Serenity, you please me

My friend Katherine once said to me while discussing Firefly that “Joss Whedon gives you what you want, but not necessarily in the way you thought you wanted it.” My movie experience tonight was very much like that. I loved every moment of Serenity. It gave me all that I wanted out of the story and characters. It satisfied my desire for justice and a win by the underdogs. But it gave it to me in a bitter-sweet way that sucked me deeper into the world. Serenity is a great damn movie.

I scored tickets to tonight’s special screening thanks to this blog, so I have to write at least something about the movie. The problem is that I’m nearly speechless. That was the best movie experience I’ve had in ages. Serenity is faithful to the TV series I loved, and tells a fantastically enjoyable story standing on its own. It delivers plenty of moments where the entire theater will laugh aloud, and moments where everyone feels the need to clap or cheer. It also will land a few emotional stomach punches that will leave you stunned only to lift you higher with yet another triumph.

Go see it. And buy the DVD set of Firefly. Then go see it again. I’m going to.

(Wow, this is really uncharacteristically glowing of me.)