care if the underdog wins or loses, it just depends on the dog. I have no ill will towards Serenity, Joss just isn't my cup of tea.

Yeah, yeah.  Serenity is going to rack up 8x it's opening weekend so it can spawn a glorious franchise.  Episode 3 sucked, critics and box office be damned.  Blah blah blah.

Anyway, what made GWH that much funnier was the fact that *everyone* in the movie was a parody of someone in real life.  Not just Sam Jackson's character being a thinly-disguised Don King.  The entire thing was a spoof of the internal politics of pro boxing, with the names changed.  I can't recall his name at the moment, but Jeff Goldblum's character was based on a reporter who was widely believed to be on Don King's payroll.  A while after the movie came out, said reporter did in fact betray King by running off with the Norris brothers and promoting them himself.  True to life, neither came to any success afterward.

I'll take The Fifth Element with a chaser of Event Horizon over a remastered showing of the ORIGINAL Star Wars Trilogy while getting my balls washed by the cast of Serenity. Joss Whedon is the diet coke of Sci-fi. That said, Lucas is the Pepsi One of sci-fi and WUA is just positively insane.

Pepsi Clear (or was it Pepsi Crystal?) of Sci-Fi, maybe... but not Pepsi One.

See, Crystal Clear Pepsi was the only Pepsi product I ever liked. Pepsi One is trying so hard to be Diet Coke but it just can't be. It stands no chance. And let's not even talk about Pepsi with Vanilla. That just tastes like carpet cleaner.

Isn't it just great?  A bunch of anti-fanboys cry all over their blogs about their childhood being raped, to which Lucas responds with "Shut up interweb, you don't matter."  And after a $380 million domestic gross and the best reviews of any Star Wars movie for Episode 3, guess what?  He gets to be right!

George Lucas 1
Interweb Goons 0

Then Joss Whedon somehow bamboozles a major studio into coughing up $40 million to make a flick out of a failed television show with less relevance to the moviegoing public than friggin' Farscape.  "I have a bad feeling about this."  But never fear, for Joss has the internet on his side!  After all, it's an undeniable fact that out among the vastness of the web, there's a fanatical cult following for literally every goddamned thing ever made.  Surely if he can flog this grass-roots following hard enough, they'll do his marketing for him and the day will be saved.  One ass-kicking courtesy of a shitty Jodie Foster movie later, and the best than can be said is that it'll probably make back it's budget once DVD sales are tallied.  Oops.

George Lucas 1
Interweb Goons -1

Todays lesson, kids, is that "internet buzz" doesn't mean nearly as much as having a project whose concept doesn't make you wonder if the studio in question is being headed by a shaved chimp in a suit.  That you can't count on a scary cult of a few thousand smelly nerds to each buy 8000 tickets to your film.  And that if you're going to make a movie out of a television show, you should probably pick one that people have heard of.

Oh, and the former Don King lackey, on which Jeff Goldblum's Hype character was based, is Mike Marley.

Event Horizon SUCKED.

Great lead up turns quickly into a shitty second-rate horror flick...in spaaaaaaaaace!

I'm as big a SW fanboy as there is and even I can admit the prequels blew large monkeys. Then again, I'm also so delusional as to think UO is anything other than a mouldering corpse being continually propped up by a bunch of grieving fans that want it to keep going. It's like somebody turned the "Weekend at Bernie's" movies into an MMO and its fanbase.

That said, me and the Surlygurl saw Serenity again tonight. She cried again when Wash and Book bought it, but we picked up on a few things we'd missed the first time, like River's "They never lay down" comment about the reavers.

I'm not allowed to think that the prequel sucked if the numbers don't agree with me?

The quality of something is obviously not directly related to mass appeal. The fact is, the three Star Wars prequels did suck.

Obviously it made sense from a business standpoint to release them, and obviously some people were going to like them. That doesn't mean Star Wars is a great, any more than it means that Tommy Boy is better than Seven Samurai.

There are a lot of objective criteria by which SW utterly fails. Awful diaog, fixation with CGI, tons of plot holes, etc. But Star Wars is a cultural phenomenon. Of course it was going to do well. The fact is, it could have been 10 times worse than it was and still do well. We all know that.

Just like StarCraft 2 could be a repacked Dark Reign 1 and do 10x better than Dark Reign 1 did. That's just the way things work.

Now from a business standpoint, I don't see how making a Firefly movie makes sense. You are right that everything under the sun has a cult following on the web. If the following was large, the show would have gotten ratings and not been cancelled.

How did this discussion turn into SW vs. Serenity anyway?

No.  Popularity is directly proportional to quality.  Except when ninja elves are involved.

Sorry to be rude, but who gives a fuck? REALLY. There's entirely too much thought put into it here. Love it, hate it. Whatever!

[edit] I'm just saying....

Because wasn't there like a fucking twenty five page thread on this? Really now. The cup is already overflowing!

An opinion with which I respectfully disagree.  Then again, unlike others, you didn't blurt it out from nowhere as a defensive knee-jerk reaction to a pet franchise taking it in the ass.


Most likely.  I'm simply pointing out to whoever decided to make this thread about Star Wars (Not me!) that taking shots at it wasn't much of a retort, even by internet fanboy penis-waving standards.

"Look, your movie flopped!  Haw haw!  Kiss my ass, contrived marketing campaign!"
"Well the movie you like got equally good reviews and made ten times the money!  Um, but I didn't like it!"
"Yeah, so?"


I think someone had Star Trek in mind, but forgot the fact that Trek spent the entire 1970's in syndication, kicking ass and gaining recognition before it was made into a movie.


Beats me.  Star Wars nothing, I wanna know how it turned into Serenity vs UO.   :-D

You are a Cunt of the highest order.  Don't even try to say that you weren't making this all about Star Wars in the first place you horrible horrible little faggot.  I've reread the thread twice now and your intent to derail is sparklingly clear.  You have all the wit, wisdom and cleverness as Triforcer in a Republican thread.

Go Die you fucknut.

And, before you even start, please go re-read the bit where I haven't seen Serenity yet because it ain't out over here.  It's not about that.  It's about you being the most incredible little pus-ridden weasel.

The good news here (for Serenity fans) is that nearly all movies lose money at the box office, the real money is made in DVD sales, toys, fast-food tie-ins, etc. By the way I'm calling it right now that the movie industry is going to collapse in another 5 years or so. DVD sales are not going to stay at the pace they are currently at. They are beginning to lose their newness factor, they compete with TV DVDs (that are often a better value in terms of length to cost), we have Netflix now, and most new movies are not worth buying. And channels like HBO and showtime are developing more and more of their own entertainment. (Remember that HBO stands for Home Box Office and at one point it was nearly ALL movies)

Unnecessary and not funny.


Unnecessary and funny.

See. The internet is easy.

I was going for incandescent fury rather than funny, to be honest.  Just something that would get across the gist of a lying wee weasel.

Maybe I should have drafted.  Or, you know, read what I was typing through the red mist.


Oh, and I agree with the whole 'movie dying' thing.   After my last couple of visits (few and far between) I'm really, really tempted to get a huge media system in my garage and just watch anything in there....

