I must be one of the 5 Buffaholics that have never seen even a second of “Firefly”.
Still, anything Joss cannot be bad.
Miller -
Given what you said, can you (or anyone) think of a movie that was successful based on a TV show that wasn’t (I’m talking ratings here, not quality).
Star Trek is exempt from this because even though it’s ratings were so-so, it’s resurrection was due to syndication success.
I’m looking for the pattern of:
TV-show with so-so/poor ratings —> successful movie (no steps in between).
I ought to add that I found the show quite interesting but I see the movie as one of extremely limited potential.
I think Rythefly got it right - this is a doorway to a Buffy movie.
I must admit I only watched the show sporadically (while I may have committed a fwe felonies to see Buffy each week…). While I liked it, liked the humor, liked the western-in-space thing, liked the characters somewhat … I just didn’t see any one episode with a terribly compelling plot. The universe they were in wasn’t any more riveting than the one from Andromeda, IMO …
So while I like little bits of it, is there any STORY here that will enable Joss to introduce the universe of Firefly and then propel a standalone feature-length movie (that’s the main luxury with a series–you have all season, at least, to get into everyone’s character arcs, etc., not 2 hours)?
I guess you missed the bounty hunter and Jayne’s doublecross. 
You are a prime example of how Fox hurt itself by showing episodes out of order. Individual eps may be weak when compared to other series but there is one hell of a story as a whole. There are so many unanswered questions. Two off the top of my head: Exactly what is Book? What the hell happend to River?
BwanaBob:
Police Squad comes immediately to mind. As a sitcom it ran only three or six episodes; less even than Firefly.
Then it became the successful Naked Gun movies.
There are probably other examples I can’t think of.
“Police Squad” was six episodes, BTW.
Some episodes of Firefly were IMO much better than others, especially given the way they were broadcast. It was either the second or third episode that had a reaver in it, and not knowing anything about the reavers, I didn’t care. However, the long section of the pilot where the crew was scared stiff of them (even though they never appeared) was so well put-together that I held my breath the entire time – if I’d seen that already when I saw the later reaver episode I would have been a lot more affected.
–Cliffy
Fiver, I think that is probably the ONLY example, but I counter the naysayers for more than one or two SUCCESSFUL shows that became SUCCESSFUL movies. The first Charlie’s Angels is one but is there a second? Most seem to have tanked as quickly as the SECOND Charlie’s Angels movie.
I can see that a studio would want to use Joss’s current infatuation with Firefly to try to pry a Buffy movie out of him. He was very disappointed that Firefly was cancelled so early. He plans his series in full season arcs and wasn’t done saying what he wanted to say.
Something that appealed to me about Firefly was that it was the anti-Trek–there were no cheesy aliens, life was hard for most people, and everything was a little dirty with none of the antiseptic future of the Trek universe. And people spoke a creole of English and Chinese, with the English straying some from Late 20th Century English, unlike on Trek. Joss made an attempt to visualize a different future than we usually get from TV.
Yes, some of the Western elements were purposeful–he and I are of an age where we saw a LOT of Westerns when we were young–but it was in other ways just a look at how people living under those conditions would dress and support themselves. The planets were colonized by poor people dumped off with little more than the clothes on their backs as soon as the planets were partially Terraformed. Wooden wagons pulled by horses would be used because the wagons could be built using local materials and horses make their own replacements and are not overspecialized, unlike machines. Thus transportation costs would be reduced.
Fiver named the only one I could think of, but you’re missing my original point entirely. A pre-exsisting fan base is a good bonus for a new film, but it’s nothing at all like a requirement for success. All else being equal, a movie based on a TV show that no one saw has as much chance of success as a wholly original movie. If no one saw the original TV show, how can that detract from it’s box office pull?
I’m actually not too sure about this. Buffy was largely paid for by the folks at Fox; the fact that it aired on rivals WB and UPN is mostly testament to the lack of seriousness with which the Fox suits viewed their property. And the show was never really that profitable, anyway; its ratings were decent but not great, even by the standards of cable networks. Rather, from a corporate standpoint, I think you could view the TV show as something of a loss leader, while Fox saw most of its profits coming from their cut of sales of ancillary merchandise: t-shirts, books, the video game, and so on.
