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Sci-Fi Media Movies

Official Firefly Movie Web Site Launched 281

The Orange Hatter writes "The official Universal Pictures web site for the Firefly Movie 'Serenity' is up. It includes a blog, message board, opportunites to get point for Firefly swag, and lots of other fun stuff. Check it out."
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Official Firefly Movie Web Site Launched

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  • by chris_mahan ( 256577 ) <chris.mahan@gmail.com> on Thursday June 24, 2004 @06:59PM (#9523480) Homepage
    There are html, css, and 508 validators.
    There should be a slashdot validator for pages: The likelihood that if slashdotted, your pages will take your server down for the count.
    • I agree...

      Check page size, check load time, estimate the approximate number of visitors before load time exceeds one minute.... and if that number exceeds the approximate number of Slashdotters that will come knocking.

      Put those "mirror in case of slashdotting" jerks out of business!
  • Of course (Score:5, Insightful)

    by arrow ( 9545 ) <mike.damm@com> on Thursday June 24, 2004 @06:59PM (#9523482) Homepage Journal
    And of course the mods miss the blaitant spam. Submitter is getting points for every slashdot clickthru.

    Non spammy link in 3..2..1...http://www.serenitymovie.com/ [serenitymovie.com]
  • heroes! (Score:4, Funny)

    by maxbang ( 598632 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:02PM (#9523497) Journal

    It appears the website appeared just in the nick of time. What do you suppose that makes the designers? Big Damn Heroes! Ain't they just?

  • by LuxFX ( 220822 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:04PM (#9523514) Homepage Journal
    And you people claim to be fans....

    Slashdot brought the website down faster than Fox took down the tv show! Now I still can't get my Joss fix....
  • Damn... (Score:3, Funny)

    by mshiltonj ( 220311 ) <mshiltonjNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:05PM (#9523516) Homepage Journal
    How do you /. the web site of a major motion picture? You'd think they could afford the bandwidth/horsepower.

    Can't wait for the movie, though. I've got to get my DVD set of the series back and watch it again. I've loaned it out -- doing my part to extend the fan base.
  • by TheUncleBob ( 791234 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:05PM (#9523519) Homepage
    It was fox that dropped the series ? See not a mozilla joke in sight

    Doh
  • by Hortensia Patel ( 101296 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:07PM (#9523535)

    Point yer browsin' gear here [fireflymovie.com] for news and discussion, including recent blogs by Nathan ("Mal") and Jewel ("Kaylee") from the set.

    And by dint of shameless grovelling the webmaster has just wangled himself a part as an extra on the movie! Kudos.

  • by grasshoppa ( 657393 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:11PM (#9523561) Homepage
    I just want to know who dusty-whatever is so I can beat the stupid right out of him.
  • by PenguinOpus ( 556138 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:13PM (#9523569)
    I didn't watch any of the episodes on Fox because I hadn't even discovered Buffy yet. 6 seasons of DVD Buffy later (waiting for the 7th), we buy Firefly's DVD set and were really impressed.

    Firefly, the series, has the usual Joss Whedan good characters interacting in interesting ways.
    Apparently they didn't show the pilot first on Fox and I can't imagine how that could have worked. The 2 hour pilot (also called Serenity) is a must see and its CGI special effects are surprisingly good.

    15 episodes (pilot + 13) + extras.

    Strongly Recommended!
    • by sflory ( 2747 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:46PM (#9523772)
      Seeing it out of order really destroyed the experience for me. My biggest complaint was that it was rather disjointed. I really wasn't a big fan until I watched it on DVD. Personally I'd rather watch the FireFly DVD again than anything Fox is currently showing.
      • I watched most of the series as it aired, and watched through the whole thing again on DVD in as-aired order to finish it the way I had started. Some time later, I started watching it again with my girlfriend to introduce her to the show. This time, however, we started with the original pilot. To make a long story short, she was confused and a bit bored, not knowing who all of the random characters being introduced were, and my feeling was somewhere along the lines of "wow, I'm glad I saw this the other
      • Heh, Our local FOX affiliate (serving a major metropolitan area) seemed bound and determined to cause even more problems. When airing "Ariel" they had sound and video problems for a good 15 minutes when Mal and Jayne were having a "chat".

        The time slot sucked, the out-of-order airings sucked, the promos sucked ("and a girl in a box!") but the show turned out to be some of the best few hours of television ever made. That's really saying something.

