Loved Firefly, but Serenity *sucked* (SPOLIERS)

POSTED BY: Jusl89
UPDATED: Friday, December 16, 2005 22:26
VIEWED: 39034
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Serenity was a big dissappointment for me. I'm going to list in decending order what dissappointed me the most:

1. Wash's death. Thanks Joss Whedon, for making me lose all interest in seeing any possible sequels or series revivals again. I can't imagine Firefly without Wash. He was a great part of the heart and soul of the series, and without him, there is no Firefly. There was no reason for him to die, and even the way he died was ridiculous. Wash's death prevented me from enjoying the ending of the movie. So great, they dealt a wound to the Alliance. Too bad the strength of the series wasn't about them fighting the Alliance or the Reavers, but was about the great characters and the character interactions. Wash's death was a result of trying to artifically increase tension in an action sequence, and what a waste it was.

2. The Simon-Jayne-Mal interaction. In Serenity, Jayne and Simon were acting like Ariel never happened, and that Simon never had that talk with Jayne in the episode "Trash". In fact, Simon acts like "Safe" never happened, and doesn't have Mal's trust. This made the Simon in Serenity seem alien to me, and I didn't see him as the same Simon in Firefly.

3. Book's death. I hated this for many of the same reason's as Wash's death. Book didn't need to die.

4. Too much action. The best episodes of Firefly were NOT action filled. Granted, seeing the Reaver ships fight the Alliance was awesome, but the rest of the action sequences were tired. River beating everyone up with martial arts? Everyone knew she would win, there was no excitement in it. And how the hell did Mal know to pretend to freeze up when the Operative hit him with the nerve strike? Didn't make sense.

5. Mal didn't kill the Operative? So the Operative kills all of Mals friends, kills Book, and leads to the death of Wash, and yet he walks away? If there ever was a use for a death, this would be it.

6. Jayne would not agree to go on a philanthropic "save the world" mission. This was way out of character. He didn't even ask what the payoff would be.

7. Ending secret was lame. So the Alliance created the Reavers? I've heard the same premise from worse sci-fi stories. And given the police state that the Alliance is, I woulnd't see how knowing that the Alliance created the Reavers would significantly weaken them.

8. Ending was a net loss. Mal lost alot at the end. The extent to how the Alliance was weakened was vague and uninteresting, without anything susbstnatial to show for all their efforts. In fact, most of the movie was directionless.

9. Not enough Inara. In Serenity, it wasn't even explained what she did or why she was on the ship. And at the end she is firing a bow and arrow? What the hell is that?

I could go on, but I'm tired. In my mind, Serenity never happened.

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Yeah, Jus, every last one of your points is pretty obvious to me. When I saw Buffy for the first time after seeing Firefly I wondered, "How could the same guy create both these shows?" After Serenity, I wondered the same thing.

Just rewatched The Message. They created more pathos from one scene and a tape recorded message than Serenity generated over the whole movie. What was up with those goofy hologram topped grave markers?

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

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while i'd like to get into a lengthy post disagreeing with a lot of what you said, but also agreeing with some, I can't. i'm a college student and i have to be up in 3 hours for a mid-term. so i'll just state a short obvious: there are some things that had to be changed between characters to bring it to the big screen. if Joss hadn't, he would have been alienating the potential audience who aren't familiar with Firefly. sorry, i'd really like to elaborate(sp?) more, but when i write about things related to the Firefly 'Verse, i get too passionate, and that means i get to lengthy, and i need sleep. but i'll check in tomorrow afternoon hopefully. sorry.

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I love[d] 'Firefly' and there were parts of 'Serenity' that I really enjoyed. But there were a couple of chunks of the film that simply reinforced in me why there's fanfic.

In my 'verse, Wash isn't dead and I'm stickin' to it. Just the way it has to be for me. Book I can sorta deal with – the jury isn’t totally in on that yet, but Wash? No way, Jose! Without him, it’s just not the ‘verse I signed on for.

But that’s okay. Everyone’s got their own point of view on the subject. And like I said, that’s why there’s fan fic.

