Joss Whedon (of Buffy the Vampire Slayer fame) created the scifi TV series Firefly. When people ask me what the series is about the best thing I can come up with is that it’s what Star Trek will be a hundred years later - once things have started to run down and rust. There’s a strong “western frontier” feel to the show also. The series aired less than a full season but picked up a strong fan-base, as sales of the DVD boxed set will attest to. The DVD boxed set includes some great features in addition to the never-aired episodes. If it’s not obvious by now, let me say it clearly: Im hooked!
One small detail that hooked me is the way that characters mix in the occasional Chinese phrase - mostly where anyone else would drop cuss words. There’s a long standing tradition of scifi shows creating their own dialect (Heinlen’s “Stranger in a strange land” coined grok, Farscape coined frell) so it’s not a surprise that Joss would follow suit with Firefly’s use of Chinese. Thing is, I have been curious what exactly the characters are saying since it’s a real language. The Firefly Chinese Pinyinary clears it all up - with translations listed alphabetically, and by episode. Wonderful.
Later this year (officially, September 30th) Firefly will make it onto the big-screen - take a look at Serenity: The Official Movie Website, where there’s a great movie trailer to whet your appetite.
I wonder if the TV networks will wake up once the movie hits the big-screen? If the big-screen debut is a wake-up-call, will a TV network pick up a second season of the TV show? If the current buzz is to be believed the movie is going to be a sleeper hit (remember how “Shrek” and “Pitch Black” took the movie execs by suprise?).
More Serenity Screenings Announced, Sell Out Immediately
Posted on Thursday, May. 12, 2005, to http://www.rottentomatoes.com/CABridges writes: “Following the sell-out success of the May 5th pre-screenings, creator Joss Whedon recently announced that advance previews of his movie “Serenity” would appear at twenty theaters in twenty cities, this time on May 26th.
By the next morning, well before the official list of cities was posted, networking fans on the Serenity movie site and elsewhere had diligently located half the listings through trial and error and several of the locations were already sold out. “Serenity” hits theaters wide (which means “normal” people can buy tickets) on September 30th.”
Now I just have to get the DVD boxed set back from friends to be able to watch the last couple of episodes in preparation for the movie.
In related news, Dark Horse Comics will be putting out a 3 episode mini-series of comics written by Joss that will bridge from the TV series to the start of the movie. The Dark Horse website says
The crew of Serenity once again find themselves broke and on the wrong side of a number of very large firearms, making the first issue a case study in how to mix intense, Whedon-style character interaction with cinematic action and violence. Artist Will Conrad and colorist Laura Martin paint a rough and wild world of adventure across a strange and dangerous universe.
The second issue:
On the run and out of cash, the ragtag crew of Serenity take on a scavenger mission with the hopes of earning enough dough to disappear for a while. Little do they know an old enemy is scheming to remake their acquaintance with the help of some covert-operatives known only as the Blue Gloves.
Details of the 3rd issue arent available yet, but it’s slated to be released in September.