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San Francisco, 8:06 AM
Thu Dec 3
24 posts in the last 24 hours
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11/30/09
See, the advantage that the series had was that when they ran long, they could pick the worst parts to trim out. When they switched it up to a four-ep movie format, suddenly they were both forced to pad the main story to fill out ~90 minutes, and they were forced to disregard the overall pacing so they could keep all the secondary stories within a strict range of runtimes. On the flip side, they had to sacrifice any pretense of quality on the secondary stories so they could try to keep the main stories flowing well enough to be followed. It just didn't work the way they'd hoped, even if it succeeded in bringing new life to the series.
11/30/09
I think it's more like they just tried to be movies. It was the same with the Simpsons movie. They took a 30 minute show and tried to expand it out to 2 hrs. If you look at the Family Guy movie, they put 4 episodes together so they could keep the fast pace of the show and still fill 2hrs.
The Simpsons and Futurama movie (I only saw one) were made more to be 2hr movies and so the energy level is much lower.
12/01/09
I've never seen the Simpsons movie, and that may be true, but I'd really like to believe that the Futurama crew could turn out a really good movie if they made it a _movie_.
See, I bought the first two seasons of Tripping the Rift, and I liked them. Then they released a movie, and it kinda sucked. It wasn't until I'd watched it a second time that I realized the reason for that was because it was four unrelated episodes that had been smashed together. But the crazy thing was that when the third season came out, those same episodes worked fine on their own.
The difference is that with the Futurama movies, each one is supposed to work as both a cohesive movie and four stand-alone episodes. Only they don't.
11/27/09
11/27/09
11/27/09
I once had a (pretty short) discussion with a friend about whether or not we'd trade Serenity for Firefly Season 2...
11/28/09
But would I trade, say, Lost? No.
TSCC? Hmmmm...... TOUGH CALL.
11/27/09
As much as Battlestar shat the bed at the end, there was enough awesome to make up for it. I wouldn't trade Roslin, I wouldn't trade Starbuck, I wouldn't trade Donna Noble or Rose Tyler or the Doctor, I wouldn't trade the Planet Express crew. Hell, given the awesome that was Children of Earth, I probably would think twice before trading in the Torchwood team. I would love it if Firefly came back, but to suggest that it was better than all of the shows that we've had in the past seven years seems overreaching, to say the least.
11/27/09
Firefly was the adventures of Han Solo in the Cowboy Bebop universe.
Entertaining? Yeah, for about 8 of 13 shows.
Original? Earth-shaking? Genre-defining? Worthy of unflagging devotion by legions of obsessives?
Umm... no.
11/28/09
"but I don't understand when people hold it up as the end-all, be-all of modern science fiction. "
Vulcanized, you ignorant slut, it was believable.
11/28/09
11/28/09
Seriously though, I do.
11/27/09
I anticipate being thankful for a forth series of The IT Crowd.
11/27/09
P.S. Watch Mis Fits like a low budget Heroes but excellent.
11/27/09
I've been watching Misfits, and I also recommend it.
11/27/09
wow! wow! wow! let me support this statement has much as i can!!! so so so true!!
11/27/09
Id happly give up the Battlestar a few times over and then some.
However, Jeykll?
Dr Who eppisodes such as "Blink"
(and well, anything else by Steve Moffett).
What about Middleman? Better Of Ted?
And, of course, Whedons own Dr Horrible. (which I thinks worth a few firefly eppisodes on its own)
Firefly might be a notch above most other things, but there is plenty of things that I wouldn't give up, not even for a more of it.
11/27/09
11/28/09
Because I dont buy it. Theres been plenty of things...rare things as a %...but plenty overall, that individually are on the same league as firefly.
Conclumatively I don't see it as a contest.
Dr Horrible *alone* is worth 2-3 firefly episodes for me. (depending which ones)
11/27/09
and i do miss TSCC and what cool stuff would have happened if we got season 3.
11/27/09
But if we are going to look down and hate apon any movie it should be Dragonball evolution... that was perhaps the worst movie in the history of movies, hell enchanted was better than that.
11/27/09
Dosnt even deserve to be in the same paragraph.
11/27/09
You have to feel sorry for the new guy, those are some mighty big shoes to fill. (Although, Davison managed it, so there is hope...)
11/27/09
11/27/09
1. Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett.
2. Star Trek and Doctor Who for making movie and TV space opera fun again.
3. District 9 for demonstrating it is possible to present a "serious" science fiction story in a dramatic format that isn't reduced to a bunch of preaching. (It came close now and then but backed off and trusted the audience to get the point.)
4. WARNING: the asparagus or brussel sprout item on the menu (read: "This item is matter of taste. I'm thankful that other people have different tastes but feel free to skip this one...and I'll skip the tofurkey).
The finale to Moore and Eick's "re-imagined" Battlestar Galactica. Yes, you read that right. To a die-hard original series fan, the crash and burn of Season 3, the bizarre unevenness of Season 4, and the total WTF? (and subsequent fallout) of the finale was pure joy. Was it karma?
5. Public libraries. Thank you, Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Carnegie.
6. And, as always, for hours of sci-fi TV and movie entertainment that makes me happy, I'm thankful for Vincent Price, Bruce Campbell...and, most of all, John Colicos.
11/27/09
11/27/09
11/27/09
11/27/09
11/27/09
As I matured, so did my tastes.
I must ask, did you read Twilight? I haven't, and that's another reason for me not to hate upon it. I've read plenty of stuff that is shit, lots of stuff that I wouldn't recommend and lots of stuff that I rave about, ad nauseum. I can recommend things that I don't care for to people who will care for it and recognize that the books I really think are smashing may not be suitable for all audiences. There is no right answer and consensus is often a mob reaction. Just sayin', ya know
11/27/09
I'm sorry your daughter isn't inherently into reading, though. When I was oan older teen, I was reading Thomas Hardy and Gabriel Garcia Marquez for fun-- still some questionable messages, but at least there, the desire to question the characters is there.
The books I was most obsessed with, we tended to chat about.
11/27/09
11/28/09
I have enough confidence in our parenting skills to know that she is reading this series as FICTION, and not as a Life Manual.
That and the fact that she's not as obsessed with Twilight as I was with Dune at her age.
11/28/09
I am getting tired of the vitriol that is being directed at the Twilight books here on io9. I really think that many people are underestimating the intelligence of today's youth. The kids know that it is romantic fiction and many of them, my daughter included, have turned away from the books the more that they get hyped. The hype is a turn off for kids as well as adults.
My daughter has read and enjoyed the Twilight books, but now she has moved onto other YA fiction and more mature books like Little Brother, Catching Fire, Oryx and Crake and The Stand.
I am currently reading Diana Gabaldon's latest. Do I think that I will find true love in the 1700s in the Scottish Highlands? No, but sometimes it is fun to read about the heroic Jamie Fraser. Historical fiction and time travel works for me! (She was inspired to write about a Scottish character after watching an episode of Dr Who) I generally read hard science fiction but sometimes a little romance is not a bad thing.
11/27/09
Shows like the new Doctor Who, Torch Wood, Dollhouse, Defying Gravity and several others ask difficult questions that no one seems interested in giving consideration.
Considering the rate our technology continues to advance, you would think that more people would be looking for answers into these sometimes difficult to swallow ethical and moral issues.
This trend toward challenge-less entertainment bores me. I need something to push my mind where it has never thought of going before.
11/27/09
Hugely unrated show. I think people gave up far too soon before the sci-fi elements kicked in more.
Could have been another Lost, imo.