Serenity by Joss Whedon

If there’s one thing Joss Whedon is a master with it’s creating riveting films or TV series which redefine popular genres. He’s created successes like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, and Firefly. Each based off a popular genre but all of them go off and manage to create a new vision for what their genre can become. It should be no surprise that Serenity would be a success as well despite the attention it didn’t rightly receive. Based off of the unfortunately short-lived Scifi-western Firefly(damn you FOX), Serenity takes place in the same world and follows the same cast as the series. Like many space operas Serenity follows the basics. Spaceships, lasers, a galactic empire bent on fighting for control, a space fairing adventure, blaster gun fights, etc. It follows the basis of the genre but becomes its own thing. This is an ability I’ve always admired with Whedon and his work. He makes a series which seems to follow a basic genre but manages to completely change it or model it into something better.

            Serenity follows Captain Malcom Reynold and his “colorful” crew of space fairing thieves. Of course though the viewer comes to learn that these “thieves” were veterans of a war for independence from the big bad galactic empire, This is an aspect I really love about the crew.The basic premise of the film is what you would see in most space operas. A giant galactic empire has branched out through space and is at odds with a group of freedom fighters/ other empire/ etc. whom they’re trying to control to get rid of. In Serenity this takes the form of the Alliance whom are at odds with the Independents. The Alliance are trying to take control of the other worlds in the galaxy while the Independents continue to defy and fight them. Mal and his crew are thrown between the middle when they become involved in a huge cover-up that the Alliance is trying to stop from being known. The whole film basically follows this with the addition of space battles, a scifi-western culture which can be seen throughout the film, and a bunch of other scifi tropes.

            I feel that what makes Serenity such a good science-fiction film and a prime example of the space opera genre is not just how the scifi tropes it displays are handled but how it blends multiple genres together. The whole film is basically a Science-fiction-western-space opera and in my opinion very successful. It doesn’t overdue the tropes it presents and if anything I think it’s a good revival of the space opera genre.

            The characters in Serenity are also something I really enjoyed. Whedon is awesome when it comes to writing characters and you can see it very well in this film. Mal, River, Jayne and the whole crew of the Serenity are wonderful scifi characters. Not only that but they don’t always follow their character tropes and they end up feeling more authentic. I’d highly suggest watching this film if you’re a science-fiction lover like myself. Whedon doesn’t disappoint!