The producers from the original "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" movie are floating plans to do a reboot of the franchise. Without Joss. Or any of the characters from the TV show.
Quick version: a new Slayer story from a different time period could be cool, even without the trademark Whedon wit. A remake of Buffy or any current era Slayer would be disastrous. That sound you hear is the collective mass of Whedon fans stirring uneasily...
Posted by Dobbie (Member # 3881) on :
What's so great about Whedon?
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
Harlan Ellison tells a story about some Hollywood nitwit who came up with the brilliant idea of doing The Wiz -- white.
Some stupidity just makes you wish you could add chlorine to the gene pool.
Posted by Alcon (Member # 6645) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dobbie: What's so great about Whedon?
*goes to find pitchforks, torches, and collect an angry mob*
Posted by Elmer's Glue (Member # 9313) on :
*joins Alcon's mob*
Posted by Armoth (Member # 4752) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: Some stupidity just makes you wish you could add chlorine to the gene pool.
I don't know if that was your own line or not, but it deserves recognition.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
In general, if the first response to a question like that is to bring out the pitchforks, the answer is "not much".
Posted by Elmer's Glue (Member # 9313) on :
Blasphemer!
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
What's so great about Whedon?
He has a knack for writing engaging characters and witty dialogue, mixing humor in every darkly dramatic scene and drama into every piece of slapstick. He tends to create shows that appeal very, very strongly to a core group of fans. He has famously said that instead of creating shows that millions want to see, he wanted to create shows that thousands had to see. And for the most part, he has. His fan base tends to be extremely vocal and protective.
And his show "Firefly" is the best television show ever made.
Posted by Darth_Mauve (Member # 4709) on :
Yeah, but Chris, what do you honestly think.
Posted by Dobbie (Member # 3881) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dobbie: What's so great about Whedon?
*goes to find pitchforks, torches, and collect an angry mob*
Please DNFTT.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Wow. This thread is giving me flashbacks of why I avoided Buffy like the plague for so many years.
<-- is a big fan of Joss' storytelling
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I wouldn't object to a reboot of the movie, but I would to the show that Whedon made. In other words, like Chris said, so long as there are not characters from Whedon's show in the new show, and Buffy and the concept of a Watcher are the only things that are still there, then it could be interesting, and would certainly be totally different.
I think it's kind of crappy of them to take something that they made and sucked, but that Whedon made a household name, and cash in on it. Basically Whedon took their idea, did it right, make it super popular, and they're piggybacking off his efforts. I find that uncool, but I don't find the idea of a new and original Buffy story objectionable.
If the movie is any value indicator of their story telling ability though...I don't think we have much to worry about in the way of longevity.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Whedon wrote the screenplay - it was his original idea. They just directed the crappy movie, but due to the original contract, retain some rights to it.
It was NOT their idea to begin with. It was definitely Whedon's.
Posted by T:man (Member # 11614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Alcon:
quote:Originally posted by Dobbie: What's so great about Whedon?
*goes to find pitchforks, torches, and collect an angry mob*
*Grabs spare pitchforks just in case someone forgot theirs*
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
well nearly all of Whedons characters had interchangeable dialogue.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Now that you mention that, that does ring a bell.
Well in that case I find it slightly less morally objectionable then, but I have even less confidence in their ability to take the original concept and do anything qualitatively good with it.
Posted by jebus202 (Member # 2524) on :
Yea, Whedon, he is a creative god. I mean, he came out with Firefly, which ya know, was a pretty good run of what? a dozen episodes that were pretty entertaining? And before that there was Buffy and Angel which could only be enjoyed with a mountain of chocolate and no testicles, and now he's got some new show that people are pretty meh about.
So, yea... Whedon... normally ginger's have to try even harder to get people's love and respect. What gives?
Posted by Humean316 (Member # 8175) on :
quote:Originally posted by jebus202: Yea, Whedon, he is a creative god. I mean, he came out with Firefly, which ya know, was a pretty good run of what? a dozen episodes that were pretty entertaining? And before that there was Buffy and Angel which could only be enjoyed with a mountain of chocolate and no testicles, and now he's got some new show that people are pretty meh about.
So, yea... Whedon... normally ginger's have to try even harder to get people's love and respect. What gives?
From my count, 3 good seasons of television, one of which is 11 episodes long (13 if you have the dvds), a decent web musical, and a descent, if not all that great, run on Astonishing X-Men are the only things that I find even watchable or readable from him. Whedon has a penchant for stepping all over the foundations of his own creation in the name of emotional "truth" or gotcha moments that just plain suck, and his mythology and world building skills are never as good as the words he can place, sometimes to the detriment of the characters themselves though, into characters mouths. Which basically means that Joss Whedon can write a funny and witty line but can't fit it into a world or a mythology that makes sense to save his life. Luckily the first three seasons of Buffy had Tim Minear or Buffy would have sucked too...
That being said, a reboot of Buffy, if done say like The Next Generation, could be really good. I like that they aren't going to step on Buffy or the rest of the gang, those guys have already taken more lumps and downright betrayals that they are beyond making them likable again.
LOL, sorry guys, I have strong feelings about Whedon. Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Now I'm trying to figure out which is more suspect -- me enjoying Buffy and Anglel, or the integrity of my testes? If it's the first, what was I really watching. If it's the second, why am I raising all of these children?
