I’m watching the DVDs for the Fox-aborted sci-fi/western series Firefly, which I bought pretty much purely on positive word of mouth and having seen a single episode when it was briefly on the air.
Mostly, it’s made me sort of cranky, because of all the potential there. Spades, bucketloads of development that could have been had. I could easily see future subjunctive seasons mutating the show, in a good way, to a sort of less-utterly bleak, more sardonic Blake’s 7 kind of deal. Granted, I could also see future seasons also sort of spinning their wheels, lurching in random directions while trying to figure out what and where the hell to go with things, and see that was probably the most likely course for it to follow, but dammit, it was a chance it should have had.
But I do understand that the public had spoken, and the public would have preferred more programming slots opening up for whatever the latest reality shows might be.
I finished up my Christmas shopping on Friday, and ended up buying a copy of Firefly for my mother. Mom’s a Trekkie, and I’m a Buffy-obsessed-freak, so I figured Joss Whedon’s take on the sci-fi adventure genre would be something we could both enjoy. I was living overseas when the series originally aired, but I’ve heard nothing but good things about it.
I’ve heard that the episodes were aired all out of order, which would definitely put a show of this type at a disadvantage. Did FOX ever give a reason for this?
No, they just laughed maniacally and had Igor lower the porticullis to their ridiculously gothic castle.
In addition to showing the episodes out of date (the pilot episode was the last one to air) they also stuck it in an impossible time slot (Friday evenings), pre-empted it frequently, and spent as little as humanly possible on advertising (the only time I ever saw commercials for it was during Buffy re-runs on FX).
On a brighter note, the movie rights were sold not long ago. Hopefully that’ll work out better than the TV show did.
I was going to go to the Sci-Fi and Comic Book Convention in L.A. today and meet Joss and the cast of Firefly. Then I was going to come back, post, and brag about how hot everybody is IRL and hopefully report on some happy Firefly-THe-Movie news.
But alas, I overslept…by 5 hours. (Needed to leave the house by 7, woke up at 11).
My girlfriend gave me the box set; that’s how much she loves me. I really enjoyed seeing the episodes that didn’t air, and hearing the commentary for some of the episodes. No idea what the thinking was at Fox. I read that the DVD’s sold out on pre-orders as soon as they were on sale; I hope that gives a boost to the possibility of a movie.
In my perfect world, the one that exists between my ears, the DVDs start a word of mouth campaign that never had a chance to do much when the show was on the air, despite the rabidness of us fans. This word of mouth leads to huge revenues (or at least decent. I don’t expect another Return of the King here) for the feature film, and some executives at, say, 20th Century Fox come to Joss Whedon and say, “Hey, about that Firefly movie… How’d you like to make a T.V. series based on it?” Of course, then a magic leprechaun shows up and gives me millions of dollars…
And Joss says, “Well, you signed away your rights to the TV show when you gave me the chance to shop it to other networks, and I’ve just signed a deal with NBC. Thanks anyway.” And Fox misses out on the most successful science fiction franchise since Star Trek.
Well, 20th Century Fox would still be producing the show, yeah? I mean, the network itself would change, but the production company would probably remain the same, right? Or am I uninformed?
The DVD box set is great but I’m kinda down that they didn’t include the full gag reel. The one on the last DVD is cut down significantly and missing one of the funniest outtakes (the part where Nathan keeps moving around and posing in different ways while listening to the recording).
Absolutely. There’re 14 one hour episodes, of which four are among the best things I’ve ever seen on TV. Okay, and one stinker: “Heart of Gold,” the never-aired, second-to-last episode, was just lame. The commentary track for the pilot episode is particularly good, too. And it only costs about as much as two movie DVDs.
I got another box set for my best friend, and let him open it early before he left to go spend the holidays at his parents’ house. We watched the pilot episode together before he left, and I am hooked already!
Isn’t she the cutest? Definitely my favorite character so far.
When it looked like Kaylee was dead, I yelled at the TV, “No Joss, you can’t do that! She was in the opening credits!” My friend thought it was funny, but I was seriously worried there for a minute.
See, maybe it’s just me, but I don’t think I’d be able to sleep with a burning alarm clock next to my bed. Of course, I don’t know if I’d be able to sleep if I knew I’d be meeting Nathan Fillion the next day either.
But sorry you missed the convention, pepperlandgirl.
I managed to get a copy of the Firefly DVDs free. Phillip B. Gaines is working on his multimedia skills and used the episodes as a master project to display his work on DVD presentations. A call went out on Slashdot about a month ago asking anyone who wanted a copy to review his work and I volunteered. I just got it earlier this week and haven’t had a chance to look at it yet.
Is War Stories the ep where Walsh and Mal are caught and tortured and Mal keeps Walsh alive? If so, I’d say that it is the best hour of television ever.
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