China-Space-Aliens !? Western Sci-Fi Tv show goes Chinese !?

[Jack MacKelly]

It's a long and crazy title , I know

but has anyone seen this Tv show? I've seen a few episodes and it looks very good.

It reminds me of some of the older Tv shows, Buck Rodgers, the invisible man, Star Trek..

However this Tvshow is a kind of a Western show ( John Wayne Ah reckon it's a fine show Pilgrim! ) except this one is in Outer Space.

The tale is set some 500 years into the future, the earth is over crowded and following the depletion of Earth's resources and an expansion of the human race into the frontier of outer space and other worlds. The show is called Firefly and the title refers to a Firefly class cargo ship named Serenity. The new future government of Earth look like a bunch of warmongering fascists, while the crew of the Firefly-class vessel "Serenity" must struggle to survive any way they can ( most of the time they're trying to find work as far away from Earth as possible and fighting with the law like Jessie James did ).

There are lots of other intriguing details, like the way people all seem to speak both English and Chinese for some reason.

Joss Whedon has already signed the entire cast to the movie, as reported in my last Entertainment Weekly, and will be doing a big screen version of the concept. Universal has officially greenlighted "Serenity", a full length feature film.

http://www.scifispace.com/html/ffcast.php

http://fireflychinese.home.att.net/episode1.html

Just wondering if anyone saw the show and what do the think of the Chinese script, is the dialogue good or way off ?

[chengdude]

Yeah, FIREFLY was a pretty alright show...too bad Fox TV cancelled it in the middle of the season. As is usual for American network TV, if a show doesn't perform well out of the box, its days are numbered. There was enough fan sympathy and outrage to push the film version towards reality.

The show was typically Joss Whedon: sharp, witty, dialogue and well-drawn characters...exactly what you'd expect from the man who adapted BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER for TV and created its spin-off, ANGEL. It got bonus points from sci-fi fans for many realistic touches like the absence of sound in space (no laser blasts and hyperspace zoom-sounds).

The show received good reviews and I started watching from Episode 1. I had no idea that part of what Whedon imagined was a future in which China and Chinese played such an important role...the first time I heard one of the stars say "zaogao!" my jaw dropped open. From then on, it was a game to try and catch all the Chinese lines spoken during each episode. Needless to say, tones were an afterthought for the actors. Makes for an intersting contrast with the film BLADE RUNNER...20 years ago, the future was envisioned as inevitably part-Japanese. Perhaps now, more rightly, Chinese will begin to exert a greater influence in the media's vision of the The Future.

[Jack MacKelly]

The Universal studios people have announced the release date for Serenity, the movie which comes from the Firefly series . The Firefly movie which is currently being filmed will be out by 2005.

[Jack MacKelly]

Serenity

http://actionadventure.about.com/od/news/a/aa071404.htm

Alan Tudyk talks

[outsider]

its doing good and there are many fans out there

http://www.fireflyfans.net/threadlist.asp?b=14

http://www.thespacesite.com/community/index.php?showtopic=849&st=45

[Jack MacKelly]

maybe not as artsy or stylish as 2046

but Serenity is No2 at the box office

[Long Zhiren]

I was hoping to read you writing about some televised versions of some 小說 which are Chinese "westerns" taking place along the "Silk Road" of ancient times. There's always some John Wayne type (rather Bruce Lee/Chuck Norris) martial arts guy taking on the robbers and occasional space aliens too. If I could recall the titles and authors of those novels, I'll edit them later into this message. Are any of you familiar with the 小說?

[Jack MacKelly]

sorry I never heard of that one Long Zhiren

[Jack MacKelly]

Here's a bit on that Firefly Serenity movie

TV show

http://www.fanscape.net/firefly/surveillance.ourvids.html

http://easylink.playstream.com/fireflyonline/omrtra.wvx

http://www.strangefinger.com/trash-slideshow.mpg

http://www.fangirl.nu/gogocactusman.rm

http://www.strangefinger.com/riverhill.mpg

http://easylink.playstream.com/fireflyonline/oogtra.wvx

film review

http://www.24x7updates.com/FullStory-News-Serenity_A_Review-ID-200507.html

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/preston200510050823.asp

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig6/crosby3.html

Wonderful teaser trailer

http://video.vividas.com/CDN1/3929_Serenity/web/index.html

9 mins of firefly / serenity

[Jack MacKelly]

