Still Flying: Serenity and FFF.net, 20 Years Later

Wednesday, October 1, 2025 10:39 PM

Twenty years ago Serenity, the film that never should have been, was released. A big damn movie continuing the story of Firefly -a short lived series that only lasted 15 episodes - should not have existed. And yet the impossible happened.
As far as the general audience knew, that was where it ended. But of course, Browncoats the world over knew it was just the beginning. It may not have been the first of a trilogy, as many may have hoped, and it didn’t encourage the Fox Network to resurrect the series, but the stories lived on.
Not just the comics created by Dark Horse, shepherded by series creator Joss Whedon, or the continuing adventures by Boom comics. Never mind the series of novels set during and after the original series, or the original graphic novels including one that finally told the story of Shepherd Book. Then there were the board games, the RPGs… the list goes on.
But none of these quite kept the flame burning like the fan community that Firefly and Serenity inspired.
FireflyFans.net was such a community. It allowed fans to share their own art and fiction; it enabled them to share their own stories of how they discovered the series; it was a community where fans could meet, discuss various topics related and unrelated to the show, and to form close friendships.
For myself, FireflyFans.net was also the place where I rediscovered my love for writing.
Around the release of the movie, there was a guerilla campaign to market this cinematic underdog and the official Serenity website (browncoats.serenitymovie.com) encouraged fans to “form their own crew”. These crews, led by a chosen captain, would then be given tasks to do, all in aid of hyping up the film.
I joined a crew led by one SoulofSerenity on FireflyFans.net, and as the crew gathered, the roles were assigned. Eventually, this discussion thread became less about the Serenity Website and more about writing adventures for our new band of adventurers. The crew of “Destiny”, a Firefly-class vessel much like the one owned by those Big Damn Heroes, found themselves getting involved in all sorts of scrapes. Most of them, admittedly, were silly but it was an opportunity to write a group story, whilst being careful not to step on each other’s toes.
It was similar to another set of stories on the website.
Prior to the release of Serenity, FireflyFans.net had also hosted another story discussion: the adventures of the Sereni-Tree. Like the previously mentioned Destiny threads, this was a place for fans to chat and imagine all sorts of crazy adventures set in and around the verse. Whilst it was more fantasy than sci-fi, it was an opportunity to “just have fun” and not be taken too seriously. However, the development of certain characters, no longer just avatars of the writers themselves, meant that some of the stories started to take on a life of their own.
This is highlighted in threads 34 to 41 of the Sereni-Tree adventures, where a number of characters head to Boros (a familiar planet in the Firefly verse) and get caught up in a firefight there. Drama and death ensue, and this story starts feeling less like a light and frothy adventure and more akin to the action seen on the series itself.
In time, the decision to return the story to something a little more fun resulted in a new story starting elsewhere on the fan site.
Special Branch, a spin-off from Sereni-Tree, would allow fans to start exploring the storylines originally set up in the original threads but with a more serious slant. What came out of that idea was a whole new set of storylines, featuring new characters, betrayals and plot twists in a verse more closely resembling that seen in Firefly/Serenity, albeit with a sprinkling of fantasy elements.
The story was a chance for fans like myself to really sink their teeth into the narrative and work alongside talented writers in crafting a new tale, separate from the crew of Serenity. Although the likes of Mal, Zoe, River etc would not appear; organisations like The Alliance and the Blue Sun Group were present, as well as new insidious groups li

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