The amount of stupid in this thread is beginning to damage my calm.

Best sci-fi i've seen since Fifth Element, or Dark City.

 - meg

And I was starting to think I was the only person on earth who liked Dark City.

Oh and Schild - if you want funny :

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/41239

I beg to differ. Firefly was cancelled not because no one watched it but because no one could watch it. Not to sound like a fanboy, but seriously, Fox aired the episodes out of order and pre-empted nearly half of them for the playoffs and world series. It's kinda like they wanted the show to fail. I knew a lot of people that were dying to see the show, but were frustrated that they sometimes had to wait 'til two in the fucking AM to watch it because a bunch of steroid popping poofters skipping around a field was pushing the start times back that far.


Someone felt the need to wave a glowy e-peen somewhere along the way...

And I hated Dark City. Mostly because the ending seemed kinda copoutish to me. The buildup was great though, I will give it that.

You know, when I try to talk about The Matrix and Dark City in the same sentence, people actually say 'What ?'  Sigh.

You think Fox fucked Firefly? Go take a look at the how Veritas: The Quest was handled. *ANGER*

Yeah, Veritas got screwed too.

Seriously, why bother buying multiple eps of a show if you're just gonna pre-empt them or not show them at all?

Pope John Paul II really liked Dark City.

Did you know that? Huh? Did you?

Yes, I did.  He was a big Ian Richardson fan, since he saw him in House Of Cards.

Ironwood, if I ever have the opportunity to buy you a beer, consider it bought.

I agree with you Surly.. fox fucked the show, guess it was metaphorical fucking for Buffy going to UPN and still kicking Fox's ass.

Dark City was great and I can see an easy comparison to the Matrix.  As for Event Horizon, while not a remake, it certainly follows the formula of the much better movie,  In The Mouth of Madness.  Sam Neill is one of those actors that stays below the horizon, but keeps providing damn good acting.

 :heart: Dark City :heart:

Wouldn't that be, "Sam Neill" is one of those actors that stays below the Event Horizon? :-D

I'm here all week, try the veal.

But yeah, pretty much anything he's in, I'll watch, he's versatile as hell.

I still think Event Horizon, while not the greatest movie evar, is still going to be the closest we ever get to a Doom movie.

Jurassic part 3? (But seriously - I agree - he's a decent actor who seems to take some interesting roles).

Except maybe... Doom (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0419706/combined)?

No, that movie is doomed.




OOOOOOOOH SNAAAAP! SOMEBODY OPEN A WINDOW!!1



*ahem*

Back on topic, i saw an interview on cable (here in Aus) with Whedon recently, during which he showed distinct interest in a sequel (or, in his words, even a trilogy since this appears to be the fad nowdays) if Serenity did well enough. So go see it again all of you.

 - meg

In the Mouth of Madness.

The black plague killed a lot of people too, we should make a sequel.

Twat.

On just about every qualitative level, Ep 3 especially (Ep 2 and 1 not so much) sucked such large monkey balls, it was like a line up of young boys making wth the circus seal impression backstage at an Elton John concert. It just blew. There are certain things movies must have to be a well-done movie, and Ep3 had none of them. I'm quite sure that if aliens came down to earth after we've destroyed ourselves and the only cultural artifact they found of us was Star Wars Episode 3, they'd think we probably deserved whatever end came to us. Then they'd blow up the planet into tiny asteroids just to make sure nothing such as Ep3 was ever produced again. Ep 3 was geek dress-up dolls with CGI. Furry fanfiction starring the Smurfs, Captain Kirk and a giant horseman penis has more drama, more pathos and better visuals than Episode 3 did.

I'm sorry that it made $380 million despite sucking ass. I'm sure Lucas sleeps well at night on his bed of $100 bills and delusion, thinking that the only thing wrong with his movie was that some Internet geeks didn't like it. It isn't like it was going to flop or anything. You could back up the Federal economy with the surety of a Star Wars sequel/prequel's success.

That doesn't change the fact that it sucked, and Serenity was in every way a better movie. Shit, Office Space tanked at the box office, and it's easily one of the best comedic movies of our generation.

EDIT: Dark City rocked, and was a better Matrix movie than Matrix Reloaded or Revolutions. Shit, 13th Floor was a better Matrix movie than those two. Also, Event Horizon and In the Mouth of Madness were good too. And all of them were better than Episode 3.

The people who greenlight shows and the people who schedule them are two different groups.  If the schedulers think a show sucks, they'll kill it by putting it in assend of nowhere and then pointing out the horrible Neilson #s to the appropriate people.  c.f. Firefly, The Quest, The Tick, etc.

Like any system, it's the asstards who fuck it up for everyone else.

And after Fox screwed Buffy and Firefly, I'd say there's probably someone in the org. who just doesn't like Wheadon on a visceral level.  He must've fucked their wife or something.

Then you've not been reading the previews I have been reading.  It's fuck all to do with Hell and more to do with Genetic Engineering/aliens.

Fuck that.  I want BLOOOOOOD and Ritual Sacrifice.  Doom was about the supernatural, not the unnatural.

Nah, I've been reading them, just being facetious.

The preview trailers I've seen of Doom disturb me greatly. Not that I thought the plot of Doom was all that deep to begin with, but hey...

Or maybe it's the "squee" of delight it elicited from my girlfriend both times we saw it before Serenity. I know it's gonna suck beyond all measure and she does too, but she still wants to see it. Then again, she'll watch anything with the Rock in it...

To be honest, I'm not sure it'll be a bad movie.  I think it may turn out to be quite an entertaining movie.

But not what we're looking for.

Where's the guy suspended on an upside down cross over a lake of blood that's on fire with his intenstines dangling to his chin.
.
.
.
.
Mommy ?

(http://www.nba.com/media/sixers/pet_rock_250_030328.jpg)

Throw in a gratuitous reference to The 13th Floor and watch their brain melt.

She's from Milwuakee, I find one of those for the Bucks, and it's gonna be her christmas gift.

Getting a little back on topic: Sobelius, I agree with you that the movie at best did a cursory job of explaining any backstories. For that reason alone I would highly recomend going back and seeing the series. The series was almost entirely about developing those characters and thier relationships. The whole attraction thing between the Engineer and the Doctor is spread over about 10 episodes for example. Oh, and you won't call Jayne one dimensional once you've heard his ballad.

Or seen his statue carved out of manure.  Well ok mud but still... (http://www.freewebs.com/robertocastillo/firefly/jaynestown.htm)

my replies:

"movies are dying"..."dying in 5 years"... agree. Not necessarily looking forward to it, but when shit like this (http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=4765.0) gets money then maybe Hollywood death is better for us all.  Hopefully we'll still be able see stuff from people like Robert Redford though.  But it's pretty telling when one the biggest films this summer was about penguins (http://www.marchofthepenguins.com) (and I saw it and it was genuinely good and dramatic in places, plus beautifully shot).

