Loved Firefly, but Serenity *sucked* (SPOLIERS)
POSTED BY: Jusl89
UPDATED: Friday, December 16, 2005 22:26
VIEWED: 39034
PAGE 8 of 12
wooo hooo!!!! And as promised, 
.
keep flyin'
EngineAngel
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Quote:
Originally posted by Tracy:
Yes, he did say that to me - I was already fine after Alan had told me so, but Joss reassured me.
In Joss I Trust...
I am not only going to kiss you
but I just may go see the gorram movie again.
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I think you're missing a significant aspect of Jayne's character development. In the series, Jayne developed a friendship of sorts with Book. They lifted weights together, and often talked about spiritual matters (such as during The Message). In the BDM, when Jayne makes the so-called "out of character" decision to help Mal "misbehave," he cites Book's advice, that it's better to do something right if you can't do something good. Yes, this is unlike Jayne from the series. But it's a stroke of genius on the writer's part that we actually get some payoff from Jayne's tv relationship with Book. How cool is it that the payoff comes in the form of a moral decision--maybe the first important moral decision Jayne has ever made?!! Fantastic.
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Quote:
Originally posted by DonCoat:Quote:Well, actually, that's not what he says, and (to me) isn't a very close paraphrase.
Originally posted by liminalosity:
Also! Thanks for the line Book burbles at the (his) end "Do whatever River says" dang, I have been trying hard to hear that one. Thanks.
The lines actually go as follows:
Book: "...River..."
(Book grabs Mal's face)
Book: "I don't care what you believe. Just believe it. Whatever you..."
He never completes the line. As written in the shooting script, it's "Whatever you have to." Apparently Joss liked the ambiguity of the uncompleted line. I'd guess that it was shot as written too, but this is the reading Joss chose in the final edit.
I'm not sure how anybody can get "Do whatever River says" out of that. While River is certainly on his mind, to me Book is simply repeating his earlier call for Mal to find something to believe in.
It's all very existential, especially when you consider that the Operative is condemned for being a true believer, while Mal is being urged to find faith.
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Ain't about you, Jayne. It's about what they need.
Ooooh I have the Visual Companion now, and isn't it pretty!
I'm wondering if anyone else is having trouble finding it in stock? Is it selling really well? Hope so. I'm sorry if that means anyone here has to wait, but I'd love to see it sell right out. I poured through it a bit this evening, and read the script to the point where Mal tells the crew to saddle up or get off at Haven. I wanted to at least get a sense of how much the film tends to waver from the script, since I've never read a Joss script before, and to read the whole Book dies scene. I've read several posts quoting differences between script lines and spoken lines in the movie (and other things, ie: keens/keels), so I wanted to have it in front of me before responding. The wavering is interesting, hopefully there will be discussions on that later. Of course I have an excuse now to go see it again this week (having already brought in all the friends I can muster without actual preaching). I would have added the idea 'do what River says' to my attempts at lip reading Book's line. But it makes more sense to me too that he says something more along the lines of - choose and act for everyone's sake, as the script says "Whatever you have to". The whatever could sound like River with a mouth half full of fake blood (yuck). He does say River's name, but reading this, I think it's only farther back as the script indicates.
Um, existentialist, I think - only to a point. I don't think Book would tell just anyone 'I don't care what you believe, just believe it.' I think that message was specifically for Mal, because I think Book understands (like Inara and Zoe) that despite the PIA ways Mal has been acting since they met, in Mal's deepest heart, he is a great man. I don't think Book would be telling Jayne 'I don't care what you believe, just believe it', because, while I believe Book sees Jayne has potential (last few episodes of the show), Jayne still struggles with even understanding why a person would choose to put someone else first. At least till he slides the bottle to Simon. I don't think Book would have said that to many people. Anyway, just my thoughts, no one else's.
Veering wildly OT now (but still Book/Mal related) there's some other stuff in the VC version of the firelit scene on Haven, that looks to me suspiciously like Joss is hinting that Book and Mal have some abilities too. Page 99, and the first bit of 100. Book has some lines that sound an awful lot like someone who knows he's about to die. Then there's the bit I've been wondering about since the first time I saw the movie. The firelit scene suddenly cuts to River lying cuffed to the grate, with Mal crouched behind her. I've been thinking everytime 'is she seeing/hearing them, or is Mal connected to and seeing her?' Maybe I'm fishing, but I've always thought that scene placement was odd. If Joss was
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Quote:I got something different out of that dream sequence, though not on first viewing. I think it harkens back to River's comment in the cargo hold: "He didn't lie down. They never lie down." Yet in the dream, she's being told to lie down by an authority figure (representing the Alliance) and is resisting.