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:That being said, a reboot of Buffy, if done say like The Next Generation, could be really good.
And tricky.
They aren't totally comparable. I thought TOS, absent a couple of pretty decent stories from a moral point of view (and Star Trek at many times has excelled at these episodes), was actually kind of awful.
Buffy, as done by Joss, was fantastic at times, and had/has a large loyal fan following that TOS never quite got, not until after TNG brought it into the mainstream.
If we assume that the new show would simply use new characters, much in the way that TNG used the exact same world but used a new crew, then I think you have some interesting opportunities. There are other hellmouths, this we know, and they could simply put a minor alteration on the plot to make a new slayer on a different hellmouth and then use some of the same basic framework for the show. We know from the alternate universe that Anya created that Buffy had her hands full in Cleveland. Maybe it could be set there.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
Joss Whedon.
First off, as a disclaimer, I think that Firefly is simply the greatest sci-fi show television has ever seen. Ever.
That being said, Joss Whedon fans scare the hell out of me. He's just a screenwriter, not Jesus Christ. When I run into people (in real life, and online) who act like his work is of biblical importance, and follow him and his persona life like a stalker, I get seriously freaked out. It almost makes me enjoying his work more difficult, because I know somewhere out there, someone is praying to his basement JW shrine while watching the same episode.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:First off, as a disclaimer, I think that Firefly is simply the greatest sci-fi show television has ever seen. Ever.
Spoilers ahead for any non-Firefly fans...
I hear people say that, I've heard people in this thread say that, but I remain unconvinced. It lasted less than half a season. I'm not saying that if it was better it would have lasted longer, but we have no idea how good it really was or wasn't. It wasn't around long enough to judge in that manner.
So, while I think it was awesome, if someone told me I was to be marooned on a deserted island, and I would be randomly given only one of three different sci-fi series that I had to choose, it likely wouldn't even make my top 3. ST:DS9, BSG and B5 would all likely come before it.
I might be willing to give it more credit before Serenity, which in my opinion just killed the whole thing, and I think if he'd had had more time, he would have done that, just slower. I mean, given his track record, you KNOW that team wasn't going to survive intact. And much as people apologize for it, I think Whedon's penchant for killing off beloved characters is one of his biggest biggest flaws. Killing Wash and Book at any point in that show would have gutted it, just like it did in the movie.
I think it was a great show with fantastic potential that we'll never be able to really match up against sci-fi shows that were allowed to go the distance. I'd still love to see him go back to where he left off before the movie was made and start the show up again, to see what would have happened.
But as is? Greatest sci-fi show television has ever seen? Please.
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
As is, yes, it's still the greatest sci-fi show ever.
I'm not rating it on potential episodes, I'm rating it on the fact that in just 14 episodes, it drew me in and captivated me more than ANY other show I've ever seen. And that includes shows that went for 7+ years.
The character dynamic was great, the setting was enthralling and fun, and every single episode was flawless. How many other shows can you think of that achieved that in 14 shows? How many achieved it at all?
I don't want to see Firefly come back, actually. I think the current 14 episodes stand as a testament to just how brilliant sci-fi can really be.
None of Joss Whedons other works (even the notable Buffy) even come close - at best, Buffy is 3 hits for every miss during season 3, and it's first season was considerably worse. And all his other shows except for Dollhouse just feel downright campy. Entertaining, but you can't quite take them seriously.
Actually, I can't think of any other show that I've found as beautiful and enthralling as Firefly. Maybe that's why I stand by it being the best ever. (for now)
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
Sine a large reason they WERE killed were they HAD to move on to other projects (since their show had been canceled) , I am not sure that follows.
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
Seems a bit... odd, to me. It'd be like making a Resevoir Dogs sequel without Quentin Tarantino. I can see doing it after Tarantino's death, but it'd be pretty poor form to do one while he was still available without at least offering.
The problem, of course, is that Whedon hasn't proven that he can make a movie that makes money.
Posted by Damien.m (Member # 8462) on :
quote:Originally posted by FlyingCow:
The problem, of course, is that Whedon hasn't proven that he can make a movie that makes money.
Um, by 2006 Serenity had made 60 million dollars on DVD sales and broadcast rights and that was three years ago.
Also Whedon is credited with the screenplay of a little movie called Toy Story.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Kwea: Sine a large reason they WERE killed were they HAD to move on to other projects (since their show had been canceled) , I am not sure that follows.
Given his track record on killing off characters, I think there's enough evidence to prove that he would have killed off someone eventually. He just likes doing it. I think with casts like the one he created though, every character is a virtual lynchpin, with the possible exception of Simon and River, who lift right out to a degree, and killing any one of them ruins the dynamic of the show. I'm totally convinced that he would have killed off at least one of them, probably two or three, and the show would have been ruined for me.
If you think they were ONLY killed off because the show had ended, well, you're entitled to your opinion of course, but I have lots of reasons for thinking that it would have happened anyway, just slower.
Dogbreath -
quote:The character dynamic was great, the setting was enthralling and fun, and every single episode was flawless. How many other shows can you think of that achieved that in 14 shows? How many achieved it at all?
