Loving on Frank's brain a lot, myself, here.

Raq, I did get the pas de deux thing from Mal and River. If Firefly had gotten three or four years' run, I don't know if that's where the story would have wound up or not. If that's where it was headed, maybe I would have stayed on board for the ride.

But for me, the crew each represented an aspect of Serenity, I guess, everybody fractured in some way and missing pieces. The process of the audience discovering those fracture lines, those missing bits, the process of the characters coming together to mend, or to combine in such a way as to become a whole, finding and lending each other strengths...that was the story.

(Sorry, got interrupted) And the movie didn't tell that story. The entire crew could have been recast with new actors for all the importance those characters had to the movie's story.

It was the bait-and-switch factor that made me feel so betrayed, that none of these characters mattered, only River, and Mal in how he enabled River.

I think I posted in the Buffy thread once the re-write in my head of sesason 5

If someone Nillyed this, I would read it. IJS.

And did I spell the past tense of Nilly right? It looks wrong, but it looked wrong with an -ied too. It's that whole names into verbs issues, I guess.

I'd go with Nillied or possibly Nilly-ed.

If someone Nillyed this, I would read it. IJS.

Honestly, I don't think it was much more than what I posted above (as I said, I just put it out in summary form). I might have proposed a way to redo INTO THE WOODS, but that also might be another thing that was just in my head. Pretty much the same way I did a quick summary of how cool season 3 could have been (much as I adore it as is) had it spent 3 or 4 episodes in the Wishverse instead of just for THE WISH. Cordelia would have died as she did in the episode, but at the end of it, not in act 2.

So much serious postage here lately. Could I ask, what inspired all this discussion of a two year old movie?

I'm still sad about Wash. It helps to talk about it.

I've finally gotten enough perspective on the film to articulate why it didn't work for me, and why it was such a disappointment as a film. I wanted it to be better. I was prepared to overlook a considerable amount of schlock. But when you go throwing perfectly good characters into the grinder without justification, without justification in the story, then I call it bad writing.

I'm still too mad about the way he and Book were squandered to be sad for losing them.

River and Simon were never characters i cared all that much about in the show. so having a movie dedicated to them, their backstory and their character growth was really disappointing to me. i was hoping it would be much more of an ensemble piece, like the show was. i was severely disappointed. add insult to injury with Wash's death who was probably my favorite character.

My favorite character was always River. No one else was even close.

And I thought Wash's death worked really well for the story. It scared the shit out of me. Book's I found to be a little contrived and it felt rushed.

I saw Book's death coming a mile away. Kill the mentor; Necessary Step 3 for the Hero's Journey.

Wash's death threw me, but upon later reflection, I thought it was brilliant. Didn't see it coming, and it left me in suspense the whole rest of the movie. Whenever Kaylee got hit, or Jayne or when Simon got shot I had this voice in my head saying "Holy shit! Nobody's safe! They're going to lose! THEY'RE GOING TO LOSE!" I was legitimately scared for them.