"Ian Richardson fan, since he saw him in House Of Cards"...   :heart:  Brilliant series

SW vs. Whatever... let's be honest, SW sux.  And so did Star Trek.  Each had moments of quality, but both overwhelmed by mediocre writing

Serenity... not knocking it, but I probably won't see it.  Never saw more than 10mins of the the show.  Here's the thing -- and please don't take this the wrong way -- I don't think a future where offworld colonist behave, talk and culturally live like late 1800's American Westerners is what most people want to see.  The grafting of SciFi and American Western I just couldn't digest.  Maybe Fox did tank the show, but I think this was a mix most people didn't get and want to see.

The hell with Jayne's ballad, his whole reaction to the kid taking the bullet for him and his "Don't tell them what I did" in Aurora gave him more depth than three prequels did for Anakin "I whine, therefore I am" Skywalker.

agree... and FWIW when it's one of Ebert's (http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19980227/REVIEWS/802270304/1023) all-time favourite films he shows at his festivals.  He liked it so much he did one of the over-narrations for the DVD.

In the movie the doctor and Mal did discuss the fact the doctor had been patching up people on Serenity for 8 months.

Wait...  *looks at thread*

It was you!  Well Teleku beat you to it by one post, but yeah, apparently I now have mind control powers.  I can trash Serenity fans with an analogy to The Great White Hype, and in some sort of weird equation, Ironwood starts talking about Star Wars and it's my fault.

For my next trick, I'm going to rip into Buffy the Vampire slayer by comparing it to a scene from Play It To the Bone.  My going theory is that my powers will kick in again, causing Schild to begin speaking uncontrollably about how Lord of the Rings blows.  Fear me.

I was genuinely afraid that Jayne would experience some real personal growth after that, but thankfully I was mistaken.

I feel that the movie did what it could to introduce the characters, but they are all complex to varying degrees on the show and only so much could be done.  I know someone that did not realize what Inara's profession was.  This background issue should not keep anyone from watching the show, and there are only eleven episodes anyway.

14 episodes actually, Fox never aired 3 of them.

Ohhh. This must be what it feels like to go crazy.

My math must be off, I thought they aired seven.

You're not going crazy, friend.  You're going sane in a crazy world!

Yeah. Because millions of English and Indian fans of Cricket can't possibly be wrong. I mean, there's MILLIONS of them! MILLIONS I TELL YOU!

Damn cricket hating heathens.

Nope, it's 14. Picked up the boxset for $30 bucks and there's 14 episodes.

Geez, piss and moan.  I really enjoyed Serenity.  The wit was way off from what is normally out there, and I liked the change of pace.  Having characters that are reasonably good at playing anti-hero, both in terms of acting and script, is nice.  Space ships with ray guns is always  :heart:.  But come on, going apeshit because there are a couple plot holes?  What movie has ever written that doesn't have them?  They're going to assume things, skip details, all for the purpose of entertainment - because it's not very fun to sit in place for 10 hours while they explain everything.

Screw it.  I went with some friends, we enjoyed it, and left us all being happy if they'd make a sequal or return to TV.  While it may - may - be entertaining to build a plot sequence diagram or to try and reconstruct their technology, I'm not going to do that in the ~2h I sit in a theatre.  I liked Star Wars too, both for nostalgia and because there are a lot of creative elements that catch my interest.  Much of the writing/acting sucked.  I liked it well enough inspite of it, so what?  Loved Dark City.  Didn't care for 13th floor - etc, etc. 

But hell, I watch this stuff for entertainment.  I was entertained.  Anyone who is out to try and "prove" that a movie sucked - go drown in your own vinegar.  If you want to talk about what you didn't like, have at it.

The show "Firefly"....  well....  It had some real issues going against it, despite the poor scheduling.  The fact that when it was aired Whedon was playing hardball with the Fox execs over his other shows didn't help.

It relied way too heavily on the Western in Space crap.  The hokey accents and steel guitar intro probably didn't endear it to alot of people.

The plot was preceding at Whedon's typical glacial plot development speed.  I watched the box set, and we really find out almost nothing about what the overall plot arc is going to be.  We get some hints about River,  alot of retreading Mal's history, and a couple bits about the Blue Gloves.  That's it, through most of a season.

At that same time,  "Farscape" was airing.  For a while,  both airing at the exact same time.  The fact that "Firefly" seemed to be borrow alot of plot elements from "Farscape" worked against it amongst the type of viewer that would check out sci fi shows.

Both had/were: character based,  with the characters on the run from an oppressive neo-Fascist enemy that might not be all bad.  One character treading the bondries of stark raving insane.  Unrequited love interests.  One character with hidden knowledge the baddies wanted access to.  Witty and ironic dialogue. 

Most importantly I think, both required very large budgets.  This required higher viewership than would normally be the case for an hour long drama.

Please don't think that I completely hated the show.  I'm just of the opinion that it's cancellation was not entirely without merit.

For the record,  I'll check out Whedon projects because he has shown that he can do some GREAT things.  The Buffy episodes "The Body" and "Hush" high up on the list.  But he has some pretty serious flaws.  His pacing could be better,  and the fact that many of his characters end up sounding like they're all speaking with the same voice.

Well, you've highlighted one of my points exactly -- in order to get any sense of who the characters really are you need to see the TV show. My comments are based on having plunked down $8.50 to see a stand-alone movie, and in that sense the characters didn't hold up on their own. You wouldn't expect to go to most theatrical releases expecting to have to watch 14 hours of other storylines in order for the characters to be developed.

I still enjoyed it on it's own merits -- it's just too bad it's not accessible enough and strong enough to bring in the "unwashed masses". Then again, Joss Whedon doesn't write for the unwashed masses, and that's why I like him. He raises the bar on what should be mundane and ordinary material by infusing them with respect for the audience's emotional and intellectual maturity.

I've recently been enjoying some quality snuggling time with my boyfriend by watching Buffy from the beginning. We're 4 episodes into season 2 and even though he's from the UK and thinks Spike and Drusilla have terrible accents, the show's beginning to grow on him. It's made me aware of how long it takes for the characters to grow and develop -- and yet it makes me love the show that much more because the gradual changes are natural and unforced.

If I decide to give Firefly a chance, it'll be because of Buffy, not Serenity.

My turn to derail the thread a little: anyone else like "Shaolin Soccer" and "King Fu Hustle"? I just watched them this week and loved 'em. </ducks>

Yes, and all of that comedic troupes other movies were good as well.

I haven't seen Shaolin Soccer yet, but I just recently watched Kungfu Hustle and I have to say I was blown away by it. Great movie.

Same.

If the subject is niche movies that are really good, I'd like to give Fallen a nod.

Finally went and saw this today. Thought it kicked serious ass. My wife who has never seen an episode of the show liked it a lot too.

Definately my favorite Denzel Washington, John Goodman, Donald Sutherland movie. Really though, it's quite good. If you enjoyed that you might enjoy the new TV show The Supernatural. It's basically just the monsters side of XFiles. It's good stuff.

Fallen did indeed rock. Well written, well acted and a cool-ass premise.

I liked The Order as well, which was another movie in that vein.

Speaking of which I love this show.  I dunno why, but Supernatural just does it for me!  I hope it is doing well in the ratings, though this is doubtful.


