Serenity Screenings Sell Out 275
DizzyEllie writes "Last Wednesday, Universal offered fans of Joss Whedon's Serenity the unique opportunity to screen an unfinished version of the movie in ten cities. This was originally intended to pull both fans and non-fans into the fold, but the screenings sold out so quickly (less than a day for all cities to sell-out, but reportably just a few minutes in a couple of locations), it is clear that only the hard-core fanbase will make it in. This seemed to be completely unexpected by Universal, as ads were appearing in newspapers after the sell out, and incentives for the fans to promote the screenings were removed. The screenings will be held in 10 cities on May 5. Serenity: The Official Movie Website" Definitely a unique promo thing. Shows serious stones too- I mean, if the movie sucked, they wouldn't dare do something like this. Hopefully someone will post a review for us on wednesday. And the rest of us suckers have to wait until September. Bah.
Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:5, Insightful)
They gave it a Friday night, 8pm slot.
They seriously under-promoed it.
Then they showed the episodes out of order.
Then they pre-empted it several times for baseball.
Then they decided to pull it.
And, lest you think this is just fanboy BS:
They released the DVD set. It reached amazon's top 5(10? something like that) in a matter of days. That's selling like Star Wars.
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Unfortunately, those who formed their opinion of the whole series from those first couple episodes probably got turned off by it.
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
The first two aired were the last ones written after Fox gave its feedback as to what they wanted. The others were written *without* Fox direction.
ie, if the shows that aired were the bad ones, then it really goes down to Fox. The first episode aired was a rewrite of the pilot as Fox wanted a different type of story to lead off the series. One that showed that the team was good-hearted at their core.. The worst episode was the one where someone cracked a whip
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2, Funny)
(Just kidding, not trolling)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:5, Informative)
One of the fansites has an Amazon tracker [fireflyfans.net]. From it, we get:
-- The show sold out of preorders on Amazon in three days in July 2003, never falling out of the top ten the whole time.
-- When it came available again in September, it went straight to number 1.
-- Excepting two days, it didn't fall out of the top 100 through the next July.
-- It's never been below 400 in the rankings.
Not bad for a show which only got half a season.
Re:But why Firefly? (Score:3, Insightful)
2. The sales data for the DVDs are supporting evidence for #1 and #3
3. It didn't make it out of its first season due to internal Fox politics, nothing to do with the quality of the show itself.
If it was just the show, why is Fox refusing to sell the TV rights to Universal/UPN (like they did for angel AND buffy after canning them)? It's only through a contract oversight that Joss was allowed to have Univer
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
Just because the average
1. Media
a. paper
b. CD / DVD
c. toner / ink
2. Hardware
a. Monitor
b. Motherboard/cpu
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
Let's face it, a self builder is going to spend more money on their PC than your average Dell buyer.
I don't know about that - the more ignorant you are, the more you succumb to marketing. This morning I put together a 300MHz 64MB desktop system for someone who needed e-mail, web and minimal word-processing. Total cost: £30. And I could have got it down further but at some point, my time becomes more valuable than my money.
On topic - I hope this show was better than Buffy -couldn't stand it (or
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
The question is... how did you spend on your system? More or less than a £180.00-£200.00 Dell?
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:5, Interesting)
I only bothered to do so because having seen Firefly in the intended order from the DVD's I'm sold on the idea that it is the best sci fi series ever made for TV. I can't say I have a similar opinion of Mr Whedon's other series but Firefly has such superior writing and characters that I can't imagine even trying to make a comparison to the other franchises that I enjoy but do not admire nearly as much.
If you haven't seen the series or only saw a few confusingly presented episodes from the FOX debacle (boy I hope some of the morons responsible for that were fired) rent the episodes in order from your local video store or NetFlix. I'm not saying I can't imagine a better series but when compared to its peers, Star Trek, Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, Farscape, Babylon 5,
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
But if you weren't on Slashdot, it's easy to see how you could have missed it. It was put in a poor time slot, and moved around a lot, and it was cancelled mid-season.