Originally posted by liminalosity:
The firelit scene suddenly cuts to River lying cuffed to the grate, with Mal crouched behind her. I've been thinking everytime 'is she seeing/hearing them, or is Mal connected to and seeing her?' Maybe I'm fishing, but I've always thought that scene placement was odd. If Joss was trying to indicate that River hears them, then why'd he put Mal in the scene behind her. Was it just to bump the line "I coulda left her there?" Fits right in with the bit where River yanks herself out of the nightmare where the class lies down, and she's cuffed to the grid, then we cut to Mal waking startled as Wash yells that
Think I'm seeing ponies and plastic rockets?...goad, goad.
I see it as a playing-out of her schizophrenia. River knows about Miranda, but she's desperately trying to suppress that knowledge -- but her "neural stripping" makes that almost impossible. (She can't not feel.) So whenever she's placed in a situation that forces that knowledge to the surface, she deflects it, never stating the underlying truth -- the Reavers don't lie down (unlike the rest of the Mirandans). Little River won't lie down (though the Alliance is trying to force her to). It's going to get much much worse (when we all find out that awful knowledge).
One thing that's quite clear after repeated viewings: even River's craziest remarks aren't crazy at all. The brilliant part is: that's true even of the things she says in the Firefly episodes. Everything makes perfect sense once you have the key.
The only conclusion I can draw is that the events in Serenity were all clear in Joss' mind from the beginning. The story would have played out more slowly if the series had continued, but it would have come to the same place.
Anyway, back to your thoughts -- I didn't see it quite as you did, but it's entirely possible for Joss to write scenes that work on multiple levels at once. The "tore up plenty" exchange is a prominent example.
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Ain't about you, Jayne. It's about what they need.
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some people liked the phantom menace. some people hated serenity. you get weirdos in every fandom. its a sad fact of life.
think about it here - serenity was a first up, nothing mainstream behind it to pull people in. hardly anybody had seen firefly. so some concessions needed to be made. hell, they even gave us some bits just for us (the three switches, i finally saw the thing on the third and fourth viewings). joss couldn't make a movie that only we'd go see. inferior numbers... terrible thing that.
there hasn't been anything like serenity in ages. it had no big stars, no big franchise like the other genre films (may i once again snipe at the first two star wars prequels, i do that alot). why should it be like firefly anyway?
Extra note - the river fight scenes, come on ppl, dont you see? summer glau in a dress, beating ppl up, it pulls in the teenage boy audience! i know - i went to see it with three of them.
peace out
Kizzie
XxX
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Quote:Y'know, for me, in the FF pilot, when they got away from the alliance so easily with the crybaby and a moonin', well then, what's all this problem with the 'fantastical' or 'unreal', anyway?
Originally posted by Grounded:Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
Book dying the very moment before Simon reaches him,.....,River's climactic and utterly fantastical triumph over the reavers).
I definitely agree about these moments being unreal, if not the others.
"We live on a spaceship, dear."
It's ALL good!
Chrisisall BDM fanforever
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Well I don't have faith in Joss regarding bringing Book & Wash back. I just can't see how this can work. Options I see:
1) Prequel - sigh... ok... better than nothing. This could be placed before the series, this would be a disaster (we wouldn't have Simon, River or Book!). This could be in the eight months between the series and the movie. Ok... but still bad cause we already know Book and Wash die and we're still mourning their loss. The one big advantage this has is that it solves the problem of having uber River psychic and martial arts master always ready to save any situation. The big flaw is that it's like reading the ending of a book and *then* reading the book all out of order. Bad... very bad. We loved Firefly, all we wanted was more Firefly (not the BDM as Serenity was made).
2) Resurrection - oh my gawd no Joss, this is NOT Buffy!
3) Flashbacks - argh... please no, this is still a really bad choice.
4) Ignore Serenity and pretend it never happened and just continue on with Firefly (an idea I had but nicely suggested in the next post, thanks Dan).
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I like option 4.
Ignore Serenity completely and continue on from the last Firefly episode. Just forget that Serenity was ever out on the Big Screen. It never happened. That's the only way the show can go on.
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Thanks Dan, I'd forgotten about that option (I've edited my post). Yes, seriously I'm tempted to say the best option is to pretend the movie never happened and just continue with Firefly from the end of the series.
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