Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I am a die hard fan of Firefly and, as such, I grabbed this book as soon as I heard about it. The cancellation of the show left me wanting more. Essays dissecting the show? What the heck. Could be fun. But, by and large, it isn't. The book starts off promising enough. There is an essay that talks about the look and feel of the show from a filmmaking point of view, and that's pretty cool. Also interesting is the examination of the episode "Objects in Space" (my personal favorite) as an exercise in existentialism. Unfortunately, the handful of insightful essays/articles do not offset the rest of the book. Most of the book reads like a fanzine (a fan-produced, fan-edited, usually low-quality collection of articles that are insightful and witty to only the most diehard fans). Chief among these were the silly "The Rise and Fall (and Rise) of Firefly," and the dreadfully un-funny and irrelevent "Firefly vs. The Tick." Many of the essays are guilty of simply overanalyzing the show to death. Yes, you can pick at the parts fo Firefly (the western part, the sci-fi part...) and find lots of flaws--but what none of the essays seem to point out is that it's the sum of the parts that makes this show such a wonderful thing. Perhaps the worst of the bunch is "I Want Your Sex..." a seemingly endless man-hating rant by an irate Buffy fan that berates Joss Whedon for not taking the initiative to make the Firefly universe a matriarchal society where women wield all of the power and men are simply window dressing. The characters of Firefly--ALL of them--are strong characters, stronger than those on most shows on television today. To say that the women of this show were marginalized and weak is just plain silly. Everyone who's ever watched the show KNOWS Zoe could kick everyone's [back] on that ship and take command. The fact that she choses NOT to do so (as my wife points out) shows STRENGTH not weakness. The fact that she is devoted to and dotes on her husband is not a weakness (as the writer of the essay would have you believe) but a personal choice. The fact River is not interested in relationships with men on the ship (or off the ship) doesn't maker her character sexless--it doesn't make her ANYTHING. It just is. The girl has other priorities. She's a fugitive, after all... I'll stop ranting now. Anyway, if you're looking to supplement your Serenity movie experience, buy the Firefly DVDs, the novel, and the making-of book. (Skip the first step if you already own the DVDs.) As for this book--the few bright spots are hardly worth the price of admission.