Summary
Serenitycomposer David Newman thinks that the originalFireflyshow would have fared much better in the age of streaming. Making its television debut in 2002, the short-lived science fiction show from Joss Whedon was cancelled after only 11 of its 14 episodes were aired. However, the show’s subsequent success on home video would catapult it to cult status and would eventually result in the 2005 sequel movieSerenity. Despite strong anticipation and positive critical responses,Serenityunderperformed at the box officeand only recouped $40.4 million against an original budget of $39 million.
In celebration of the vinyl deluxe edition release ofSerenity’ssoundtrack, available on June 28,Screen Rantspoke with Newman about the movie’s release and the original show from which it was born. Suggesting that Whedon had originally planned forSerenity’sstory to serve as anotherFireflyseason, he thinksit would have fared much better as a streaming serieson platforms like Netflix or Apple TV+. Check out his comments below:
We finished, we went to a premiere, and there was a big party at Universal, and then it just didn’t do enough business. It’s too bad, because it’s a terrific movie. It’s really good. It’s funny, it’s exciting, it’s cerebral, it’s interesting, and there are some really standout performances. Summer Glau’s performance is great.
I think the movie was a little ahead of its time. It’d be more like an Apple or a Netflix extended series now, which is probably where Joss initially envisioned it—as another season of Firefly.
I could see this doing incredibly well on an Apple TV+ if it had come out now. That’s such a good point.
Yeah. If you look at the difference between movies and episodic television now, episodic television has gotten really good. It has really good effects. It looks just as good as a movie, but it’s spread out over five, six, seven, 10, or 12 episodes.
It’s like a novel. It can sprawl into different directions, where a movie is really a short story. Some people are really good at short stories, but a short story has to grab you immediately, it has to be about one big thing, and it can’t really sprawl. When there are a lot of characters and it’s coming from a sprawling series, it’s hard to do. At the point that that came out, before all this other stuff started, maybe it suffered from that.
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With so many shows serving to overstay their welcome and see their quality decline in later seasons, some viewers may even suggestFirefly’slegacy is best served by being remembered as one cut too short rather than one that went too long and began to lose its appeal.
Regularly considered a prime example of a show that was scrapped far too soon, the originalFireflyfirmly remains a cult favorite among sci-fi fans. Since its original cancellation, calls for aFireflyseries revivalhave regularly been floated by internet pundits eager to see Nathan Fillion’s Captain Mal and his ragtag crew of outlaws return to their screens. WhileSerenity’s2005 release did manage to provide some measure of closure for audiences disappointed by the show’s premature ending, many viewers have since suggested it even had the potential to matchBuffy the Vampire Slayer’slongevity.
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The Unification War was the defining moment of the Firefly universe, yet the show kept the details of the Serenity crew’s involvement in it a secret.
However, much of the acclaim surroundingFireflylargely comes from audiences who discovered the show after it had already been scrapped by Fox. During its original television run, viewership was often hampered by the network’s often erratic scheduling and decision to air the episodes out of their intended order. While Newman may be correct in his assertion thatSerenitymay have fared far better asFireflyseason 2on a modern streaming service, much of the show’s cult status was also further bolstered by the fact that only one season was ever made.
HadFireflybeen made two decades later as a streaming show, it is indeed possible that it would have attracted a much larger initial viewership and potentially lasted for more seasons. However, the question remains whether it would still enjoy the same enduring cult status. With so many shows serving to overstay their welcome and see their quality decline in later seasons, some viewers may even suggestFirefly’slegacy is best served by being remembered as one cut too short rather than one that went too long and began to lose its appeal.
Firefly
Cast
Firefly is a science fiction television series set in the year 2517, focusing on the crew of the spaceship Serenity. As humans inhabit a new star system, the renegade crew, led by Captain Malcolm Reynolds, navigates conflicts and alliances while pursuing their own interests across lawless territories.
