Waiting for SERENITY
Apr 22nd, 2005 (MJD 53482.7) by Michael
What you care about is the ships — and mine’s the nicest.
— Kaywinnit Lee “Kaylee” Frye
. . . and it was to have hit the screen today at A Theater Near You. But ’twas not to be, alas; the current release date is now 30 September, when we will have forgotten the assault of advertising for Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Typo.1 (As they say on Vulcan, “Oy vey.”)
Ah, well. If you haven’t viewed all the episodes of the late and much-lamented Fox TV series Firefly, on which the film Serenity is based, the complete series is available on DVD and worth every nickel.
Meanwhile, until the end of September … just call me Dr. Browncoat and take me out to the black …
NOTES
- Larry Niven once said that an SF author should always save typos, since you never know when one will come in handy as a name or an alien word. I always figured that’s where George Lucas got “Sith.”
Which typo, you ask? The one where your left ring finger hits the S instead of the W. I have no idea which one you had in mind. [return]
So I finally got around to watching Firefly … unbelievable. Seriously some of the best television I’ve ever seen. It just pushed every one of my buttons.
I can’t wait for the film.
Likewise! Whedon has this knack for figuring out what we expect characters in a television program will do, and then not only having them do the opposite but convincing us that our expectations were way off the mark in the first place. A number of sf writers know where those buttons are and how to push them; he’s one, and Firefly certainly hit mine. I’m delighted you found it!
Side note: I’m a TOS trekkie from ‘way back before syndication, who lost most of my interest when Star Trek became a three-incarnation industry. Firefly put the storytelling zip back into sf TV for me.