Saturday, July 26, 2008

I'm not a Joss Whedon fan, I swear!

I'm really not.  I've recently stumbled into some of his productions, and enjoyed them, but I couldn't be classified as a fan. 

I joined NetFlix nearly a year ago to catch up on some of the classic and recent movies I've missed out on for one reason or another, and as I was browsing the site recommended the movie Serenity for me.  I didn't know anything about it; but it had a decent rating so I thought 'what the heck' and just added it.  It arrived in the mail about three months ago, and I watched it, and actually enjoyed it.  It was fairly evident that there was more to the overall story than what they were telling in the movie, and after searching on the Internet I found that it was the continuation of the short-lived television series Firefly.  So I logged on to half.com and purchased both my own copy of Serenity and the Firefly series (it was only 14 episodes, so it was cheap.)

My friend Phyl and I have been watching Firefly on our Thursday night "Lost" nights (we had to have something to watch when the season of Lost ended) and it is really good too.  Highly recommended with one caveat... there are a couple scenes in the middle episodes that could have been left out of the story and we would be better off for it.  (My favorite character is Kaylee, just in case you were wondering, but Mal is pretty darn cool too.)

So when Dr. Horrible came up in the news a few weeks ago (a third Whedon production) I thought I'd give it a shot too.  And actually quite liked it.  My favorite part is the song (duet) in the beginning of Act II; I like the two characters opposing viewpoints being sung in harmony.  I've also noticed that several of the other bloggers I follow have shown interest in Dr. Horrible too.  I guess it's the cool thing to do.  Anyway, I liked it enough that I actually bought it on iTunes after the free streaming version was taken offline.  That's pretty significant, because I hadn't ever purchased any video anything on iTunes previously.

I don't think I'm going to go back and try out all of the Buffy the Vampire episodes, or even Angel, but I do like some of the stuff that Joss Whedon has been doing in the last several years.  So, I can't really consider myself a Whedon fan, but I do recommend Firefly, Serenity, and Dr. Horrible.

3 comments:

HeatherC said...

we're right with you on the Serenity, Firefly, Dr. Horrible kick (well, Jason more so, I'm partial to Dr. Horrible myself). I don't know if I can bring myself to want to pay for "the rest of the story" though, unless I use a gift card. (I know, I'm cheap). Let us know what you think of the iTunes episodes - I'm thinking they'd be worth it, but it's the principle of the thing... When you get it for free, it's tough to start paying for it!

Lin said...

okay, don't rule Buffy out of your life, just yet. I'm not saying go out and watch it now, but maybe in the future should you need/want something "new" to watch. Especially the musical episode, which Dr. Horrible reminded me of a lot.

Buffy was what got me into Joss Whedon. He really is out there trying to produce new things and that's what I like about him. Plus, it's funny. I bought Dr. Horrible on iTunes as well. worth the $4.

Drew said...

Dr. Horrible is really great. FYI, I was surprised to find they have the full film back online to view for free in one long clip, rather than three parts. I thought it was lame to make it available only by purchase, and I was considering buying it myself, but it's good to see they have it up again.

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