Well, I'm not necessarily willing to concede that each episode was a work of art, but I do think that the run was really impressive, and very, very good. But off the top of my head, I can think of a half dozen animes that drew me in just as quickly and sustained me quite well through their run. I think longevity is a huge factor in what makes a really great show though. Chuck, for example, I would count as science fiction, has utterly fantastic characters, not a single miss episode yet I think, great character interaction, a compelling plot arc on multiple levels and has only gotten better and better going on its third season.
What if Heroes had only lasted 14 episodes? Most people are willing to say that it was really quite good in the first season then went downhill rather fast, with a few spurts of goodness (notably during Kristen Bell's tenure on the show) here and there (death rattles). But to evaluate it as a whole? It's a mess.
You apparently use a different set of criteria than I do. How a show does after multiple seasons I think is an important mark of its greatness. As a rule I like shows with defined plot arcs, but I'm more than willing to make exceptions for ones that don't, like ST:TNG, large swaths of Stargate SG1 and the first few seasons of ST:DS9. And the same for Firefly. That's like calling a rookie pitcher who pitches a perfect game and a no-hitter in his rookie season, and wins every game, but only plays a half season the best pitcher in the history of baseball. I think that's a great analogy, and it's a ludicrous assertion.
At 14 episodes it wasn't a television series, it was a sci-fi miniseries. Compare it to Children of Dune and Tin Man, not other television shows. And yes, I'd agree it was far and away considerably better than either of those.
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
quote:Um, by 2006 Serenity had made 60 million dollars on DVD sales and broadcast rights and that was three years ago
It didn't even make it's production budget back through it's entire box office run... and that's worldwide. It's great that it's made $60M over three years, but that means its total gross from Sept 2005 to now has still not cracked $100M.
Not exactly a resounding commercial success, though admittedly not a failure, either.
quote:Also Whedon is credited with the screenplay of a little movie called Toy Story.
Yes, he's credited as one of four screenwriters, and was not involved with writing the story. I'm sure that starts making cash register sounds in production executives' heads.
Now, I love Joss Whedon's stuff and I'm decidedly in his target audience - but he isn't a proven box office money-maker.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
While I AM one of the scary Whedon fans, I agree that some of them can get overwhelming, with hair-trigger responses to the slightest slight.
Some of us just like his stuff, though. And I like that characters aren't safe. Yeah, the deaths in Serenity were shocking, but I submit that even as a hardened movie watcher, I was on the edge of my seat for the last 15 minutes because I had absolutely no assurance that any of them would make it through. Had that been a second season instead, who knows? But he figured this was his last shot at capping the story and wanted to go out strong.
Luckily the first three seasons of Buffy had Tim Minear or Buffy would have sucked too...
Minear never worked on Buffy. He got hired for Angel and subsequent Whedon productions, but never worked on a single Buffy episode.
Posted by Dobbie (Member # 3881) on :
Then they had someone else who performed Minear's function.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Which was?
Posted by Dobbie (Member # 3881) on :
Making the show not suck.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Which apparently couldn't be Whedon himself.
The first few series of Buffy was pretty much him and a talented staff of writers, with his final edit on every script. Listen to the commentaries to hear the writers talk about his input, and how they'll unanimously say the best lines and character moments came from Whedon.
After season 3 Whedon was split, running both Buffy and Angel, and Marti Noxon took on more of the duties for Buffy. Those are the seasons that suffered, I think, from his fractured attention.
I avoided watching Buffy for years because the original movie was so bad. It wasn't until recording the musical for a friend that I was motivated to go back and watch 'em all, and now I'm a fan. I don't claim everything Whedon does is golden, or that he doesn't benefit from collaboration at times, but I'm also not going to buy that he's incompetent on his own. You don't like his work, no worries. But I doubt you'll be able to convince me I shouldn't like his work based on inaccurate accusations and "making the show not suck."
Posted by Dogbreath (Member # 11879) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: At 14 episodes it wasn't a television series, it was a sci-fi miniseries. Compare it to Children of Dune and Tin Man, not other television shows. And yes, I'd agree it was far and away considerably better than either of those.
Okay, so it's the greatest sci-fi miniseries of all time!
Part of this is just subjectivity, (you mentioned Anime. I can't stand Anime and have never seen one I like, but I realise most people do enjoy it) but for me, I cared *more* about the cast of Firefly from the first, hell, 6 episodes than I could from either the first 6 episodes of TNG, or even the entire run of TNG.
I think it's flawed to say "yeah, sure, it was great, but if it had gone for 6 more seasons it could have potentially gotten bad, so you can't call it the best show ever." I'm not rating it on whether it could have potentially been bad or good, I'm rating it on how good it actually was. I don't care how many seasons there were - one season was enough to convince me.
Posted by Humean316 (Member # 8175) on :
quote:Minear never worked on Buffy. He got hired for Angel and subsequent Whedon productions, but never worked on a single Buffy episode.
My apologies, I obviously brought up the wrong person. I was referring to David Greenwalt.
quote:The first few series of Buffy was pretty much him and a talented staff of writers, with his final edit on every script. Listen to the commentaries to hear the writers talk about his input, and how they'll unanimously say the best lines and character moments came from Whedon.
