Firefly: "That Redneck Show"?

Thursday, January 27, 2005 12:22 PM

I was thinking recently about image problems and then it occured to me that Firefly/Serenity might well have one. Not only that, it might be damaging to the chances of the movie succeeding too. Is Firefly seen as a show by rednecks, about rednecks, for rednecks?

Think about it. The "Southern" theme tune and musical motifs, the crew from the losing side of a civil war, a lot of the outfits and stylisation of the outworlds. Heck, even Jubal Early was a Confederate General.

You can see how those in just vague contact with the show might think it would be angled that way. Undoubtably some of you are thinking "So what if they do, what's wrong with it being Southern?" Well, I'm sure I'm not breaking this to you but for one, the US is fairly bitterly divided at the moment between the red and blue states so that's going to dramatically cut the available audience. For another, the world hates rednecks. Oh yes, we do, the one in the White House in particular. Granted, America is split 50/50 over Bush but the rest of the world is far more decisively against him.

Redneck is shorthand for thoughtless, violent, bigotted American, whether that is justified or not, and if Firefly/Serenity is seen as being "on their side", it's not going to attract much of an audience.

Now I think this is just an image problem. I don't think Firefly is thoughtless or bigotted but if we're going to attract the mass audience that it needs (remember, a $100m gross requires over 13m people to go see it) then we're going to need it to break out beyond the small circle it's currently sitting in.

Of course, this wouldn't have been an issue if Fox had let the show grow over a couple of seasons and spread the word beyond the obvious.

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