#Firefly
Maybe I’d never heard of Firefly before because its short stint on TV happened to coincide with when A & I didn’t have one and watched even less of it. Maybe it’s Serenity’s upcoming release that brought it on to our radar screen. Or maybe it was just chance.
In short, it’s a Steampunk/Western & Space Opera mash-up that seems to gel pretty well and isn’t totally insufferable. If you can make it through the pilot episode. It’s hard to do quality sci-fi. Especially for screen. Especially for TV. More so for network TV. It’s pulled off fairly well and in the five episodes that A and I have screened on DVD, it seems to be very well done. The story has gotten pretty interesting and the actors have brought some life to characters that on the surface could easily be cliched. Granted, we haven’t finished up the complete series … so maybe it all falls apart? Or maybe (just maybe) like so many other sci-fi programs from TV-land, it just fell victim to the curse that follows genre shows. Or maybe it’s the curse that follows every good show ever premiered on Fox. (See also: Profit; counter example: X-Files)
[...] Recently I posted about the short-lived Fox series Firefly and its upcoming related film Serenity. This past weekend, A & I saw Serenity at the theater. Overall? 3/5 stars if you’re unfamiliar with the series. 4/5 stars if you are. As I mentioned re: Firefly, it’s a pretty refreshing take on the sci-fi genre and worth watching if for no other reason than the novelty of a good Western/Space Opera mash-up. But I also happen to strongly favor the premise and think that there was a lot of unrealized potential there. (Cancelled after 11 episodes? That’s barely a warm up!) They fit the story nicely into the two-hour block and it works OK on its own but definitely lacks and/or takes you by surprise if you don’t know the setting and characters too well. [...]
November 16th, 2005 at 12:25 pm