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:3, Informative)
They did long story arcs. Not quite as long as on Babylon 5, but long enough to make each episode potentially fun to watch both on its own and as pa
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:3, Interesting)
I mean all the things people mention about his work were also done by Xena, which I thought was a much better show than Buffy (and which had TWO musical episodes befo
Re:Joss Whedon....Who??? (Score:2)
Joss isn't for everybody. You're not the first one to say that to me. As you say, different tastes.
But thanks for the inspiration. I just finished watching Buffy and Angel on DVD (I don't have cable and over-the-air reception is terrible at my house.) I've watched the with my gf over the past several years, and we've been looking for something else to watch. Xena is a good choice. I mis
Common practice (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Common practice (Score:2)
Re:Common practice (Score:5, Insightful)
I suspect that this is a new interesting marketting attempt. They get paid to show the movie in advance to a small group. That will raise interest in the film and awareness a bit. It is not even free marketting as the fanbase will pay for this. I seem to recall a couple other instances of this sort of thing, but they are rare.
I seriously doubt they would do this if they did not think they had something though. A lot of the flamebait on here is blathering about the fanboy base and *nobody* flames a franchise more than an upset fanboy.
A test audience signs non-disclosure agreements. They *want* people to talk about this. Not quite viral marketting, but they definately think that word-of-mouth will sell this. Since their dvd sales were pretty much all word-of-mouth and sold about 5 million set to date, there is a certain logic to that.
Re:Common practice (Score:2)
Well...
Usually the test audiences are culled from random people at malls in the San Fernando Valley, usually by the sophisticated technique of "Hey, wanna see a free movie Tuesday night?"
I think the targeted demo and so on is a myth. It's mostly a lot of industry wannabes (who, of course, live in the Valley) telling industry are-right-nows what's wrong with their movies.
Keep that in mind, and a lot of decisions made based on test screenings make a lot more sense.
Re:Common practice (Score:2)
The source of the people is somewhat random. But, not the composition of the people.
Re:Common practice (Score:2)
The composition of the groups is no more accurate that exit polling data (and you have only to look at the 2004 election to see how accurate that is).
If you put some kid on the street with a clipboard, pay him 8 bucks an hour, and tell him to get x number of people, he'll get x number of people.
Beyond that, they're gonna cut corners and take whatever "type" comes along.
It's a nice system in theory, but it's not the way it works at ground level.
Re:Common practice (Score:2)
Have you seen the movie ads where they say at the end "Now playing in New York and LA. Showing everywhere starti
Re:Common practice (Score:2, Insightful)
Great trailer (Score:4, Interesting)
pilot: (flying into a battle) This is about to get interesting.
captiain: Define "interesting."
pilot: "Interesting: Oh God, oh God, we're all going to die?"
bad guy: This destruction, this is your fault.
pilot: No, *I* don't murder children.
bad guy: [smiling] Oh, well I do.
Re:Great trailer (Score:3, Informative)
Captain: Mal(Malcom) (Former rebel. Wants to nail the space hooker)
Pilot: Wash
Engineer: Kaylee
Space Hooker: Inara
Stupid Muscle: Jayne
Female Muscle: Zoe (Wash's Wife, served with Mal in the revolution)
Doctor: Simon (River's Brother)
Preacher: Book
Psycho Chick: River
Re:Great trailer (Score:3, Informative)
Mal: Wants to nail Inara. Too much pride to admit it.
Wash: Ecstatic he gets to nail Zoe.
Kaylee: Wants to nail Simon. Annoyed he won't admit he wants her too.
Inara: Wants to nail Mal. Too "professional" to admit it.
Jayne: Wants to nail anything with boobs.
Zoe: Nails Wash regularly. May have nailed Mal in the past. Backstory hazy.
Simon: Wants to nail Kaylee. Too shy to admit it.
Book: Doesn't appear interested in nailing anybody.
River: Off in her own li
Re:Great trailer (Score:5, Funny)
More importantly:
Every male Firefly fan: Wants to nail Kaylee. Thinks Simon is an idiot for not going for it.
Jewel Staite broke my "never attracted to anyone younger than my little sister" rule. Apparently Joss had her put some meat on for Firefly; she looks great.
