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I want to be able to swear in Chinese
Oct. 25th, 2002 09:19 pmSpoilers for Firefly 10/25 episode 5! Beware!
Tonight's Firefly has cemented my love for this show. I liked it already, but have been waiting with that kind of trepidation a frequently burned fan gets, where you just know it's going to head downhill quickly; adding to my stress was knowing that Joss is burning the candle at both ends with all his shows, and I wondered if it would start to suffer. I know they're showing a lot out of order, but this felt like good timing. The episode was character-driven, introduced us to more of the background, and fleshed out some of the relationships. It was also technically superb, using many tried and true film techniques that worked nicely.
The flashbacks were handled deftly, I thought -- the earliest flashbacks done in sepia tones, the middle flashbacks to the accident done in a nice cross between blue lighting and the sepia, and the current story with Mal on the ship alone in dark blue filters. They also mixed their camera speeds nicely. That's normally something that comes across as extraneous on TV, but here I thought it contributed to the different styles and helped set apart the action and timelines. Color cues are rarely used on tv (most shows pick color schemes and stick to them), and I'm glad to see that they're not afraid to take some of the standards -- the bright, amber tones of the far distant flashbacks, for instance -- and use them to their advantage in telling the story.
The intros to the ship's crew characters were fun and solid -- it's a nice joke for people who've enjoyed Zoe and Wash's relationship to see that she didn't like him at first, and I especially liked the little bit where Mal tells Inara not to trust Jayne and not to let him take over, right after telling her that he'll be helpful. Jayne seems like the kind of guy who is incredibly useful in the crunch, but once out of the crunch, not someone trustworthy or sensible, and I liked the little nod to what we've seen of him already through Mal. It will be interesting to see (at least, I keep hearing we will see) the original pilot that introduces us to River, Simon, and Book and how they came aboard. (Oh, and I'm just so enjoying the fact that people swear and mutter in Chinese, for no explained reason, and that Mal's speech is peppered with Britishisms, Old West style language, and neologisms created to stand in for words they can't use on American tv.)
It's a classic plot, of course -- marooned in space, time running out. I'm sure there were people throwing in the towel on Firefly tonight, saying, what a cliche! But that was something I enjoyed about it -- instead of being plot-driven, with lots of extraneous action and suspense, it came down to character, to who those people were once confronted with this old scenario, and what they'd do in the end. Much as I love a good fight scene on Buffy or Angel, in the end, they don't do a lot for character or plot, and to my mind, fights and action aren't what Firefly is about. The suits at Fox might feel differently, and think that's what keeps the numbers down, because anyone watching tv on a Friday night must need action, but I'm grateful they're not succumbing to it.
And again, the producers did two things that nobody ever does with this trite theme -- they kept the space stuff silent, and the "fight" scene is nearly non-existent. The guy just shoots Mal, who takes the gun and tells them to leave, they go away because they realize it's not worth it. And then Mal goes off and instead of calling his crew back, he fixes the ship first. What his life comes down to in the end is the trust and belief his crew -- notably Zoe -- have for him. And I want to be around to watch as we see how, in the past, that trust developed and where it's going in the future.
My only gripe: that they're using regular screen widths on the past two eps after using widescreen on the first three. This makes vidding a real problem for those of us who still use vcrs, because so many people complain about mixing regular screen with widescreen. Grrr. I wish they'd pick one and settle on it..
Tonight's Firefly has cemented my love for this show. I liked it already, but have been waiting with that kind of trepidation a frequently burned fan gets, where you just know it's going to head downhill quickly; adding to my stress was knowing that Joss is burning the candle at both ends with all his shows, and I wondered if it would start to suffer. I know they're showing a lot out of order, but this felt like good timing. The episode was character-driven, introduced us to more of the background, and fleshed out some of the relationships. It was also technically superb, using many tried and true film techniques that worked nicely.
The flashbacks were handled deftly, I thought -- the earliest flashbacks done in sepia tones, the middle flashbacks to the accident done in a nice cross between blue lighting and the sepia, and the current story with Mal on the ship alone in dark blue filters. They also mixed their camera speeds nicely. That's normally something that comes across as extraneous on TV, but here I thought it contributed to the different styles and helped set apart the action and timelines. Color cues are rarely used on tv (most shows pick color schemes and stick to them), and I'm glad to see that they're not afraid to take some of the standards -- the bright, amber tones of the far distant flashbacks, for instance -- and use them to their advantage in telling the story.
The intros to the ship's crew characters were fun and solid -- it's a nice joke for people who've enjoyed Zoe and Wash's relationship to see that she didn't like him at first, and I especially liked the little bit where Mal tells Inara not to trust Jayne and not to let him take over, right after telling her that he'll be helpful. Jayne seems like the kind of guy who is incredibly useful in the crunch, but once out of the crunch, not someone trustworthy or sensible, and I liked the little nod to what we've seen of him already through Mal. It will be interesting to see (at least, I keep hearing we will see) the original pilot that introduces us to River, Simon, and Book and how they came aboard. (Oh, and I'm just so enjoying the fact that people swear and mutter in Chinese, for no explained reason, and that Mal's speech is peppered with Britishisms, Old West style language, and neologisms created to stand in for words they can't use on American tv.)
It's a classic plot, of course -- marooned in space, time running out. I'm sure there were people throwing in the towel on Firefly tonight, saying, what a cliche! But that was something I enjoyed about it -- instead of being plot-driven, with lots of extraneous action and suspense, it came down to character, to who those people were once confronted with this old scenario, and what they'd do in the end. Much as I love a good fight scene on Buffy or Angel, in the end, they don't do a lot for character or plot, and to my mind, fights and action aren't what Firefly is about. The suits at Fox might feel differently, and think that's what keeps the numbers down, because anyone watching tv on a Friday night must need action, but I'm grateful they're not succumbing to it.
And again, the producers did two things that nobody ever does with this trite theme -- they kept the space stuff silent, and the "fight" scene is nearly non-existent. The guy just shoots Mal, who takes the gun and tells them to leave, they go away because they realize it's not worth it. And then Mal goes off and instead of calling his crew back, he fixes the ship first. What his life comes down to in the end is the trust and belief his crew -- notably Zoe -- have for him. And I want to be around to watch as we see how, in the past, that trust developed and where it's going in the future.
My only gripe: that they're using regular screen widths on the past two eps after using widescreen on the first three. This makes vidding a real problem for those of us who still use vcrs, because so many people complain about mixing regular screen with widescreen. Grrr. I wish they'd pick one and settle on it..
