My own Firefly story... My wife started watching it when it was first on Fox. She kept saying "You've got to watch this new show! It's amazing!" I stalled and resisted, I'm not even sure why. But she kept at it, and finally I tuned in. I can't remember what episode it was (maybe Shindig?). Anyway, I watched about 5-10 minutes of it, and pretty much dismissed it. Cowboys? In Space? Speaking Chinese? No thanks. I figured my wife just liked it because it had one of her favortie soap opera stars in it. Soon it was cancelled, I felt vindicated, and thought no more of it. But primarily due to the people on this board, I kept hearing how great it was, how they loved it so much, etc. Then the announcement that a movie was being made came, and everyone went bat-shit. I figured, for one of the few times in my life, that maybe I was wrong, and I ought to give it another try. When Sci-Fi ran the marathon, I planted myself. I remember saying to my wife after it was over "What the hell was I watching the first time??!?! This is brilliant!" She likes to remind me of that one. We bought the DVD's to get the unaired episodes, watched them all, and just loved them tremendously. We saw the movie several times, and hoped against hope that the box office numbers would take off. Alas it was not to be. I'm okay with it all. If I could wave my magic wand I'd renew it in a second, but I don't feel angry or cheated or anything like that. I thought it was clever, moving, exciting, and different. But yes, finally, most of us Browncoats have moved on.
It was the widespread enthusiasm for the show on this forum during and shortly after its run that led me to buy the DVDs sight unseen. Thanks all.
What do you guys mean we browncoats have moved on? Star Trek fans helped cause the second wave that kept coming. Joss Whedon is still in his writing hey day. Why not keep the heat on while he has influential power to answer to it? It may not be firefly it can be browncoats or something related. Besides some of those actors have commitments that would make firefly impossible, but the concept can be revived. Do anyone know Whedon's thought's on continue the story line?
I shouldn't claim to speak for anyone else. I was just agreeing with the previous poster. Like the Battle of Serenity Valley, we fought the good fight and lost. I have accepted it. If you want to reminisce, let's go for it. If you want to gather for another battle, I'm not interested in that. JMHO
You might be surprised how many shows have been canceled without airing all of their episodes; some have had as few as a single episode air, and because the ratings are considered unacceptable, not one more episode is ever aired nor seen. Firefly was actually lucky in that it got such an enthusiastic response from those who did like it that FOX Home Video (who apparently have a better head for business than the FOX network suits) delivered the entire series as intended, in order and including the unaired eps. I can't really address the wisdom of not at least getting the studio or network's value out of what they paid for by airing the remaining eps, since it often seems that what they fill the now-empty space with gets even lower ratings. And whether you want to consider it to FOX's "credit" or not, after they thoroughly sabotaged the show's ratings through pre-emptions for MLB, they then publically issued a mea culpa in the general language of, "We may have been a bit shortsighted in frequently pre-empting a new series, still trying to find its audience, and might have had better results had we thought of this beforehand. We'll try to keep that in mind in the future." Of course, the future was already too late for Firefly. As to whether the Western elements may have had an effect: of course they did! If you had seen the discussions here, you'd have seen many sci-fi fans who just couldn't wrap their heads around "science fiction" that had horses instead of hovercraft (although one of the unaired eps did have a hovercraft ) and bullets instead of blasters. To many, sci-fi is synonymous with ray guns and robots and spandex and aliens, not a lived-in universe of human beings who, despite living on other planets and traveling twixt them in spaceships, look more like the Old West than Metropolis (Fritz Lang's, not Clark Kent's). Now, there are several very good arguments that such a situation is more rather than less likely under the circumstances of humanity's exodus from Earth, but they weren't explained in the course of the show - IMHO, to Joss's eternal credit, because it made the show feel more real if it wasn't bogged down by a bunch of characters explaining to each other the things they should take for granted. In much the same way that the original Star Trek series simply took its circumstances and technology for granted, unlike later series that explained everything with technobabble and pseudo-science in an effort to "seem" high-tech, but more accurately just seemed silly (and sillier as it went on). And if the sci-fi fans couldn't wrap their minds around a concept that brought back the Old West on other worlds, then non-sci-fi viewers must've suffered a one-two punch: here was a Western show - already considered a 'dead' genre - but it had spaceships in it, too?? All the smart writing in the world isn't going to help when the viewer is suffering one of Sheldon Cooper's facial tic storms as he tries to figure that one out! Still, it's better - IMHO, again - to have a thoughtful concept, with solid characters and well-crafted storytelling, that dies prematurely than to be given nothing but the same old sitcoms and reality shows, and no effort to ever reach people on a level that rises above their necklines.
