Firefly: Serenity

[Riedquat]

Again, until the movie really decides to drop the ambiguity and beat us over the head with the Alliance being evil, the only directly bad thing we know about is the shit they did to River. But, by the same token, considering how large the Alliance bureaucracy probably is, there was at least a fairly good chance that the project was done by a rogue, section-31 type agency that was not actually sanctioned by the Alliance (again, this is all pre-movie).

"Rogue element" is too easy a cop-out.

"Ariel" didn't show the Alliance in good light - oops, secret thing, so we'll just kill people (unpleasantly) who were in the same area. There's no sign of the Alliance being oppressive to most of the people living in it, but it seems to cross the line too easily.

[GreyICE]

If the series had developed as planned (we were on episode 14 of a likely 22 episode first season) then it would have been more organic, to be sure. The Operative would have been organically introduced, Mr. Universe would have been a point in another episode, and we'd have seen more of what the alliance was. We can see sketches of that - the Alliance officially denying reapers exist, the episode where Mal saves an alliance captain from one, etc.

They had to compress that development into a very short amount of time for a 2 hour movie instead of 8 42 minute episodes. Oh, and Wash would not have died obviously.

But nothing we see is contradictory. The Alliance has good people in it, just like the Fire Nation in Avatar has good people in it. Even people who believe they're doing the right thing - and Firefly was showing WHY they believe they were doing the right thing. If the outer planets were paradise, then they'd be straw villains.

[Riedquat]

But nothing we see is contradictory. The Alliance has good people in it, just like the Fire Nation in Avatar has good people in it. Even people who believe they're doing the right thing - and Firefly was showing WHY they believe they were doing the right thing. If the outer planets were paradise, then they'd be straw villains.

Agreed, Simon doesn't seem to have had any problem with the Alliance that he ever mentions, before they started messing around with River.

[Scififan]

Well yeah, he had no reason to. He was one of the 1% and had no reason to question life in the Alliance.

[AndrewGPaul]

From the point of view of something that should last more than eight hours, it’s fine that the only evidence of the Alliance being evil is from those who already don’t like it. There’s room to build on that later. The actual backstory war seemed to me to be the American Civil War if it had really been about “states’ rights”.

As for Mal vs Inara, she must be able to see the same tension between them that we do - that’s part of her training, after all. She never seems really insulted by anything he says, perhaps because it’s not coming from a position of control. He needs her more than she needs him, and if he’s got a foul mouth, well, that’s redneck truckers for you.

I bought the box set on the back of the nerd hype. I liked it. Still do, although it’s been a while since I watched it, but it’s good, not the best thing ever. Blake’s Seven and Red Dwarf already did the whole “deadbeats on a spaceship” thing, after all. I think someone tried the “but it’s scientifically realistic!” Thing while gushing about it once, and that was as stupid here as it was in Babylon 5.

[Beastro]

Thing while gushing about it once, and that was as stupid here as it was in Babylon 5.

Stupid? Why so hard on it?

It's an appreciated bit to the show as it was with B5. No, it's still not hard Sci-Fi, but it's an effort to add more verisimilitude than a typical Sci-Fi show tries for.

[Scififan]

The Train Job, is a much better episode and Mal is a more likable character later on. Pilot episodes always has some bumps.

[Fianna]

Thing while gushing about it once, and that was as stupid here as it was in Babylon 5.

Stupid? Why so hard on it?

It's an appreciated bit to the show as it was with B5. No, it's still not hard Sci-Fi, but it's an effort to add more verisimilitude than a typical Sci-Fi show tries for.

It and the Battlestar Galactica reboot used a model where they included the bare minimum amount of technology needed to make a space opera work on television (artificial gravity, a way to reach other worlds relatively quickly, ships that can achieve escape velocity without giant booster rockets), plus one bit of far out-there science that the main story arc is built around (River's ESP for Firefly, the Cylongs for BSG).

[GreyICE]

From the point of view of something that should last more than eight hours, it’s fine that the only evidence of the Alliance being evil is from those who already don’t like it. There’s room to build on that later. The actual backstory war seemed to me to be the American Civil War if it had really been about “states’ rights”.

I'd call it "what if the British won the revolutionary war?" Especially with all the analogies to the American west (and the more than a few ways that the inner planets are presented with aristocracy). The structural difference of the British Empire, a powerful globe-spanning force, and the backwater podunk colonists fighting a war with some pretty pathetic forces and very mixed results (American troops were so awful in the war that they'd often break and run before the first shots were fired). But that's quibbling, it's a good analogy.

[AndrewGPaul]

GreyICE - you might be right, but the Western theme makes the post-Civil War era a more obvious point of reference, to me.

Beastro - because some people see one one minor scientific “accuracy” (B5’s centrifugal “gravity”, Firefly’s silence in space), and ignore all the other usual TV science problems by claiming them to be hard SF. It’s a problem with elements of the fan base, rather than the show.