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
I wasn't gonna say anything potentially incriminating 2 weeks before my wedding though.... :)
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
On another subject, anyone laying odds of Firefly returning to the small screen of the film does well?
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
I'd say they're exactly the same as the odds that FOX will suddenly have totally new management.
Re:Great trailer (Score:3, Insightful)
If those three movies are successful, it might make Fox eager to order new seasons...
If the three movies are successful, the stars involved will have become "movie stars" and would be unlikely to agree to go back to doing a TV show. Granted, there are cases where "movie stars" have gone back and done TV, but they are few and far between (good luck getting the whole cast back) and usually don't happen until the "movie star" has had a string of high profile movie flops.
So, damned if you do, damned if y
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
She's a hermaphrodite then? Or does she use a strapon?
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
Cool.
Re:Great trailer (Score:5, Funny)
Bad Guy: I want to work this out like civilized men. I'm not threatening you. I'm unarmed.
Mal: Good. *BLAM*
Re:Great trailer (Score:3, Insightful)
Bad Guy: I want to work this out like civilized men. I'm not... ...threaten...uh...
Mal: Good. *BLAM*
Bad Guy:
Re:Great trailer (Score:3, Funny)
Bad Guy: I want to work this out like civilized men. I'm not [SHOOTS FIRST]
Mal: Damn you Lucas!!
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
Re:Great trailer (Score:3, Insightful)
First time you watch "The Train Job", you expect Mal to wind up with Niska's tattooed goon as a continual nemesis.
He kills them both in cold (OK, they were bad guys, lukewarm) blood. It is entirely possible that's how that bad guy dies, not that him dying will be the end of the story since I guarantee he isn't the only bad guy.
That said, you're probably right, at le
Re:Great trailer (Score:2, Funny)
Book: Quite specific. It is, however, somewhat fuzzy around the subject of kneecaps.
Re:Great trailer (Score:3, Informative)
It's not uncommon to splice together stuff for a trailer that never happens that way in the movie (or TV episode).
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
bad guy: Variations on "I'm gonna kick your ass"
good guy: slick answer
I'm hoping the good guy makes it look like he has to think about these one line perfectly structured responses every once in a while.
Re:Great trailer (Score:2)
If you appreciated Toy Story, Alien 4, Rosanne, or anything [imdb.com]
Links for the unitiated (Score:3, Informative)
This isn't news (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:This isn't news (Score:5, Interesting)
makes you wonder how the show failed so fast. was it because it was on friday nights, or because it was shown out of sequence (the pilot being shown last) or is the TV rating system flawed enough that they may miss a whole demographic of people that use VCRs/TiVo to catch shows.
Re:This isn't news (Score:2)
Yes, yes, and yes. Also it was preempted by sports fairly often.
I think that a hefty majority of current fans are people who first watched the show on dvd. As evidenced even here, many people simply couldn't understand the show until they could see all of the episodes in the correct order. So subtract those potential viewers from the potential viewers who never even heard of the show before the dvds, and you get one canceled show.
Though I
-1 Wrong (Score:3, Interesting)
Furthermore, I'd be curious to hear where you got your "1000 seats" number, as there is no actual article linking any solid information, other than the official website, which only lists the cities being shown.
*And before
focus grouping (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know if that's a good thing or not. Most good movies are more organic -- they're the result of someone's vision, expressed with comparatively small amounts of interference.
But then again, I'm already planning on not going to the last Star Wars movie [strasheim.org], so I'm out of step.
Re:focus grouping (Score:4, Insightful)
For me, the Serenity movie is a chance for the Firefly team to show me something different.
Re:focus grouping (Score:2, Insightful)
If you and the rest of the general public don't like it that much, tough shit.
Re:focus grouping (Score:2)
Too bad for you, glad your friends enjoyed it.
For me, the Serenity movie is a chance for the Firefly team to show me something different.
Why? You've got Everything else on the planet if you want something different, the idea of the Serenity movie is to be Firefly. If you don't enjoy Firefly then I'm sorry, this movie simply isn't fo
Hell, all movies are pretty much made by committee (Score:2)
Story, plot, subject matter, appropriateness are all plowed under for a six seconds of basically orange tinted celluloid showing some geographic background and a big fractal/dynamic fluid flow pattern.
