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SciFi Wire reports Joss says 'No more Firefly'

POSTED BY: HATEHATEHATEFOX
UPDATED: Tuesday, January 10, 2006 03:37
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Monday, January 9, 2006 8:28 AM

HATEHATEHATEFOX


http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=1&id=33982

Whedon: No More Firefly

Firefly/Serenity creator Joss Whedon told USA Today that he still hopes to tell more stories set in the futuristic universe, but added that there's no chance he'll do another Firefly TV show. "We'll never make Firefly again, because that was a thing that existed and is now gone," Whedon told the newspaper before Christmas . "And Serenity isn't Firefly, and whatever comes next won't be, either. But I would love to tell more stories of this universe and to hang out with these people on and off for the rest of my career."

Serenity, based on the canceled Fox TV show Firefly, hit theaters last September and has pulled in a disappointing $25.4 million domestically since opening Sept. 30, 2005. The movie is now available on DVD. "The best-case scenario is that the DVD is such a spectacular, monster hit that we get to make another movie," Whedon said. "Then we get to make another movie. After three movies, we're all very tired. After Serenity: Revolutions, we feel like we've played it out. And then we make another series."

Whedon is currently writing the script for Wonder Woman, which he is slated to direct once Warner Brothers signs off.

~~~~~~~~
Nothing is ever so profoundly regretted as a kind act.
Robertson Davies

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:08 AM

KBACHELDER


Before everyone starts getting negative please remember that in more recent (i.e. after Christmas) postings Joss has stated that he would love to revisit the 'verse if a studio is willing to let him do more.

Kevin

-----

Listen to the only podcasts in the 'verse dedicated to Firefly & Serenity...

The Signal
http://www.serenityfirefly.com

Firefly Talk
http://www.fireflytalk.com

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:12 AM

JUBELLATE


Quote:

Originally posted by HATEHATEHATEFOX:
http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=1&id=33982

Whedon: No More Firefly

Firefly/Serenity creator Joss Whedon told USA Today that he still hopes to tell more stories set in the futuristic universe, but added that there's no chance he'll do another Firefly TV show. "We'll never make Firefly again, because that was a thing that existed and is now gone," Whedon told the newspaper before Christmas . "And Serenity isn't Firefly, and whatever comes next won't be, either. But I would love to tell more stories of this universe and to hang out with these people on and off for the rest of my career."

Serenity, based on the canceled Fox TV show Firefly, hit theaters last September and has pulled in a disappointing $25.4 million domestically since opening Sept. 30, 2005. The movie is now available on DVD. "The best-case scenario is that the DVD is such a spectacular, monster hit that we get to make another movie," Whedon said. "Then we get to make another movie. After three movies, we're all very tired. After Serenity: Revolutions, we feel like we've played it out. And then we make another series."

Whedon is currently writing the script for Wonder Woman, which he is slated to direct once Warner Brothers signs off.

~~~~~~~~
Nothing is ever so profoundly regretted as a kind act.
Robertson Davies





Its already been clarified that Joss has never said he won't do Firefly again, its just that what Firefly was the first time cannot be duplicated exactly. That's what he meant by that comment.

The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule. – H.L. Mencken

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:14 AM

RIAN


I'm not going to be pessimistic any time soon, there's no power in the 'verse that can stop me from being cheerful.

Right now I trust that Whedon wants to tell more stories about the Firefly crew...and I trust that the immense DVD sales will make one very important person say: "hey, why not let him?"

It's not going to end here.
Anyone who thinks otherwise may duct tape my mouth and dump my in the hold for a month. We're going to get our happy end. I know it.


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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:14 AM

BWARE42


I read that Firefly never actually happened.

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:16 AM

GWENHARKER


This has already been debunked. Pretty much the same article from Entertainment weekly.

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:17 AM

RIAN


Quote:

Originally posted by BWare42:
I read that Firefly never actually happened.





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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:19 AM

JUBELLATE


Quote:

I read that Firefly never actually happened.



like the boogeyman from stories

The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule. – H.L. Mencken

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:21 AM

STAKETHELURK


I don't really see the big deal here. Serenity wasn't "Firefly," wasn't supposed to be "Firefly," and couldn't be "Firefly" if it had tried. "Firefly" was something special, something magical, and FOX killed it. Joss found a way to bring the 'verse back to us, but he couldn't bring "Firefly" back. And even if they return to TV (which Joss is now suggesting, see: http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=17800), it won't be the same and Joss won't even try to pretend it's the same. Which doesn't mean that it won't be great and shiny and scrumptralescent, but any new series would not be "Firefly." It'd have a different feel, a different paradigm.

