those eyes that you get when your circumstance is movie size
[non-spoiler review.]
"we're going for a ride."
- river
[TITLE: WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY JOSS WHEDON.]
joss whedon is one sadistic son of a bitch. not since james o'barr has a force of nature in fandom found such glee in putting his characters through such brutal, unflinching hell.
in the end, serenity is everything you already know it's going to be. it's a love letter to the fans, the series finale the gypsy-cursed show never got, the unravelling of a riddle that was supposed to take a couple of seasons to unfold, and the opportunity to see -- and i know this comes out of nowhere, so bear with me -- a waifish emo teenage girl become an axe-wielding high-kicking smackdown-putting slayer, as it were, of all those who oppose her and hers.
how we get there is, as the prologue suggests, quite a ride. if anything, the movie gives us all of the elements of the television series turned up a little (and in some cases a lot) louder. without network interference to soften his antihero into a kinder, gentler protagonist, malcolm reynolds gets to be even more of the broken soldier searching for a good day to die. jayne gets to be even more of the swaggering semi-mutinous lout. zoe gets to sign, seal, and deliver the perfect audition for (please god, make this happen) one hell of an amazonian goddess of a wonder woman. kaylee gets to be even cuter, even more sarcastic, and even more sexually frustrated. and so on.
the shortest shrift, and this is a complaint that only gets slightly mollified with the knowledge that 1) scenes were apparently cut that would have filled out this story arc, and 2) it's one of the most fertile plains for an as-yet-unexplored sequel subplot, is inara. i can't even recall if we ever got to hear that her actual job was a courtesan; allusions are made to training students, but she could have been a driver's ed instructor for all that this contributes to the story itself. then again, since this is an action adventure first and a science fiction story second, the skills to be highlighted are of necessity the more thrilling ones. i would certainly have loved to see more of kaylee kicking ass as a mechanic or simon kicking ass as a doctor, but with only so many minutes to throw into the feature-length of the narrative, wash kicking ass as a pilot and river kicking ass as the little girl that suddenly remembers how to be the weapon the government turned her into makes the movie ever so much likelier to spawn sequels that could give the characters with less pulse-pounding skills more of their chance in the sun.
whedon's master stroke in creating the world of firefly was to construct a science fiction show without aliens. [this couldn't have been easy for the creator of such narratives as the necklace that brought a vampire back from the dead and a sister that was actually a big ball of universe-destroying energy.] no bumpy-forehead walking allegories for other races and nationalities for this space saga; the enemy without is the enemy within. to the extent that there is evil, (and there most certainly is, on a simply terrifying and unstoppable level), it's not a silicon matrix or an artificial intelligence or an alien race of giant killer space bunnies. it's us. it's humanity, and what it's capable to doing to itself, and the sometimes severe consequences that such interference creates. in the end, malcolm's choice -- to ride off into the loneliness of the black rather than trade security for servility -- is the only choice that makes sense.
the roller coaster ride along the way is some of the most intense filmmaking in recent memory. by the denouement of the movie's last act, the hard part is remembering to breathe. it should be perfectly accessible to people who have never seen the show; nevertheless, it's certainly a worthy trip to the video store, and the story is all the stronger if you know the backstory -- or at least understand some of the pre-existing tensions between the characters.
as a handful of choice loose ends turned into a pretty bow, fans of the show will of course mourn what-might-have-been in terms of sheer character development; in a better world, it could have taken two seasons (or more) instead of two hours to reach the movie's conclusion, and the 'verse would have been ever so much the richer for it.
in the end, i'm left with two complimentary and almost-concurrent thoughts.
"thanks, joss."
and
"y'bastard."
kmh
"we're going for a ride."
- river
[TITLE: WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY JOSS WHEDON.]
joss whedon is one sadistic son of a bitch. not since james o'barr has a force of nature in fandom found such glee in putting his characters through such brutal, unflinching hell.
in the end, serenity is everything you already know it's going to be. it's a love letter to the fans, the series finale the gypsy-cursed show never got, the unravelling of a riddle that was supposed to take a couple of seasons to unfold, and the opportunity to see -- and i know this comes out of nowhere, so bear with me -- a waifish emo teenage girl become an axe-wielding high-kicking smackdown-putting slayer, as it were, of all those who oppose her and hers.
how we get there is, as the prologue suggests, quite a ride. if anything, the movie gives us all of the elements of the television series turned up a little (and in some cases a lot) louder. without network interference to soften his antihero into a kinder, gentler protagonist, malcolm reynolds gets to be even more of the broken soldier searching for a good day to die. jayne gets to be even more of the swaggering semi-mutinous lout. zoe gets to sign, seal, and deliver the perfect audition for (please god, make this happen) one hell of an amazonian goddess of a wonder woman. kaylee gets to be even cuter, even more sarcastic, and even more sexually frustrated. and so on.
the shortest shrift, and this is a complaint that only gets slightly mollified with the knowledge that 1) scenes were apparently cut that would have filled out this story arc, and 2) it's one of the most fertile plains for an as-yet-unexplored sequel subplot, is inara. i can't even recall if we ever got to hear that her actual job was a courtesan; allusions are made to training students, but she could have been a driver's ed instructor for all that this contributes to the story itself. then again, since this is an action adventure first and a science fiction story second, the skills to be highlighted are of necessity the more thrilling ones. i would certainly have loved to see more of kaylee kicking ass as a mechanic or simon kicking ass as a doctor, but with only so many minutes to throw into the feature-length of the narrative, wash kicking ass as a pilot and river kicking ass as the little girl that suddenly remembers how to be the weapon the government turned her into makes the movie ever so much likelier to spawn sequels that could give the characters with less pulse-pounding skills more of their chance in the sun.
whedon's master stroke in creating the world of firefly was to construct a science fiction show without aliens. [this couldn't have been easy for the creator of such narratives as the necklace that brought a vampire back from the dead and a sister that was actually a big ball of universe-destroying energy.] no bumpy-forehead walking allegories for other races and nationalities for this space saga; the enemy without is the enemy within. to the extent that there is evil, (and there most certainly is, on a simply terrifying and unstoppable level), it's not a silicon matrix or an artificial intelligence or an alien race of giant killer space bunnies. it's us. it's humanity, and what it's capable to doing to itself, and the sometimes severe consequences that such interference creates. in the end, malcolm's choice -- to ride off into the loneliness of the black rather than trade security for servility -- is the only choice that makes sense.
the roller coaster ride along the way is some of the most intense filmmaking in recent memory. by the denouement of the movie's last act, the hard part is remembering to breathe. it should be perfectly accessible to people who have never seen the show; nevertheless, it's certainly a worthy trip to the video store, and the story is all the stronger if you know the backstory -- or at least understand some of the pre-existing tensions between the characters.
as a handful of choice loose ends turned into a pretty bow, fans of the show will of course mourn what-might-have-been in terms of sheer character development; in a better world, it could have taken two seasons (or more) instead of two hours to reach the movie's conclusion, and the 'verse would have been ever so much the richer for it.
in the end, i'm left with two complimentary and almost-concurrent thoughts.
"thanks, joss."
and
"y'bastard."
kmh