Jim, be sure to watch the out-takes after you watch the movie. Trust me. Nathan Fillion vamping a scene in front of the absolutely flabbergasted cast is hilarious! (Fans, you know the one I mean. “Dirt-nap.”) 
The man has fun with funeral scenes, doesn’t he? Remember Tracy’s recording in The Message?
Ok, I’m way wrong, apparently. The Sonny Rhodes to whom you refer did do the title song and is NOT the balladeer. There was something special about the balladeer, though, which I am trying to recall.
Sorry, I’m a bit spaced on pain right now… going for an emergency root canal in less than two hours.
Does the name Ronald Craig Williams mean anything to you? He’s credited as “Busker”, and the balladeer appears to be a busker.
w00t!!! Firefly marathon tonight on SciFi!
The “darker”, more bitter Mal from the original two-part pilot, who would insult Shepherd Book to his face and order Jayne to leave the table with extreme prejudice, was a more interesting character. Fox made Whedon tone him down into a more sympathetic character for the series, and he ended up a bit too Han Solo, too much the lovable space rogue. Without wanting to spoil it too much, the Mal in Serenity is a return to the original bleaker, angrier character.
i have never seen more than 5 minutes of Buffy/Angel, despised Alias and love original Star Trek.
I think Firefly is some of the best gorram TV ever made.
Enjoy!
Or not. That’s what my newspaper TV section is saying, but SciFi is advertising some Bruce Willis movie. 
11PM - 3AM EST, after the movies.
BTW, anyone watching these eps for the first (or whatever) time might want to print out the relevant sections of the Pinyinary so they can follow along.
I’ve been meaning to chime in here for a while. We had a film festival leading up to the release of Serenity. Here’s the last thread with links in the OP to all of the previous threads. Haven’t seen the movie in a while. Maybe this afternoon while I’m putting some decorations together.
GT
The movie was excellent, I really enjoyed it. Shame that Book had such a small part. They didn’t give Jayne his normal ration of great lines I noticed.
I nearly hesitate to ask this, but what is the scuttlebutt on why the show was canceled in the first place?
Jim
Low ratings, I think. FOX didn’t have much faith in it, though, and never really gave it much of a shot. The executives in charge made Joss write a second premiere (The Train Job), showed the episodes out of order, actually aired the real two-part premiere as the very last episode, and didn’t air two of the episodes at all.
Oh, and according to pretty much every *Firefly *(and Drive and Doll House…) discussion I’ve read online, because they’re also evil incarnate and live for nothing more than torturing us poor, trodden Whedonites.
I don’t have a cite for this, but my understanding is that the exec who greenlit the show was fired before it went to air, and his successor didn’t like the show. Hence, the show was aired out of order, frequently pre-empted, and under-advertised, and as a result, never found an audience until it came out on DVD.
Thanks for that link. I didn’t discover *Firefly *until after the movie came to DVD, so I missed all of that.
Glad you enjoyed it all, Jim!
I just got done re-watching the show. This time with my kids. They both loved it and my daughter doesn’t like Sci-Fi mostly except for new Who. Though she loves Buffy, having watched all of it on NetFlix.
I think I liked the show better this time around and I liked it much the first time. Now I wonder with the success of the *Avengers *if Whedon will decide to make one more movie for Firefly. He could get anything green lit now.
Several of the cast members have regular gigs going now, dunno how easy it would be to work out filming. I mean, I know Nathan Fillion would love to do it (Castle even dressed up as Mal for Halloween in one episode) but does he have time?
In the first episode, Inara (the courtesan) has an onscreen sponge bath. In the same episode, Kaylee (the mechanic) eats a strawberry.
Kaylee’s scene is about ten time sexier than Inara’s.
And River was nekkid in the cryo-thingee.
I’ll be in my bunk.
Evidently when Nathan Fillion sees Joss Whedon on his Caller ID, his customary method of answering the phone is “YES, I’LL DO IT.”