Serenity Now

OK, it's an obvious headline, but gimme a break: you come up with a better one using the word "serenity". Anyway, I just got back from seeing Joss Whedon's pet project. It was entertaining, and on a Tuesday night, that's pretty much all I need. The thing I enjoyed most about this movie is that it doesn't fall into the trap of most sci-fi these days: it isn't trying to be Star Wars. It exists in its own world, and that's pretty refreshing. Granted, that world may have been a little more confusing to me if I had never seen any episodes of Firefly, the very short-lived TV show this movie was based on, but other than fleshing out the supporting cast a lot more, there wasn't a lot from Firefly that I needed for Serenity to be a good experience. In some ways, Serenity felt very much like TV (everything wrapped up pretty neatly at the end), and in some ways, a lot like it was meant to be an "event" (Joss has never been shy about maiming or killing his main characters, and this movie's no exception). And like all good sci-fi movies, it's a lot heavier on the "fi" than the "sci". I'll sum it up like this: in the 70's there were a string of mediocre, dime-a-dozen post-apocalyptic sci-fi movies which you can now sometimes find showing on Saturday afternoons (they usually feature Charlton Heston fighting humanoid apes or zombies or some such). If you've ever seen one of those movies, you have a reference point: Serenity is in the same vein, although with much better production values, special effects, and a better overall experience. So at the very least, 10 years from now it will make good Saturday afternoon viewing.