Of course, David Greenwalt basically played the same role on those three seasons that he would play on Angel. Marti Noxon didn't really take over the show until season 6 when Firefly was on the air, and before that, Whedon spent most of his time on Buffy, while Greenwalt, the co-creator of Angel, ran Angel.
It's no surprise to me that seasons 2 and 3 of Buffy are great seasons of television while seasons 4 and 5 are the beginning of a slide and seasons 6 and 7 are the most controversial, simply because David Greenwalt was no longer with the show. I completely agree that Whedon is great at character and dialogue, but none of that means anything if the story, mythology, foundation, and other aspects of the story are in direct conflict. That is Whedon's big problem, in my view, he sacrifices whatever he deems necessary to gain a direct emotional impact, for which I think he values more than anything else. When he wants to pull something off, it doesn't matter what he has to sacrifice (look at the official season 8 comics or even season 7 of Buffy--there are so many inconsistencies in those seasons that it's hard to take them seriously) to achieve it, and that includes the very foundations of the story he has set up. It would be like Tolkien allowing Frodo to get all the way to Mordor and then allowing him to turn evil and join Sauron just so that we could see the emotional impact it would have on Samwise. At some point, when you try and tell a story, it cannot be all about emotional impact and you definitely cannot sacrifice the characterizations you have meticulously set up just so that you can achieve some deep emotional moment because the moment doesn't mean much if that's how you pull it off. More to the point though, that makes you a bad story-teller and a bad writer.
Compare the seven seasons of Buffy to the seven books of Harry Potter, Rowling blended deep and meaningful characterization with story and foundation, she was able to set a solid foundation and achieve emotional resonance without sacrificing the characters or the story itself, and the same can be said of Tolkien. The best comparison I can come up with for Whedon is Stephanie Meyers and the Twilight Saga, but that isn't saying all that much.
Note: I do like Buffy and I do like Twilight, they just aren't masterpieces. Just saying...
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
Hmm. I didn't know Whedon was responsible for the screenplay of the original Buffy movie. Interesting.
I am undoubtedly in a very small minority: I've never seen more than a few minutes of the Buffy television series, and I don't share in the general concensus that the movie sucked. It didn't knock me out of my shoes, or anything, but it certainly had more than a few fun moments.
What I admire about Whedon's work- aside from the underlying skill of his writing- is the clear lack of genre blindness. Mal kicking the bad guy's #2 into an engine intake in Firefly had me howling with laughter, and if the series had done nothing else, that moment would have made the enterprise worthwhile.
It's also true that the abbreviated run of Firefly managed to work in more depth of character than a lot of shows manage in multiple seasons. None of the characters are the kind of blank slates or broad swatches that many shows deal in in part to make it easier for a large and/or changing team of writers to put together episodes. Newsweek recently had an article by a former ST:TNG writer who noted that the show ate through writers like candy. I love me some Star Trek, but powers know that if a particular sentiment had to be expressed or a particular plot thread followed, especially in the first couple of seasons, you knew exactly who was going to express or follow it. Cool leadership? Picard. From-the-hip leadership? Rikker. We need to show a bad guy is more physically dangerous than we can deal with? Worf's going to go flying across the bridge. Feeling... Great... Pain!?... Troi. Social snafu? Data. By contrast, I really wasn't sure if Mal was going to throw Jain out the airlock, and it wasn't because they were broad caricatures; it was because I could feel their history and Mal's ambivalence, and he had sound reasons for doing either.
There's a great quote attributed to Whedon: "People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy." It's true that killing off characters may have become something of a crutch in his writing. But I kind've appreciate that characters can actually grow and change from show to show, even if it makes them mortally vulnerable.
I was surprised to find myself glad that Dollhouse got renewed. I'm increasingly, perhaps foolishly, willing to view the weaknesses of the early shows as meddling from the suits- the need for exposition hitting us over the head with things we already knew, the cliched plot elements, the sense of running in place. As facets were shown that made unlikable people human and elements that would be status quo in other shows crumbled, I've found myself being drawn in almost against my will.
I don't think Whedon is God, but I certainly admire his abilities. And as television- especially network television- continues to devolve into a sea of vapid talk shows and reality shows I'm wont to handle with a long pair of tongs, for the love of all that's good and holy, give the man a budget.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Humean316, fair enough. I disagree on several points, but I can see where you're coming from, and I've complained about some of those myself. Just wasn't enough to detract from the rest for me. Also doesn't explain why I like "Dr. Horrible" so much, despite the utter absence of Greenwalt or Minear.
Personally I think Rowling's first few books were undeniably fun to read while still being a bit amateurish, with elements obviously pulled from several other familiar sources. She got better at it, and finally stopped using so many adverbs. She was great at characterization and dialogue, not so good at the plotting. The final battle really bugged me -- build up to a big finish and then turn it into a long, convoluted, confusing explanation? It would have been easier for Harry to pick up the exposition and just hit Voldemort with it. And yet the scene of Harry walking into Dumbledore's office after that made me cry. To each his own.
And Dobby? That's how you critique someone. Note the reasoned explanation and the startling lack of the word "sucks."
Posted by Humean316 (Member # 8175) on :
quote:Also doesn't explain why I like "Dr. Horrible" so much, despite the utter absence of Greenwalt or Minear.