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Quote:

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Originally posted by Rimcat:
But that’s okay. Everyone’s got their own point of view on the subject. And like I said, that’s why there’s fan fic.

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If everyone was this magnanimous with their own point of view we would be living in a far nicer world than we are!

extremely dimensionally transcendental

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Quote:

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Originally posted by Emma:

Quote:

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Originally posted by Rimcat:
But that’s okay. Everyone’s got their own point of view on the subject. And like I said, that’s why there’s fan fic.

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If everyone was this magnanimous with their own point of view we would be living in a far nicer world than we are!

extremely dimensionally transcendental

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Thank ya kindly.

No other way it *can* be, really. I can't make someone change their mind about something, all I can do is say why I feel a certain way and let them pick and choose from what I said.

Besides, I'm been part of another fandom that's *really* polarized about some issues. I certainly don't want to have that sort of stuff here in this 'verse.

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It's a shame that you were disappointed, but I don't agree with much of what you cite.

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Originally posted by Jusl89:
1. Wash's death. Thanks Joss Whedon, for making me lose all interest in seeing any possible sequels or series revivals again. I can't imagine Firefly without Wash. He was a great part of the heart and soul of the series, and without him, there is no Firefly. There was no reason for him to die, and even the way he died was ridiculous. Wash's death prevented me from enjoying the ending of the movie. So great, they dealt a wound to the Alliance. Too bad the strength of the series wasn't about them fighting the Alliance or the Reavers, but was about the great characters and the character interactions. Wash's death was a result of trying to artifically increase tension in an action sequence, and what a waste it was.

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There's nothing artificial about the increase in tension. After Book died I thought 'hey, maybe one death will be enough for Joss', so when Wash died the stakes were raised even higher. The ensuing corridor battle then sees Zoe, Jayne, Kaylee and Simon all getting hurt, and as each injury builds up to Simon getting shot you really get a sense that maybe no one (or at least very few of them) is coming out of there alive. If everyone had survived, all credibility for the seriousness of the situation is lost.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Jusl89:
2. The Simon-Jayne-Mal interaction. In Serenity, Jayne and Simon were acting like Ariel never happened, and that Simon never had that talk with Jayne in the episode "Trash". In fact, Simon acts like "Safe" never happened, and doesn't have Mal's trust. This made the Simon in Serenity seem alien to me, and I didn't see him as the same Simon in Firefly.

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Months have passed between the end of Firefly and the beginning of the film. Due to the wonders of cancellation we may never know everything that happened in the that time, but given how much relationships changed over the course of the series, it's logical to assume that period was also change-filled. In fact, it would be pretty ridiculous to assume everyone went into stasis at the end of Firefly and all relationships are exactly as they were when the series ended.

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Originally posted by Jusl89:
3. Book's death. I hated this for many of the same reason's as Wash's death. Book didn't need to die.

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Of course he did - the crew needed to experience that horror to push them on towards Miranda. Having said that, I think the manner of his death could have been vastly improved. The 'deliver vital message with last breath' thing is a bit tired.

Another thing to think about on the topic of death is if Wash and Book hadn't died, who would you prefer to have died in their places? The answer is no one, because Joss makes you care about each and every one of these characters. Of course, if seeing beloved characters die is too much for you then maybe you shouldn't be watching anything from the Whedon stable...

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Originally posted by Jusl89:
4. Too much action. The best episodes of Firefly were NOT action filled. Granted, seeing the Reaver ships fight the Alliance was awesome, but the rest of the action sequences were tired. River beating everyone up with martial arts? Everyone knew she would win, there was no excitement in it. And how the hell did Mal know to pretend to freeze up when the Operative hit him with the nerve strike? Didn't make sense.

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Serenity is a sci-fi action movie. Joss would never have been able to sell Objects In Space 2, as cool as that might have been. Action movies need action, and, though I do partially agree with the point about River's fights, I think all the other action sequences were both well paced and well executed, given budget constraints. I don't think I've ever tire of that space battle.

Mal knew to freeze up because he knew that the nerve cluster was there. How did he know? Because, as he said, he'd had it removed following some war wound or other.

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Originally posted by

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