Joss is not abandoning the 'verse, he says as much in the article here. But he knows that he can't turn back time to recapture "Firefly," the beloved show that FOX killed. He'll spin more tales with our BDHs, and stay true to "Firefly's" legacy, but he can't undue the evil that FOX wrought.

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:21 AM

JAYRO


From Empire On-line today (and already being discussed in a parallel thread):
Quote:

Browncoats around the world cried out in despair when, due to an underwhelming performance at the box office, Joss Whedon announced that the saga of Serenity had ended. No sequels, no follow-ups, no hope. But Whedon isn't a man to let his brain-child die; the man's already resuscitated the franchise once and there's still hope for a third coming.

"A sequel's unlikely," Whedon told Empire with a note of clear regret, "but it's amazing what permutations of something can happen." But if not a theatrical encore, that leaves... yes, you guessed it, a possible return to the smaller screen. "As long as I was able to service the characters with integrity and had enough money so that I wasn't hampered, then I would love to return Serenity to TV. I love that universe; it continues and those characters live on. There could be a series, there could be a miniseries, there could be all sorts of things. I'm not ruling anything out. I'll let it simmer for a while and see if anyone calls."

As for why the film failed to rake in the cash despite uniformly glowing reviews, according to Whedon it's all in the presentation. "It's a question of marketing ultimately. The fact that I like to dance around genres with gay abandon has worked to my disadvantage. Nobody knows exactly how to market anything I do because it usually has so much in it. It has a diffuseness because of it's origin that keeps it from being the easy sell. Some people also said that you can't call an action movie 'Serenity' but I think that's still okay. What was I going to call it? 'Big Smash Bang With Boobies'? Which was, of course my second choice."

DVD sales should, however, put Serenity back in the black and when the bucks start rolling in we can only hope that one of the suits at Universal looks at the numbers, adds the success of the Firefly DVD box set and greenlights a return for Captain Reynolds and his crew. Until that time we advise Whedon to keep his phone switched on.



Just thought I'd post this here for comparison, as it seems relevant.

EDITED TO ADD: Though I see that Stakethelurk is wayyyy ahead of me.

---------------------------

"Also... I can kill you with my brain."

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:45 AM

GELASSENHEIT


Quote:

I read that Firefly never actually happened.


i also heard rumors that Joss Whedon is a fictional person; someone studio made him up to sell tv shows.

Gelassenheit means Serenity

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:47 AM

RIAN


I find Joss' words to be very reassuring. All we need is patience...and money...


What I wonder about: when do we know if the DVD sells well? I understand that the USA are the most important place in that aspect(= biggest audience)...yet Serenity/Firefly wins fans from all over the world. Like, daily.

I'm from Germany and nodobdy even knows a release date for the DVD. Sigh.

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Monday, January 9, 2006 9:49 AM

JAYRO


Quote:

Originally posted by Gelassenheit:
Quote:

I read that Firefly never actually happened.


i also heard rumors that Joss Whedon is a fictional person; someone studio made him up to sell tv shows.

Gelassenheit means Serenity



Couldn't be true - or why would they keep cancelling him?!
---------------------------

"You can't take the sky from me."

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Monday, January 9, 2006 12:10 PM

CARTOON


Maybe I'm treading on thin ice, here, but...

Let's just assume that some network wakes up, gets a full dose of sanity, and decides they want another TV series from the "Firefly/Serenity" verse.

Let's just assume that Joss goes berserk and doesn't want to be involved.

Even though "Firefly" was Joss's brainchild, it can go on (dare I say it?) without Joss...

"Star Trek" survived Roddenberry. "Firefly" could likewise survive without Joss's input.

(I'm not sure, but he didn't even write a majority of the episodes, did he? Off hand, does anyone know how many episodes he actually wrote?)


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Monday, January 9, 2006 12:13 PM

SIMONWHO


Actually I thought TNG improved quite a bit after Gene's departure. Doesn't mean he wasn't a genius but...


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Monday, January 9, 2006 12:18 PM

CARTOON


Quote:

Originally posted by SimonWho:
Actually I thought TNG improved quite a bit after Gene's departure. Doesn't mean he wasn't a genius but...