        Come April 22 of next year, I know I'll be donning overalls
    • The series seemed to confuse the NeuroTypicals out there. I read a review in the Oregonian (Portland, OR newspaper) where the critic completely focused on what he felt were technological inconsistencies ("they've got spaceships and bullet trains but most people use horses?") and uterly failed to understand the backstory at all (of a Centralized "galacticazation" trade group that kept the core rich and the outlying planets poor, quite an interesting social commentary there about the power of corporations in cahoots with governments). It just went right over his head. And I know that reviewer, read his TV reviews quite often, I'd put him slightly above normal intelligence; so obviously the great number of boobs who would fall for "Joe Millionaire" and other Fox Reality shows just weren't smart enough to get Joss Whedan. And thus we're stuck watching the idiocy they CAN understand.
      • I have just finished the second DVD of the set (pilot + 6 episodes). I have not watched Firefly before this... ...and I am still confused over the backstory! I understand that the core is richer than the rim, and that some sort of galactic feudal manorialism is in place, but some stuff still seems odd. When do they start explaining this stuff? I get the sense that there's a complete history behind "companions", but without an explanation it's hard to reconcile prostitutes being revered members of the upper
    • Insensitive Clod (Score:3, Informative)

      by tqft ( 619476 )
      I tried all the DVD stores in Brisbane Australia. No Firefly released or planned to be released in Australia.

      Firefly not released in Australia (Region 4). Store guy recommened downloading it off the intenet.

      Anyone seen Region 4 DVD of the series available.

      BTW; it has also not been shown on TV here either.
    • I know nothing about the show, but how can a geek pass up intelligent scifi? Cheapest I've found so far is $28.76 with free ship (below). Found the coupon codes on FW.

      Deepdiscountdvd.com

      Use any codes below for 20% off thru 6/26
      SUMMERSALE
      DVDTALK
      DVDSALE
      USATODAY
      PRIC ESEARCH
      DEEPDISCOUNT
      KLSX
      BROKEWALLET
  • by Jerf ( 17166 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:15PM (#9523582) Journal
    See title. All the summaries seem to point to that but that seems odd.

    I'm not sure how I feel about that, either way.
  • no time travel (Score:5, Insightful)

    by fermion ( 181285 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:15PM (#9523583) Homepage Journal
    That says it all. That is why i think firefly is a better that the late incarnations of Star Trek and B5. Don't get me wrong. B5 is a wonderful story that is more ambitious and make a better effort to be technically accurate than practically any other sci-fi show. And Star Trek is great, it is the Granddaddy.

    But the time travel, unless we are traveling in time and not space, is the overused plot device of the past ten or 15 years. Enterprise sucks because that is the basis of the whole show, and hopefully they can compensate for the mistake. B5 was nearly fatally wounded by it's misuse of the time line.

    But Firefly concentrates on the basics. The relationships. The flawed characters. The goal of living life the best you can. You don't have people floating willy nilly in and out of time. You don't have have people going back and forth in time so that the writers can cowardly destroy a ship at the beginning of the episode only to have it resurrected at the end. All you have is a totally unbelievable ship floating throughout a totally unbelievable universe with totally unbelievable characters. Just like real life.

    This is also why Battlestar Galactica was so cool.

    • Blockquoth the poster:

      This [no time travel] is also why Battlestar Galactica was so cool.


      And why -- among other reasons -- Galactica 1980 stank up the screen.
    • Re:no time travel (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Dr. Spork ( 142693 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:44PM (#9523763)
      It is actually possible to make good time travel stories. I just read an amazing one in Axiomatic by Greg Egan. Others, like 12 Monkeys and Heinlein's "All You Zombies [heinleinsociety.org]" are at also entertaining and well-conceived. What ruins Star Trek is just bad writing, not time travel per se. Read this paper [vuw.ac.nz] if you're really interested in the conceptual issues in Time Travel. It will make you hate that cheapo Star Trek crap even more, because you'll realize exactly why that "second time 'round" crap they always pull with time travel is completely incoherent.
      • What's sad is that the last Harry Potter movie had completely consistant time travel.

        It's very sad a scientist can enjoy a movie about magic more than the completely innaccurate garbage that passes for science fiction.

