Feature Friday | Serenity

FEATURE FRIDAY | SERENITY

We have decided to introduce a new reoccurring feature on our blog called Feature Friday in which we share with you some of our favorite Movies & TV Shows! When we first were dating one of the things we bonded over was chatting about some of our favorite shows. We’ve found that is the same for a lot of our couples too! Several Fridays throughout the month we with showcase a different movie or show and share some of the reasons why we recommend it and the things that we really like about it. So be sure to tune in, check out some of our favorites, & maybe even turn it into a date night with your fiance! Make dinner, or order in, & tune in to watch one of our favorites…. this week, Serenity!

There has never been another movie like “Serenity.” There are movies with similarities.  “Guardians of the Galaxy” is a funny sci-fi action movie.  “Veronica Mars” was a big-screen adaptation of a cult-hit TV show.    But nothing will ever quite be like “Serenity,” and it’s really hard to put into words why.

It makes the most sense to start with the basics: “Firefly” was a show that only got one season on Fox.  And barely got that.  It had its timeslot changed almost weekly.  It had its episodes aired out of order.  Despite all of that, it built up one of the most rabidly loyal fanbases on TV, and all of us Browncoats were devastated when the show was inevitably canceled.

Then Joss Whedon picked up the pieces of his broken show and made them into a glorious movie that answered questions from the show like “Why is River the way that she is?” and posed entirely new ones like “Is it actually possible to paralyze somebody by punching them in the kidney?”  It introduced us to the Reavers, characters only spoken about in hushed tones throughout the series save for one brief sequence, and turned them loose on an unsuspecting town, then tying them into the big finale battle sequence in an incredibly satisfying way.

Part of the charm of “Firefly” and “Serenity” is the cast.  Nathan Fillion, Alan Tudyk, Morena Baccarin, Summer Glau, Adam Baldwin, Sean Maher, Ron Glass, Gina Torres, Jewel Staite…  And those were just the series regulars.  Throw in new-for-the-movie performances by Chiwetel Ejiofor, David Krumholtz, and Sarah Paulson and the iMDB page reads like a who’s-who of your favorite nerdy stars.

Probably the thing that most makes “Serenity” what it is is Joss Whedon himself.  Aside from maybe Tarantino, there is not another writer/director working today whose style is so recognizable that you can hear one line of dialogue and think “Oh, Joss wrote that” or see one frame and think “Oh, Joss shot that.”  His singular vision for what this show’s worlds were and who these characters are made what could have been a cash-in attempt on something that was already popular into a truly amazing piece of cinema.
Of course, it’s a Whedon movie, so he has to kill off SOMEBODY that you love, but we’re not going to spoil that if you haven’t seen it yet.
Which, speaking of, see it.  Right now.