If you want inventiveness and daring, challenging writing, l
It's a good thing (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:It's a good thing (Score:2)
I agree that many bad movies are made by auteur types. But most of the really good ones are too.
A movie like the mask is pleasant enough to sit through, and if I were in the movie business, I would have loved to have been associated with it, because it made money. But for me, a guy in the aud
Re:It's a good thing (Score:2)
I really dig hitchcock...
Serenity trailer - direct download (Score:4, Informative)
http://movies.apple.com/movies/universal/serenity
Pent Up Demand (Score:4, Interesting)
The networks really seem to have a love hate relationship with Sci-Fi Fantasy fans. They are not content to cater to a smaller demographic. While that same demographic will none the less be loyal and unwavering for a good show, and support said show with DVD purchases and Fan sites, proving while maybe a 1/2 to 1/3 the normal demographic for other fair, the long term property value is much Higher. Sci-Fi fans should let advertisers know that they are major consumers and will well reward brands that support our hunger for good alternate fair on TV.
I will probably hear some boos on this, but I find it ironic that Enterprise has been exceptional the last few episodes. I liked it in general, though it could have been better. I was not obsessive about its departure, but now they've decided to go out with a bang and have plots that are not retellings of TOS I am vexed. It would seem we will never get a third Evil-Universe story, it seemed like a cliffhanger. Granted the Evil-Universe thing was used kind of gimmicky in the DS9 series, but Enterprise has it right by leaving the main universe out. Probably just get tired of seeing all the PC hand ringing our characters do, and enjoying seeing people give into some raw animal emotions.
check out that sneaky affiliate link in the post! (Score:5, Informative)
See the u=dizzyellie in the article link?
That's to get them credits when you sign up for the site to browse! SNEAKY! (wish I thought of it)
(credits let them get free t-shirts and posters and such)
Re:check out that sneaky affiliate link in the pos (Score:3, Interesting)
Slashdot is a "link site", not really a news site. Journalistic integrity is neither its strong point, nor a requirement.
If the submitter gets free goodies for being the first to send in the link, more power to them.
But back on topic:
As for whether the movie is good or not... if it's as good as any of the episodes were, but with a bigger effects budget, then it's already more than worth the money that many people spend to go see utter crap in the theatre. Joss is getting my money, it
Re:check out that sneaky affiliate link in the pos (Score:2, Informative)
Serenity: The Official Movie Website [serenitymovie.com]
FireFlyFans.net [serenitymovie.com]
http://forums.prospero.com/foxfirefly/start [serenitymovie.com]
Test Screening-Early Reviews [serenitymovie.com]
Another Serenity Review [serenitymovie.com]
WonderCon Clip 128k.mov [serenitymovie.com]
WonderCon Clip 300k.mov [serenitymovie.com]
WonderCon Clip 700k.mov [serenitymovie.com]
WonderCon Clip 128k_wmv.asx [serenitymovie.com]
WonderCon Clip 300k_wmv.asx [serenitymovie.com]
WonderCon Clip 700k_wmv.asx [serenitymovie.com]
Wait till September? (Score:2, Insightful)
Trailer? (Score:2)
Re:Trailer? (Score:2)
Re:Trailer? (Score:2)
Reviews (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=20089 [aintitcool.com]
Its by a big Whedon fan, so probably a little biast.
there are already reviews (Score:4, Informative)
H.264 trailer (Score:2)
H.264 trailer is freaking awesome. (Score:2)
Of course, watching it on the gorgeous flat screen helped.
I got my tickets!!! (Score:5, Interesting)
I happened to trip over the announcement at 1 a.m, woke the wife, and scored our tickets. We're very excited about it!!!
What's it about? One good quote that I read was, "Imagine if Star Wars had been about Han instead of Luke." (but with much, much better writing and no damned cutsie aliens).
