So I finished watching Firefly and then re-watched Serenity and I have a few comments to follow up in my previous post.

First, and for the record, I wound up thoroughly enjoying Firefly, in spite of the combination of the Western theme with the...idano...HOKEY...language. Great characters, good plots and enough action to keep me from wondering about things like "how does the ship fly?" and such. Still, the show was clearly designed for a longer run and spent a lot of time doing character development. I feel cut off to have gone through the development and then to have...nothing.

I wish the show had had more time to really get into River's head. So much potential here to have a well written character played by the right actress.

The movie was a lot better the second time around. A lot. I personally wouldn't recommend watching it without watching the series first or you'll spend all your time waiting for backstory that isn't coming.

My only real complaint is the archaic and yes HOKEY, version of English that the characters speak. Especially in combination with the constant barrage of Old West imagery. I'm a hundred and fifty pages or so into Anathem and I much prefer Stephenson's take on far future language. While Firefox/Serenity seem to draw from the past for the language, Stephenson's English has evolved into something new that the reader[1] must puzzle out. And in the process of puzzling it out, you get to compare his symbols for a given concept to the symbols you're used to, hopefully gaining some insight into your own language in the process.

[1] I didn't read the intro to the book (which apparently Tells All) since the first sentence read, in essence "If you read a lot of speculative fiction and like to figure shit out for yourself, don't read this intro."