Personally, other than the original series, I probably liked "Voyager" the best of the lot. And "Voyager" came years after Roddenberry's death.


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Monday, January 9, 2006 12:32 PM

WILLOWSKYLOR


Quote:

Originally posted by cartoon:
Quote:

Originally posted by SimonWho:
Actually I thought TNG improved quite a bit after Gene's departure. Doesn't mean he wasn't a genius but...



Personally, other than the original series, I probably liked "Voyager" the best of the lot. And "Voyager" came years after Roddenberry's death.




i hate voyager... Deep space 9 was the best... any whay back on topic...
i don't think that firefly/ serenity could be the same without joss

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Monday, January 9, 2006 12:59 PM

STAKETHELURK


Quote:

Originally posted by Cartoon:
Even though "Firefly" was Joss's brainchild, it can go on (dare I say it?) without Joss...

"Star Trek" survived Roddenberry. "Firefly" could likewise survive without Joss's input.

(I'm not sure, but he didn't even write a majority of the episodes, did he? Off hand, does anyone know how many episodes he actually wrote?)

All together, Joss wrote or co-wrote six episodes of “Firefly,” more than any other of the series writers: “Serenity, Parts I & II” (counts as two eps), “The Train Job” (with Tim Minear), “Our Mrs. Reynolds,” “The Message” (with Tim Minear), and “Objects in Space.” (Tim Minear comes in second, with four written or co-written episodes).

Additionally, as executive producer, Whedon was heavily involved in the writing of other episodes. Besides conceiving the overall seasonal arc, Joss also came up with the initial ideas for most of the episodes. Here’s some snippets from interviews with Joss & Tim about the episode “Jaynestown,” where they comment on how unusual it was that the episode was pitched by Ben Edlund, rather than Whedon.

Joss: “Very few ideas are actually pitched to me. I tend to come up with them myself or in concert with Tim or Marti Noxon or David Greenwalt. Or I tend to come in with at least some idea of, “You know, I think we need to feel scared. I want the insecurity of....” It’s usually a process of developing the idea from something I’ve pitched out.”

Tim: “Usually it’s Joss who comes up with the basic idea.”

And besides helping in the initial pitch, Joss often does uncredited rewrites, usually firming up the dialogue (though in some cases the episode’s writer, pressed for time, would have him write one or more entire scenes, again without credit). I don’t know the specifics for “Firefly,” but on “Buffy” and “Angel,” the writers said that nine times out of ten, when a fan compliments them on a particular line of dialogue in one of their eps, it turns out it was a line Joss had added.

Joss Whedon’s level of involvement in his shows is surprisingly vast; any ‘verse series without him would lose much of what made “Firefly” and “Serenity” great. And I wouldn’t want to watch any ‘verse series that he completely disavowed, because he probably had some damn good reasons for not getting involved! Star Trek may have survived without Roddenberry, but GR was (I believe) much less involved in TNG, and besides, what else could the show do after his death? As long as Joss is alive and kickin’, he has to be involved if I’m gonna watch it.

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Monday, January 9, 2006 1:15 PM

FREERADICAL42


Trust the media to completely distort what he is saying there.

All he said is that it won't be the same as Firefly. Okay, sure. It won't be. We knew that.

"See, morbid and creepifying, I got no problem with, long as she does it quiet-like."

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Monday, January 9, 2006 2:05 PM

CLJOHNSTON108


Y'know, it's funny...

I went into my local 20/20 Video, where they had a whole shelf of Serenity behind the counter, and asked, "So how's Serenity moving?"

The guy said, "Like crazy!"

"WOW!"

"Well, it was huge hit in the theaters, wasn't it?"

"Naw, man. Nobody went to see it. They were all waiting for the DVD!"

"Huh."

"It's so sad, because Whedon had a $50 million budget, he came in about ten mil under that, critics raved about it, but people were saying that only, like, five or ten people were in the theater when they went to see it, so the movie only took in around 25 mil."

"Now that's just screwy!"

---------------

Deep Thoughts...
...by Jack Handey...

"Whether they ever find life there or not, I think Jupiter should be considered an enemy planet."

