# Serenity (Open spoilers a plenty! You've been warned!)) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 29, 2005, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011 "2005-09-29T13:49:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 22
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/421 "2005-10-07T19:54:10Z")
> [@CandidGamera](#): > > They don’t “only want”, they “prefer.” And it’s not like anyone went to see Titanic without being psychologically prepared for the - spoiler - big boat sinking at the end. Right. Because that was where the chief emotional attachement was in that film. To the boat. :rolleyes: > [@](#): > > I don’t. I refused to draw a conclusion on the matter. You quoted my entire post, but you don’t seem to have read it. Oh, stop being disingenuous. It doesn’t suit you. > [@](#): > > And I’m not laying down the gospel from on high, here - just explaining why one shouldn’t be incredulous that another person is upset at laying down eight bucks to see the movie version of a rollicking scifi Western show they enjoyed, only to get jabbed in the eye with a fire poker. Well, I’m a little curious as to why you bothered with the movie in the first place, since you decided months before you saw it that you [weren’t going to like it.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=322591) And, yeah, I’m still surprised that you expected this movie to be different from pretty much everything else Joss Whedon has ever done. And I think its sort of sad the way you shy away from any sort of genuine emotion in entertainment. So, yeah, I’m a little puzzled by why you’re bothering with this thread. You don’t like the movie. You don’t like Joss Whedon. You don’t like drama. We get that. Do you have any additional information to share, or shall we just go round and round on this for another eight pages? ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/422 "2005-10-07T20:21:23Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > And, yeah, I’m still surprised that you expected this movie to be different from pretty much everything else Joss Whedon has ever done. And I think its sort of sad the way you shy away from any sort of genuine emotion in entertainment. I’m not **CandidGamera** , but as someone who feels Wash’s death was cheap: Out of Whedon’s stuff, I’ve only ever seen Firefly, and there was certainly nothing like Wash’s death in the existing episodes. It’s also a bit insulting to newcomers; I’ve encouraged people to watch the series before they saw Serenity, but it’s taking it a little too far to require people to know Joss Whedon’s little quirks as well so they can “properly” appreciate a movie. And yes, in my opinion, the death was cheap, precisely because there _was_ no emotion such as you said. It went from being relieved at the landing to the shock of the spike coming through the window, a brief “Wash? Wash!” then they’re out of the ship and taking up positions around the elevator, with Zoe going into soldier mode (read: displaying no emotion aside from that short-lived attempt at fighting hand to hand with the Reavers). There was nothing in that scene that really conveyed the full weight of what happened: a major crew member just _died_. There’s plenty of ways it could have been done much better; one was mentioned earlier about having the Reavers catch Wash and actually get a chance to eat someone (either that or Zoe puts a bullet through her own husband’s heart, which would have been a much more vivid display of her character than simply soldiering up.) Joss paid $100 for a burger and fries at McDonald’s when he could have gotten a seven course meal at a five star restaurant. This is, of course, only my opinion (and a few others’). Obviously a lot of people feel differently, but I think either interpretation is valid. ---
**Author:** ![Silentgoldfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@Silentgoldfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silentgoldfish)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/423 "2005-10-07T20:30:55Z")
**CandidGamera** , of course Wash’s death didn’t have the intended effect on you. You spoiled that for yourself by finding out that he dies before you went in. You KNEW that he was the only one left to die at that point so of course it didn’t raise the stakes for the rest of the characters for you. You’re really not arguing from a defensible position on this one. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/424 "2005-10-07T20:50:32Z")
> [@BayleDomon](#): > > I’m not **CandidGamera** , but as someone who feels Wash’s death was cheap: > > Out of Whedon’s stuff, I’ve only ever seen Firefly, and there was certainly nothing like Wash’s death in the existing episodes. It’s also a bit insulting to newcomers; I’ve encouraged people to watch the series before they saw Serenity, but it’s taking it a little too far to require people to know Joss Whedon’s little quirks as well so they can “properly” appreciate a movie. I don’t think this is anything like a “quirk” of Joss Whedon’s. It’s a part of his method of storytelling, but its hardly unique to him. **CandidGamera** doesn’t care for that method. Which is fine, but he knows Whedon uses it, and should have expected him to continue to use it in the movie. Acting like its some sort of betrayal is ridiculous, to anyone who has even a passing familiarity with his work. If you _don’t_ have any familiarity with his work, _and_ you dislike this method of storytelling, then yeah, his death is going