I admit I liked Freaky Links when it came out.  All my favorite shows get cancelled (I will stab someone to bring Keen Eddie back!)

The only part of The Order that I liked was the line "Your order rivals even the Jesuits in its heretical pursuit of knowledge!"  (I went to a Jesuit school.)  I found the rest of the movie to be meh.  Which is sad, because I really wanted to like it.

I need to see The Order. I'm not afraid to admit that I like Heath Ledger and it's because of Knight's Tale. Though I probably like Knight's Tale because of Paul Bettany.

Yes.  Heath Ledger was incidental.

Ooooh SNAAAAAP!

Now STFU. ;)

Bettany and Alan Tudyk, which brings us full circle back to Serenity. Poor Wash.

Actually, it brings us back to Knight's Tale. Muaha.

Shows the first 14 minutes of the movie (http://video.vividas.com/CDN1/3929_Serenity/web/index.html) Large version is full screen widescreen, theres also a dialup version.


Unfortunatly, I forgot to bring my sword to work today.....oh...you did...

The Order was boring shit that could have been good. But it wasn't. Not even remotely. Peter Weller as a corrupt bishop or some such was just really bad. Also, I like Heath Ledger. If you like Heath too, see Ned Kelly. It even has Orlando Bloom in it.

Orson Scott Card reviews Serenity (http://www.hatrack.com/osc/reviews/everything/2005-09-30-extra.shtml)

Good review. I usually think Card talks out of his self-righteous ass (and he does that a little here as well with his talk of "values") but this time I mostly agree with him. The Salon review said a lot of the same things. You actually care about these characters. The missus had only seen half the series when we saw Serneity the first time and she cried when Book bought it and absoluetly bawled when Wash took his final bow. She was still sniffly even on the second viewing. And Mal's, "I aim to make mischief" is now on her lips regularly.

"You can move models around on the screen all you like. Just because you whoosh up your spaceships doesn't make it science fiction as it's supposed to be. "

The difference between the Star Wars prequels and Serenity can be summed up by the death of a main character - when Padme dies, no one gives a shit, it's just like marking a box on a plot checklist. When Wash died it hit me in the gut, I felt something. It lingered on after I left the theater. I don't care if it's sci-fi or drama or action or any other genre people want to classify films into, what separates a great film from something average is an investment in the characters, caring about fictional people as if they were real - Firefly/Serenity makes this emotional connection where Star Wars simply doesn't, and that makes all the difference.

In other news, Serenity has dropped from second to ninth at the box office, with a 51 percent decline in revenue from last week.  For shits and giggles, I'll point out that Flightplan has suffered only a 27 percent decline from last week, and is making more in it's fourth weekend than Serenity made in it's opening.

Yes Lum, adults do still go to theaters.  They just don't care about this movie.

Except adults are the lowest number who attend movies.

Why is this puke not yet IP banned.

In other news, adjusted for inflation, such films as Independence Day, Grease, Love Story, Home Alone, and Towering Inferno made more than EP III.

Who gives a shit.

I'm not sure being a tasteless, annoying, moronic douchebag is a bannable offense.

Saw the movie, liked it a lot.  Then again I've seen every episode of Buffy, preordered the Firefly DVD, and caught most of Angel.  Certain seasons of Angel and Buffy were not all that good, but for the most part I've always liked Whedon's style. 

I've read page one of this thread and now page 5.  I can hazard a guess that the intermediate pages read something like the following:  "OMG PLOTHOLES IN A SCI-FI MOVIE", "umm.. more characterization please, please", "Buffy season 4-7 sucked", "why is this losing to Panic Room: Airplane Edition?", or "NOOOOOOOOOO, Star Wars still rules, even though this movie is probably better than any thing Lucas has ever breathed on".  I think I'll save myself the clicks and inevitable headache.

This movie didn't rock my world ala Batman: Begins, but I knew what I was going to get coming in.  I wasn't disappointed.  Well worth the popcorn induced stomach ache.

I went this weekend after a lot of prodding by several Firefly-fanboy friends and I have to say I was terribly unimpressed. Not having seen a minute of the TV series, I found a lot of the characters flat, the supplied backstory irrelevant and the setting uninspired.

Throughout the film, I felt that there was a lot going on that I hadn't been clued in on; without any pertinent knowledge of the characters, they felt like a collection of sci-fi cliches, since little, if any, motivation or history is introduced in most cases. I continually was asking myself why, if this Captain is such a prick all the time, this ragtag crew of unlikely (and in certain cases, unwilling, I think) heroes decided to keep following him. Some of them seemed to have (weak) reasons (the doc and River, for example, although I still don't know why the captain decided to take them back after the bar fight) while others, like the Tough Guy whose name I completely forget, seemed to just be there because.

I've never really enjoyed Whedon's writing. The resolution for the love-interest subplot seemed to just spring out of nowhere, and the convenient invulnerability to the villain's signature nerve punch was quite the Deus Ex Machina, as was the villain's sudden change of heart after the broadcast. The whole "Information Wants To Be Free!" theme seemed very Slashdot. From what I hear, the humor is strongly character-driven, so having little information on the majority of the cast didn't help here.

I went with two other folks who'd also not seen a lick of Firefly and the consensus we built was that we'd probably have enjoyed the movie more if we knew the series. Having no supplementary material to support the flick, I felt it was a mediocre sci-fi western, at best.

Why you doin' this?

10 years from now, noone will remember Serenity..

But we'll all remember how the prequels sucked.

In other news there was a big announcement of the Matrix being released for the PSP on UMD.

Nobody noticed. It was on like 3 websites.

To be fair, very few people probably give a shit about UMD either.

I don't stand by the UMD as any sort of ally, but I'll say this - it's gaining more marketshare in the DVD market than the games are in the gaming market. The UMDs are selling INCREDIBLY well. It helps since the PSP is the most ideal portable media player on the market for video. If they release one with a harddrive that can play video soon enough it will be hardcore competition for the iPod. All they have to do is market it.

Actually, it was more like...

"SERENITY = GREAT!"
"Haw haw, look at it flop!"
"WTF?!  WELL SERENITY IS BETTER THAN UO!"
"Um, I'm not sure that's relevant..."
"AND IT'S BETTER THAN STAR WARS!"
"Well Episode 3 got equally positive reviews and lots more money."
"FUCK YOU! STOP TALKING ABOUT STAR WARS!"
"But I wasn't the one who brought it up."
"SHUT UP, YOUR LOGIC AM HURT ME BRAIN!"
"Hey look, Serenity is doing even worse in it's second weekend!"
"AAAAH! YOU STOLE MY FUCKING CLOUDSONG!"

No really.  I actually got a "Well UO sucks!" response, and someone actually accused me of somehow making them talk about Star Wars without ever mentioning it (or even alluding to it) myself.  It was precious.


Episode 3 received positive reviews, grossed over three times it's budget domestically, and furthermore I happened to like it.  I really don't know what point anyone is trying to make by pointing at it.  Worse movies have made more money.  Better movies have made less money.  Serenity has made no money.