But the Firefly movie is being produced by Universal. Fox produced the original TV show, but they clearly had no interest in continuing it in any form, so they released it back to Joss to shop around, no doubt thinking, “yeah right” as they did it. Now he’s got a deal. Fox doesn’t care; as the original producer, they’ll still get a cut if it’s profitable. Zero risk, in other words. But what possible leverage over Buffy will Universal get? Given Fox’s apparent continuing control, seems to me to be zero.
Now, if Fox had greenlighted the Firefly movie, I’d be totally agreeing that a major condition of the deal must have been that Joss would do everything he can to put together a Buffy movie soon afterwards. It’s Universal, though, so I don’t think that theory holds water.
Joss would love to do a BtVS movie. He’s said so more than once. SMG isn’t on board though, has never been on board, and won’t be on board until her movie career tanks. Of course, she has the lucrative Scooby Doo franchise, so that may never happen.
Are you intentionally stabbing me in the eye? 
I’m certainly happy for those firefly fans, but I can’t help but wonder why this show has such a fanatical following. I gave this show a shot when it premiered, but just wasn’t taken with the heavy-handedness of the “western-in-space” message. I barely got through that first hour, but the futuristic train was the final straw, and I never returned.
Despite my loathing of the basic concept, I found the first episode to be a terrible way to get a new viewer involved, (which we all were at that point). One reason I tuned into Buffy for a second week was that the premiere had balanced the neccessity of introducing the characters and concept with a coherent and exciting adventure. Firefly decided to put us in a rip-off of the “Great Train Robbery”, with characters that I didn’t know. Since the entire hour failed to give me a reason to care about these characters, I never returned.
Now, I suppose the show must have gotten better, but it does seem as if this weak opening, along with the horrid scheduling on Friday nights sealed its fate.
I do hope that if the movie happens, it will at least attempt to introduce who these people are, and why we should care. Relying on the fanbase of the show won’t be enough.
(Sorry if I came off as harsh, but I really was frustrated that the guy who so brilliantly conceived Buffy would make such basic errors in the premiere. I wanted to like this show, but I had no desire to sit through retellings of old westerns with the only novelty being that it was set in space.)
Alzarian, unfortunately the episode you watched was the 2nd pilot ep. The first pilot ep titled “Serenity” was a 2-hr pilot that gave more background on the characters.
I thought the futuristic train was pretty spiffy. And the episode had one of the all time great endings in television history. But, like kasuo said, that wasn’t the pilot, that was just the episode Fox nitwits decided to air first. The actual pilot was, naturally enough, the very last Firefly episode to air.
::happy dances::
I actually heard the news a few hours ago. The giddiness hasn’t worn off yet.
Caprigenus Chèvre wrote:
I have found that only a minority of Buffy fans seem to have taken an interest in Firefly.
Yeah, most of the Buffy fans I know (in the online fandom…) either are indifferent or hate it.
To second what kasuo said, it was Fox who decided to start off the series with the train robbery episode. They didn’t show the actual pilot episode until after the show had been officially cancelled, iirc.
With the episodes mixed around, the show often made reference to things that the audience was supposed to already have seen but hadn’t seen yet. On top of that they kept pre-empting the show and did little to advertise it so it was hard to know when it was going to be on.
Anyway, I’m trying to keep my excitement in check. There’s a long way to go until the movie ends up in theaters. Many more films get to the planning stages than ever actually end up getting made. However this is really, really cool news.
Do you suppose if the DVD does really well and the film is successful there’s any chance…
Well, I can dream, can’t I?
Eric
I just thought I’d add a note for all us Canadian Firefly fans, that the Space Channel is apparently running the series again, starting this coming Monday at 9pm, just after they start airing Stargate SG-1 from the beginning. So now I have a reason to watch TV on Mondays again…
Shiny, Horatius!
Firefly was never intended by Joss to be “Buffy Goes to Outer Space,” which could explain both Fox’s and the Buffistas’ disappointment. In a lot of ways it was a more “adult” drama with an older (for the most part) cast. Mal’s disillusionment and weariness made even the Depressing Buffy of the last few seasons seem chipper by comparison.
Alzarian, I will go with what the others have said: see it in order, from the beginning. It has some of the best dialogue I’ve ever heard on TV. Just know that you are far from the only person who was turned off by the first episode Fox showed and never gave it a second chance. Fox really shot itself in the foot with this one.