Airing the premiere episode in a two-hour special has gotta be the most unusual way to cancel a show in history.
I’ll be taping it (because like most people, I actually go out on Friday nights), and curling up tomorrow morning in a blankie to watch it.
buh-bye, Firefly. It was nice while it lasted.
I saw the pilot months ago(yes, the two-hour one). It is much better than the ep. they aired first on Fox.
Darn you! Darn you to heck on a willy nilly basket!
I wanted to start this thread and say “ha ha I started the Firefly thread so pbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbt to all of you. Bow down to me.”
But now I’m just another lowly responder.
Fine. I declare myself Duke of this thread. Suck on that you pasty cherry blossoms zoo beasty things.
I declare myself Arch-Duke.
I just watched it. Great great great episode. This show will be fondly remebered and I sincerely hope it will be picked up by another network. It had potential to be better than Star Trek or Star Wars or any of that other crap. This show wasn’t about the cool ships or the aliens, it was a look at what people in space will be like. It didn’t resort to mubo jumbo like the Trek’s did in order to sound smart. It was just a bunch of interesting complex people out in space trying to make a living. Instead of the one trick ponies of other Sci-Fi’s we had layered people with complex enigmas surronding them. If the story had been given sufficient time to develop it would have been without a doubt a classic. If hope is lost and Firefly disapears I’ll have to wonder for years just who Book really was, what the Blue Hands did to River, or any of the other undoubtable interesting plots that would rise up in later years. Firefly will be dearly missed.
I gotta hand it to FOX. Mighty unconventional of them showing a pilot episode in December. I’ve seen a few pilots here and there in January with the mid season replacements but kicking this series off a month early. Why that’s just sheer genius! Getting the scoop on all the other networks. Quite crafty.
Starting the series off on a Friday night after everyone’s done with finals or winding down after a hard week’s work, why there’s nothing else people want to do but sit down and watch a little tele.
But the coup de grace had to be the complete lack of advertisment for the show. It’s why I couldn’t be a network executive. No, sirree. Think about it, folks. No expectations! You’re just randomly flipping through the channels and BAM! By complete happenstance you find this show and start watching. What’s it about? How should you know, you’ve never heard about it before. But you’ve never heard a bad thing about it either, have you? Aha! There you go. So it can’t possibly be a subpar episode, can it? I thought not.
Well gosh, what a great pilot. Another episode or two like this and they’re sure to build up a good fanbase. I gotta hand it to FOX. Unconventional, sure. But when it works, it works.
I can tell they’re looking out on the horizon for this show. It’s sticking around for the long haul. Genius man. FOX, I tip my hat to thee. You surprise me each and every day I tune into your network.
And what DO they advertise? Joe Frelling Millionaire.
They can the best show on TV, and use it’s final-first episode to advertise the height of tackiness. Sheee…
Since it’s a thread about a show, I’m Assuming everybody will expect spoilers but just in case.
UNBLACKED SPOLIERS BELOW!
It was a great episode, and a great episode to start a series with, too bad they were too stupid to start with it. It was the best episode to explain the Space Show/ Western Show fusion, and the basics of the 'Verse. Without it some of the later episodes confused a few people I had talked too. The Kaylee dying thing was stupid too, because we all knew she wasn’t dead. The only good part about it was that they only let it last about 10 seconds instead of a cheesy over the commercial break cliff hanger like most shows would have done. It also would have been nice to know from the beginning of the show the religion doesn’t particularly like prostitution. Book never seemed to have a problem with it in any of the previously shown episodes, and I was curious if the new religion didn’t care. Anoria was always the most repectable member of the crew, and I had begun to assume that everybody respected her profession, it would have helped character development to have known that even though Companions are official, there is still some stigma attached. It was also interesting to see Book unsure and wierd at the end. He was on the verge of betraying the crew to help the lawman, which makes it more interesting that he adopted the crew so wholeheartedly under his protection in the later episodes, which is another thing that would have been better to watch from the beginning. Showing the pilot last also screwed up my pet River theory. From the beginning I was thinking that she had been experimented on by a super-secret Alliance group(which the blue-hand guys episode confirmed) I was thinking the Book was probably an agent of a super-secret Alliance group that was working counter to the first SSAG, and was sent to protect River from them. And in the episode where Book was given VIP care I was thinking I was definately right and was proud of my deduction. But if I had seen the Pilot first I would have known how unlikely that was and would not have wasted my time theorizing pointlessly.
Favorite lines(paraphrased).
“I was kicking around the idea of just shooting her first”
“Well, it is her turn”
The only thing I didn’t like was the end scene with Book and the Whore. It seemed a bit of over-the-top cheese to have the Whore absolve the Priest of his guilt. But that just one bad scene in an otherwise great episode.
Wow! Awesome premiere. This is my favorite new show this year. I’ll definitely keep watching.