Hey dipshit, figured out which parts of science are being "unlearned" yet?   :roll:

Get off the sugar high and stop trolling. It's getting old already.

 - meg

Eh.  I saw half an episode once, and have never seen Buffy or Angel aside from 5s segments while flipping channels.  I have no love for the writer, since I have an active dislike of Buffy; the movie looked obscenely stupid (though admittedly I never wathced it), and that thought has stuck with me since.  I still loved Serenity. 

I think the biggest weakness for the characters is that there are just too many of them; it's hard to do a lot with 9 main protagonists, plus baddies.  LotR could do it because it had over 12 hours of footage to deal with, whereas Serenity had just under 2.  The plot holes were mild, and I didn't mind the use of deus ex.  No, it doesn't make a terrible amount of sense, but it moves the story along and feels ok.  I take that for granted anyhow; about any movie has a fair shake of both.  For example, Gandalf was brought back from the dead, literally, by God (Eru).  Although, you don't really get a full understanding of it all without the back story, and granted Tolkien has a much wider audiance than Whedon.

Hahahahahahahahahahahaahahhahahahhahahahahahahahahahaha.

This made my morning.  And I have yet to drink any coffee!!!

Can you please stop shitting in this thread though sir?  Perhaps you can make an anti-Serenity thread.

I'm being taken to see this with the wife tonight. 


No matter what I think, I don't think I'll be sharing my views.

:)

I think that The Matrix won awards for the amount of suckage tho.  I think the Sequels were so very, very confouding of expectations that it actually shut people off from liking the first film ever again.

I know that when I rewatch the Matrix there's always the little voice in the back of my mind that says 'The Next Two are Going to Suck, The Next Two are Going to Suck.  Kill Prostitutes'.

But, hey, at least I don't post my views on the matter for other people to have the goddamned audacity to say 'You just didn't UNDERSTAND them'.  That'd be awful....

No no, i think it's perfectly allright to view the first Matrix as a standalone movie. I just blink in mild retardation whenever someone mentions the other two. Then i make a joke about gay sex and everyone laughs heartily.

 - meg

Gay Sex IS funny.

I find it pretty repulsive myself.

*This has NOTHING to do with how I treat gay people.

Oh, and umm...Sci Fi movie threads suck. There's just no other way around it.

There's a good reason for that. There's about 3,000 movies that could actually be classified as "sci-fi" and after crunching the numbers, which took all night btw, the total number of GOOD sci-fi movies comes to a grand total of 9.

This is because Zoe (2nd in command) gave Mal (captain) a hard time about not saving that extra from the Reavers.


Jayne is pretty much a "just because" tough guy and doesn't have much of a backstory.  The only character element you missed was in the Jaynetown episode.  Not that I have seen all of the episodes.

Which 9?  I would qualify the Alien series as such, and its younger brother series Predator.  I am trying to think of what else would qualify after reading Mr. Cards spiel. 

Oh God.  I spent the weekend telling the wife that Alien wasn't a sci-fi film.

It's really not.  It's a horror film.

My current pet peave:

Movie ad: "The 24th Century, a lone deepspace probe delving deep in to secrets of the universe. A crew of seven highly gifted scientists exploring the mysteries of the unknown... They find a strange alien probe..."

Which promptly turns one of them in to a raving lunatic who stalks through the ship chopping up crewmembers with a machete.

Fucking Hollywood.

Could be worse.  Could be Contact.

Point taken.

I look at it like Stephen King's book "IT."  Yeah, there are horror parts, but once you get past that (jaded?) it is really an adventure.  It is even better if you are versed in Stephen Kings little world.  Same with Aliens.  I also enjoyed the books written in the Alien universe, even if they are poorly written.  Its the whole storyline that is interesting.  

The Alien, Predator, and Terminator movies were the Big Three of R-rated science fiction from the late 70's through the early 90's.  But really, I prefer to call them The Things Which Have Killed Bill Paxton.  (For the noobs: Paxton played one of the punks Arnie killed in the first Terminator, as well as a cop in Predator 2.  And fuck you if you don't know who he was in Aliens. :-D )  My ranking of them stands thusly:

-----The Goddamn Best-----

Aliens
Terminator 2

-----Classics-----

Alien
Predator
Terminator

-----Still Pretty Entertaining-----

Predator 2
Alien: Resurrection

-----Teh Sux0r-----

Terminator 3
Alien 3
Alien vs Predator

Fuck you, David Fincher, for making me watch Newt's autopsy!  I saw Alien 3 on it's opening weekend, then told everyone I knew how much it sucked.  I tried to actively contribute to that movie's failure by spreading negative word of mouth.  But yeah, the Aliens books were fun.  And if you can turn up the Terminator books by S.M. Stirling, those are actually quite good.  They take place after T2, but were written before T3 and have nothing to do with that heap of shit.  They do a much better job of capturing the atmosphere and character of the films than T3 ever did, and I've heard that James Cameron is said to like them, and like them better than the third movie.

Best Bill Paxton Movie

Near Dark (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093605/)

All the rest are pale imitations of greatness.

Or as I can't help but think of it:  The Colonial Marines Go Gothic!

Paxton only had a small part in it, and it's not really sci-fi or horror, but I'll go ahead and throw Streets of Fire into the ring.  Because how can you not love any movie that ends with a Michael Pare vs Willem Dafoe sledgehammer fight?

Quick update:  Can't go tonight.  Why ?  Queues.


The irony.

Right now I wish it was as unpopular as I'm being told.

WUA might be a myopic turdburglar, but I gotta agree with him on the quality of Streets of Fire. Dafoe and Pare beating the shit out of each other is classic.
 
But he forgot Diane Lane's Ellen Aim...

The only problem with Streets of Fire is that the writing and frankly the acting makes even Daredevil look like shakespear in comparison.

Now, it was a good Rock Opera though.

See, I think that's the crux of the issue right there; since it had a built-in fanbase, Whedon could afford to give a cursory treatment to most of the characters and expect his viewers to know who they are and why they're doing stuff. Without that, it's a whirlwind of names and faces, some of which, particularly those that receive 5 minutes of screentime, you need to care about for certain scenes.

For example, I could tell that, when the pilot was killed at the end, it was supposed to be a Dramatic Moment with a lot of Emotional Impact. However, since the pilot got maybe 3 minutes of dialog prior to that point, I really didn't care much. I'll admit I was shocked, but that was more due to the abruptness of the scene than emotional attachment to the character.


Okay, that kind of makes sense to me, but I'm still having trouble making the jump from "Scolding: You don't care about helpless people" to "Action: take dangerous, unstable weapon aboard ship, putting self, ship and crew in danger". That latter bit seems to contradict the character at this point, because he's put up some dialog about putting his crew and ship first and strangers later.

I guess it can kind of be connected, with that action being the first point of an attitude change towards caring about other people, but then he shoots a guy in cold blood after the preacher gets killed. :|

This movie was the biggest waste of time ever. The only good part is whent he head scientist is blabbering about "Beautiful Butterfly". The movie is still a total piece of shit.

First Buck Rogers episode (hey, it's movie length at least!): Intergalactic, time traveling, pimp. THIS is Science Fiction at it's finest.