some info on the show

當年成功將Buffy the Vampire Slayer捧成cult天后的Joss Whedon，以創新的手法將西部牛仔的拓荒豪情放置在500年後的外太空高科技時空，人類在經歷最近一次內戰後，因資源缺乏，許多人必須放棄地球到其他星球發展，落魄的Malcom船長在廢棄場以低價購入一架只能以破銅爛鐵來形容的太空船，還取了一個極有詩意的名字：Serenity(寧靜號)，招兵買馬準備一圓他的太空探險夢想，結果毫無向心力的組員們不但像一盤散沙內鬥不斷，還幫寧靜號取了一個外號：Firefly(螢火蟲)。

Malcom眼看耐心就要被磨盡，在外地跟外星人討生活又不盡理想，所以本來就很火爆的他脾氣一發不可收拾，這下不但未能贏得傭兵組員們的尊敬，還落得一個難聽的新綽號：Captain Fancy Pants。

在幾次鋌而走險的任務之後，個性迥異又互不信任的組員們開始發展出共患難的情愫，其默契之棒讓Malcom始料未及，到劇末幾位組員願意與他生死共進，Joss Whedon以其一貫的黑色幽默，成功的塑造出幾位特色分明的落魄英雄，Firefly很快就被影評簇擁，其命運更緊緊繫在粉絲的心頭。

http://tuberina.blogspot.com/

http://www.chinadvd.org/movie/show.asp?id=1645

http://www.mov99.com/movie/2005032295750.html

http://lib.verycd.com

http://movie.tianya.net/modules/FilmInfo.aspx?FilmID=18468

http://www.donews.net/sogoo/archive/2005/02/22/284817.aspx

http://nofi.net/blog/blogview.asp?logID=139 a

类　　型 ： 动作（Action）　冒险（Adventure）　科幻（Sci-Fi）　

上映日期：2005年4月22日

类型：动作，科幻，冒险

主演：

一群无名之辈

导演：

Joss Whedon

编剧：

Joss Whedon

出品：Universal Pictures 环球影业

官方网站：Serenitymovie.com

关于影片：

除了漫画之外，越来越多的电视剧也被改编成为电影搬上大银幕，科幻电视剧自然是最好的选择。这部类似Star Trek的影片由环球影业发行，影片的导演Joss Whedon曾担任 Angel，Buffy，Firefly等电视剧的导演和编剧，这一次负责电影的导演和编剧工作，不知道能不能应付得来。可千万别把这部大制作的科幻电影拍得跟电视电影似的。影片的演员完全是电视剧的原班人马。惭愧的是这部电视剧我从没看过，这一次还是头一回听说。

演员：Nathan Fillion - Captain Malcolm "Mal" Reynolds

　　　Gina Torres - Zoe

　　　Alan Tudyk - Wash

　　　Morena Baccarin - Inara Serra

　　　Adam Baldwin - Jayne Cobb

　　　Jewel Staite - Kaywinnit Lee 'Kaylee' Frye

　　　Sean Maher - Dr. Simon Tam

　　　Summer Glau - River Tam

　　　Ron Glass - The Shepherd Book

[carlo]

I saw the feature film, not bad, the plot is more interesting than average Hollywood fare (the bad guy doesn't explode in the next-to-last scene as you automatically expect), visually it's much too dependent on Star Wars but the usual bar scene reminded me of the "Demon Princes" by Jack Vance, which is a huge compliment in my book.

The strange thing is that characters would suddenly say things in colloquial Mandarin Chinese (拜托！ 我的天啊 etc) yet I didn't notice one actor of obvious Chinese heritage in the movie, it's like the Chinese taught their language to everybody and then left for another planet or something.

[roddy]

Watching the movie just now, about halfway through. I enjoyed the TV show, but the film is great. Good action, and a great script (won't spoil it for anyone though).

Question - did anyone else think that parts of the English dialogue were Chinese influenced. For example, the Operative's use of 'little miss' (小姐), Zoe saying that 'nobody flies like my mister', which sounds odd to me but in Chinese 先生 would fit quite well, and Jayne's comment about taking River 'tea and dumplings'? Or is this part of the 'wild west' patois?

Roddy

EDIT: Finished the movie. Loved it, great fun. Space battles and 17 year old psychic ninja babes all in one movie. Hope to see more Firefly / Serenity stuff.