Actually, I like Dr. Horrible too. I'm one of those people who think that if Firefly had gone more than 2 seasons, it would never have had the following it does, but of course, there is absolutely no way to prove that nor is that anything other than conjecture on my part but still. It's kinda like what happened to Warren in the comic books, I read the first 10 or so issues of season 8, but I stopped when he brought back Warren to punish Willow. Warren appeared as The First in season 7 which means that Warren had to be dead, and yet the explanation given for his return was that Amy saved him right before Willow killed him. That's contradictory, and when Joss explained it he basically said that he forgot that Warren had to have died. In that sense, he chose the emotional impact of forcing Willow to face what she did and sacrificed the internal consistency of his own story, and at that point, I just didn't care. I liked Dr. Horrible because Joss never got to that point in the story, he never was able to contradict himself because he just didn't say enough, and it is the same with Firefly. Dr. Horrible was silly stupid fun, and since it was free, I quite enjoyed it.
BTW, I agree with you about Harry Potter. Cheers Chris...
Posted by Dobbie (Member # 3881) on :
quote:Originally posted by Humean316: I was referring to David Greenwalt...Of course, David Greenwalt basically played the same role on those three seasons that he would play on Angel.
I was right.
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
It may have happened, in some fashion, but that is a far cry from having it happen like it did in the movie.
I think it would have been great, and would have lasted 3-4 seasons, maybe 5. Hardly a favorite, but it would have been far better than most of the crap that is on now.
Posted by Jhai (Member # 5633) on :
Out of a possible thirty joss earns twenty seven. Joss is a god of storytelling, enough said
Posted by Danlo the Wild (Member # 5378) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dogbreath: Joss Whedon.
That being said, Joss Whedon fans scare the hell out of me. He's just a screenwriter, not Jesus Christ. When I run into people (in real life, and online) who act like his work is of biblical importance, and follow him and his persona life like a stalker, I get seriously freaked out. It almost makes me enjoying his work more difficult, because I know somewhere out there, someone is praying to his basement JW shrine while watching the same episode.
Joss Whedon has a better record than the Catholic Church.
His Astonishing X-Men is on of the best things I've read in a long, long time.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
Man, oh man, was "Danger" an awful character. And he kept bringing her back. Even though she was awful.
His AXM run was fine, but it (like Grant Morrison's much bally-hooed run before) was mostly a "Greatest Hits" revisiting of earlier X-Men stories. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it wasn't his best stuff.
Posted by Tarrsk (Member # 332) on :
See, Humean, I think you can take your thesis about David Greenwalt and apply it to Joss himself. The fact is that the same seasons of Buffy in which Greenwalt wasn't involved, were the same seasons in which Joss himself played a much reduced role. Remember that Joss wasn't even Buffy's showrunner anymore starting in season 6 - by then, he had handed off virtually all creative control of the show to Marti Noxon.
In fact, looking back at when the drops in quality occurred on Buffy and Angel, it seems pretty clear to me that an absence of Joss's input was at least as much to blame as anything else. Let's look through it season by season.
It's generally agreed that Seasons 4, 6, and 7 of Buffy were the weakest, along with Angel's seasons 1 and 4. Buffy 4 and Angel 1 were produced concurrently, and represented the first time Joss was trying to juggle two shows. By the season after that (Buffy 5 and Angel 2), he had ironed out the wrinkles in the production process, and as a result we got substantially stronger seasons from both shows, although neither was without its flaws.
However, his interest in Buffy was clearly declining during this time, and by the following year, he had ceded showrunner status on Buffy to Noxon to work full-time on Angel. The end result? We get what is arguably Angel's strongest season (season 3) coinciding with one of Buffy's weakest (season 6).
Buffy season 7 and Angel season 4 suffered from a brand new problem: Joss had a new show that he was spending all his time working on. Firefly got virtually all of Joss's attention during this production year, and the result was a fantastic, albeit sadly abbreviated, season of Firefly, and the worst season of Angel coupled with one of the two worst seasons of Buffy.
Importantly, during this period, the strongest episodes from each "weak" season were, not coincidentally, the ones that Joss wrote and/or directed. "Hush," "Once More With Feeling," "The Body" - these were Joss's token "I'm still here" moments in their respective seasons, and despite the uneven quality of the episodes around them, are generally held up as some of the best episodes Buffy ever had.
Finally, we get to Angel season 5, which is considered one of the two strongest seasons of the show. At this point, Buffy has ended and Firefly has been canceled. So Joss's full attention is once again devoted to Angel. And despite the craptacularity of the previous season, Angel once again works like gangbusters.
I don't disagree that Greenwalt brought a lot to Joss's shows - he absolutely did. And I don't think Joss is flawless - on the contrary, he has his Achilles heels just like any other writer. All of the criticisms leveled against him in this thread (well, Dobbie's aside) have an element of truth to them. Joss has a very distinctive voice that inevitably seeps into the dialogue of all of his characters. Joss does use character deaths as a bit of a crutch sometimes, and has been guilty of weakening his own death scenes by bringing the dead characters back a few episodes later. And let's face it, he's not the best at world-building or creating a consistent mythology. But all writers have weaknesses. Tolkien would never be capable of creating characters with the vibrancy or wit of Whedon's. Roddenberry could never match Whedon's explorations of moral complexity, nor his ability to craft long character arcs that ring true. And Moore could never infuse his drama with humor and his humor with drama the way Whedon does as a matter of course. Doesn't mean these writers aren't also titans of their genres. And Whedon's weaknesses similarly do not take away from the indisputable fact that his work has been good enough to influence an entire generation of television and film writers.