Really. Anything more serious than that is losing the point. Or too geeky. Take your pick.

*This goes for all the intergalatic, time traveling, pimps that for that matter (i.e. Kirk).

And if Kirk or Buck are too pedestrian, then Alphaville. Not exactly a time traveler, but Lemy Caution is still intergalatic. And a pimp.

HOWEVER, the last 15 minutes of the Road Warrior is possibly the greatest bit of action filmed in all of Sci-Fi. So this counts too. For other reasons.

Oh man I forgot all about the roadwarrior series!  Thanks Stray [added to must get DVD collection]

It's also dealt with in the series in that Simon saves the lives of some of the crewmembers, including Kaylie (who the Captain has a quasi-fatherly relationship with). Mal comes to realize that having a doctor on board might be worthwhile. Add to that, Mal has a very strong sense of responsibility to his crew. He treated the guy running after them on the planet callously, because he considered it a choice between that unknown guy and puting his crew at risk.

At this point in the story, Mal considers Simon and his Sister as part of the crew, so he's conflicted between being loyal to them and being loyal to the crewmembers that have been around longer.

As for the crew's loyalty - The 1st mate's been following Mal since the war, the Pilot is her husband, the Engineer thinks of the crew as her family, the Whore is in love with the captain, the Doctor and his sister have no one else to help them, and the Merc knows that he sucks at being a criminal on his own.

As for shooting the guy in cold blood - well, that's just the tone of the show.

Well, thanks, now that makes sense.

This movie needed ushers handing out cheatsheets or something before the show. A lot of this material comes from the TV series and I can identify maybe a few lines in the movie meant to reference each fact.

Jayne points this out but Mal has already made his decision.  As for shooting the Alliance officer, he was really pissed at the time, and he fought against them in the war.  This shows Jayne's role as the "bad extreme" or "shoulder devil" since he doesn't have Mal's sense of loyalty and whatnot, and is counterpoint to Zoe as Mal's conscience.

It is bad that there could be confusion without the backstory, but if you thought you might like the movie if you knew what the hell was going on, Netflick the show and try again.

I don't know how to spell conscience, and I don't plan on learning that today.

If there are two words which occur too infrequently in cinema, they are the words "sledgehammer fight".

EDIT:  Regarding Ironwood's "queue" problem, I hear Serenity is actually doing okay for itself in the UK.

I also took it to mean with no survivors any readers the Alliance might have will not realize that Serenity was there...  That and the fact Book just died in his arms moments before and it was a good point maker for the whole your staying here or going with, or if you get me angry I will shoot you next...

It's a tough call, because going in I was worried that they would waste 30 minutes of the movie with backstory exposition. Having seen the entire series, I was glad that they didn't. He did cover most of the key relationship points in the opening minutes, but it was brief. I can see how someone coming in to the show cold would be left wanting more though.

And maybe go buy the DVDs... ;)  Who's to say they really cared so much about a sequel movie as increasing the residuals value.

Heh, like the best scene of The Train Job - after the crew has got the drop on a couple of Niska's henchmen, they're bound just outside Serenity's cargo bay.

Mal: Okay, so you take back Niska's money and we're even, job declined.

Niska's Henchman 1: Big mistake, I'll hunt you down, you'll never get away with this, blah blah.

Mal kicks Henchman 1 into running Serenity engine. Goes over to Henchman 2.

Mal: Okay, so you take Niska's money back, we're even.

Niska's Henchman 2: Sure! No problem! Sounds great!

Done.

Found them onsale and order these plus the first season of Battlestar Galactica. 

Just got back from watcing this movie.  Le Brilliance.  I knew I would enjoy it, but holy shit was it good!

This was just pure genius in the making.  The musical score alone was well thought out and executed.  Plot was well thought out, characters developed well (I have yet to see Firefly), and the ending left me yearning for more.  Of most important is the little details.  I am a detail person; I blame my time in the military for this.  There were just so many little details, from the dropping of some foreign language to the way the fights developed, to the fact that they had to repaint the ships name on the side.  I am assuming those of you who were complaining earlier in the thread about the fact that they had to fly (sail?) to Mr. Universes pad to deliver the message are not very technology oriented.  Seriously, I can think of multiple reasons as to why they had to travel there, of prime importance it was obvious that Mr. Universe was in trouble and there was no way the message would be delivered if they had just e-mailed it or whatever.  Notice Mal brought Reevers with him?  It was not to have tea. 

Final thought, WUA you can suck shit.  I sorta agreed with you up until I saw the movie, but it is obvious you were flaming in the thread to increase e-peen. 


edit.  This was all my opinion obviously, and not pre-assumed bias thanks to my apparent F13 bias.  I expected to enjoy it, but the level I enjoyed it was very surprising. 

Good thing you caught it when you did.  It'll be out of the theaters in another week or two, as owners use their screens to display something more profitable.  Like the umpteenth week of Corpse Bride, or that dreadful-looking Doom flick.  :-D

What's your point?  That people will line up week after week to watch complete crap because it's shiney, has shitty cgi and an equally shitty plot (don't forget Hell and MONSTARS!!!)? That some good films do poorly while other good films do good based on the notoriety of director?  You mean movies that don't do well don't stay in the theatre because Joss Whedon says so?

Wow. Deep, man. Deep.

You can really shut the fuck up anytime now. 

I'm serious, man. I'm having trouble determining what the deal is with you and this thread.

Is it a joke? Do you think it's funny? Do you like being mean and being loathed? Is there an overarching, arrogant point? Are you testing reactions as some sort of a social experiment? Is this satire?

Why are you bending over backwards to purposefully be an asshole? I'm honestly asking. I'm incapable of comprehending your motives.

It is a manifestation of his psychosis.  Obviously he has some education, but still remembers when he was mocked and derided throughout his childhood and teens.  Online we all have washboard stomaches and rippling muscles, yet his school money is still being stolen by the bullies. 




edit.  Its Bruce.  I know it is.

Might want to fix that last sentence there chief, it's a grammatical abortion.

I still haven't seen it.  The trouble with actually having a life is that when your schedule goes to shit it's hard to reschedule.

Did I ever mention that I hate life ?

Cheddar's edit has it.

Y'know I blew that off when I first saw it, but now that you mention it again..

I like to hate things.  F13 hates to like things.  But I like to hate things that F13 likes, and F13 hates it when I like to hate the things it likes.  Sometimes I like to like things which F13 hates to like, and it hates that.

Meanwhile, in other news:  Nerds won't go down without a fight! (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0379786/board/thread/27150824)


She just likes you as a friend.  Pussy.

F13 is not an entity. That's your first mistake. With this Me vs Them mentality, you set yourself up to be an bigger asshole than the rest of us.

Me vs Them is really the defining factor between all "unique" assholes who've passed through here. Bruce, Hyu, Geldon (Maybe? -- Still undecided on that).

Hyu's too damned clueless to be qualified as an asshole.

Goddamn dude. I'm really sorry that Serenity came over to your house, drank all your beer, pissed on your carpet, killed your dog then stole your girlfriend. I can really understand the h8.

