Shameless Firefly Fan

[astr0creep]

First off we are talking about science fiction movies, Grommie and the Star Wars prequels were crap in comparison to Serenity.  Spider Man movies and the X Men movies are not sci fi, but comic book movies.  Not even in the same catagory.

 

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Spiderman, X-Men and most comic book movies are science fiction. Because most comic books are science fiction.

The stories deal with fictional science mishaps, robots, aliens, mutants, lasers, god-like entities that can control space and the universe, etc. All those things usually happen either in the future or an alternate universe/dimension and many other elements make these stories Sci-Fi in nature. The least Sci-Fi comic that I can recall(with my relatively limited knowledge of comic books) is Batman and even that, because of the gadgets and the scientific nature of the main character, is stretching it...

 

Not all Sci-Fi happens in space.

 

As for liking Serenity, It is a Firefly fan's movie. If one does not know and love those characters, one will not enjoy the movie as much as one that does.

[Gromnir]

First off we are talking about science fiction movies, Grommie and the Star Wars prequels were crap in comparison to Serenity.  Spider Man movies and the X Men movies are not sci fi, but comic book movies.  Not even in the same catagory.

Also what is this fixation of River and her violent tendacies.  In the movie she got overly violent twice and the rest of the time she was well, nonviolent if not a little loopy.  Besides in the second violent bit it was going back and forth with Mal's battle with the Operative.

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comic book movies is, 'ccording to most genre listings you find, sci-fi. no doubt simpsons character comic book guy sensibilities is offended by such a thing, but it is true even so. there is sci-fi tech in each o' the comic book movies we mentioned... though we did forget batman beyond, so add 'nother to the list.

 

as to being fixated by river's violent tendencies... we ain't. she were simply a terribly written and terribly acted character. in the series she were the raison detre for a number o' episodes, and she were the Mystary, as is the popular label in these parts, but outside o' 1 episode she were never particularly important as a character... coulda' been off-screen the entire series with the doctor searching for ways to rescue after an initial botched attempt and the series would not have been needed to change much at all.

 

now in the movie, buffy/river and the operative were focal, which required those characters to be compelling. some people claims the operative were compelling for the simple reason that he were atypical. sorry, but that ain't 'nuff. if you is gonna create a character that is so enamored of giving speeches, then you better find somebody who is damned good at those soliliquy things... movie soliliquy. is different from plays. am, recalling a 7-up or sprite commercial in which the actor breaks character of the inner-city basketball player, and announces, "I played Hamlet at Cambridge!" the operative kept telling Gromnir that he to had played "Hamlet at Cambridge." there were no subtlety, and he sure not manage to make empathetic neither. is only partial the actors fault as he did have some terrible dialogue. he were the Mouth o' Sauron, he spoke for the Alliance, and as such joss felt he needed to gives explanations. bah. writethe concept o' the character weren't terrible, but sadly his conversion were predictable and maybe even a little insulting.

 

but river... river were simply awful. as the Mystary she were an ok character in the series, but when she had to do more than looks confused and slightly ill, like some freshman sorority girl after her first campus party, well then, the gig were up for river, 'cause she didn't have the chops. she weren't scary 'nuff or likable 'nuff for us to feel much o' anything 'bout her... and it weren't her violence that made us loather her. heck, we hate uma thurman as an actress, but we enjoyed kill bill, and the scene in which uma tears through the crazy 88s is a bloody masterpiece of camp. unfortunately, when buffy/river leaps into the hellmouth and confronts the reavers we rolled our eyes and groaned, 'cause it were just such a waste o' violence. we already knew that river were a superpowered, so taking on a dimly lit horde o' reavers were less impressive than the poorly choreographed bar fight, and that bit o' comic book art at the end of battle in which river poses for camera, bloody weapons in hand, were on par with vader's "NNNNNOOOOOOOO!!!!!!" from episode 3. river's character were written clumsy by joss, and acted poorly by glau, and filled terribly by... whoever.

 

and truth to tell, the operative and river characters were... unnecessary. after all, the whole movie is a rather heavy handed bit o' preaching 'bout the evils o' government, but joss were so inartful 'bout it. we gets the tragedy o' what were done to river and we is recognizing the terrible nature of a government that needs to have men like the operative, and we sees the over-the-top evil o' a government that would so desire to control its people that it ended up with the mistake o' the reavers, and a dead planet... a terrible secret which the govt had to keeps hidden.

 

...

 

the good episodes o' firefly let us see joss' jaded view o' tolitarian govt. nightmares w/o bashing us into a bloody pulp. name your 5 favorite episodes and then ask why were they best? 'cause o' the political metaphors, or 'cause of the character interactions? Gromnir LIKED mal and wash and kylie and jane and book... the others were ok too, but ultimate it were the smaller stories we enjoyed rather than the Mystary.

