Burn the land and boil the sea
What the hell are you doing here? Don't you know the Serenity trailer just went up? (OK, I only knew because some people are even more obsessed than I am.)
Not surprisingly, it's hard to tell exactly what we can expect. My guess is the percentage of action in the trailer is MUCH higher than what will be in the film -- and the need to put all those action shots in meant sacrificing some footage that would have teased the flick in a more coherent and perhaps compelling manner.
Still, there are two lines that made me tingle just a bit: the responses to "define interesting..." and "I'm unarmed..." See for yourself.
Nice looking logo too. Just hope it doesn't turn up on Hanzi Smatter.
Update: Egotastic has vidcaps. The eigth one down confirms something I thought I saw: that's Earth. I mean, Earth That Was. Looking very much like Earth That Is. At least from this distance. Are we finally going to see what happened?
Comments
I'm sold, although I loved the series so much I'd go if Dennis Dugan directed it. I get the impression that they seem to be starting over with the story, yeah? It's hard to tell but it looks like they're going back to the beginning of the Simon/River storyline and pretending that the series didn't happen. Probably not a bad idea, actually, if that's the case.
Posted by: Kevin G | April 26, 2005 4:46 PM
Joss's plan is to walk a fine line: he's going to start where the series left off, but in such a way that newcomers (ie, most of America) feel like the story is starting at the very beginning.
Considering that Firefly itself actually started well into the plot (remember, the pilot didn't air until the end, and an important backstory flashback episode was dropped in pretty late) I suspect he can pull it off.
Posted by: radosh | April 26, 2005 5:23 PM
A few interesting things I noticed:
1. No evidence of Ron Glass/Book, which is a character I REALLY want more backstory on, and am afraid will be left behind. Very little of Kayleigh, which makes sense in an action trailer, but she's prob. my favorite character
2. I think Universal is putting WAY too much credence on Joss' name. Yes, his name will sell to a certain audience, but not to the broader audience that's going to be needed to make this a crossover hit.
3. The "quotes" are a bad idea. They don't come from good "pushers" and emphasize that this is a cult phenomonon.
4. A couple of great lines--"I don't murder children"/"I do." and "It's worse than you know"/"It usually is." may help sell.
5. The tagline makes no sense. "You Can't Stop The Signal?" The logo is less than attractive, too.
Watching the show (which I only did on DVD in DVD sequence), I wasn't really hooked until "Jaynestown," but that wouldn't have worked without the previous episodes. I'm still headed there opening weekend, though.
Posted by: Matt | April 26, 2005 10:33 PM
The phrase means "tranquil; tranquility", which is not too far off from "serenity". but it is interesting to point out that both characters 寧靜 are written in simplified form, which is like simplifing "Budweiser Light" to "Bud Lite". It is acceptable, but a bit tacky in my personal opinion.
Here are the references if you are interested:
http://www.unicode.org/cgi-bin/GetUnihanData.pl?codepoint=5be7
http://www.unicode.org/cgi-bin/GetUnihanData.pl?codepoint=975c
cheers
-tian
www.tian.cc
www.hanzismatter.com
Posted by: tian | April 27, 2005 12:40 AM
I suspect the marketing will be overhauled several times before September. They probably have no idea what to do with this film, which may be a good sign artistically, though I'd love it if it were popular too (I have a fantasy of Fox begging Joss to restart the show...)
Meanwhile, here's the funniest comment I've seen on the trailer so far, over at Whedonesque:
"Joss, you rock! you're awesome and that trailer was SO cool. I can't wait to get tickets to the screening, which I think I can do through something called Fandango(?). Anyway, you're a god!
These posts are anonymous, right?
joss | April 27, 07:35 CET"
I mean, the guy's comment posts are funnier than most people's screenplays. That's gotta give you a lot of hope.
Posted by: radosh | April 27, 2005 10:42 AM
Yeah, I'm a touch irked that the early screenings are taking place everywhere BUT NY.
Posted by: Matt | April 27, 2005 11:33 AM
Read the mostly spoiler-free script review at AICN?
http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=17749
Reading this plus the trailer fills in some blanks.
Posted by: Dan | April 28, 2005 11:54 AM
Oops, meant to quote from said script review:
"Perhaps the single most impressive aspect of the script is how it manages to maintain just the right balance between giving those familiar with the T.V. series plenty of new material to chew on even as it draws in complete newbies to its world. "
Posted by: Dan | April 28, 2005 12:01 PM
hey, OK, I'm a newbie to this phenomenonomoneo-- I know you loved this show, I've never seen it. Should I go out and buy the DVDs and watch first or just wait for the movie? Was the show really that great?
Posted by: jake | April 28, 2005 3:02 PM