Why you should be GLAD that Firefly got canceled

POSTED BY: HAKEN
UPDATED: Sunday, March 27, 2011 02:04
VIEWED: 8473
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HAKEN

Monday, March 21, 2011 5:12 AM

BLASTR.COM - Imagine, for a moment, an alternate universe in which Joss Whedon's sci-fi western wasn't cut down after its full-of-promise first season and, instead, ran for as long as its creators wanted it to. I think that universe would suck....

http://blastr.com/2011/03/why-you-should-be-glad-th.php

SISTER

Monday, March 21, 2011 1:24 PM

I would trade everything for more Firefly! Any idea of how to get to this alternative universe?

ZEEK

Monday, March 21, 2011 1:28 PM

Dollhouse - not worth it
TSCC - definitely not worth it
Dr. Horrible - I'd miss
Browncoat unity - I'd miss

Still I'd trade all that for Firefly season 2. Nathan would still be a geek god IMO.

GWEK

Monday, March 21, 2011 1:55 PM

Here's what I posted in the comments section:

Ridiculous. FIREFLY currently stands as the apex of Whedon's body of work because he was able to hit the ground running using everything he's learned on BUFFY and ANGEL. The loss of the show devatated his creativity in a way that I think he in only now recovering from. For seven years of FIREFLY, I would trade everything he's done since in a heartbeat (the only thing that I MIGHT have felt bad about would be DOCTOR HORRIBLE, which might well have been made anyway).

Although it picked up steam as it went, DOLLHOUSE is laughably bad when compared with FIREFLY. I just about cried when I did the math and realized that instead of DOLLHOUSE's premiere, I should have been watching the second half of the seventh and final season for FIREFLY. Tragic.

Honestly, I suspect Joss STILL would have done DOLLHOUSE--if only out of loyalty to Dushku. The likely impact is that the premiere would have been pushed back by a few months (summer or fall), and it would have been a much, much better show, with Joss bringing the energy of seven successful seasons of FIREFLY with him. (Take that, silly, one dimensional thinking!)

As for "the ripple effect," most of the roles the cast has taken have been steps down. Don't get me wrong, I think Baldwin is great on CHUCK, but I think there are other actors who could have brought much the same thing to the role. Jayne? Not anyone else in the world can do that.

The one thing I agree with the author about is that Nathan Fillion might not have exploded as he has. Although Boreanaz and Gellar have had modest success, it's nothing compared to the adoration that Fillion has garnered. On the other hand, neither of them have been as good to the fans as Fillion has been, so who's to say? Heck, with seven years of face recognition in the same role, if FIREFLY had gotten a little attention as it progressed, perhaps Fillion would have, too. Instead of starring in CASTLE, a post-FIREFLY Fillion might be starring in GREEN LANTERN or re-inventing the Indiana Jones franchise.

www.stillflying.net: "Here's how it might have been..."

BROWNCOAT1

Monday, March 21, 2011 7:10 PM

Can't say I agree with all the author's points. Definitely will never agree with anyone that Firefly being cancelled can ever be somehow construed as a "good" thing.

There's nothing to say that Joss having Firefly would have kept Dollhouse from seeing the light of day. As the author himself pointed out, Joss was juggling Buffy, Angel, & Firefly all at once. Not ideal, but not impossible. If nothing else, Firefly introduced many to the rest of the Joss shows.

No browncoats? Hardly. We may not have grown as fast as we did, or be as hard core as we are, but we were around before the cancellation, so why would one assume we would not be here without the plug being pulled?

Not a bad article, but just don't agree with the core arguements.

__________________________________________
Holding the line since December '02!

X.O. / Battalion O.I.C.

http://76thbattalion.homestead.com/index.html

http://76thbattalion.proboards.com

RIONAEIRE

Friday, March 25, 2011 7:50 AM

As evil as this might make me sound I can relate to this article.

"A completely coherant River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya

CLJOHNSTON108

Friday, March 25, 2011 4:18 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by RionaEire:
As evil as this might make me sound I can relate to this article.

"A completely coherent River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya

As do I. I think of Firefly the way we all think of Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, Elvis, John Lennon, etc.
Struck down in its prime, we were spared having to watch a slow, sad decline until, when it finally passes on, and we say, "Oh, jeez! Was that still on? I thought it died a long time ago!"