 :roll:

This YTMND made me think of this thread. (http://gameoverforever.ytmnd.com/)

PS:

LOL (http://serenityfails.ytmnd.com/)

Obviously, you made that. But it doesn't matter. Because it was funny.

How are estimated marketing costs not applicable? Clearly the movie had marketing, I've been seeing commercials for it for months.

I thought I'd post this as amusing before Nutsack posted it as 'meaningful' :

http://www.columbian.com/lifeHome/lifeHomeNews/10102005news9829.cfm

That's not "meaningful" or "amusing" - that's a Whedon Cultist. It's the sort of shit a Buffy/Angel fanboi does. Comparing him to a trekkie was 110% spot on.

Yeah and I agree.  It's nonsense and should be ridiculed as such.  You don't find Trekkies amusing ?  Or cultists ?  I do.

What I didn't want is for anyone to post it and say "hahhaha, teh taers of tah jaded and ownnnt.  Lollll!!!"1)"

If you see what I mean.

hahhaha, teh taers of tah jaded and ownnnt.  Lollll!!!"1

That name change is the coolest invention ever.  Even cooler than this:

(http://engsoc.queensu.ca/events/Pictures/Cropped%20Beer%20Hat.JPG)



Well, maybe not cooler.  But they are on the same plane.

I think it means not available.  Quite a number of the movies I was looking at are marked that.

Oh noes!

"WindupAtheist^2"

Okay now...

I don't think even SirBruce took it this far. Even he knew when to can it.

Why do care so much that no one here likes you? Why do you feel the need to make an alt profile and post...Again? Act like a fucking man and leave. Or just shut the fuck up for a while.

[edit] Oh noes!

Eh, didn't see the other thread...

Just saw it.  Loved it.

When they find the tape on the poor scientist lady's ship, Mal says something about her ship being old and Serenity not having equipment to play the tape thing.  Fairly sure....

Also, the point about installing her player in Serenity doesn't bother me, they don't have a computer geek in the crew... kinda like asking your auto mechanic to get MythTV installed for you.  Maybe they could have done it, but they may not have thought of it.

I'd worry more about the fact that Mr. Universe had a seekrit player setup with the exact right drive all set to go.  They should have had the robot fix up something out of the broken stuff.

The whole Miranda thing was pure genius IMO, much better than that Clone Wars crap.  You just know there are people in government right now who would be willing to try something like that.

That's kinda the only thing I have trouble with.  I can suspend disbelief on a lot of crazy crap, but having a crew that includes multiple genius-level IQs not spot an easy answer isn't one of them.   :wink:


Agreed.  And I was very happy that they had rational explanation of some sort for the Reavers.  The whole "went mad on the edge of space" thing always sounded like a load of crap to me.

Hrm, talking about continuities, one thing _did_ seriously bother me after seeing the film:

About the Reavers. How the hell is it that they are completely batshit insane (as explained by the vid they find on Miranda), yet are still somehow able to operate very complex machinery such as spacecraft (particularly the big cruiser-type ones that would require large numbers of them working in unison) with any semblance of cohesion? Furthermore, why have they not turned on each other and self-destructed as a society in the ten years that they've been floating around in "Reaver space", since i would imagine they'd get pretty bored after a while. I know Wash mentiones them sending out raiding parties, but on how large a scale? Enough to satisfy the collective insanity of several hundred thousand (or however many there are)?

 - meg

Same way Chaos Space Marines have been doing Black Crusades every few 1000 years....

(Anyone else think reavers=Warhammer40K Khorne Chaos army?)

Hmm... Army Ants?

And there's 30,000.  1/10th of a percent of 30mil.

I figure it's the same neurological phenomenon that causes zombies to attack the living instead of each other.

Ha. Clever boy =D

 - meg

According to the Walking Dead, that's a smell thing.  But then, mysteriously two issues later, they'd forgotten they could use that for immunity.

Riiiiight....

Everybody knows its a visual thing. Shuffle like a zombie and moan a bit, you'll be just fine.

After reading the book, which does not explain the Reaver portion to any greater degree, it does explain that Mr. Universe was the closest place to do a broadband broadcast and had the appropriate equipment.  If you remember, on the shuttle that it was recorded, they could not broadcast the feed either.  Guess it requires some major mojo to do it.

I think the Reavers molded into something psychopathic, and perhaps kicked in as a mob mentality... lord of the flies kind of state.  So, they operated in a tribal strongest one directs kind of society.  They did not become mindless.

I never thought of any of them as general geniuses, just really good at what they do.  Mal and Zoe are soldiers turned smugglers.  Wash was a great pilot but not at all cut out for combat.  Kaylee is almost an idiot savant with machinery, but you would have to watch the series to get the history.  Simon is smart, sure, but he used all of his brain on medical knowledge.  Book kept his abilities to himself most of the time.  Inara?  Same as Simon, essentially.  River is (was?) crazy and Jayne is an idiot.

I maintain that even Jayne would be clever enough to say "uhm, let's beam it to him instead of flying there k?"   :wink:

Would have been a good excuse to explain it to the audience.

Exactly.

And if they shot that scene, it's the type of scene that ends up on the cutting room floor.

"Do we need this scene to explain this plot hole?"

 - "Well, the fanboi types who read the comics and buy the roleplaying game will probably jump all over it."

"Will normal people notice?"

 - "No."

"Cut it."

Saw it tonight.

Fantastic.


I don't even have the enthusiasm for sarcasm, digs or devils advocate.  I loved it.

Sorry.

Now get your mitts on the series.

(http://www.michaeltotten.com/archives/images/ME-poster2-view.jpg)

Did I mention I'm dressing as Jayne for Halloween this year?  (Along with every other Firefly geek on the planet, I'm sure.)

That's odd - I'm going as Animal Mother.

I've been rereading this thread (oh God, the pain) to see if there's stuff you guys thought that, now I've seen the film, I can agree or disagree with.

This bit stands out because it's obvious to all that Whedon had planned summat like this from the start.  The Reaver madness was a load of crap, as presented.  Even Jayne - not the sharpest tool in the box - makes a big speech about how he's been to the edge and not gone crazy.  I thought the film dealt very nicely with this apparent incongruity that never made sense to anyone.  Hence, I think, planned.

Also, the plot hole that kept most of this thread going seems a silly argument to me.  Holo-player was on ship, holo-player was not on serenity, holo-player was in Mr Universes Pad - as well as the power to shunt it out everywhere.  I don't see the big deal or plot hole here at all.  It's also quite obvious that Mal knew that Mr Universes pad was a trap for various reasons :

The Operative had been killing and trapping EVERYONE that Mal knew.  The 'burning screens' scene made that clear.  Further, he made a speech about 'trapping your prey' and leaving it 'no ground to run to'.  All of a sudden Mal sees that Mr Universes place is clear ?  Doesn't sound likely.  Mal would have known it was a trap, just as with Inara.  Hence, Reaver baiting.  Also, it's been made clear that Mr Universe is THE GUY to go to if you want a signal put out everywhere.  The operative would know that as well as Mal.  So, trap.  That's also why he didn't just beam it over there, even if he could've, which he couldn't.  Arg.  We need to talk about this over drinks.  It's easier that way !