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Monday, January 9, 2006 2:39 PM

MYCROFTXXX


Regarding the question on whether Joss has to be directly involved in a Firefly resurrection, my opinion is: not necessarily. Yes, he should be involved in some capacity but the show wasn't executed by one guy. It takes a whole team of extremely creative individuals to make this type of magic. For instance, I think Tim Minnear could take the helm of Firefly: Phoenix (just made that up .) Getting most of the original cast back together could be difficult but not impossible.

I, personally, think the one thing that makes the show/movie work is the rich 'verse that Joss and his team created then populated with some great characters. The 'verse has plenty of room for more such characters and, more importantly, more story arcs. All that's needed is a little of that magic Hollywood ingredient (aka Money), stir in some 'verse juice, add a pinch of acting excellence watched over by a master chef (Tim are ya listening?) simmer and, viola!, we have another fantastic masterpiece.

Okay, that last bit might've been a little over the top...

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Monday, January 9, 2006 2:55 PM

CARTOON


Firstly, I wasn't saying that the show *should* go on without Joss. I was just saying that should the circumstances arise where it could return, but he didn't want to do it -- that it *could* survive without him. I agree fully with what Mycroftxxx said in that regard.

Regarding getting the cast to return --

Just from my viewing of the series (and movie), it's my opinion that these actors really loved their parts (and it showed -- hence, why their characters have become so endearing to us). If you love a character you've played, I think it would be hard for them *not* to return.

Unless, of course, their careers take off big apart from "Firefly" (like Harrison Ford's career after "Star Wars") -- in which case, they may think such a show would be *beneath* them.

In my opinion, if you help create a character everyone loves, you'd be silly not to return to it. Typecasting? Heck. Connery survived Bond. If the actor is good enough, they could be forever linked to a roll, and still go on to bigger and better things.


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Monday, January 9, 2006 2:58 PM

CHINDI


Joss who? Ain't he that young kid who was on Star Trek? Thought his name was Wil

gosh it gets soooo confusing out here in the black...

Chindi ( see sarcasm emoticon...)

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Monday, January 9, 2006 3:10 PM

CHRISTHECYNIC


Those of you who know me, and I have no idea who you are or if you exist, know that I love hypothetical things to an unnatural degree.

HOWEVER the guy said that he wants the 'verse back, he said he'd like it in movies, or a series, or a mini-series, or anything else. He was fighting to get it made before we knew it existed and he was fighting to get it back before we knew it was gone. Whether or not it can survive without him it will not need to.

If Firefly comes back, if Serenity 2 comes out, if Serenity: The Reaver Wars is released as a six hour mini-series on sci-fi, if the animated series comes out or an original novel is written you can be fairly sure that if he is alive at the time he will be involved.

Why ask if it can be done without him when it is so incredibly clear that if it is done it will be done with him?

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Monday, January 9, 2006 3:18 PM

JAYTEE


I can hardly wait for George Lucas to give us a spinoff from Star Wars. "The Jar Jar Binks Story: A Rebel in the Making" and for the networks to give us a spinoff of American Idol where lame talentless people recite really bad poetry. Maybe a spinoff of Fear Factor called "Eating Revolting Organ Meats on a Dare" would be a good idea. I hate it when Hollywood creates shows that are clever and inventive with good characterizations and a bit of humor interjected here and there like Firefly. High quality shows like that make me think too much and like most Americans I don't like to think too much. I just like to believe whatever my President tells me while drinking my glass of polluted water, breathing my polluted air and eating bad foods that raise my cholesterol.

Jaytee

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Monday, January 9, 2006 3:43 PM

MYCROFTXXX


Hmmm... spinoffs.

Universal produced Serenity. Universal also owns at least a couple of them big ole theme parks. If Serenity/Firefly really takes off it won't be long until we see ...wait for it...

Serenity: the Ride

Imagine it: 3D LCD shutter glasses properly affixed, sitting in the cockpit (with plastic dinos everywhere of course) mounted on a multi-axis gimbal, IMAX screen surrounds you. Lights dim. Next thing you know you're flying through the Alliance vs. Reaver battle.

"No! Yes! No! Yes! Yes!" WHOOSH!!!!

"I'm a leaf on the wind..."

Five minutes fly by (literally!) Lights up... You get up, exit the ride, go to the end of the line and do it all over again!

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 3:37 AM

HATEHATEHATEFOX


I've never been so relieved to read something on this site ... oh, wait ... maybe it's a tie with the announcement of the movie.

~~~~~~~~
Nothing is ever so profoundly regretted as a kind act.
Robertson Davies

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