Serenity

10/04/2005 07:55:00 a.m.

We saw Serenity on the weekend. I've seen a few episodes of Firefly, and I quite enjoyed the way the film extended the series and gave closure on a couple of things. We went with a few friends who hadn't seen Firefly, and they all enjoyed the movie immensely as well. Viewed as a piece of the whole Firefly universe, the movie succeeds very well. Viewed simply as a science-fiction movie, it also succeeds very well.

Serenity the ship gave me the same kind of feelings as the Millenium Falcon did in the Star Wars trilogy, and it should—she's a beat-up old hulk held together by chewing gum, baling twine, and the combined spirit of her crew. Said crew is at the fringe of society, doing jobs that at best skirt the edges of the law, and usually are flat-out illegal.

There's a scene, too, in the movie, where the captain (Malcolm "Mal" Reynolds) is essentially telling his crew that they can either follow his orders or die where they stand, that very much put me in mind of Roland Deschain, the archetypal gunslinger in Stephen King's Dark Tower saga. There was a core of iron to him, in that moment, that I found very powerful.

If you're at all interested in SF movies, I highly recommend that you go see Serenity. I suspect I'll be going to see it again.