Serenity Now

[robotnik2004]

Everybody else will be doing this, and using the same subject line too, so I'll just get mine in quickly: we saw Serenity last night, and liked it a lot. A completely solid, wholly enjoyable sci-fi film that was by turns funny, scary, sad, surprising, and smart. I think it would work for non-viewers of the series, if any of them ever happen to see it. That's something I'd been seriously doubting before hand. But it also had everything the fanbase needed to see, tying up or at least addressing every hanging thread from the series I can think of.

It's hard not to want to compare it to certain other recent sci-fi films, but "it's better than Revenge of the Sith" sounds like damning with faint praise. So let me amplify: not only is Serenity vastly superior to Revenge of the Sith in every way it is possible to judge a movie, it is superior to Revenge of the Sith in every way it is possible to judge human endeavor at all.

Except, I suppose, profit.

Comments

[brdgt.livejournal.com]

Personally I don't think you can have the "better than Revenge of the Sith" comparison, as without Star Wars, Serenity could not exist. I'm also a raving Star Wars fangirl.

[robotnik.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure that follows. You're right that Serenity and every other post-1977 space opera owes a debt to the original Star Wars but it doesn't mean one movie can't be better than the other. Me, I regard Episodes I-IV and VI as apocryphal, but I respect your beliefs and know better than to argue with a true believer.

[head58.livejournal.com]

Except, I suppose, profit.

I for one will be astonished if this makes more than Fifth Element kind of money. ($17M opening weekend, $60M total domestic box). I'm guessing they'd need at least that kind of showing to even begin talking about a sequel, and I think they'll be lucky to do half that. The budget was $40M.

I look at it this way: no Kevin Smith film has ever brought in more than $30M in domestic box. Smith's movies have a cultish following similar to Whedon's (maybe the Browncoats are a wee bit more fanatical) and similar complete lack of popular appeal outside that cult.

Quality-wise, one simply has to compare the Anakin crash-landing a capital ship scene with the Serenity crash landing scene. RotS lacked any element of tension or drama or even remote interest. Ditto Mal vs Operative/Obi-Wan vs Anakin. I think by looking at similar type scenes you see the glaring failures of RotS even stronger.

[robotnik.livejournal.com]

MAN TRUE.