Firefly

[Crothian]

while shows like Firefly and Farscape fail

Farscape is a failure? It lasted 4 seasons! Sure fans wanted it to get more (they always do!) but if shows need 5 or more seasons to not be a failure I think the bar is really high!

 

[John Crichton]

Farscape is a failure? It lasted 4 seasons! Sure fans wanted it to get more (they always do!) but if shows need 5 or more seasons to not be a failure I think the bar is really high!

Yeah, fail is hardly the word. Not finish is more appropriate.

 

[frankthedm]

Orcs. They're space orcs.

Best orcs since Tolkien.

IMO A BIG chunk of what made Firefly / Serenity good was that Joss knew the TV show was being canceled and he would have only the one movie. The plot was served tasty and fresh and in good sized portions because he had to rush it to the audience. Once the movie started, he had to finish the story. This did mean a lot of folks had to die in a short time, but Joss managed to play his hand very well for the constraints he had.

None of this stretching out a 1 to two season show over half a decade with filler episodes and overused scenarios. No cranking out a movie with a barely related plot to the main series just because the suits want to inflate the property. And no finally being canceled after the show wears thin. Firefly is short and sweet and it is a classic because of its brevity.

It's weird, but Screwed By The Network worked in favor to the property's quality.

 

[Orius]

As to why shows like BSG, Andromeda, and Stargate keep going forever while shows like Firefly and Farscape fail, it seems like it's largely a result of conditioning. Sci-fi fans want their science-fiction nice and regimented, with established chains of command and unflappable leaders making inspiring speeches where they draw the line against the bad guys. Having a bunch of misfits constantly bickering and infighting and downbeat situations is apparently a turn-off.

Well, I can relate to that. I generally turn to speculative fiction for escapism, I'm not particularly worried about realism. If I want dysfuntion, I'll just return to reality.

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

As to why shows like BSG, Andromeda, and Stargate keep going forever while shows like Firefly and Farscape fail, it seems like it's largely a result of conditioning. Sci-fi fans want their science-fiction nice and regimented, with established chains of command and unflappable leaders making inspiring speeches where they draw the line against the bad guys. Having a bunch of misfits constantly bickering and infighting and downbeat situations is apparently a turn-off.

I think we watched different BSGs.

Mine had very flappable leaders, a muddy chain of command, people running from the bad guys most of the time, and the only surviving military were explicitly the misfits who spent most of the time bickering and infighting against the most downbeat situations imaginable.

Compared to most of BSG, Firefly was an example of over-the-top "Big Damn Heroes" cowboying it up in space. Firefly was a much lighter show.

For other points of irony... this thread has complained that Firefly's cast was too big for success. BSG's regular cast could swallow 6 of Firefly's cast.

As has been pointed out, the primary reason BSG was allowed to finish and Firefly was not is simple: Firefly was on a Network, and BSG was on a network. There are many other points of comparison, but at the end of the day, that one's the 400 pound gorilla.

 

[Mallus]

Mine had very flappable leaders, a muddy chain of command, people running from the bad guys most of the time, and the only surviving military were explicitly the misfits who spent most of the time bickering and infighting against the most downbeat situations imaginable.

I watched the same nBSG as you.

Compared to most of BSG, Firefly was an example of over-the-top "Big Damn Heroes" cowboying it up in space.

I watched the same Firefly as you, too.

BSG's regular cast could swallow 6 of Firefly's cast.

Not to mention the fact roughly a quarter of that cast was the same actors playing multiple version of their characters. Heck, I got confused, and I've been reading about clones and robots et al since I was five.

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

I watched the same nBSG as you.


I watched the same Firefly as you, too.


Not to mention the fact roughly a quarter of that cast was the same actors playing multiple version of their characters. Heck, I got confused, and I've been reading about clones and robots et al since I was five.

I think that was not a bug, but a feature. The better BSG scripts did a very good job of putting you inside the perspectives of the characters... who had every reason to be confused and conflicted.

I love both shows. Alas, I was a late-comer to both. I like TV shows, but I hate Television. DVD and Netflix are eminently practical solutions to that problem, but it does leave me without the capacity to vote with my dollar or viewership at times that matter to production.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think that was not a bug, but a feature. The better BSG scripts did a very good job of putting you inside the perspectives of the characters... who had every reason to be confused and conflicted.

I love both shows. Alas, I was a late-comer to both. I like TV shows, but I hate Television. DVD and Netflix are eminently practical solutions to that problem, but it does leave me without the capacity to vote with my dollar or viewership at times that matter to production.

Well, if you're not one of those mystical Nielson households, it doesn't matter anyway, right?

I suppose that DVD sales are actually better, because if the series lives long enough on screen to see the sales of its first DVD, a network at least might let that count for something. If you had watched it on TV, you might not have gotten the DVDs.

 

[Fast Learner]

I think we watched different BSGs.

My thought as well. BSG totally broke all of those rules.

Firefly might well have succeeded wildly on SciFi, it was Fox -- and the associated audience demainds -- that made all the difference.

Felon, I really think we have vastly different perspectives on "science fiction fans." I think what you're saying might well apply to "will watch science fiction but is no great fan" people, but not at all to fans.

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

Well, if you're not one of those mystical Nielson households, it doesn't matter anyway, right?

I suppose that DVD sales are actually better, because if the series lives long enough on screen to see the sales of its first DVD, a network at least might let that count for something. If you had watched it on TV, you might not have gotten the DVDs.

Well, since they can actually get a raw count of internet views (legitimate ones, anyway), that's actually the best of all.

Alas, I don't usually watch anything that way but The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, so I'm still not contributing to propping up good TV when it matters.

Honestly, TV is consistently bad enough (or I'm picky enough), that I'd rather wait until something has been on a couple seasons and has good recommendations from my friends before I spend time on it. If we had better structured consumer-driven plans for TV watching (or I had a way to get Hulu on my TV, rather than my computer), it would be easier to try something out when it was new.