Firefly Reconsidered: Why Firefly Isn't "Hall of Fame" Great

[dragoner]

Stargate Universe very much felt to me like someone had seen the BSG remake and went "Can't we do that, but in Stargate?"

Pretty much.

Episodic vs serial is also a artifact of the way shows were watched, you might see them once or twice a week, unless you had tivo or something. Which meant that if you missed an episode, it took a whole season re-run to see it again. Now people binge on a service like roku or netflix. It also informs us as a viewer as to how we watch TV; and not really being an American, I go for days without watching TV because when I was a kid, there were only three channels anyways, and the TV was always dominated by siblings and my parents.

Writing is another thing, it has always been hit or miss, with B5, JMS did everything, which is pretty amazing. Sometimes it all just falls together, such as I was reading about Blade Runner, and Roy Batty's dying word was just "Crap" and he improvised the whole "Teardrops in the rain" speech, Deckard was supposed to shoot Rachel in the head, and say if he didn't do it someone would, the street scenes were done by going to Melrose ave and getting a bunch of local punk rock and new wavers as extras, and the whole "dark and smokey" was them experimenting with neo-noir, which in turn has lead probably to the dark and edgy of today's TV. Ridley Scott called it the perfect storm.

 

[MGibster]

And in yet other news that I'm getting older; it's been 19 years since Firefly first and final season aired in 2002. When I started watching Star Trek back in 1982 only 13 years had passed since it was cancelled. Wow. I didn't watch Firefly in 2002 because I had something better to do than watch television during whatever night it ran. But a lot of my friends enjoyed it and I have to say it practically changed their lives. They started hanging around "Brown Coats" and at least one woman I know decided her first tattoo would be a Firefly inspired tattoo. For years afterward every time I'd get together with some of my friends the conversation would turn to Firefly and I'd feel left out. (Queue sad music)

I finally got around to watching it in 2005 before going to see the movie. Did it change my life? No, but I enjoyed it and I wish we got more episodes. I wouldn't put it in the hall of fame though.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

And in yet other news that I'm getting older; it's been 19 years since Firefly first and final season aired in 2002. When I started watching Star Trek back in 1982 only 13 years had passed since it was cancelled. Wow. I didn't watch Firefly in 2002 because I had something better to do than watch television during whatever night it ran. But a lot of my friends enjoyed it and I have to say it practically changed their lives. They started hanging around "Brown Coats" and at least one woman I know decided her first tattoo would be a Firefly inspired tattoo. For years afterward every time I'd get together with some of my friends the conversation would turn to Firefly and I'd feel left out. (Queue sad music)

I finally got around to watching it in 2005 before going to see the movie. Did it change my life? No, but I enjoyed it and I wish we got more episodes. I wouldn't put it in the hall of fame though.

I still think it's a very good show, and not to reiterate the points that I put in the OP (and the comments), but it's just hard for me to enjoy with the whole Whedon stuff and Inara stuff and Lost Cause stuff.

And I get it makes me a hypocrite- I still love Buffy/Angel to death ... well, okay ... there are parts (Charisma Carpenter at the end of Angel ...) that I can't take ... but I can't unlearn things. I want to just forget and appreciate the great banter and amazing cast of Firefly, but it's hard.

Ahem.

Anyway, the main thrust of it is that anything that ir really good and gets cut short tends to benefit because it never has a chance to decline. Those rock stars that died early never had to hang around and make bad albums in their 40s. Those TV shows that were ended early didn't have to meander around for the last three seasons like the X-Files.

Even Buffy. I mean- I love Season 6 ... but that's a pretty idiosyncratic opinion. Almost every person (other than me) will tell you that the best two seasons of the show were 3 and 2.


EDIT- PS- yes, getting older sucks. Nothing worse than watching the Olympics and seeing athletes born well after Y2k.

 

[Imaculata]

Even Buffy. I mean- I love Season 6 ... but that's a pretty idiosyncratic opinion. Almost every person (other than me) will tell you that the best two seasons of the show were 3 and 2.

As much as I love season 2 and 3 of Buffy, season 4 has some of the best one-off episodes, season 6 has the fantastic musical episode, and season 7 has an actual conclusion to the whole series.

I would have loved to see what Firefly could have become with a second and third season. Thanks to the movie Serenity, at least we know how it would have concluded. But we miss out on the greatness that most good shows only develop after their first season.

 

[billd91]

Thanks to the movie Serenity, at least we know how it would have concluded.

We really don't. The screenplay was written after the cancellation of the series as a means of capping things off - there's no indication this is how things would have capped off had the series continued. It might have gone in a substantially different direction.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

As much as I love season 2 and 3 of Buffy, season 4 has some of the best one-off episodes, season 5 has the fantastic musical episode, and season 6 has an actual conclusion to the whole series.

...Season 6 is the one with the amazing musical episode (Once More With Feeling).

Season 7 is ... not good. But it does have the conclusion.

Season 4 has Hush, which is one of the best stand-alone episodes (after OMWF and the Body and maybe the conclusions to Seasons 2 and 3), but it is definitely the best Buffy-ish standalone episode, if you know what I mean.

 

[Imaculata]

Ah, right you are. I've corrected it.

Yeah, Buffy's final season meanders quite a lot. It is one of my least favourite season of the show.
As for Firefly's conclusion... sure it could have gone in a whole different direction. But at least we got an answer to the Reavers and River's powers.

 

[Janx]

We really don't. The screenplay was written after the cancellation of the series as a means of capping things off - there's no indication this is how things would have capped off had the series continued. It might have gone in a substantially different direction.

Two by Two with hands of blue.

Very different.

 

[payn]

The nursery rhyme stuff was terrible. The operative in the movie was 1000X better

 

[cmad1977]

Serenity does a better job telling the Firefly story in the first 15 minutes than Firefly did.