That episode was fantastic. It was also the best ‘Jayne’ episode. It would have been interesting knowing just how mercenary Jayne really was.
Here’s hoping UPN picks it up.
I like the fact that, on “Firefly,” the people who aren’t experienced fighters DO NOT summon up heretofore unknown reserves of courage when in the heat of battle and save the day with a bold stroke. They freeze up. They fall prey to their fear. They wind up having to have their asses saved by someone else. That’s how it should be.
I missed everything before the first commercial break. What went on?
I cannot be sure I’m 100% accurate on the details here but…
It starts off in a war zone. Then Sergeant Mal Reynolds along with his platoon of a bunch of randoms and Zoe are part of a rebel group fighting the Alliance.
Fighting’s going badly for them but they’ve radioed in for backup. They know they’re losing but they still have hope because, well, they’ve managed to kill people right and left. One by one, though, their troup gets killed off until it’s down to Mal, Zoe, and random peon who is too scared to fight anymore.
The radio crackles and someone over the bandwidth says the zone is too hot and they’re not coming in to rescue them.
Not exactly sure how they get out of there, but the scene cuts to a nearby base exploding due to bombs from two nearby ships.
If I’m inaccurate on the details here someone correct me.
Anyway, that’s about up to the first commercial. It starts off 5 years later as the original ship crew is on a scavenger mission to collect the cargo from a deserted ship. They’re nearly identified by an Alliance cruiser as they make their escape, but enough details are reported to hurt any chance of easily selling off the goods they’ve contracted for to the original purchaser. And so the adventure begins…
I can’t help but think that tonight’s episode would have been a good starting episode.
Thank God for VCRs. That was a damn good two hours!
Darn it, I’m really going to miss this show.
They took away Farscape.
Now they’re taking away Firefly.
Oddly enough, the word that springs to my mind also begins with an ‘F.’
I very much enjoyed this too. I can’t believe they didn’t show it to start off the series! It laid the groundwork, introduced the characters, the whole bit. Jackasses!
One thing I did notice, was that Mal’s pistol isn’t actually a cap&ball revolver like I thought it was! We got a closer view, and I didn’t see any revolving chambers, it just had an old-timey look to it.
Fantastic opening episode, I’m going to really miss this series…
The pilot was the best episode out of the 13(?) of them.
Book was actually…not annoying. I liked him. I wouldn’t have guessed he was anything other than a Shepherd from this introduction.
This episode established character dynamics that were more subtlely touched upon in later eps – Mal’s authority over Jayne, for one. (Mal seemed a lot darker than he did in later days…the torment was palpable.) Inara’s compassion with Book. Everyone’s affection for Kaylee. (I thought her scene with Mal in the infirmary while she was loopy from sedation was incredibly sweet. Aw, little Kaylee…)
sigh I feel so…teased. I want to know the rest of these people’s stories!
I was all settled down in my nice comfy chair to watch and tape the episode.
Great opening scene, nicely setting up some backstory.
Clever bit using the phony transmitter thingy to lure the Alliance ship away so they could finish getting the box things.
I’m really enjoying this episode.
Then the screen goes to black static The sound is fine but no picture. Two minutes later the sound goes.
Damn you FOX 47. Damn you to hell with the white-hot fury of a trillion blazing suns. It’s not enough that I was in a car crash four hours ago, you have to take away the thing that was going to take my mind off the crash for a while, the one bright spot of an otherwise unblemishedly shitty day? And what, I’m supposed to catch it in re-runs? Bastards, bastards, bastards.
Oh but look. The station’s back on the air in time to show both episodes of the “Everybody Loves Raymond” hour. Joy.
Wait for a day or two, then load a newsreader and go to alt.binaries.multimedia.firefly. Every episode has been posted there within a couple of days of its airing.
Great episode. Apparently, there is a decent chance that UPN will pick up the show - Whedon pitched them last Monday, and they announced that their decision would be made within a week or so. So we should find out very quickly.
But time’s running out. Another week or two, and they’ll release all the actors and strike the sets now that production has halted.
Great, great show. I will miss this one more than other other show that has left TV.
I just discovered this morning that my FIL is a Firefly fan, when I wandered into the family room (we’re visiting them over Christmas) and saw him watching this show that had elements of both sci-fi and westerns. I’d followed the discussion enough to know that this had to be Firefly (he’d taped last night’s show and was watching it this morning), so I sat down and watched with him.
Great show. I hope UPN picks it up, and starts off by re-running the old episodes so that those of us coming in late can get caught up. (I only started hearing the buzz about this show about the time it started appearing only intermittently.) Or if they put the Fox episodes on DVD and got it out fast…
How to add insult to injury. Dang, Otto, that’s horrendous!
I’ll mail you my tape if you want to see it. I might have missed the first minute, but I got all the rest.