A Great Short-Lived TV Series

I've never been more happy that I never saw a show during it's original broadcast. Firefly was a quality show from the creative mind of Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel). Unfortunately, FOX decided to screw around with the show by airing episodes out of order, ruining the character development and dramatic impact of several episodes. Therefore, I'm actually happy that I missed it during it's original run because this DVD collection includes the episodes in the order they were originally planned.

Firefly is set aboard a spaceship (named Serenity) in the future. The crew are a band of rebels who travel from planet to planet smuggling stolen goods and often get caught up in trying to do the right thing to their own detriment. There are no aliens in this vision of the future. Instead the main villain is a monolithic corporate government known as the Alliance.

Captain Mal Reynolds (Nathan Filion) fought on the losing side of a war against the Alliance. The cause was something he really believed in, and the defeat has turned him into a bitter, faithless man. His second in command is Zoe (Gina Torres), a hard-nosed woman who fought alongside Mal in the war. Her husband Wash (Alan Tudyk) is the wisecracking pilot. My favorite character is Kaylee (Jewel Staite), the sweet-natured ship mechanic. Jayne (Adam Baldwin) is the monosyllabic thug who likes to shoot people. Inara (Morena Baccarin) is a "professional companion", which is just another way of saying high class prostitute, which is a legal and noble profession in the future. Finally, Book (Ron Glass) is a preacher who mysteriously seems to know quite a few things about combat.

Things get complicated when they take on Simon (Sean Maher), a doctor who threw away his career to rescue his younger sister River (Summer Glau) from the evil clutches of the Alliance's mind experiments. Naturally, the Alliance wants to find both of them, and this makes smuggling operations all the more difficult. Also, River has gone a little crazy because of the experiments and the rest of the crew does not know how to act around her.

The original pilot (after an exciting opening teaser) is leisurely paced, taking its time to introduce us to all 9 main characters. This is what panicked FOX, so they held back the pilot and told Joss to write a more exciting episode. Joss did as good as possible, weaving in the exposition with the action, but the result must have led to great confusion to those who saw this during it's original broadcast. It's unfortunate FOX didn't have more confidence in Whedon's original pilot, because it does a great job of setting up the characters and the story for the rest of the episodes. Thankfully the DVD has the episodes in their correct order, and the result is so much better.

The setup is important, because by the time we get to the 2nd disc, there are some really strong character based episodes that wouldn't work nearly as well if seen out of order. Joss's strengths are characterization and dialogue, and both are in full display here. As on Buffy and Angel, Joss expertly mixes comedy, drama, and suspense throughout the various episodes. An episode called "Our Mrs. Reynolds", where the captain has "accidentally" married a small town girl, is one of the funniest things Joss has written. The 3rd disc begins with "Out of Gas", a brilliant episode which uses a creative narrative structure to tell stories through three different time frames.

As usual, Whedon did a terrific job with casting. Nathan Filion is a perfect choice as an embittered man who has given up on nearly everything, but has retained his loyalty and leadership. Morena Baccarin brings an exquisite sensuality and dignity to her character that she makes what seems like a ridiculous idea work. Jewel Staite brings the same vulnerability and perkiness that Alyson Hannigan worked to perfection on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. There really isn't a weak link in the bunch, although Summer Glau and Ron Glass had the least to do over the course of the series.

Firefly only lasted 12 episodes before FOX cancelled it, although 15 were filmed. Thankfully these three episodes are available on the DVD set and shown in the order they were originally intended. I'm not sure that a character based Sci-Fi show ever would have worked on network television, but the way FOX handled things made it impossible. The great news out of all of this is the DVD sales were so strong Joss was able to convince Universal Studios to greenlight a feature film, which will be called "Serenity" and is set to be released in September.

The DVD set itself is a really nice piece of work. There are 7 different episode commentaries featuring various combinations of cast, creator, and crew. Nathan Filion and Joss Whedon's pilot commentary is particularly entertaining. There's also an extremely well made behind the scenes documentary, a blooper reel, and Alan Tudyk's audition tape. With the combination of quality content, unaired episodes, and a load of extras, this is one of the best TV on DVD packages I've seen. Don't let FOX tell you any different.