Well, duh.

That doesn't make me cynical though. That's just Hollywood savvy in my book.

His strength, in the main, is a strong grasp on emotions. However, it's a large part of his weakness as well. He handwaves a lot of world building, privileges emotion over sense-making, and tends towards both pandering and melodrama.

Melodrama? I don't know. He might cop to that under the heading "Operatic." He does like big juicy emotions.

I don't think he panders, particularly. He's conscious of his audience but doesn't go out of his way to bend toward their preferences.

I think he's weak on plot, but I think his biggest strengths are in a kind of vertical compression. That is, he's very economical in his writing to compress exposition and character and plot and witty play all into a few lines. Sort of the Steve Woz engineering trick.

That's also a virtue of his use of language which is distinctive and metaphorically rich. He mostly reminds me of Shakespeare in that regard - in that Shakespeare's plots often have holes in them, or logic gaps, or dangling subplots, but that isn't the point.

They both have a density within their storytelling which overcomes their plot deficiencies. You can tug at each character and thread and there's a complex backstory and arc to each one. You can turn the story around and look at its different facets and there are multiple structures on view.

For example, Serenity can map out as Joss working out his issues with Fox (i.e., You Can't Stop The Signal). It can also be seen as him revisiting and fixing what he disliked about the finished version of his Aliens 4 script. It also works as Joss rehabilitating and investigating the original conception of Han Solo - in short a critique of what's gone wrong with the Star Wars franchise. It's also Joss exploring the complex moral history of post-Civil War America.

That's just the meta-structures. Within the story he does a lot of doubling and refracting of character arcs that's very pleasing. The spiritual paths of Book and Mal. Zoe/Wash ending to Simon/Kaylee beginning. Jayne and River taking different paths to being integrated into the crew. Wash and Kaylee's functions within the crew. Jayne & Zoe as different warrior images. The way each crew member reflects something back of Mal. Book and The Operative. Mal and The Operative. You can go on and on.

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I think he wants to do the comics because he wants to tell that story.

But after the first few, it's going to be a continuing series. His motive there isn't, "I've always wanted to have unspecified editorial control over a comic book that someone else writes." If he just wanted to tell one particular story, he could certainly make a deal to just do that.

But is that all that different from how he approached television? Occasionally writing, but mostly just nodding or shaking his head at other people's additions to the story. He may not be interested in telling something short and particular for the comic; he may just want to hold the hand of something long and rambling.

Telling a story, especially in a collaborative medium, doesn't have to mean every aspect of it is yours.

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Telling a story, especially a collaborative medium, doesn't have to mean every aspect of it is yours.

That's probably why he encourages fanficcers.

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I don't think he panders, particularly. He's conscious of his audience but doesn't go out of his way to bend toward their preferences.

(Looks at Spike's character.)

(Raises brow.)

(Calls bullshit.)

He's not just pandering to the audience, if that makes sense. I've heard everyone liked writing Spike, and writing for JM. It was fun for them. However, you've seen my Spike = Salt comparison before. Joss is self-indulgent to a fault, and it doesn't help storylines or plotting at all. They get buried under the salt.

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Joss frequently writes himself into corners because he has overconfidence in his ability to work his way out of them. Which he can do—spectacularly—sometimes.

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(Calls bullshit.)

Well, if he did any pandering it was definitely there. However, I'll note that it was also tied in with some meta issues: (1) keeping his star happy by giving her the storyline she was intersted in pursuing; (2) bringing over Spike was a condition of Angel's renewal.

It was also (I think) exacerbated by him leaving Marti to do the showrunning and her weaknesses and Spike's weaknesses as a character were a bad match.

Plus, as you note, the writers enjoyed the character and the actor. So while I feel like there was shoring up of his fanbase with the Spike focus, the decision was made out of a variety of factors that on-balance tipped that way.

At the same meta-time, you've got ASH wanting to go part-time, NB dealing with an alcohol depency, Riley getting less interesting as a character as they moved from grad student to demonfightin' junkie. JM was the easy and obvious choice to fill the man-slot. It fixed a lot of problems outside the narrative.

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That doesn't explain why he went to Angel, when there were lots of good reasons for the character not to.

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That doesn't explain why he went to Angel, when there were lots of good reasons for the character not to.

Well, I alluded to the fact that Spike going to Angel was a condition of AtS being renewed.

I don't know - is that not a fact? It was a widely circulated story anyway.

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But is that all that different from how he approached television? Occasionally writing, but mostly just nodding or shaking his head at other people's additions to the story

Not at all. I'm just saying that I don't think he's priming the pump for a comic series because he thought of a story that he really wanted to tell.

I don't think I can get near the Shakespeare comparison. But

It's also Joss exploring the complex moral history of post-Civil War America.

Not being overly familiar with Firefly... is there any hint that the Alliance had moral justification for deciding that "all the planets had to join under their rule"? Because one of the many things that infuriated me about that concept was, that's not a civil war, that's a war of conquest. And I had the strong impression that the government was just Eeeeevil Totalitarian Badness.

I have the strong impression that Whedon likes to come close to moral dilemmas and then bunt. See, once again, Spike. I hear he has a soul now.

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I have the strong impression that Whedon likes to come close to moral dilemmas and then bunt. See, once again, Spike. I hear he has a soul now.

I really liked the construction of the Firefly universe, because it was fraught with interesting moral/character choices. Mal and Zoe both came out of the war changed by it, but Zoe wasn't embittered by it. Inara was aligned with the Federation. Book was too, but had rejected it. All from different angles. I didn't think there was a lot of bunting there.

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