Posted by Humean316 (Member # 8175) on :
quote:The fact is that the same seasons of Buffy in which Greenwalt wasn't involved, were the same seasons in which Joss himself played a much reduced role. Remember that Joss wasn't even Buffy's showrunner anymore starting in season 6 - by then, he had handed off virtually all creative control of the show to Marti Noxon.
Ahhh then does that mean that Joss doesn't get credit for the majority of Buffy's run? Should we basically say that Buffy wasn't really Joss' show, especially in the last 4 seasons, and thus, we should credit Noxon and the others who *really* ran the show? See, to me, he either gets credit for Buffy or doesn't, so if Buffy is his show then he gets credit for the good and the bad. It can't be the case that he gets credit for the good and no blame for the bad.
What's more, and please please please don't make me go over to Whedonesque and grab the quotes--I will if you so desire mind you Tarrsk but please don't ask, but Whedon has said before that even in seasons 6 and 7, he was the one creatively in charge of the show, it was his vision, his outline, and his ideas that ran the show. Marti Noxon may have been the show runner but Joss Whedon was telling her where to go and how to get there, apparently, so I think that's really important.
quote:Tolkien would never be capable of creating characters with the vibrancy or wit of Whedon's.
I must disagree with you here Tarrsk, I think the characters of Lord of the Rings are much more vibrant and alive than anything Whedon has ever done, and the reason is simple for me. Fiction itself is not a moment in time it is a journey, it takes you on an adventure with characters that we can relate too, and in so doing, it brings us into the story created as if we were the ones who slayed dragons or attacked Mordor. For fiction to succeed though, especially with regard to character, it must succeed in revealing a vibrant journey throughout, the adventure must be consistent through and through or the vibrancy of the journey is compromised. In that sense, where authors such as Tolkien or Moore or Rowling succeed is in the adventure they lay before the reader, it informs the characters and the characters inform the adventure, and in that symbiotic relationship neither can succeed without the other's successful implementation. For these authors, the characters who reside in the stories they create garner their vibrancy through the vibrancy of the story, through the adventure, and in some sense, through their foils and through the drama that is created. I think it's easy to write a funny line or a witty comeback, it's even easier to create moral complexity especially in science fiction or fantasy, but it's another thing all together to create vibrant characters through brilliant story and vice-versa, and to me, that's the hallmark of great fiction. If you can't do one part, then it doesn't matter how well you do the other part, you are just a bad story-teller, and that's what separates Whedon from Tolkien or Rowling. Tolkien and Rowling are talented writers who can bring both vibrant characters and brilliant adventure together into something cohesive and dependent upon each other, and though Whedon may be great at creating characters or moral complexity (which, IMO, is highly overrated for the reasons I mentioned above) he certainly can not put them together in anything I have read or seen of his.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
No, what separates him from Tolkien and Rowling is that neither one of them writes episodic television -- that I know of -- where each short story has to stand on its own as well as serve a longer story arc while remaining within time constraints, network restrictions and advertiser whims. If Whedon wrote speculative fiction and had several hundred thousand words to spread out in, then you could accurately compare those writers. He doesn't, so I'm not really sure why either of you keep bringing it up
As for Moore... I'm not a fan of military shows, and there wasn't enough humor in his BSG to help me overcome that preference so I never got into it. But I respect him based on the opinions of my friends who do enjoy such shows and absolutely loved BSG. See, Moore's work is not my cup of tea, but I don't claim he's overrated because other people like him.
What I do know is that Whedon's shows have entertained me, his characters have made me laugh and cry and I've identified with them at different times in my life. Whatever you perceive his faults to be, his work has touched me and many others. His shows are not about grand adventures but about getting through everyday life (with assorted undead metaphors added). Even his spaceship show was about a group of people just trying to get by. He doesn't do high adventure, and I'm pretty sure it's not required by any sort of governing body.
Whedon is unmatched at creating the sort of stories, the sort of characters, that I like. Your mileage obviously varies.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Tarrsk -
Tolkien and Whedon aren't nearly in the same league, but not in the way that might think.
I can't fathom how you could find Tolkien's characters lacking in vibrancy. His writing style isn't for everyone, but for those who read it, the characters aren't even close to lacking. The wit part isn't really comparable, as nothing of Tolkien's that I've read (everything involving Middle Earth) was really in any way a comedy.
As for Roddenberry, well, I disagree, as I think TNG, and TOS to a lesser extent covered a lot of moral complexity, but that's hardly the best that Trek had to offer. I think if they'd done more plot and character arcs they'd have been better off, but that wasn't really the style back then. Whedon had the benefit of coming after all that. The best of DS9 against the best of Whedon wins in the moral complexity department.
But don't get me wrong. I have Firefly and all of Buffy on DVD, and I watch them from time to time, amazed at how great a lot of it is. Buffy had some singularly spectacular episodes, and Firefly was a great romp through space that I wish could have gone on a hell of a lot longer than it did. I think he's clever, I think he's funny, I think he's AMAZING at casting the roles for his shows (stunningly so really), and he tells great stories with great characters.