        How come we can see the laser beams? And why are they so freaking slow?
        How come we can hear in the vaccum of space?
        How come we only have inertia when dramatic events occur?
        How come nearly every alien species lives in an earth-like atmosphere?
        How come slowing down is infinitely easier than sp
        • How come we can see the laser beams? And why are they so freaking slow?
          The movie is so dense that light has a hard way throught it.

          How come we can hear in the vaccum of space?
          The space in movies isn't fully empty to let director shout "Action!". It's kinda half empty. Or half full.

          How come we only have inertia when dramatic events occur?
          Inertia is the force of nature that keeps us watching this movie.

          How come nearly every alien species lives in an earth-like atmosphere?
          Because the cost of live is
    • B5 was nearly fatally wounded by it's misuse of the time line.
      What misuse? The [SPOLIER ALERT] Sinclair / Valen thing was perhaps the most ingenius use of the timeline I have ever seen.
      • I agree- Makes for a VERY interesting religious commentary as well. Judaism/Catholicism was evident throughout B5- then you end up having the most Catholic character in the whole series become a martyr, go back in time, and start the religion of an entire alien race who becomes central to fighting the ultimate evil of the Shadows. Best use of time travel I've ever seen.

        Those who do not like time travel in sci-fi are the ones who can't wrap their minds around the changes possible and the shifts in timelin
    • Re:no time travel (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Noren ( 605012 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @08:17PM (#9523983)
      Hmm... I can certainly understand not liking the concept of time travel in science fiction, or of not liking specific episodes. But... in B5 there were only three episodes out of the 110 which contained any (out of sequence) time travel- "Babylon Squared" and "War Without End" parts 1 and 2. The three basically comprise one story (even though two years separated their production) and the net result was interesting in my opinion. Though not a totally novel outcome, it was at least mostly self-consistent and I hadn't seen it on the small screen before... unlike the average Star Trek "We must not alter the past and/or we must fix how someone else altered the past" or "Visit to Earth in some time period for which we already have sets" plot. More episodes were produced before the first time travel episode (19) than were ever produced for Firefly.

      There were a number of anachronistic things (e.g. "Comes the Inquisitor", "A Late Delivery from Avalon", Garibaldi's Daffy Duck poster and motorcycle) which were not results of nonsequential time travel, as well as some episodes which took place over odd timelines (the "camera" going years after the rest of the series) but which had no time travel per se ("The Deconstruction of Falling Stars", "Sleeping in Light")

      There was precognition at many points, though, and lots and lots of foreshadowing and glimpses into the future. What time travel there was also implied some amount of predestination. Was it the predestination more than just the time travel which you found objectionable?

    • Well, interestingly enough, back in the 60s, Gene Roddenberry's one-line summation of Star Trek was "Wagon Train to the Stars." Firefly is far more "Wagon Train to the Stars" than Trek ever was. It's very much a space Western.

      Not that this makes Trek bad, or Firefly derivative, by any means, just that Firefly is very much in the "pioneer spirit" vein of sci-fi; something that I think Trek has been missing for a long time.
      • I loved Firefly for one because it was fresh. The captain didn't make long monologues about morality.

        I loved the tension of legal / moral between him and the Companion (sorry, I forget her name).

        It also gladly showed a future were humanity remains imperfect and is still subject to civil war and tyranny because that is practically human nature, IMO.

        I also loved Firefly because it didn't try to take itself too seriously, some Whedon style humor pops up here and there.

        What I find interesting is that those
  • by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) ( 613870 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:24PM (#9523631) Journal
    When was the last time you waited for a movie to come out and it was good?
    • When was the last time you waited for a movie to come out and it was good?

      D00d, all kinds!

      Star Wars Episode I

      Star Wars Episode II

      Teh Hulk

      Ma7r1x Reloaded

      Ma7r1x Revolutions

      Troy

      Jersey Girl

      Chocolat

      All aewsum!!!111

    • Holy smoke, have you forgotten the LOTR trilogy already ?

      (Yes, there where some letdowns, but generally PJ did a fantastic job!)
    • But you have a point.
      A friend of mine discribed he feeled insulted and scammed after seeing the day after tomorrow ;)

      But hey. That's the power of the media (which can and will be bought). Look at a program like Idols. The whole concept is to create a mediahype and to profit from the spinn-off.

      Same thing with Bush by the way. In the aspect of using the media to influence the people.

