In true paranoid fashion, I've been scrolling through the showthreads to see if I'd made some horribly insulting complaint about your TWOP recaps that I didn't recall. I think the post I made in the Angel 3 thread on Oct 7, 2003 sums up my general response pretty well.

Reading over-the-top negative reactions to entertainment tends to be fun for me. At least the reviewer is passionate, y'know? Though when the hatred is channeled as personal insults about the creator rather than their work it can get a bit uncomfortable—that bit about corporate yes-men and baloon heads struck me as crossing the line.

Oops- hit the wrong button. Now then.

I find some of the recent discussion pretty interesting. This whole Kool-Aid thing I think is a bit unfair. For many people Joss and/or Firefly is the home team and they are rooting for the home team. When the Red Sox play the Yankees and Schilling tosses a 13 stirke out 3 hit performances not too many people are saying, "gotta give it to him he pitched well." More likely they are letting him have it. When it comes to reviews I feel you should always consider the source. Anyone with a website can post a review doesn't make their opinion any more credible than mine or anyone elses.

I think most reviews contradict themselves. There were a fair amount of constraints with this particular story. In many ways it was similar to what X-Men faced. X-Men was made in 2000 for $75 million and was 1 hour and 44 minutes. Serenity was made 5 years later for less money ($40 million) and comes in at 1 hour 59 minutes. Even if you attribute some of the X-Men money to cast anyway you slice it Serenity does more with less. Like X-Men, Serenity was a known quanity from a different medium that had to be reintroduced on film. Serenity had 9 characters that needed to be represented from Firefly. It's inevitable that someone's favorite character would settle into the background. That comes like Trekkies who complain that Dr.Crusher doesn't do anything in the The Next Generation films. Still I feel each character was represented well and they truly do get their moment to shine. Take Kaylee for example. When the Mule returns the first person she shows concern for is Simon. She stands up to Mal when River and Simon leave. She's upset when they do. In a few moments the essence of who Kaylee was from the show is established. There also is a Kaylee/Simon payoff in the end. Even Jayne grows. Jayne the mercenary who fights at the end for a noble cause for no personal gain. It's Jayne who's concerned if they were successful. "If you can't do something smart, do something right."

Going to cut it off here and talk a little bit about plot.

As for the costume thing, I think costumes are fine for special, fan-oriented events: cons, the pre-screenings and midnight showings. Red Carpet strikes me as very inappropriate because IMO it's a classier sort of deal.

Wearing costumes for regular showings is also not of the good, because that level of obsessiveness is going to alienate the casual fans and people just looking to spend two hours in a fun sci-fi adventure, and those are the people that are going to determine how much of a success Serenity is in the box office. You can show your love of Firefly with a t-shirt or a button or a brown coat without scaring off the rest of the viewing public.

When the Red Sox play the Yankees and Schilling tosses a 13 strikeout 3 hit performances not to many people are saying, "gotta give it to him he pitched well." More likely they are letting him have it.

Depending whom you mean by "people." (Way to out yourself as a Yankees fan, dude!)

Not that he could get 13K, without giving up and equal number of HRs, this year. It's been a bad year.

Budget on a movie certainly can contribute to quality, but only (to me) in superficial ways. Do I care if the Batsuit is actually just lycra? No, I do not. And all the money in the world can't buy a good script, as Michael Bay can attest.

If Batman is prowling Winnipeg because he can't afford New York, I don't really care. If Batman spends more time learning how to balance a spoon on his nose than he does fighting crime? There are issues.

There is no spoon.

(Has that joke gotten tired yet?)

I'm sure plot was as equally important as the character reintroduction and translating the show to film. The first draft comes in at 190 pages and I'm pretty sure that version has enough of whatever anyone feels was lacking. From what I understand Joss basically condensed the arcs he had planned for the show so they are TV plots. Playing devil's advocate, Firefly was set up for TV. The day to day struggles work better week to week. They needed a bigger story, a story that makes them effect the universe in which they live. I think this plot does that.

I haven't seen too many specific examples. 1) Zoe/Wash is now ruined. Wash/Book died. No Book backstory. I don't think it's a coincidence that Alan and Ron were the last to sign. I think it's possible that outside stuff effected story. Salary, future comittment, could be any number of things who knows? Those deaths do pay off in the short term. Even at my second viewing I felt like anyone could die at anytime at the end. 2) No Mal/Inara payoff. I don't think there will ever be one. Don't necessarily believe there should be. 3) Mal not killing the Operative is out of character. Mal is supposed to have undergone a change. In a blatant on-the-nose statement he believes the truth is worth dying for. His friends have died for it. At the time for him, having the Operative know the truth is more important then killing him. In addition, it becomes personal between Mal and the Operative. Mal is imposing his will like he always does. He is right and the Operative is wrong and he wants him to know it, almost as if to one up him. 4) When the dialogue is good it's really good and plays just as well the second time through. There might be a few missteps but nothing that significantly bothered me. I'm hoping "really don't" is just Serenity's "I have a bad feeling about this."

I would have been pissed if there'd been a Mal/Inara payoff. I think the Kaylee/Simon was enough, but I also think it wasn't well written.

Depending whom you mean by "people." (Way to out yourself as a Yankees fan, dude!)

I'm Met fan and you've hurt me more than you'll ever know. But yeah, I make allowances for home team mentality.

I would have been pissed if there'd been a Mal/Inara payoff. I think the Kaylee/Simon was enough, but I also think it wasn't well written.

Just speculation on my part but I don't think you'll see more than one couple at a time on that ship. I think that was more of a payoff for the fan as opposed to the non fan. At first I thought Wash and Book's deaths left a huge hole in that they almost represented parts of Mal's conscience. They were the angel on his left shoulder. Wash always with the non-violent solution and Book with right, just and Christian approach. In many ways I think we see Simon bring what Wash has brought. In the show, he didn't do much. He never really participated in the galley table chats. Now he's apart of the ship's on board couple and I can see him as the one offering the civil solution to problems.

I thought the Simon/Kaylee romance was the most poorly-written and poorly-integrated plot thread. As a 'shipper, I was disappointed in the resolution--such as it was--of all their flirting and sexual tension on the show. I liked the Mal/Inara interactions and was glad that nothing was resolved for them.

Mal not killing the Operative is out of character.

I disagree. I think it would have been consistent with his characterization if he had killed him, but I don't think it's inconsistent that he didn't. (Although I confess that I don't quite understand the school of thought that equates "staying in character" with the character doing the same thing every time he or she encounters a similar situation.) I think Mal has been written with enough compassion and righteousness (tempered with vengeful and ruthless tendencies, to be sure, but I observe in him a struggle to maintain a balance between the two) that I understand why he made the decision to leave the Operative alive. Possibly he saw something of Book in him, and that was enough to justify not killing him.

Also, because the fight between the Operative and himself was in many ways an ideological one, I understand why it was more important to him that the Operative see the message than that the Operative be removed entirely as a threat.

I just checked rottentomatoes.com - Serenity is up to 77% fresh; 35 total reviews so far, 22 counting toward the tomatometer, with the good reviews mostly by Firefly fans but with a few total newcomers to the 'verse saying nice things as well.