It was linked in one of the threads a few weeks back. I can't find the original link, but I found the copy I made and posted into an e-mail I sent to Browncoat friends. (gmail's search function is beautiful thing.)

Hi, my name is Joss Whedon. Before we begin the special screening, I have a little story I want to tell you. It's about a TV show called Firefly.

Firefly went on the air a few years ago and was instantly hailed by critics as one of the most canceled shows of the year. It was ignored and abandoned and the story should end there, but it doesn't, because the people who made the show and the people who saw the show (which is...roughly...the same number of people) fell in love with it a little bit...too much to let it go, too much to lay down arms when the battle looked pretty much lost. In Hollywood, people like that are called 'unrealistic' ... 'quixotic' ... 'obsessive'.

In my world, they're called 'Browncoats'.

Whether you've watched the show, or saw the DVD's, or whether you've never set foot in the Firefly universe before tonight, the fact that you're here means that you are part of something...something that is a little bit remarkable. This movie should not exist. Failed TV shows don't get made into major motion pictures unless the creator, the cast, and the fans believe beyond reason.

It's what I've felt. It's what I've seen...in the DVD sales, the booths at the cons run by fans, the websites, the fundraisers... all the work the fans have done to help make this movie. It is, in an unprecedented sense, your movie...which means, if it sucks, it's your fault. You let us down, but let's not dwell on your failures because the work is not done.

I have to finish making it. Obviously it's not quite the final cut and you will notice some placeholders in music and effects, but we're very close. Once we are finished, we have to get people to see it. Now, obviously the studio is going to do their thing. There will be ads and trailers and all that joy, but this movie doesn't have stars and it doesn't have a giant mega-budget or even a simple salable premise. What it has is us, the people who believed unreasonably.

If this movie matters to you, let somebody know. Let everybody know.Make yourselves heard. If you don't like the movie, this is a time for quiet, silent contemplation. But, when the unfinished credits roll, if you still call yourself a Browncoat, remember the millions of people who don't...who might.

I want us to do this together. The cast is going to be appearing wherever they can. I'm going to be blogging and stumping and whatever I can think of. We've got Can'tStopTheSignal.com up and running...I'm fairly certain. We're all doing everything we can to make this the event that it should be.

Just remember, they tried to kill us...they did kill us...and here we are. We have done the impossible, and that makes us mighty. Thank you for helping to get this movie as far as it has gotten.

Welcome to Serenity.

Thanks muchly!

I swear to God, I could use it for work.

Whatever you're hatching (and I won't ask), that's gotta be the coolest work ever.

Whatever you're hatching (and I won't ask), that's gotta be the coolest work ever.

Perhaps some scheme to replace temp workers with Reavers?

If you don't like the movie, this is a time for quiet, silent contemplation.

"If you don't like my marketing presentation now is a good time to shut your piehole."

"If you don't like my marketing presentation now is a good time to shut your piehole."

Joss is an amazing guerrilla marketer, but to be fair, that line was delivered in his typical self-deprecating, ironic style.

And, as someone who *really* disliked the Chinese slang in the series, because I don't think there were enough external markers to show a strong Asian influence on the world they existed in -- I thought the movie did a bang-up job of giving the various settings an Asian influence.

And all without showing anyone of actual Asian descent.

River is totally the Slayer. She was created by a mysterious council to fight creatures that feed on living humans. I thought the axe she was holding looked a lot like Fray's axe, too.

The science just bugs. Solar systems, even terraformed ones, just can't fit that many planets in the the habitable zone. And even if you could, the ones out near the very edge of the system like, say, Miranda, would be a lot colder than the core planets. They have to be. They're farther from the sun. They wouldn't be that bright either.

As to nitpicking about sound in space, that didn't used to be a problem with Firefly. The vacuum was sound free in the series. NSM in the movie.

That said, I did like the movie quite a lot. I'm sad to see Wash go, especially since it's sort of like his death was sort of shorthand for "no one is safe."

I maybe was making stuff up but I thought they said they found new solar systems, not just one. But I am probably wrong.

Also, re: sound in space, maybe I was just inattentive but the only time I noticed it was when they were entering atmo.

I'd like some examples of that too, because as far as I know, the only sounds from space were the ones that were coming from the gun they'd mounted on Serenity, which was only causing sound because its vibrations were going through the ship. You could hear how muffled it was, even. I thought that was particularly well done.

There were sounds of explosions in the space battle.

Although I suppose you could argue that the explosions would be heard on the ships that suffered them....