It's the characters where I think he wins when comparing him directly to other shows. With the possible exception of BSG, and maybe tied in a way with B5 but probably above that, the characters he creates are singularly awesome. Firefly especially so. Even then it's hard to compare his stuff with a show like BSG because they are so different it's extremely hard to compare.
I think of Whedon like I think of Hugh Grant. Hugh Grant plays the exact same character in every single movie he's in. The names change, the plot changes, the setting changes, but he's the same guy. And I don't care, cause I actually think he's pretty funny, so I watch most of his movies. Whedon, in what I've seen, has nearly identical styles of witty dialogue/banter in his shows, with the same sorts of conflicted characters, different plots that really don't matter all that much, because honestly I couldn't care much less about the vaporous plots in most of his shows, I watch them for the characters. But I don't care if they are the same, similar, or cloned, because they're all really, really good, and I'll watch every variation on a theme he comes up with.
Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
quote:I can't fathom how you could find Tolkien's characters lacking in vibrancy. His writing style isn't for everyone, but for those who read it, the characters aren't even close to lacking.
I really enjoy Tolkien, but his characters were predominantly set pieces. They were there to further a plot and a history - devices that allowed Tolkien to explore the worlds and languages he had created. Put Gimli or Legolas against Jayne or Spike, and I'd give the edge to Whedon when talking about *character* only.
Of course, ymmv. But Tolkien's goal wasn't to create robust characters.
quote:The best of DS9 against the best of Whedon wins in the moral complexity department.
But Roddenberry was dead a full 2 years before the first episode of DS9 ever aired - and he had little involvement with TNG after the first season. And again, Roddenberry wasn't looking to craft characters. As you said, it "wasn't the style". So again, I'd take Kaylee and Lorne over Checkov and Sulu any day.
Even so, Joss writes for a certain audience (of which I am a part)... but that audience isn't large enough (or his net isn't cast widely enough) to have huge box office success. Hence why I can see them green-lighting a Buffy movie without him.
Posted by kamp101 (Member # 684) on :
Firefly is awesome, Dr. Horrible is pretty good. Everything else Whedon has done is complete garbage (except the episodes of Roseanne he wrote). In all other cases he is too obsessed with his own cleverness to write a believable line of dialogue or a decent character. Somehow he thinks he can write female characters, yet every female character he has written except for Kaylee and Willow have been one-dimensional, and characters like Buffy and Inara are self-service/fan-service and painfully corny.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:I really enjoy Tolkien, but his characters were predominantly set pieces. They were there to further a plot and a history - devices that allowed Tolkien to explore the worlds and languages he had created. Put Gimli or Legolas against Jayne or Spike, and I'd give the edge to Whedon when talking about *character* only.
It's easier when you pick weaker characters. Put Sam or Frodo, or even further, someone like Turin, against Jayne and I think you have a much more even equation.
Thing is though, it's sort of a useless comparison, as I said before, not only because the genres are wildly different, but because television is naturally more emotive than literature. Case in point, the LOTR movies at many points use dialogue taken directly from the movies, and use song lyrics taken directly from the movie that are more stunning than I ever could have imagined on the page. So of course people you can see and hear are going to sound fuller than those you have to do all the visualizing yourself for.
Maybe we can have this discussion again when they unearth a Tolkien movie screenplay, or when Whedon writes a book. Then we'll be able to do it justice.
quote:But Roddenberry was dead a full 2 years before the first episode of DS9 ever aired - and he had little involvement with TNG after the first season. And again, Roddenberry wasn't looking to craft characters. As you said, it "wasn't the style". So again, I'd take Kaylee and Lorne over Checkov and Sulu any day.
Huh, I could have sworn I put in a sentence about how I liked the guys who made DS9, Behr, Berman, Piller, etc, who really took ST into a new realm after Roddenberry left off. That's my bad. Anywho, I wasn't talking about characters in comparison between Star Trek and Firefly. If I was, I'd probably end up siding with Firefly, though not any of Buffy's characters, that's for sure. I agree that TOS characters were largely junk, and TNG's were in many cases wooden archetypes, despite the amazing jobs the actors did with it, Stewart in particular. Choosing Roddenberry, in Tarrsk's case, was a little silly maybe, since other than creating the framework, I don't think most people, except the diehards, would really be able or willing to say that he's some storytelling legend. If you're going to pick on Star Trek, compare the best to the best, which to me, means talking about DS9, and it doesn't lack for compelling moral complexity, or good characters who both grow and change over time and wrestle with a lot of moral gray (or black, in Garak's case).
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
[ November 22, 2010, 08:13 PM: Message edited by: Bella Bee ]
Posted by Tarrsk (Member # 332) on :
Ugh. No way this turns out well.
I'm not a fan of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," the Franchise. I'm a fan of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," the television series created by Joss Whedon. I hold no inherent interest in a story about a blonde chick who fights vampires. It's what Joss did with that premise that I love.
So, sorry, Kazuis et al. You're not getting my dollars based on franchise name alone. And hate to break it to you, but the world is pretty solidly divided into those who love Whedon's vision of "Buffy" and those who couldn't care less about the whole concept to begin with. Good luck luring that latter population into theaters.