There have been several test screenings in the past to tune the movie. Almost always, the word leaked and these turned into flash mob events for Firefly/Whedon fans. This 10 city screening is a little different. The movie is nearly the finished product, but the purpose is to incite the fan base into a word-of-mouth guerilla marketing machine.
Universal apparently thought that there was going to be trouble getting butts into seats, and created a marketing campaign and ads just for this screening. With 30,000+ registered fans at the official Serenity website [serenitymovie.com], they need not have worried about that. A couple of folks have even put their tickets on eBay with bidding now at absurd levels.
This promises to be big! Check out the trailer [apple.com]!
It's all about Han (Score:3, Interesting)
Surprisingly, I didn't catch this while firefly was on the air, nor after I watched the DVDs. I was describing the show to a friend of mine, and he says "So it's basically the adventures of Han Solo?" It's really the best synopsis I've heard, and he hadn't watched the show.
I wonder if that's what Whedon had in mind the whole time?
Serenity HD Trailer (Score:2)
Beta movies good enough for production sale (Score:5, Funny)
MS: Beta Software Good Enough for Production Use [slashdot.org]
(Only, this time they're charging.)
The people that are interested don't care that it is still beta. The people that do not want to consume an unfinished product will stay away.
Re:Beta movies good enough for production sale (Score:2)
Serenity trailer in HDTV format, here (Score:5, Informative)
80mb ultra high res XVID trailer [whoisriver.com]
It's 80mb. Well above DVD quality.
Needs Xvid. In linux, use mplayer -framedrop (you may also need "-vo x11" in linux if your graphics card doesn't handle very mad resolutions).
Also, whilst I've got your attention: I've seen the movie in London last month with the UK distributors (UIP), and it was freakin' brilliant.
Re:Serenity trailer in HDTV format, here (Score:2)
Ah fuck! They had one in LV... (Score:2)
Damnit.
Testing the waters does not take stones.. (Score:2)
END COMMUNICATION
Re:Testing the waters does not take stones.. (Score:2)
Trailer didn't excite (Score:2)
TWW
Re:In other expected news (Score:5, Funny)
Don't hate. He does good grocery.
Re:In other expected news (Score:2)
Schedule Change (Score:3, Funny)
Re:In other expected news (Score:3, Funny)
Wow, when does that come out?
Re:If the movied sucked... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:CGI cities (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The movie will still bomb (Score:3, Insightful)
Given that a lot of the Firefly episodes were written/directed by Joss, I'm not sure how he was trying to do an impression of himself.
Re:The movie will still bomb (Score:2, Funny)
Because you're a fucking retard. In my opinion.
Re:OT: Goodbye karma. (Score:3, Insightful)
"Where is his science?"
Well, Firefly is just about the only sci-fi series to actually
So whilst you might not like Firefly (I do, because it doesn't resemble Buffy much at all: Firefly is funny and has well thought out, rounded characters instead of the buffy-characiture), you ca
Re:OT: Goodbye karma. (Score:2)
You compare his work to that of children's authors, claim without support that Firefly somehow rehashes Buffy (what? Do you have the secret scripts from Firefly Season 2 that has Simon losing his soul and trying to kill Kaylee?)
His science is fine. Whedon just isn't bothered when his characters say "fuel" instead
Re:ripoff (Score:3, Insightful)
If you want to draw parallel's between Han Solo and Firefly's captain, who both happen to wear remarkably similar pants, might I point out that's
Re:wtf is serenity? (Score:4, Insightful)
But the show itself is not formulaic. It subverts a lot of different "sci-fi" and even TV-series-in-general expectations. No vinyl-clad halloween-esque aliens with more make-up than my dead grandfather, no scantily clad crew members who have no real business being scantily clad (Inara's a Companion. Dressing beautifully is part of her job description. and she's never scantily clad anyway), the dialogue is FUNNY and entirely character driven... and the characters are complex rather than based on single opposing traits.
In the "literary" sense, the series really doesn't belong on mainstream tv at all because that's not the kind of thing that gets played on mainstream tv.
Buffy had a fanbase because it had pretty faces, yes. But this series has a fanbase (much bigger and with a higher average IQ than the buffy fanbase) because it's a GOOD series.