 

oh, and as you might recognize by now, the solarpolitical nonsense were not something we particularly liked 'bout firefly or serentity.... and we liked the series back when nobody seemed to know much 'bout the physics and geography o' the firefly universe. there were all kinds o' threads at the firefly fan sites trying to guess how there coulds be so many accessible planets w/o faster-than-light travel. old west meets space opera were a kewl setting, but we suspect that the main reason for that were it were cheaper to make such a show with black powder fire arms and corrugated aluminum buildings than it were to try and come up with expensive sets. nevertheless, even this indian boy from south dakota is a fan o' westerns, so we appreciated getting so see a sci-fi show/movie setting that owed more to Rawhide than to Star Wars.

 

the main characters o' serenity weren't well written or well acted. the story were more than a bit heavy-handed w/o being original in any meaningful sense. visually the movie looked likes a jumped up tv show, with 1 big space battle tossed into the mix.

 

honestly, am trying to think of what we really did like 'bout serenity, and the one thing we can come up with is that we liked firefly.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[metadigital]

... And, for whatever reason(s), it was better than most Hollywood SF crap. :D

[Judge Hades]

Best sci fi movie in the last 10 years.

[Dark_Raven]

Age is creeping up on Gromnir, his logic has failed him. River was well written and was played well. Now the rest of the movie was good, I do not know much about the short lived tv series but after seeing the movie, it has my interest to go out and buy the DVD collection and watch it.

 

The days of 1950's pulp sci-fi is long gone Grommie.

[Gromnir]

is not a matter of logic... never is. find a syllogism that proves or disproves that glau can act. you can't. neither can Gromnir. we didn't claimwe could. not used logic.

 

*shrug*

 

'course if all you want is buffy 2 in need of some psychotropics and a good shampoo, then river is your gal... is just too bad that glau is such a terrible actress. is there some scene you can point us to in which glau elevated the craft? did she has a particular sequence o' dialogues that were so compelling or evocative that you can replays in your noggin?

 

am not asking for olivier doing hamlet or deniro doing jake la motta... but we is honestly shocked that anybody were impressed with glau, even if they did thinks the river/buffy character were kewl.

 

look, we get it that some folks dig on the teen girl superhero bit. not a few women like 'cause it is a s'posedley strong female character of which there once were so few. we get that some guys like 'cause they gots some juvenile fantasy notions. no doubt you got reasons o' your own... but we were honestly offended by that terrible post-reaver battle scene, and river's/glau's performance in general. have seen sock puppet performances that elicited more emotion from Gromnir.

 

some movies can overcome sub-par acting from main stars. matrix is a prime example. keanu reeves? fishburn and weaving and the deceased gloria foster and the under appreciated joe pantoliano were all fantastic in the matrix. the movie not take itself quite so serious as the sequels, and it had a nifty, if less than original concept, and it were visually intriguing. the main character need not be the bestest character. heck, anybody who has read shakespeare's sir john falstaff character is aware o' this truth.

 

glau didn't have to be great, and neither did the guy who played the operative. they didn't have to be great, and in that, at the very least, they succeeded.

 

if all you needs to be satisfied is to see your teen girl super hero kick arse to be happy, then we suspect that you is gonna enjoy the heck out of joss

[Dark_Raven]

and don

[Fionavar]

I do have to agree that Glau's performance in Serenity was not her best. Though I suspect I may disagree with Grommie about her ability, I do think that the final battle scene was ... scripted too much. It lacked that realism of FF. I do not, however, feel that was her fault per se. In fact that final scene, was to me, quite contrary to FF's overall tenure. Though I am not certain, I feel that scene was scripted to make the movie palatable to the 'action audience.' I do like Glau's character acting - in fact Serenity up until half-way balanced River's usual reservation and withdrawal well. I'll never know the pressures brought to bear in the editing stage - so there you are.

[kumquatq3]

I do have to agree that Glau's performance in Serenity was not her best. Though I suspect I may disagree with Grommie about her ability, I do think that the final battle scene was ... scripted too much. It lacked that realism of FF. I do not, however, feel that was her fault per se. In fact that final scene, was to me, quite contrary to FF's overall tenor. Though I am not certain, I feel that scene was scripted to make the movie palatable to the 'action audience.' I do like Glau's character acting - in fact Serenity up until half-way balanced River's usual reservation and withdrawal well. I'll never know the pressures brought to bear in the editing stage - so there you are.

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[metadigital]

am not asking for olivier doing hamlet or deniro doing jake la motta... but we is honestly shocked that anybody were impressed with glau, even if they did thinks the river/buffy character were kewl.

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Never said that her performance was even credible. As for chatacters, in fact I think Mal has the most important and best character (Zoe and Jane's are terrific too; the Doctor is a wee bit clich