Actually, you could probably say that Fox "martyred" the show by treating it like it did, huh?

I really liked this post in the comments...

Quote:
Hendel on Mar 18, 2011 03:05 PM
I actually agree with this post. Firefly was my first tv show and I am completely broken over it's loss. There's just one thing: right now every episode of firefly is amazing. The are brilliantly written and performed. BUT if firefly continued, we wouldn't have the perfect firefly that we have. Every tv show has bad episodes and so would firefly. These bad episodes would lower firefly to the level of normal tv. It wouldn't be the most amazing show ever anymore.

RIONAEIRE

Saturday, March 26, 2011 7:31 AM

I agree, we have this amazing show that didn't have a chance to get lame, what we have is amazing without all the flaws that would have appeared as time went on. I guess I just don't trust people. Firefly has become something beyond regular TV.

"A completely coherant River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya

BIGGESTDAMNHERO

Saturday, March 26, 2011 1:42 PM

Ponder this.....
If Firefly had been a hit and went on for multiple seasons.........You might have had these.....
1. Replacement Actors: original actors would have been famous faster and may left Firefly for the Big Screen, starring roles in other TV shows. E.g. Nathan Fillion leaves to be replaced by Alec Baldwin..scary huh?
2. Guest stars: "Next week on Firefly Pamela Anderson guest stars as the Guild House High Priestess".
3. Serenity gets an overhaul. Phasers, photon torpedoes and a teleporter for those tricky core planet jobs. Cause "She's got no flash".
4. Jayne would have come out of the bunk closet. Since every show has to have a gay actor. E.g. "Six men came to kill me one time. Ooh! I still get chills.. And the best of 'em carried this. It's a Callahan full-bore auto-lock. Customized trigger, double cartridge thorough gauge. It is my very favorite gun....I call it Randy".
5. Aliens....Cause you can say SciFi without wookies!
6. Spin-offs. E.g. CSI Osiris, or Terrifying space monkeys in 3-D.
Update:
Just pondering the what ifs. Don't go all Browncoat wacko on me...Just joking about it. Seriously some of you need to get a life or switch to decaf.

"And I'm thinking you weren't
burdened with an overabundance of
schooling"

ANONYMOUSE

Saturday, March 26, 2011 2:59 PM

I can see the logic of the original comment. But against that is the fact that at least we'd have had more Firefly!

Let me give you a bit of background: I'm a UK citizen, and one of the 2% of the UK's population who those gorram freaks in TV Licensing don't believe exists, i.e. I don't have a TV. Except for weekends, when I visit my family, I don't actually watch TV at all and haven't since I moved out in 1999.

This is not a joke. We really do exist.

Anyway. While this means I'm not subjected to adverts or, worse, soaps, it also means I miss out on the few gems that TV has to offer until they come out on DVD - which is why (FINALLY getting back to the point!) I only discovered Firefly a few weeks ago.

This is not to say I wasn't aware of it; I was, from SF conventions I'd been to. I knew it was beloved and had been cancelled after its first season. Everyone who mentioned it spoke of it with a love that, at the time, I found baffling. But until I attended Redemption '11 and listened to a small group of filkers talking about it, I didn't really understand WHY it was beloved.

They didn't tell me much, on the courteous and considerate grounds that they didn't want to give anything away in case I decided to buy the DVD set. But what they did tell me sounded intriguing, in particular the idea of a ballet dancer using her training in combat. One filker sang what I now know to be "The Ballad of Serenity", and again I was intrigued. A week or so later I saw the set on sale, and I thought "Hell, why not?"

The impression I got from the filkers - that I'd like it - was not entirely correct. I LOVED it!!! It was completely unlike anything I'd seen before, and I've been watching it to death ever since. Not since Lexx have I been so completely grabbed by a show's different style; it was so refreshing.

As a result of my newfound love, I may be posting fanfic at some point. Be warned: I have a sense of humour that occasionally veers to the bizarre. The characters will *not* have an easy time of it. :)

"A government is a group of people - usually, notably, ungoverned."

- attributed to Malcolm Reynolds, commanding Firefly-class transport Serenity

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