Category: Geeky Fanboy

Nathan Fillion (aka Cpt. Mal Reynolds) posted a little farewell note on the Firefly board (well, everyone did, but his was the best one). Included below:

So, here we all are. It seems that we are a living embodiment for the show. We are Browncoats, fighting a war we were never meant to win, but fighting nonetheless. The Fox Alliance has spoken, leaving us to make due with the cards we’ve been dealt. If you are anything like me, you’ve been pulling the record tabs off your precious Firefly VHS tapes, pushing along through your life still bitterly fighting the war from within.

I love Firefly. Walking around the cargo bay, the bridge, it’s all been terribly painful. It does still live inside me, though. With every “gorram” or “them as can” I throw unknowingly into my daily conversation, or everytime I sit in the captain’s chair that lives in my heart, I smile with the knowledge of what we’ve accomplished here. We may have been on the losing side, still not convinced it was the wrong one. I can’t remember who said that.
Keep sending those postcards into to UPN. Every little bit helps, and if ever you see me on the street, just nod and say, “Captain.” You’ll make my day.

Okay, quick and dirty.
Excellent. Just excellent. More Gimli, good Legolas stuff, Eowyn was great, Grima was great, and the animation on Smealgol was absolutely stunning.
There were scenes where I wanted to see more — not because they felt incomplete, but just because I wanted to enjoy the scene even more and for longer.
Oddly, Helm’s Deep was not one of those scenes. It was the part I thought could have been shortened a bit in favor of more Treebeard, but probably only by a minute, total… I say it could be shorter, but there isn’t really any bit I’d want to lose. Ah well.
I wanted more Treebeard. His section was far too ‘hasty’. Smealgol was excellent.
There’s a rumor going around that a major scene from the second book was moved to the third movie. That is not true: there are two major scenes that were moved, both near the end. Should make the start of RotK ver ver interesting and of course I can hardly wait.
With the first movie, I enjoyed the added scenes on the DVD mostly for the fun of it. In Two Towers, I think they’ll add considerably to my enjoyment (which was already substantial) just because there is SO MUCH going on that it would be nice if there were no arbitrary three hour time limit.
As with the first movie, the timing of some of the dialogue seemed odd and off-center the first time I saw it, but flowed seamlessly the second time — don’t know why that is.
Wanted to see more of Faramir, but I liked the stuff they added to that section of the story. Did I mention Smealgol was brilliant?
Quite a large section was added to this movie that is not in any way in the books, but it was so interesting visually and story-wise that I really didn’t care. It needed to be added to counterweight the stuff that was moved to RotK.
All in all, great stuff, although I think I might have liked FotR just a squige more (this being so very very VERY ‘middle of the story’), but having said that I want to also mention that Two Towers made me want to reread the whole series again more more so than FotR did.
Seeing it twice in the same day might have been, in retrospect, unnecessary, although I’m glad I did it since now I won’t be constantly thinking about it until I see it again.
Again, Smealgol was great.
There are many great little one-liners that I’d love to mention, but I hate reading those myself before I’ve seen the movie because I end up waiting all movie to hear the lines, so I’m not going to mention them. I will simply mention Legolas, Gimli, Samwise the Brave, and Gollum.

I spent the lunch hour turning my electronic tickets for The Lord of the Rings into paper.
The first show we’re going to is at midnight tonight. Twelve hours later, we’ll there again.
Geek? Maybe. When I went to the theatre where they’re doing the midnight show there were already people in line outside (for seats, not tickets). Lawn chairs, reading material, and warm clothing — not particularly warm outside today.
Matter of fact, it just started snowing a little bit.

Jackie bought me the Farscape PC game last week (according to the minimum requirements it shouldn’t even run on my box, but it does just fine, which I’ll credit to a large). The controls are a little weird, but the 360 pan is cool and EVERY SINGLE VOICE was done by the original actors, which is very cool. I already miss hearing those guys. Gigi’s ‘Chiana’ voice is so cool.
The secondary characters (which means anyone but the guy you’re currently controlling directly) don’t follow directions worth a damn, but that’s on purpose — you definitely have the sense that you’re in charge (not control) of a bunch of disparate alpha personalities. Luckily you can switch control to anyone you’re working with at the time, so if Chi’s wandering off out of boredom, you can switch to her and get her back in line.
Crighton follows any of the female characters very closely. Go fig.
Anyway, lots of shooting things and sounds of pulse pistols going off. Always good.
(Somehow, computer-controlled Chiana with a pulse rifle uses less ammo than I do running Crighton with a lil’ ol’ pulse pistol. Witness my lack of surprise.)

Lois McMaster Bujold, a right-fine sci-fi and fantasy writer whom I really can’t recommend enough, has prescreened the Two Towers and provides a review here, quite spoiler-free and predictably erudite.

Short, non-spoiler review:

Oh. Yes.

Longer version: This was very fine. [snip] As with the first film, I could spot quite perfect renditions of elements from the novel, over and over, just as described, which always made me want to cheer. It still stuns me that they managed to get anything this good past the Hollywood system.

I really don’t think I could look forward to tomorrow midnight anymore than I already am, but damned if this didn’t raise the bar again.

(via the charming and shockingly-powerful Madeline)

So from now on, the goal is to have Firefly picked up by another network. The first target at the Firefly Immediate Assistance Campaign is UPN. They’ve had success with Joss Whedon’s work in Buffy and previously expressed an interest in Angel. Send them a copy of the Variety ad using the postcards available here.
Address the postcards to:
DAWN TARNOFSKY-OSTROFF
PRESIDENT, ENTERTAINMENT (CEO)
UNITED PARAMOUNT NETWORK
11800 WILSHIRE BLVD
LOS ANGELES CA 90025
Firefly Immediate Assistance Campaign’s advice is to let them know how much you enjoyed the show while it was on FOX, and how eager you are for it to find a home with UPN. Keep things upbeat and positive. Some ideas for things to mention: your favorite episode, why the show moves you, why you think the show has potential, etc.

Four AM. Can’t sleep. Who’d have thought?

There’s a couple of things I’d like to say and a few things I really can’t. …

Don’t think for a second that I have given up on this show. I think it has been mistreated shamefully but the Fox network has indicated that they would not stand in the way (which they can) of my finding a new home for the show. That’s no easy prospect. But I will do everything in my power, as always, to keep this bird in the air. Of course I’ll post if there’s any news. …

So for now, I proudly take my place beside Profit, The Ben Stiller Show, The Tick, and Action. But I won’t rest until I’ve found safe harbour (no, not the Gregory Harrison show) for this vessel.

I’ve got the time.

It ain’t like I’m sleeping.

-joss.

So, hope springs eternal. Everyone say it with me: UPN, UPN, UPN — where the network is happy to have you.
Couple things:

• Firefly has more current viewers than Angel or Buffy.
• Their ‘horrible ratings’ are double-digit multiples of Buffy’s numbers the first season.

A cult hit on a smaller network seems like a perfect fit.

Tim Minear and Joss have announced that Fox has not picked the series up. No more episodes will be bought by Fox, though they claim to want to air the in-production eps now being worked on (2) at some point.
Here’s hoping Firefly flies on another network.
By the way, thanks go out to Jon, who hooked me up with a sweet little site that’s got all the Firefly eps available for download in electronic format. I’ve got them all on my harddrive for Christmas CD burning fun.