Someone please break Joss' fingers! [spoiler]
POSTED BY: Toadsmoothy
UPDATED: Saturday, January 1, 2011 01:04
VIEWED: 40555
PAGE 10 of 13
In regards to Wash, I was more shocked than disturbed, it's a quick, sudden death, and he doesn't look like he suffered long. Zoe will bear the brunt of that loss. Again, it seems to purposely portray his actions as heroic in death, by landing the crew safely.
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The dynamics of this discussion still has not changed, despite what Tim Minear, Firefly writer, said at Fanboy Confidential. www.fanboy-confidential.com/interviews/episode-8-tim-minear/
Minear mentioned that the Inara vs The Reavers story had not been broken: the breaks in the story - the plot's turning points - have not been decided. That means it does not have to be Reaver Rapists. Inara could be imperiled by being Lost-In-Space. The important thing is she rescues herself and Mal apologizes to her after disrespecting her.
Someone like Jane Espenson could tell Whedon and Minear during a story conference that Reaver Rapists are bad for the story and, please, don't go there because it gives many people an allergic reaction. And when Whedon suggests an Inara/Kaylee or a Kaylee/River lesbian story (anybody here read Buffy-Season 8?), Espenson can shoot down those bad ideas, too, because those stories are for very small audiences watching cable TV or reading comics, not broadcast TV.
I may have discovered the secret sin of Joss Whedon. He did not have a story conference with other writers for the Serenity script. There were no PAID AND CREDITED writers for him to bounce ideas off. All he had was producers and Universal executives. What are producers and execs required to know, other than money? Next to nothing (Remember Joss vs the confused producers of Wonder Woman?). Nobody told Whedon to not kill Wash. If he was going to kill Wash, he needed to outline the story for Serenity II, beforehand, so the other writers could see where he was going with the story in the next movie. If Joss doesn't have a plan for the aftermath of dead Wash and dead Book, he is not allowed to kill them. When Harry Potter was published, there was an obvious plan for 6 more books. There needed to be a plan for the Serenity trilogy. I don't think there was.
The Joss Whedon script for "Serenity", where Wash lives, is
Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/two
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Joss needed Serenity to be as dramatic as possible. A film in which all the BDHs survived would have satisfied the Browncoats, but for the casual viewer it would have seemed too pat, too clichéd, too within the norm.
What we got was epic; it had heroics, and it had tragic loss. Serenity is the better for it.
wo men ren ran zai fei xing.
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Quote:I agree with you, Wash and Book had to die. I think that their dying should change the entire direction of Serenity II. What I don't want is ordinary reality, where people die, there is grief, and life goes on. (So dull. See Serenity: Float Out for an example.) What I do want is Wash's death to be a stage 5 Cataclysm! I actually got a sci-fi idea of where to go next for that cataclysm. Maybe I should write a story so others can dump on it? Wash's death changes what happens in the two weeks immediately after Serenity ended. There is disaster! Nothing goes smoothly.
Originally posted by ecgordon:
Joss needed Serenity to be as dramatic as possible. A film in which all the BDHs survived would have satisfied the Browncoats, but for the casual viewer it would have seemed too pat, too clichéd, too within the norm.
What we got was epic; it had heroics, and it had tragic loss. Serenity is the better for it.
What I think is that Joss Whedon did not have specific ideas of what Serenity II and III would be about. Joss doesn't need his fingers broken. He needs help from other Professionals: writers PAID to criticize Joss' ideas and add some of their own. Writers with big egos and many produced scripts that he respects.
There is an hour of Jane Espenson and Tim Minear On Writing TV (Serenity LA 2009)
Not enough people have seen all 6 videos on Firefly
The Joss Whedon script for "Serenity", where Wash lives, is
Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/two
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Quote:
Originally posted by Platonist:
...no one survives being held hostage by Reavers...Quote:
Well, River might, as she proved in the BDM.Quote:
...It’s just a very horrific way for her to have to prove herself to him and earn his respect. I’m not sure if the means justify the ends with this kind of scenario. She would be ruined professionally.
Not only that. If I were Mal, seeing what she was capable of, sex with Inara would forever be out of the question. haha I just wouldn't want to go there. If you catch my drift.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Platonist:
In regards to Wash, I was more shocked than disturbed, it's a quick, sudden death, and he doesn't look like he suffered long. Zoe will bear the brunt of that loss. Again, it seems to purposely portray his actions as heroic in death, by landing the crew safely.
At what price? We learn later that Zoe is pregnant with Wash's child. That child is forever deprived of her father. Zoe is deprived of her beloved husband. Where is the good in any of that? People don't just "shake off" that kind of tragedy. The rest of the crew was heroic in that scenario. They were bloodied but they all got to walk away from it. Considering the child on the way, they arguably had less to live for than Wash did. I guess I just don't see how it's going to be a happy crew after that. I think Wash proved his heroism in War Stories. I think he deserved to live, and Zoe deserved to have her husband and that family deserved to be. It was the one mostly functional relationship amongst the entire crew. Maybe Joss had a problem with that. I think the relationship between Zoe and Wash grounded things on the ship.
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Quote:
Originally posted by two:
The dynamics of this discussion still has not changed, despite what Tim Minear, Firefly writer, said at Fanboy Confidential...
Thank you for making sense of what happened with the BDM. I have heard it said that Whedon and Minear wanted to go a lot darker with the series but that Fox exec's refused. In the interview you cited Minear said that the Inara vs Reaver rapefest is what convinced him to join the project, which makes me seriously wonder about his mental state.
The upshot seems to be that Fox deserves my thanks as much as Whedon/Minear, not only because Fox aired the show (albeit poorly) but also because they kept Whedon and Co. from ruining it. When Whedon had the chance of doing entirely what he wanted, he started killing off beloved characters and painting the story into a corner.
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Quote:
Originally posted by ecgordon:
Joss needed Serenity to be as dramatic as possible. A film in which all the BDHs survived would have satisfied the Browncoats, but for the casual viewer it would have seemed too pat, too clichéd, too within the norm...
Tell that to J.J. Abrams. All of his Star Trek heroes lived and gee, he's gonna bring 'em all back in a sequel in 2012. He even gained an extra Spock in the bargain! I guess he didn't get the memo about possible casual viewer dissatisfaction if you don't kill off main characters. I don't think they're worrying about it as they're laughing all the way to the bank.
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You just lost all sympathy from me for mentioning that crapfest of a movie by JarJar Abrams. I don't care if it made money at the box office, because it was mainly the Star Trek title that did that, not what was on the screen. That would have been a much better movie if the entire crew had been put out of their misery.
wo men ren ran zai fei xing.
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Quote:
Originally posted by ecgordon:
You just lost all sympathy from me for mentioning that crapfest of a movie by JarJar Abrams. I don't care if it made money at the box office, because it was mainly the Star Trek title that did that, not what was on the screen. That would have been a much better movie if the entire crew had been put out of their misery...
You may not like Abrams or his Star Trek but, the upshot is, Abrams got a sequel and Whedon didn't.
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