Joss let me down! *non-plot BDM spoiler* by Pan

GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

Joss let me down! *non-plot BDM spoiler*

POSTED BY: PAN
UPDATED: Friday, October 28, 2005 06:57
SHORT URL:
VIEWED: 2003
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Thursday, October 27, 2005 8:07 PM

OK... To avoid any childish "oh yes he is! oh no he isn't" arguments, let me just state some facts up front.

1. I am a big fan of Firefly.

2. Although i think the series is much better than the film, I really enjoyed Serenity.

3. I think Joss W is a very good storyteller, who is getting even better as time goes on...
(Buffy=good, Angel=great, Firefly=amazing!)

That having been said...

There is on thing that really annoyed me about the Serenity movie. I will try to avoid spoilers as much as possible, on the off chance that there may be someone here that hasn't seen it yet, although on this board, I doubt there is...

Near the end of the movie, at one point pretty much all the main characters are in a room, with a load of bad guys attacking in waves. Everyone has to fight. They have to hold the line so that someone else has time to get something done. It is a really tense, cool scene. They all grab their weapons...

Inara has a Longbow... An actual bow and arrow! I saw this and thought "Wow... They've actually put some thought into this!". It would have been really easy to just have her pick up yet another random firearm, but they didn't. They gave her a Bow. When I saw it, I realised it fits her perfectly. It's EXACTLY the weapon you'd expect a companion to learn to use.

Then it switches to a close up shot of Inara... Suddenly she's holding some wierd techno-random piece of junk. Then the next wide group shot - Bow. Next close up - Techno-junk. It keeps switching backwards and forwards throughout the whole sequence!!!!!!

Since then, I've looked into why this is... In an interview, Joss said that in the preview screenings, people didn't like the bow, so it was going to be replaced in post-production by "some sort of CGI sci-fi gun that fires like a bow".

So I just wanted to say:

1. I can't believe Joss caved in to the opinions of a bunch of random strangers when it came to his vision of Serenity. I thought more of him than that.

2. SHAME on the post-production crew, the editor, the studio people, and ESPECIALLY the person responsible for continuity checking. If they had definitely decided to make the change, screwing it up like this and doing such a half-arsed job is UNFORGIVABLE. Did nobody actually sit down and watch the film one last time before sending it to the publishers?

P

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 8:33 PM

INSANITYLATER

I noticed the bow change to a "Laser Bow" or whatever first time through, actually first time I thought I saw something change but wasn't sure what it was, second time around it was really visible. However, I can forgive a mistake like this, the editing mistake. They had far worse in LOTR and look how well that did. I see your point about caving in, but look at it from this perspective.. Inara is firing a standard bow that is slow and has a long reload time compared to a gun or other more advanced weapon. Their lives are on the line and she wouldn't be pulling her weight on the front with an inefficient weapon. While it may score 10 outta 10 for style and grace, it's about a 2 for what they were up against. I think she should have fired one arrow, dropped the bow and picked up Vera... Hasta la vista... Baby!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Serenity NOW!!! ... Insanity later."

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 10:21 PM

ALAND

See, there was a deleted scene there, where the guys from Pimp My Ride came in and gave that old-fashioned bow some serious upgrading, with all new suspension, glow-in-the-dark spoilers, mp3 player, and bling bling a-plenty.

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Friday, October 28, 2005 5:02 AM

DONCOAT

I think the main reason for CGI-ing out the bow was that Joss had to cut an earlier scene that set it up (Inara teaching archery to her students, plus later she dug the bow out of the famous trunk she left aboard Serenity). When the bow appeared "out of nowhere" it was confusing to the test audiences.

I agree that it was a blooper to leave the original bow in some scenes. Ah well, there have been worse goofs in movies almost as good as the BDM!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ain't about you, Jayne. It's about what they need.

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Friday, October 28, 2005 6:42 AM

BROWNCOAT1

May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one.

I noticed the change from the recurve bow to the techno/Nerf looking bow/slingshot looking weapon in the prescreening in June & in every time I have seen the BDM since. I pointed it out to several people, but most blew it off to her switching out weapons. Guess it could be explained that way, but I think it more likely that the switch was missed in post production.

I think Joss more likely ditched the bow because it came across as "out of place" or too archaic for the scene. I personally thought the bow very appropriate to Inara given her profession and her obvious knowledge of ancient weaponry (see her obvious skill w/ the sword in the episode "Shindig"). Too bad they went all techno on us.

__________________________________________

"May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one."

Richmond, VA & surrounding area Firefly Fans:

http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/richmondbrowncoats/

http://www.richmondbrowncoats.org

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Friday, October 28, 2005 6:57 AM

PHOEBE

I just don't understand where he got the 'people didn't like it' thing from. I was in one of the first screenings of the incomplete movie, and I *LOVED* the bow. And glared angrily at the screen when I saw the techno-junk you mentioned. If they were gonna get rid of a good thing by removing the bow, they could at least have done a full job of it.

*glares*

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