Marketing Steps Up - City of Heroes Toys!

You really, REALLY need an animated .gif there.

They are nature's most deadly mammal.

I was just thinking, "Mutant Enemy"... I just can't remember any of the shows that came out of that outfit.

Ah the freaking "Clone Saga™"

...and one of Recluse's leg-arms snapped off...

So you'd rather die than watch something you apparently know nothing about? I see we are par on this course.

I have seen, and it was more than enough

Buffy: The Vampire Slayer (the show, which was nominated for and won several awards, including Emmys), Angel (which, granted, had problems), Firefly and Serenity (both of which are shown on an ongoing cult basis), Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog (!!) and Dollhouse.

Buffy: The Vampire Slayer movie was not Mutant Enemy, it was just mutated.

Like "Battlefield Earth"?

Okay, I have to defend Joss Whedon, because he's one of the best damn writers and directors in the world. And as far as I know, he had absolutely nothing to do with the travesty that was Battlefield Earth.

There are movies that are cult favorites because they're so unbelievably bad, such as the aforementioned Battlefield Earth, Plan 9 from Outer Space, Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, etc.

Firefly, Serenity, Dollhouse, and some of his other efforts fall into a completely different category, shows that were highly underrated at the time, efforts that were undermined by the very distribution channels by which they came to us so that they could pile on us the cheaper-to-produce dreck that is modern media, especially science fiction, instead.

If you haven't seen it, or if you've only seen bits and pieces of it out of context, I highly recommend renting Disc One of Joss's masterpiece, Firefly. Fire up the first episode (titled "Serenity," not to be confused by the movie of the same name), and watch the two opening scenes. I can almost guarantee that you'll be hooked. Bear in mind after watching it that this was actually the fourth-from-last episode of the series shown chronologically during its original run, because the pinheads at Fox wanted a pilot that was more action-packed and made them run "The Train Job" as the first episode instead. That was among many boneheaded decisions they made that killed one of the best shows ever. Along with schedule shifts, preemptions, and other shenanigans, it never had a chance to get its following while it was being broadcast. I have made no less than five die-hard fans since its cancellation by showing them the first episode before it became the cult classic that it is, when they had never even heard of the show.

Hopefully, you'll watch the series enough to get to the episode "The Message." In my humble opinion, that was one of the top five hours that has ever graced television airwaves.

Joss Whedon's genius is in understanding that good fantasy and science fiction, just like good anything, isn't about the genre or billion-dollar special effects, it's about the people. Nail that down and the rest is gravy. One thing I always liked about Firefly and never really considered until I heard him specifically mention it is that there are no aliens. Think about it. A space show without any aliens. As I recall when I heard him talking about it, he wanted to make sure the show stayed focused on the people, and "little green men" would have been very distracting to that end.

I have to admit, I thought the first two or three episodes of Dollhouse kind of sucked. I distinctly remember thinking after watching the first episode, "This is going to die a quick death." Still, being Joss Whedon, I knew he had more in store than just Eliza Dushku being a sex kitten each week. Sure enough, by mid-season or so, it ramped up the intrigue and deeper layers, and I was hooked yet again. The last two episodes were amazing, and I thought the ending was incredible. As a side note, every time I see Tahmoh Penikett in anything now, I can't help but say to myself, "Hey, it's Mr. Bal-LARD!" with Adele DeWitt's British accent on the second syllable. I didn't watch Battlestar Galactica until after Dollhouse was in full swing, and I could never call him Helo. It was always Mr. Bal-LARD.

Anyway, watch Firefly. You won't be disappointed.

Captain Den'Rath 53* Merk/Traps MM, Rivona 50Energy Blast/Time Cor,Victoria Von Heilwig 53* Dual Pistols/Traps Cor, Crab Spider Webguard 53* SOA, Accela 53* Bot/FF MM,Valkyrie's Executor 53* Broadsword/Shield Def Scrap. On FREEDOM! @Knight Of Bronze

interesting thing with the anti-government thing, noting the period shifted western setting, the observance of different alliance holidays and some other incidental things about the setting. It always seemed to me that firefly was kind of a period shifted tale of a confederate soldier in the reconstruction era america.

as for joss, i was TRYING to just make a joke there, but i'm about 50/50 for him, i loved buffy and thought firefly was good, but i also felt firefly could get incredibly preachy at times, and towards the end, buffy was just a garbled mess, so Joss gets interest from me, but not entirely confidence. dr horrible was very good, even if it did find a way to fit in a surprising number of joss's cliches in a short musical. I feel that joss suffers from his own hype, people hype up firefly beyond it capacity to fulfill the expectations they lay out and leave people disappointed. hes pretty good and writes clever, funny dialogue, i just leave it at that and leave outt he unsustainable hype.

That would be because it was. I recall seeing him talk about it, or mayeb I read it? Anyways, he said the show's idea started while he was reading a history of the Civil War. Now add in the Millennium Falcon (also something he owned up to) and there you have it.

Specifically his inspiration came from the novel, "The Killer Angels" by Michael Shaara - a recounting of the four day battle of Gettysburg from the perspective of the Confederates. It's an excellent novel, and was made into the also excellent movie, "Gettysburg."

I believe the Battle of Serenity Valley was a parallel for the battle of Gettysburg in that it was the beginning of the end for those who were fighting against the government.

That guy is so getting Genericized.

Heh.

Yeah, I know. You seriously need to update the Fan Site Kit so that their graphics look better.

I want something like WoW's FigurePrints.

If I could get a statue of my hero Skylancer, preferably in an in-flight pose, I would buy it in a heartbeat. No hesitation at all.