*Aside :  All the Firefly women are hot as fuck.  There's nothing like having an extremely large woody during the film to detract you from plot holes.  Could Zoe's ass be nicer ?  Kaylee's smiler more seductive ?  Innaras sheer attraction more indepth and wholesome?  Man, I wanted to jump in *

I do think it's a shame it's all over now.  I agree that a sequel is unlikely and a return to TV even less likely.  Bah.

I took it to be something like stories old sailors tell the green to scare 'em.  Everyone knows it's bullshit, but everyone keeps telling the same stories, so just maybe...  It becomes the galactic boogeyman.  It didn't help the story any that Reavers liked the black. 

The only plot point I wonder about is why the Operative didn't leave a garrison of soldiers at Mr. Universe's place.  Can just chalk it up to arrogance on his part, I suppose.

Or how the Reavers always shoot to immobilize or trap rather than kill, except when their target has another acting gig lined up.   :cry:

Er, why would he do this ?

He was in orbit around the planet with a fleet.  No-one was getting past him.

.
.
.
Unless they brought every reaver in the verse with them, of course.

Accidentally though. It's not like they *planned* on it killing him.

Welcome to the dark side, your conversion is complete.

So they were trying to merely immobilize him?  WITH A TEN FOOT HARPOON?

Next you're going to tell me that they were trying to harpoon the ship, and Wash was just an innocent bystander.  Never mind that the ship was very obviously not going anywhere by that point.   :wink:

I had assumed that they harpooned it so they could haul it out of the hole and back into space.  No sense in field-stripping a ship if you are going to use all of the parts anyway.

I'm tempted to discuss how there's no way in hell a few harpoons shot through the cockpit window would be able to haul a ship that size out of the hangar and off the ground.  Or how it'd make no sense whatsoever from a Reaver point of view to start working on towing arrangements for the ship before raping, skinning, and eating the passengers.  But I won't.   :wink:

You just don't grok the Reavers. =)

That's probably a good thing, since the Reavers apparently reproduce by inducing grokking in others.

Didja get that gas canister I sentcha?

(http://www.vaxxine.com/sparrow/other-folder/peter.jpg)

Don't take a lot to tow in space if the other craft has no propulsion...  Not sure those harpoons are especially useful in atmo, but they certainly do add a spicy element.

People seem to have a serious missaphrension here - I got the DvD's as soon as they were released on these shores.  I've been watching Firefly for as long as I could.

This is not a recent thing really....

I just got a chuckle from the use of the slang.  Verse just sounds right.  Same with Gorram for some damn reason.

Stocking stuffer, anyone?

Fuck yeah.

I know what I'm getting the wife now!

Got to talk to Summer Glau over the weekend at Wizcon Tx.  Asked about a sequel and she gave the depends on how good it does answer, but seemed upbeat.  Hope they pull off enough to do a trilogy.

Wish Whedon could get a spot doing a show on HBO.

Thought that I would watch the serie before the movie, since this stuff seems to be fairly highly regarded. However, after watching the first 4 episodes I'm strugeling to continue. Sci-fi meets the wild west gets a bit silly. It also seems to be the kind of series where nothing really happen, at the end of every episode they're back to square one so it doesn't really matter if you miss a truckload of episodes.  There's no real plot to follow, or questions you're waiting for answers to. The characters seems about as deep as the ones in Buffy the vampire slayer. So, does the serie take of at some point? I watched Battlestar Galactica just before Firefly, which I found to be superb.

If the Wild West sci-fi thing turns you off, you probably won't like much of the series, and may only marginally like the movie. It's kind of central to being able to stand the characters and the setting that you buy into that premise.

Ultimately the plot is the characters. They cover a bit of a running story about Simon and River and the people they are running from (which leads in to the plot of the movie), but mainly its about the characters and the relationships between them. If you don't get in to the characters, you probably won't get in to the show.

I'm having a bit of a problem with Deadwood myself right now, because I'm just not interested in quite a few of the characters. Once you get past Swearigen (sp?) and the Canadian, the rest of the cast just hasn't fleshed out enough for me yet to get interested in. I'm still hoping for something out of Molly Parker. Or it could be that I'm just really annoyed by Calamity Jane. The last episode I watched was the one wear she sits in the woods and drinks with a dead guy, and I just haven't had the urge to put the next DVD in. Hopefully things pick up.

Sorry for the derail, but this thread was just stagnating mostly anyways.

Finnished all the episodes, the order seemed scrambled though, what seemed to be the pilot was episode 11. Got fairly enjoyable after the first bunch of episodes.

Her progression into a lesbian is fun to watch.

You have to watch them in the order they're on the DVD, not the order in which they were originally aired.  One of the major complains that fans have about Fox's handling of the show is that they showed everything out of order.

I never got to watch this when it was on Fox, always had something else to be doing.  However, this is the criticism I've heard most often, and it makes no sense to me.  Wild West meets Sci-Fi seems far, far, FAR more reasonable and logical than Sci-Fi meets Fantasy a'la Star Wars, yet people can't wrap their heads around it.   At least in the wild west they had guns, so you avoid the whole magic sword and ranged weapons that move slower than bullets problem.

The one thing that threw me on the whole movie vs show.

Was I missing something during the show that they were in one solar system the whole time? Because it really seemed like they were traveling system to system. Yet the movie made it seem like, no inter-stellar travel happened.

I think there is only 1 system.

EDIT: The word Either didn't make sense when I put it where it was. Writing is hard.

I think of Star Wars more like fantasy in a sci-fi setting.  Sci-fi meets the wild west seems silly to me in the same way a serie set in present time, with our technology, mixed with the middle ages weapons and outfits would be.

What's confusing or silly about it?  "Western" in Serenity has more to do with the tone than anything else; dress, speech, etc.  The main character uses a revolver, but hell, revolvers are still manufactured and in use today.  It seems that the little 'old tech' that is in use has a fair amount to do with limitation of production or availability.  It's convenient to fit into the story of course, but plausible.  There's also the situation that many of the colony planets have extremely limited access to any means of production or trade - this being one of the primary gripes that these planets held against the government.  Other things, like how Serenity's engine looks like a steamboat's paddlewheel, are just aesthetic.

Highlander was a great movie!

I seem to remember that the guns do not actually use powder, they just look like they do.  Then there's Jayne's favorite gun.  One shot blowing up another ship... that wasn't a regular old bullet.

It's clarified in the first few minutes of the movie that they all immigrated to a star system with many planets, some more habitable than others. The inner planets formed the "core planets" and the farther out you go the rougher it gets.

Actually a pretty damn clever idea.  It saves them from having to worry about "warp drives" and time dilation and "hyperspace" and all of the other theoretical complications of interstellar travel.

I think they use caseless ammo, basically just feeding slugs into the chamber; which would also explain why Mal could shoot x gazillion times before reloading.

RIGHT. They just never showed it that way during the tv series. It just doesnt jibe with their whole "We're in the middle of nowhere, no one will receive our distress signal." episode.