Movie Review: Serenity

On the March Hare Scale: 4.5 Golden Tickets.

I have been studiously avoiding all but the most general of reviews about Serenity. Julie D. over at Happy Catholic clued me in on this one and now I’m hooked. Since Hubs watched with me, he’s hooked too.

Unfortunately, if the local Sunday matinee is any indication, Serenity is not long for the theater world. Such is the life-expectancy of intelligent science fiction movies. Star Wars Episode ? will play for weeks on end. Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and Serenity are banished to video land. The problem is that these movies play much, much better on a big screen with big speakers surrounding you.

First, we watched the Firefly episode for this week where Jayne gets a hat from his mother. It’s a stupid-looking hat, but he loves it and wears it, and, frankly, who is going to tell him it’s dumb? Especially when its from his mother?

The hat shows up in Serenity. Hubs caught it; I missed it.

The plot is fairly simple: David (the crew of the Serenity) vs. Goliath (the Alliance). The Alliance is after River Tam, who has been snatched from an “Education Facility” by her brother, Simon. Simon smuggles River aboard the Serenity, a Firefly-class ship piloted by Malcolm Reynolds who fought against the Alliance and lost. His Executive Officer has fought with him and the others are a pilot (and the husband of the XO), a mechanic, a mercenary (the previously mentioned Jayne), a Registered Companion (think classy prostitute/courtesan), and a “Shepherd,” who wasn’t always a Shepherd. (Interesting note: the Shepherd carries a Bible and refers to himself as a Christian, simply and straightforwardly, without any of the snarkiness this kind of revelation usually occasions.) No one quite knows what the Alliance has done to River and why they want her back so badly. River can’t tell them—she’s psychotic.

There is much witty repartee, of the kind that made the audience laugh out loud, although I noticed Hubs and I laughed where others did not. Could be because we’re more familiar with the characters from watching the series. None of our children joined us, so I can’t really tell.

There is as much thinking about values in this movie as there is action. Who is Family? Who is not? When do Others become Family? Why is Belief so important?

The ending is quite touching. And open-ended.

“This should be a series!” Hubs exclaimed.

“It was a series and it was canceled,” I pointed out.

“Then they should make a sequel!”

However, I don’t think Serenity did well enough to justify a sequel. I’m going to go through withdrawals when the SciFi Channel runs through all the episodes.

SPOILER WARNING!!!
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He killed Wash! How could he? Of all the characters, Wash was my favorite because he was always wise-cracking and he loved Zoe and showed it and he had that whole dinosaur thing going on on his flight console and I love desk toys! I will say that Zoe looked absolutely gorgeous in that long tan & white dress at the grave site, though. Like a queen.

So my fantasy sequel would be—Zoe discovers she’s pregnant.

And it’s about time Simon and Kaylee got together. Next is for Mal and Inara to figure out how to admit they have feelings for each other.