It all must have gone down during one of my too-overworked-to-keep-up-with-the-Bronze periods, because I remember absolutely nothing of the situation as it happened, only what I've heard from people years later.

I think that it's pretty obvious that, without the fans showing their support, both verbally (letters, websites, etc) and, FAR more importantly, financially, the movie would not have come to pass. But the same could be said for the cast all being willing to reprise their roles, Joss not just walking away, the Fox studio execs allowing it, etc, etc, etc. But the fans were certainly a bigger direct part of getting this movie made than, say, Dukes of Hazzard. Unless there was a whole underground, "Let's make a Dukes of Hazzard movie without any of the original people" movement that I'm unaware of. And if there was, please don't tell me. Allow me to retain my mental purity for just one more day.

www.hoggistas.org...

You fucking bastard.

My work here is done.

t Leaves silver bullet behind...

I heard the song from the first Serenity trailer (Kasabian, "Club Foot") on the radio today!

Entertainment Weekly's Fall Movie Preview has both a short blurb with an adorable quote from Summer:

"I said, 'If you have to recast me with Winona Ryder, or some kind of "star," tell me. I'm ready for it,'" says Glau. "But no, he wanted me, thank God."

and a three-page article with a picture spread of the cast. EW responds to a recent topic of conversation:

There's a lot of heavy lifting involved, trying to explain a sci-fi Western in which cowboys giddyap on space freighters, fire Winchesters, and curse so damned much. In Chinese. (In case you're wondering why Fox canceled the series after 11 low-rated episodes, now you know.)

It's a nice little article, and not spoilery except for a one-line summary of the plot which can be gleaned from the trailers or, I don't know, having watched the show.

I think that it's pretty obvious that, without the fans showing their support, both verbally (letters, websites, etc) and, FAR more importantly, financially, the movie would not have come to pass.

Mother's milk leads to heroin.

If there hadn't been a loyal fanbase, Joss may have dropped the whole thing and crawled into bed licking his wounds for a year.

But "the dedication of Firefly fans" didn't make the movie. Universal's business decision to drop 40 million on the joss to woo him from 20th made the movie.

From the aforementioned article:

"I was a Whedon stalker," laughs Mary Parent, Universal's now-outgoing vice chairman of production, who dug Whedon's vision and no-surrender passion. She also recognized a potentially marketable Cinderella story. A modestly budgeted film, Parent believed, was a gamble worth taking, and in September 2003, Universal optioned the rights from Fox. "I thought this band of underdogs could make for a cool movie," she says. "But I did want to see a script first."

But perhaps the dedication of the Firefly fans was one of the things that made Universal think that dropping 40 million on the joss would be a reasonable business decision.