Serenity

[dalekboy]

This is going to be a short post as the top half of my head is trying to detach itself. I just rewatched Serenity with Sharon. It was a little bit of geek together time.

It's not a good movie.

I'm far enough removed from Firefly at the moment that my auto-movie-watcher mindset kicked in. By 'not a good movie' what I'm saying is, it doesn't stand on its own. You need to have watched Firefly to appreciate the characters, and without that foreknowledge, the film fails to engage. None of the major characters get enough fleshing out to mean anything to anyone who doesn't know the series.

Case in point is Shepard Book. Lots of films have had the same idea - heroes seek sanctuary with an old friend, old friend gives some advice, gets killed, usually gets to utter a few last words to the hero that strengthen his resolve. It's an old formula that is used because it often works. It doesn't work in Serenity. Book is just some old dude who croaks. I felt more emotion for the woman on the vid report explaining what happened on Miranda.

Wash gets almost nothing to do for the film, and then dies. To a general audience member it's just 'oh, the funny pilot is dead.' You haven't been given the time or the chance to get to know him, to care about him.

Those are the two biggest examples, there are many more. And I know that I telling some of you something you already know. I mainly had to get it out of my head or it was going to keep me awake tonight.

For the record, I love Firefly and I love Serenity. It's a great season 1 finale. It's just not a good feature film.

Cheers,
Danny

Comments

[ghoath.livejournal.com]

have you had your eyes checked yet?

[(Anonymous)]

Fair enough; in its defence, though, the first scene on Serenity with Mal moving through the ship and having a one-line exchange with each character is probably one of the most effective introductions I've ever seen done - it sets up each character so quickly and efficiently!

(Oh, uh... Greg Tannahill here, feel free to visit at http://amongthedust.blogspot.com )

[phred-has-sonar.livejournal.com]

I saw Serenity before watching Firefly. The impression I got from the movie was Shepard Book was a character that appeared in maybe one or two episodes of the series. Inara's profession wasn't exactly explained or even hinted at either. I initially thought she was a priestess or monk of some kind. It spun me out a little finding out she was really a high class intergalactic call girl when I sat down and watched the series. Wash's death in the movie felt really pointless. It was like he was killed off just for the sake of it.

Despite all that, I liked the movie a lot. Enough infact to motivate me to watch the series. Admittedly though, I like the series more.

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

Too many characters for a movie, tried to do too much with all of them.

Seemed to me to kind of miss the point of the show - the character interaction and the dialogue was the best feature of the show, and the nature of the movie meant it had to have lots of action instead.

Disappointing. I would SO much rather have had six episodes of the show instead. But hey, better than no new Firefly at all.

I disagree

[kitling.livejournal.com]

I saw the movie before the series - having had no previous desire to see the series - in that whole over hyped way. I really enjoyed the movie as a stand alone thing. The main characters - who are river, simon and mal in the movie work well together and their relationship with the other characters is all clear. I think the movie works well as a stand alone and does what it is meant to do - which is encourage people to see the series.

Says the girl who immediately borrowed the series after leaving the cinema.