1)It was badly promoted. The promo's promised something quirky and funny. What they got was something way different. 2)They ditched the 2 hour premiere in favor of the second episode, which screwed up the viewing order. 3)They put it on Friday's, which very few people watch TV on Fridays. 4)It was way too expensive for how much little money it made. 5)It was on Fox. Rupert and his boys are ruthless, cutthroat bastards. So if something isn't a hit right of the bat then they cancel it. 6)Genre TV is a niche market that does well on cable, but usually bombs on network TV. Network TV is the viewing place of the average, American, moron. So Reality Shows, Crime-Investigation Shows, and Generic Sitcom's will always be watched before anything new a different.
Thrall, That's exactly what I was thinking in regards to network TV and NBCU's SciFi Channel. I honestly thought when I originally viewed Firefly, it was on cable - UPN or something. Most SciFi fans understand that civilizations don't mature at the same rate - hence the prime directive. So why not accept some planets having a western culture - for those that was against it. By no means am I expecting a Firefly return, but that does not mean we cannot have a spinoff prequel with browncoats or another aspect of the Serenity battle. If fans want it Joss will build it. Other than Summer Glau, Adam Baldwin, and soon Morena Baccarin with "V" what is the other cast up to anyway?
Fans DID fight for it. That's how we got "Serenity" in the first place. And frankly, that was an incredible achievement. I think for most of us "Serenity" was a satisfactory conclusion to the story, so we are all willing to move on. There's no reason to force more out of it.
There's a rumor Tudyk may join Dollhouse soon. Fillion is the lead on Castle (which is great). Jewel was a regular on Stargate Atlantis for a while, but that's over of course. Haven't heard anything about Glass or Maher.
Nathan Fillion is currently the lead in ABC's Castle series, a police procedural where he plays a mystery writer who tags along with - and assists - a female police detective. Alan Tudyk, of course, was the voice and the motion behind the robot "Sonny" in Will Smith's I, Robot movie, and will soon Spoiler: be seen in Joss Whedon's Dollhouse series on FOX . Jewel Staite was most recently in the last seasons of Stargate Atlantis, which just ended its run. EDIT: Understandably, Lindley beat me to it
Ptrope and the rest - Did you guys see this: Top 26 Great TV shows that got the quick hook http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20266883,00.html Do you agree with where they placed Firefly?
^I haven't even heard of most of those shows! One thing I will say that you might not know is that Firefly was the #1 seller on Amazon.com for a great many weeks back around the time Serenity was coming out. It stayed in the Top 10 for months.
That's exactly what I thought about http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20266883,00.html There was only two shows I may have wanted to see. Some of those shows may have deserved to have gotten the axe but we won't ever know because they were gone too fast to here any ads or comments. One thing I noticed is the cancelations were fairly even between each major network. Firefly was way too far down and I think Wonderfalls, Bryan Fuller - Dead Like Me and Pushing Daisies writer, may have been underrated.
While I greatly enjoyed the series on DVD, it didn't grab me while it was on the air. I would contribute that to the theory of airing episodes out of order. Traditionally popular shows appeal to the masses when there's no need to know the back story. A risk that something like "Lost" won. Makes you wonder what would have happened if they skipped airing the pilot.
A common enough view from those who have uninformed conceptions of his earlier work. It's not that different in style, humor, or awesomeness. Only subject matter.