to come as a shock and leave you disappointed and unhappy. Which is the risk you run whenever you take in anything new. I’ve never said or meant to imply that you must be familiar with Joss Whedon’s work to properly appreciate the movie, although I do think you need to be familiar with the original TV show to get the most out of the movie, and out of Wash’s death in particular. Even then, there seems to be pretty strong anecdotal evidence that you don’t need to have seen the TV show to at least _enjoy_ the movie, even if the impact of Wash and Book’s death is going to be partially lost on you. I mean, if you don’t like cubism, fine. But if you know you don’t like cubism, don’t go to the Picasso exhibit and complain that you got ripped off. You knew exactly what you were going to get, and you only have yourself to blame for exposing yourself to it. > [@](#): > > And yes, in my opinion, the death was cheap, precisely because there _was_ no emotion such as you said. It went from being relieved at the landing to the shock of the spike coming through the window, a brief “Wash? Wash!” then they’re out of the ship and taking up positions around the elevator, with Zoe going into soldier mode (read: displaying no emotion aside from that short-lived attempt at fighting hand to hand with the Reavers). There was nothing in that scene that really conveyed the full weight of what happened: a major crew member just _died_. There’s plenty of ways it could have been done much better; one was mentioned earlier about having the Reavers catch Wash and actually get a chance to eat someone (either that or Zoe puts a bullet through her own husband’s heart, which would have been a much more vivid display of her character than simply soldiering up.) I’m talking about the emotional response of the _audience_, not of the characters. Zoe’s response was necessarily muted, because of the situation they were in and the nature of her character, which is that of a professional soldier who has seen dozens of people she cared about die horribly. She’s not going to break down in tears while there’s a horde of flesh-eating maniacs beating down the door. I don’t really see why having Wash get killed by Reavers outside of their spaceship would be any more satisfying than having Wash get killed by Reavers inside of their spaceship. “I hate that Wash died! He should have been tortured, first!” That’s _better_? I’m glad that, if he had to die, at least he died quick and clean. And I don’t really see a way to have Zoe shoot Wash without violating her character: she wouldn’t shoot him, she’d get herself killed trying to save him. Might have been interesting to set it up so Mal has to shoot him, and she can be resentful of him in the sequel or something, but the way the plot was laid out didn’t really make this feasible. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/425 "2005-10-07T21:00:20Z")
> [@Silentgoldfish](#): > > You spoiled that for yourself by finding out that he dies before you went in. > You’re really not arguing from a defensible position on this one. Well, I am. 🙂 I heard rumors _someone_ would die, and kept hoping _Let it be River. Let it be River._ I’d have prefered that Zoe have to shoot him among the Reavers, but it’s a movie and that’s the way it was written. “Come on, Baby, we’ve gotta go.” was well done. I f _Firefly_ was going to continue, I’d be pissed that a major character was killed off, but I think the movie was written to end the series, and it ended well. As it is, it could be _River the Reaver Slayer_, which does have a certain ring to it. She fights better than Zoe or Jayne, flys the ship, she’s psychic and can figure things out better that Reynolds. I’m sure she can do engineering better than Kaylee and not even get dirty. Who needs the rest of the crew? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/426 "2005-10-07T21:17:27Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I’ve never said or meant to imply that you must be familiar with Joss Whedon’s work to properly appreciate the movie, although I do think you need to be familiar with the original TV show to get the most out of the movie, and out of Wash’s death in particular. Our local reviewer, whom I normally enjoy and trust quite a bit, [seemed to have a major bug up his ass about this movie](http://www.mountainx.com/movies/s/serenity.php). About three quarters of his review of _Serenity_ was complaining about how heavily it relied on having seen the television show, which he’d never seen, because he didn’t like it. This is a guy who is happy to talk about how [Oliver Twist is best watched "From the standpoint of Polanski’s filmography](http://www.mountainx.com/movies/o/olivertwist.php). Bugs the hell out of me when someone goes into a movie knowing he’ll hate it. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/427 "2005-10-07T23:27:03Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I’m talking about the emotional response of the _audience_, not of the characters. Zoe’s response was necessarily muted, because of the situation they were in and the nature of her character, which is that of a professional soldier who has seen dozens of people she cared about die horribly. She’s not going to break down in tears while there’s a horde of flesh-eating maniacs beating down the door. Yes, and so the action keeps right on rolling along while the audience has to deal with this sudden death. For me it just felt empty. > [@](#): > > I don’t really see why having Wash get killed by Reavers outside of their spaceship would be any more satisfying than having Wash get killed by Reavers inside of their spaceship. “I hate that Wash died! He should have been tortured, first!” That’s _better_? I’m glad that, if he had to die, at least he died quick and clean. And I don’t really see a way to have Zoe shoot Wash without violating her character: she wouldn’t shoot him, she’d get herself killed trying to save him. Might have been interesting to set it up so Mal has to shoot him, and she can be resentful of him in the sequel or something, but the way the plot was laid out didn’t really make this feasible. No, no, no. Try “I hate **the way** Wash died.” I can accept that he died. I am right there with Joss when he makes a point of not protecting his main characters via deus ex machina. Wash dying, even if it’s to heighten dramatic tension, is a-ok by me. What gets me is how _extraneous_ the death is. The only way it could be more disconnected from the movie around it is if Darth Vader appeared outside the window and choked him to death. If Wash is to die, let him die from a fate that may very well await the rest of the crew. _That_ heightens the tension. Sure, he gets killed by a spike through the chest, but once the crew is in the elevator room, there’s no danger of that happening again. However, if he gets snagged by Reavers, then any one of the characters could also get snagged at any time. Or shot. Or stabbed. Or anything during the final shootout. Besides all that, not once has a Reaver been able to do their thing on-screen. Maybe it’s just too gory, but given how visceral and animalistic the Reavers are, having their one successful kill on the ground be by a spike that got lucky doesn’t really make them all that much more deadly. They’re not really real, whereas laying hands on a crew member and tearing him apart creates a major immediacy and makes them that much scarier. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/428 "2005-10-07T23:49:16Z")
> [@BayleDomon](#): > > Yes, and so the action keeps right on rolling along while the audience has to deal with this sudden death. For me it just felt empty. Well, that’s the entire point. He died in the middle of combat. There’s no time to deal with it right then: sometimes, there’s more important things going on than the death of someone you care about. I found it very effective, and a refreshing change from the way most major screen deaths are handled, with slow motion and a dying speech. He goes from a leaf on the wind to shish kebab in a split second, and that’s the end of Wash. > [@](#): > > No, no, no. Try “I hate **the way** Wash died.” I can accept that he died. I am right there with Joss when he makes a point of not protecting his main characters via deus ex machina. Wash dying, even if it’s to heighten dramatic tension, is a-ok by me. Sorry, that’s how I meant to phrase it. But honestly, I can understand why **CandidGamera** hates the fact that Wash died. The people who are getting hung up on the manner of his death are the ones that confuse the heck out of me. > [@](#): > > What gets me is how _extraneous_ the death is. The only way it could be more disconnected from the movie around it is if Darth Vader appeared outside the window and choked him to death. If Wash is to die, let him die from a fate that may very well await the rest of the crew. _That_ heightens the tension. Sure, he gets killed by a spike through the chest, but once the crew is in the elevator room, there’s no danger of that happening again. However, if he gets snagged by Reavers, then any one of the characters could also get snagged at any time. Or shot. Or stabbed. Or anything during the final shootout. But he _did_ get killed by Reavers. They fired a giant fuckin’ spike through him! And then they come very, very close to killing everyone else, with an impressive array of various spiked, bladed, serrated, and generally pointy implements. Wash just got killed by the biggest one they had available. I don’t see why the particular implement that kills him makes the death so much cheaper. > [@](#): > > Besides all that, not once has a Reaver been able to do their thing on-screen. Maybe it’s just too gory, but given how visceral and animalistic the Reavers are, having their one successful kill on the ground be by a spike that got lucky doesn’t really make them all that much more deadly. They’re not really real, whereas laying hands on a crew member and tearing him apart creates a major immediacy and makes them that much scarier. The Reavers kill plenty of people in the movie. The colony at the beginning, the Alliance ships in orbit, the chick on the hologram they find on the dead world. (And that’s not counting the TV show.) I liked that they never show it: leaves what actually happens to the imagination of the audience, which is almost always going to be worse than anything they show up on screen. It’s a shame that more directors don’t follow this lead: monster movies usually stop being scary once they show the monster. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/429 "2005-10-08T00:00:47Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > That aside, it’s trivially easy to disprove your basic thesis that audiences only want happy endings. You know what the highest grossing movie of all time is? _Titanic_. Tell me that one had a happy fucking ending. You have to look at the WHOLE picture. Leonardo Dicaprio died AND I got to see Kate Winslet nude (again). Sounds like a happy movie to me! -Joe, shallow ---