      And how can media be independent if they depend on their income (generated by their advertisers).
      So if the advertisers fay a
  • by Mechanized Elf ( 682620 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:25PM (#9523647)
    Posts by Nathan Fillion on one of the fansites indicated that the movie deal with Paramount was exclusive--i.e. that there would be no TV series until the film franchise has run its course. Assuming the deal is a standard 3-film option, we can assume that Firefly is reserved for the big screen for at least the next few years. Kind of a shame since the prolific Joss Whedon really shines in serial format.

    Maybe the answer is an entirely new distribution channel like Mark Cuban's HDNet [hd.net]. Whedon should not be burdened with product placements and FOX-style scorecarding.

    • Wait, they've got a deal for _more_ than one movie?? And this is not good news how? As long as every geek makes sure to go out and see each movie three or four times, we'll get a couple movies out of it and much higher odds of another tv series after the fact :)
  • Ron Glass (Score:5, Informative)

    by hchaos ( 683337 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:32PM (#9523694)
    Is finally being listed in the cast. I've always thought Book was one of the more interesting characters of the show.
    • Re:Ron Glass (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Cyno01 ( 573917 ) <Cyno01@hotmail.com> on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:43PM (#9523758) Homepage
      Yeah, to bad the show got canned before they could get around to what his deal was. "How's a preacher know so much 'bout crime?"
      • Re:Ron Glass (Score:4, Interesting)

        by kalidasa ( 577403 ) * on Thursday June 24, 2004 @08:43PM (#9524082) Journal

        Yeah, to bad the show got canned before they could get around to what his deal was. "How's a preacher know so much 'bout crime?

        "That's no preacher." I figure he must be an exile from Blue Sun who sided with the browncoats, but for some reason is still considered untouchable.

        • Re:Ron Glass (Score:3, Interesting)

          "That's no preacher." I figure he must be an exile from Blue Sun who sided with the browncoats, but for some reason is still considered untouchable.

          "I don't give a damn if you're innocent or not! So where does that put you? Hmmm?"

          I don't think he sided with the loosers, I think he was a high ranking official who suddenly realised that the ends did not justify the horrible means he was using. He's obviously trying to atone for his sins.
          Though I think we'll curse his sudden but inevitable betrayal when he
        • by sql*kitten ( 1359 ) *
          Too... much... hair!!
  • by methangel ( 191461 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @07:37PM (#9523721)
    Take my love
    Take my land
    Take me where I cannot stand
    I don't care
    I'm still free
    You can't take the sky from me

    Take me out
    To the black tell 'em I ain't coming back
    Burn the land
    And boil the sea
    You can't take the sky from me

    Have no place
    I can be
    Since I found Serenity
    But you can't take the sky from me

    This is one of the catchiest show songs I have heard in a long time. I remember thinking it was kind of a weird song for a space show the first episode of Firefly I ever saw. Pretty soon I found myself singing along.

    I can't wait to see the movie!!!
  • by duffhuff ( 688339 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @08:06PM (#9523907)
    I was at Universal Studios Hollywood on Tuesday. During the studio tour (where you drive around on the busses) we went through a "quiet zone" where they were filming several movies. Right beside the Jurassic Park ride was the set of Serenity, and who was right outside the set? None other then Nathan Fillion, the Captain himself.

    Although I don't subscribe to the obsessive-fan mantra, being a huge fan of Firefly and seeing him, dressed in his usual captain garb, was the highlight of the day for me.

    I really hope the new movie does well, but either way, we've kept flying.
  • It's good that the site has such a short, easy-to-remember URL.
  • Jewel Saite (Score:3, Funny)

    by doormat ( 63648 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @08:54PM (#9524126) Homepage Journal
    Ever since I found out the cute engineer girl is married [imdb.com] i lost all interest in the show. Sigh..
  • I was wondering why the site was so sluggish and timing out with errors.... slashdotting underway! *g*
  • by glwtta ( 532858 ) on Thursday June 24, 2004 @10:47PM (#9524679) Homepage
    Do you really need flash for a title, a release date and three links? If you REALLY want that swishy effect for the title (which I'll agree, is just groingrabbingly fantastic!), is it so hard to put the three freaking links outside the flash thing, as well?

    What's wrong with these people?

  • Sounds like good future name for Phoenix, Firefly 1.0?

  • by TheMeddler ( 790145 ) on Friday June 25, 2004 @09:30AM (#9527047)
    Serenity Now!

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