Some people need to be brained with a pink hammer, though.

I went to a 7 pm show on Saturday in the Bay Area and the theater was 95% full. Big crowd, and applause at the end, so I suspect there were a lot of fans there.

I enjoyed it. Didn't love it to death omg, and I see some problems inherent in the structure, but I'm basically happy. It wasn't possible to make a movie that would have pleased a non-fan and a fan audience equally, but they did the best they could.

The 13-year-old certainly liked it, although she needed some of the plot twists and characters explained to her. She thought it was scary and fun.

I understand the meta behind killing Wash: I think it was a smart move, both for the movie and for the possibility of the franchise. It hurt the characters and the fans, and Wash and Book's deaths gave the cast a little breathing room for the future: 9 is too many for a movie, really.

What I don't understand is the personal rage and sense of betrayal that I've seen exhibited in some responses. Good stories hurt. That's what they do. Good stories surprise and challenge. Killing Wash off was a narrative choice inherent to the form, and while I can understand why people were shocked, horrified, and grieving, I'm afraid I don't understand why people are announcing that they'll never watch the sequel, will "never trust Joss again", and that sort of thing.

Ah, well. Anything that pleases everyone would be so mushy as to have no value in it, so.

Oh, the reason I popped back in was that I just started watching my tape of the SciFi special about Serenity, and Ron Glass looked reassuringly hale and hearty in it too. Maybe he was just lit/made up extremely harshly in his scenes for some reason?

It was not the series--Mal was back to the darker, more bitter Mal that Joss originally wanted and Fox made lighten up. He basically ended up in the same emotional space at the end of the film that he was in the beginning of the series, but that didn't bother me.

I wonder how much of the changes in character we could handwave as "six months passed." Simon's greater assertiveness, I can definitely buy with that. Mal's reversal of his notion that Simon and River are very much a part of his crew takes a little more. But maybe things happened in those six months that hardened Mal up again. And I know Joss has said he doesn't want a prequel, but a movie set in that time would have Wash. But it wouldn't allow Mal to learn Book's secret.

It might allow us to learn Book's secret though, so I'm all for it regardless of Mal being left in the dark. ;-)

Hee. Yeah, that's what I thought too, Matt.

He basically ended up in the same emotional space at the end of the film that he was in the beginning of the series, but that didn't bother me.

Yeah, it did bother me a little--I felt like I'd already seen this story, or something. Like the characters had all been smacked backwards, without me getting to see how. And I was able to get around that by separating off the series and the movie in my head--the different Simon-and-River backstories helped there--but it was a little disorienting.

I think that in some ways, that arc might've worked better for me if I hadn't watched the show. (Though I think I still would've bounced off of everyone else going along on Mal's suicide mission a little bit. Didn't believe that for a moment.)

I bet River knows Book's secret. Whether she knows she knows it is another matter.

Serenity III: The Search for Book, anyone?

I'm afraid I don't understand why people are announcing that they'll never watch the sequel, will "never trust Joss again", and that sort of thing.

I can't believe they trusted him in the first place.

The box office looks miserable to me, overall, for everything. I've heard box office receipts have been in decline, but is this a miserable time of year on top of it?

I KNOW, Allyson. The Cronenberg film got rave reviews, has lots of stars in it and was made by an established director with a devoted following and barely did any business.