**Author:** ![CandidGamera](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/candidgamera/32/2878_2.png) [@CandidGamera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CandidGamera)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/430 "2005-10-08T00:53:33Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Right. Because that was where the chief emotional attachement was in that film. To the boat. :rolleyes: Ah, that’s your angle. _shrug_ One - Titanic wasn’t based on a TV show of radically lighter tone. Two - Titanic was a dyed-in-the-wool romantic melodrama, and advertised as such. Three - the ending of Titanic, as presented, is telegraphed from a mile away. It’s expected. > [@](#): > > Oh, stop being disingenuous. It doesn’t suit you. I’m not being disingenuous. I refused to assign Whedon a motivation precisely because I could not make a case for any of them, as I said. You can take me at face value or not at all. > [@](#): > > Well, I’m a little curious as to why you bothered with the movie in the first place, since you decided months before you saw it that you [weren’t going to like it.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=322591) And, yeah, I’m still surprised that you expected this movie to be different from pretty much everything else Joss Whedon has ever done. And I think its sort of sad the way you shy away from any sort of genuine emotion in entertainment. So, yeah, I’m a little puzzled by why you’re bothering with this thread. You don’t like the movie. You don’t like Joss Whedon. You don’t like drama. We get that. Do you have any additional information to share, or shall we just go round and round on this for another eight pages? My first post in this thread covers the why. And this movie IS different that what Whedon has done before, as I mentioned in a previous post. The only real equivalently annoying twist I can think of was Xander’s eye gouge. “Genuine” emotion? Heh. Because Zoe was so terribly convincing… I don’t like the movie. I do like Joss Whedon, usually. He’s usually lighter than he was when he wrote Wash’s death. I do like drama. I don’t like cheap cliches or melodrama. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/431 "2005-10-08T00:56:44Z")
> [@CandidGamera](#): > > One - Titanic wasn’t based on a TV show of **radically lighter tone**. What show were you watching? There was nothing **light** about _Firefly_. Or do you consider people getting kicked into thrusters, sliced up by psycho girls, shot in the face, belly, shoulder, and the ever-present threat of being eaten alive to be comic gold? ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/432 "2005-10-08T01:05:01Z")
I don’t agree with **CandidGamera** ’s points but now you’re the one being disingenuous, **silenus**. \*Firefly \*might not have been _Duck Soup_ but neither was it _M_ – it had more humor in it than most sitcoms, some of which was dark, but a lot of which was also light. ---
**Author:** ![Gozu\_Tashoya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7993a0/32.png) [@Gozu\_Tashoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gozu_Tashoya)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/433 "2005-10-08T01:05:57Z")
> [@BayleDomon](#): > > And yes, in my opinion, the death was cheap, precisely because there _was_ no emotion such as you said. It went from being relieved at the landing to the shock of the spike coming through the window, a brief “Wash? Wash!” then they’re out of the ship and taking up positions around the elevator, with Zoe going into soldier mode ( **read: displaying no emotion aside from that short-lived attempt at fighting hand to hand with the Reavers** ). There was nothing in that scene that really conveyed the full weight of what happened: a major crew member just _died_. I’m gonna go into my take on Wash’s death in a second, but I wanted to get this out of the way first. Zoe’s hand-to-hand fight with the Reavers **was** part of her emotional reaction. No part of the plan involved hand-to-hand combat with the reavers; Zoe was supposed to stay behind the crates with everyone else and blast away. I don’t recall what Jayne said, but it was basically “What are you doing?” with the subtext, “This wasn’t the plan,” and/or “You’re in my line of fire.” (BTW, he should’ve brought more ammo for that chaingun of his.) Zoe, in this scene, was so angry/devastated/in shock that she did what was one of the least rational things she could have done. Maybe she wanted to die, maybe she wanted to extinguish the reavers singlehandedly. Read what you will into it, but it was all because of emotion. Beautiful scene. Now, personally, I left the theater irritated with the way Wash died. It seemed like a cheap “…and then they got hit by a bus” device, and these devices are, generally, inherently manipulative. As I thought about it, though, I realized that Wash’s death was **absolutely necessary** for the reasons mentioned above, and **not cheap** also as mentioned above. After thinking about it, I decided that what I’m irritated with was the _way_ the scene was shot. Basically we’re watching Zoe, Mal, and Wash talking, then a _huge freakin’ spear_ enters from off-screen left, and impales Wash. To the audience, the spear comes out of freakin’ nowhere. Personally, I think if the scene was shot in a way that let us see the reaver ship coming around - in the background, out of focus - to shoot at Serenity, the scene would have been better. That’s pretty much it. I just wanted to see it coming. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/434 "2005-10-08T01:08:52Z")