Posted by Bella Bee (Member # 7027) on :
You know, the other day I was thinking that they could update Buffy as a grown-up, sexy show about a perky blonde waitress with a secret destiny who sometimes stakes vampires and is hopelessly in love with a reformed dark-haired vampire with a tragic past, while also having strong feelings for an evil-but-secretly-sensitive bleach-blond European vampire.
She could have a magically talented gay friend, an unlucky friend who always seems to attract problems, a cool werewolf friend... you know, the usual.
But then I realized that this show is already on HBO.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Edit to add: didn't see the earlier link, this only adds Angel then
Posted by Wingracer (Member # 12293) on :
No Joss, bad idea. Don't believe me? First, they should watch every single episode of Buffy that Joss wrote and directed himself, skipping all the others. After that they will be thinking "what a fantastic show, we should make a new movie." Then watch all the other episodes and they will say "get me Joss on the phone."
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: well nearly all of Whedons characters had interchangeable dialogue.
Mr. Croshaw! When did you join Hatrack?
Edit: I just realized I'm responding to a year-old post. Oh well.
Posted by Aris Katsaris (Member # 4596) on :
quote:Put Gimli or Legolas against Jayne or Spike, and I'd give the edge to Whedon when talking about *character* only.
Gimli was a warrior poet -- the most eager for bloodshed and vengeance, and also the most eager to appreciate beauty in all its forms: from the lake of Khelez-Zaram, to the lady Galadriel, to the glittering caves.
(In the movies, he's ofcourse just a belching buffoon)
Legolas is the most lighthearted *and* the most serious. While in a snowstorm he can make light jokes, but weep when recounting the story of a 400-year old couple, or be thrown into a life-changing depression by the cry of a seagull.
(In the movies, he's ofcourse just an emotionless archer automaton)
I loved characters like Spike and Jayne, but Gimli and Legolas more than hold their own against them, even while being largely secondary characters that are meant to primarily illustrate their *races*' ways.
Posted by Stephan (Member # 7549) on :
The good news is that there will be no Spike, Angel, Faith, or Willow. Those characters are safe, they belong to Whedon.
This is a re-make of the original movie and its characters (or new ones).
I'll treat it like the original movie. Probably watch it once, in a theater if the reviews are good, and move on with my life. This is just an attempt by Warner to furthur cash in on the recent vampire fad.
Posted by Darth_Mauve (Member # 4709) on :
After reading the old stuff on this thread I have a new saying:
WWAAMD?
(What would an angry mob do?)
Posted by JonHecht (Member # 9712) on :
Bad article. It isn't that he didn't want it, its that he was already contracted and they didn't want to wait for him. He was approached last year, didn't he already have Avengers coming up by that point?
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
That seems a bit earlier than the time he was being approached with Avengers. Of course it's hard to say without actually talking to Joss. Oh Chris?!
Posted by Tarrsk (Member # 332) on :
Joss having been offered the job doesn't surprise me. It doesn't matter anyway - what's objectionable about this whole situation was never the studio ignoring Joss entirely, but rather that they would go ahead with the remake even knowing that Joss didn't want it to happen.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I'm kind of wondering what the new take on Buffy is.
I thought this was going to be a new show though, not a movie, which tamps down whatever excitement I might have had for it, though of course I have to imagine they'll try to TV-ize it if they can.
While I might not pay to see it in theaters, I'd be willing to rent it, pending reviews, to see what's new or different.
Posted by Nighthawk (Member # 4176) on :
quote:Originally posted by Tarrsk: Joss having been offered the job doesn't surprise me. It doesn't matter anyway - what's objectionable about this whole situation was never the studio ignoring Joss entirely, but rather that they would go ahead with the remake even knowing that Joss didn't want it to happen.
Have Joss and the studio executives ever agreed on anything?
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I absolutely adore Buffy. But I don't hate this idea, because 1) It isn't like my DVDs of Joss's show are going to be wiped, and 2) Joss wasn't planning to do something else with Buffy and this thwarted him.
It's the same reason I don't get mad at movie versions of books I love. Art is all about building on what came before and telling the same stories in a different way. That's not a problem - that's healthy and inevitable. I don't know if I will watch it or not, but if I do, I won't be disloyal to Joss.
Artistically, it will live or die on its own. At the moment I don't care, but I'm open to such an amazind story they make me care. Meanwhile, I hope Joss is making something brilliant with the Avengers.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Of course it's hard to say without actually talking to Joss. Oh Chris?!
Sadly, I don't have his batphone.
I'd want to know what they were offering. Was it to bring his whole crew back, and would that have meant sharing the rights to his TV characters with the Kuzuis? There's a nonstarter. Or was it to pick up where the 1st movie left off? Why should he work with that set of characters when he's already gone off and rebooted Buffy once and made her much more successful?
Frankly, I can't see Joss agreeing to a deal that got him involved again with the Kuzuis.
Re: the movie: katharina nailed it, as far as I'm concerned. It's entirely possible it might be a good movie. I'm not in favor of it but I won't march against it or sign petitions or anything. They've got one hell of a challenge, to win over dedicated Buffy fans. Let's see what they do.
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I don't know if that was your own line or not, but it deserves recognition.
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