> [@Aesiron](#): > > I don’t agree with **CandidGamera** ’s points but now you’re the one being disingenuous, **silenus**. Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/435 "2005-10-08T01:08:52Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > But he _did_ get killed by Reavers. They fired a giant fuckin’ spike through him! And then they come very, very close to killing everyone else, with an impressive array of various spiked, bladed, serrated, and generally pointy implements. Wash just got killed by the biggest one they had available. I don’t see why the particular implement that kills him makes the death so much cheaper. Yeah, but it’s so impersonal. There’s no actual Reaver shoving the spike into him. They fired it at the ship and happened to score a hit. Hell, I bet they were disappointed, one less person to hunt. Eh. I’ve done what I can to present my view that Wash went out like a punk. I admit it’s been a week since I saw it, and I may have missed details in the initial surprise, but that’s the feeling I took away from it, as strongly as you think it was the best way for Joss to handle it. The rest of the movie is A-grade material, so I’m not going to let this one scene take away from the whole. I might go see it again in the next few days and try to look at it in a different light, see what it does for me. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/436 "2005-10-08T01:27:05Z")
> [@Aesiron](#): > > I don’t agree with **CandidGamera** ’s points but now you’re the one being disingenuous, **silenus**. I don’t think he’s being at all disingenuous. _Firefly_ is a dark fuckin’ universe. The protagonists are cold-blooded killers. Cop killers, no less. They get tortured by psychopaths, and have bits cut off of them. One of the most important characters in the show is a teenage girl who has been subjected to _experimental medical techniques by the government until she goes insane._ The only reason none of the main characters died in the series is the damn thing didn’t last long enough: we only had half of a season, and that half was spent establishing these characters so that when Joss started killing them off, we’d give a shit. All the movie did was pay off on that build-up. And it did so beautifully. Look at how badly it affected **CandidGamera** : it was such an emotional suckerpunch that the guy wants to boycott Joss Whedon entirely. That’s some effective storytelling, right there. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/437 "2005-10-08T01:55:50Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > What show were you watching? There was nothing **light** about _Firefly_. Or do you consider people getting kicked into thrusters, sliced up by psycho girls, shot in the face, belly, shoulder, and the ever-present threat of being eaten alive to be comic gold? Oh, c’mon. The TV series had its dark moments, to be sure. Yet in the middle of them, there were hilarious lines. In “War Stories,” where Mal is in a life-or-death fight with Niska after being tortured to death (and then revived) by him, remember when Zoe says, “This is something the Captain has to do for himself,” and Mal croaks out, “No, it’s not”? **I** sure laughed then; I don’t know about you. And of course, that’s the “I’ll be in my bunk” episode. Plus, the TV show had episodes like “Our Mrs. Reynolds” and “Trash” which were flat-out funny, and “Jaynestown” where the seriousness at the end didn’t exactly outweigh the humor of Jayne as hero of Canton, with a statue and a song and all the rest of it. BTW, did you notice that in the TV series, the interior of _Serenity_ was _literally_ lighter than it was in the movie? They didn’t make it so dark in the movie just for kicks; they were conveying a message. The movie is darker, both literally and figuratively. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/438 "2005-10-08T02:04:16Z")
I’m not saying I didn’t laugh. Hell, I laughed out loud any number of times. _Firefly_ had a great sense of humor. _Mal: “And Kaylee, what the hell’s goin’ on in the engine room? Were there monkeys? Some terrifying space monkeys maybe got loose?”_ But a _light_ show it wasn’t. Everybody but Kaylee and Wash had a dark side, and I’m sure we would have seen them if the show had made it to the second season. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/439 "2005-10-08T02:21:25Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Everybody but Kaylee and **Wash** had a dark side, and I’m sure we would have seen them if the show had made it to the second season. Jealous husband. Once or twice. Okay…maybe not so dark…more a slightly whiny gray. But still :D. - Tamerlane ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011/440 "2005-10-08T02:24:53Z")
> [@CandidGamera](#): > > a TV show of radically lighter tone [long pause] We’re talking about _Firefly_, right? Did you happen to miss the episode in which Mal is tortured _to death_, only to be revived so the torture can resume? The same episode in which Mal gets most of ear sliced off (prompting what I thought was one of Jayne’s best lines when he realized Zoe has returned to the ship with the ear wrapped in a napkin - “Whaddya wanna do? Clone him?”)? _That_ TV show, right? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011.md?page=21) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/serenity-open-spoilers-a-plenty-youve-been-warned/324011.md?page=23)