"Firefly" was the first boxed series set I ever bought, so yeah, it sounds like a pisser. Any hope of it passing over to FX, which seems to know how to treat a series? Or, (never thought I'd say this) AMC?

I don't know why a genius like Whedon would want to deal with any of the broadcast networks. Okay, I know -- that's where the money is.

But the only source for entertainment that's original and challenging is pay cable -- HBO with shows like "True Blood" and Showtime with "Dexter".

Management at the broadcast networks and the Big Three auto companies appear to have attended the same business school.

If Friday Night is Fox's dumping ground, does that mean they plan on losing the dismally abysmal (or is that abysmally dismal) Don't Forget The Lyrics! and Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader?? My kids and I might be more inclined to not rent movies if the network offered something more stimulating than that claptrap.

Why the hell does Whedon keep doing business with Fox? Seriously, I've never understood this. He keeps going back and going back no matter what they do to him, like a battered wife or something.

Fox Entertainment has different management than when Whedon was doing "Firefly." Hope springs eternal. Then again, to use another cliche -- Some things never change.

It is not nearly as slow a news day as everyone would like to pretend. The subject that NO ONE is covering is the heightened use of drones and the attacks within Pakistan recently. The administration is stirring the hornets nest thoroughly before the transition? There are still 2 MONTHS to go before the handover. The Pakistanis are vocal in their protest and yet ... we keep discussing the fab new team to come, more arcane belly button gazing. Burrowing may be nothing by comparison... Out there in the world, things are happening and until a starlet blogger frames it, well, it really isn't newsworthy. Why focus on a messy patient when we can wait and autopsy the cadaver ... Seymour where are you ?

This, of course, is following hard on the news that ABC is killing "Pushing Daisies," as fun an hour as there has been on TV in years. Boo, networks!

I had the re-read this post...how can anyone say anything about Wheedon without mentioning Buffy, the best tv show in the history of best tv shows? With no intention of starting a war, I honestly don't understand what people see in Firefly. I had the discs from Netflix and was so bored I couldn't finish the few episodes that were created.

I watched Firefly and perfectly understood why FOX did everything it did to the show.

Look, Buffy was a great show in many ways but comparatively very few people watched it. I'm not sure that even at its height it got ratings that would have made even FOX happy, let alone ABC, CBS or NBC.

Whedon has proven that he can make a quality show that appeals to a, again comparatively, small group of people. He has never demonstrated he has the ability or aptitude to appeal to the broadest possible audience, which is what the Big 4 networks want.

Mike

Hopefully, network TV will stop sodomizing science-fiction and just leave it alone. The godawful "Heroes" is at least (justifiably) losing a million viewers a week since the season opener. Seven more episodes and they'll be down to zero, but I am sure there will be some trekkers out there crying to save it.

The only thing sadder than what Fox does to s-f series is what the Sciffy Channel puts out on Saturday nights - sciffy movies guaranteed to make you actually dumber if you watch them.

If you want to talk about GOOD TV, there's 90 minutes of commercial-free magnificence coming this Tuesday with the finale of "The Shield." A show that's had all the moral quandaries sciffy shows want to show and never deliver (not even BSG the past two seasons). I can't even begin to have a clue what's going on there, other than Vic has to die.

The Whedon worship here verges on the same ridiculousness twentysomething slackers give Judd Apatow. (Same thing with "Lost.") Sorry, gang, but I don't need to believe.

I too wonder why Whedon keeps dealing with Fox. While none of the other big 4 networks would be any better, he would probably find USA or FX to be the perfect place for his shows. He wouldn't have the same pressure to appeal to huge audiences and from what I understand, they pretty much leave the show creators alone.

I can't comment on these specific examples, but I would think that well done major network adaptations of anything would be the exception rather than the rule. My brickbats go especially to the horrendous job that the Sci-Fi channel (SF channel!) did to the likes of Earthsea. I mean these people are supposed to be plugged in!

If it's good enough, maybe it can pull an X-files and jump its way out of the Friday night dead zone.

I've heard you can also find science fiction in books.

I never tire of quoting Jon Lovitz on this point, when he went on Letterman after his animated show "The Critic" had been screwed over by this same network: "FOX. They should spell it with a 'U'."

The SciFi channel sure could use Whedon's help. Their latest batch of original programming (Ghost Hunters, Estate of Panic, Sanctuary) seems to exist soley to cultivate an audience dumb enough to go to 13makethemoney.com to get the cash they need for that new Bowflex.

I gave up on the SciFi channel when they started showing wrestling and General O'Neill left.

Since I rabidly followed Buffy and agonized over what Fox did to Firefly and have watched Serenity so many times I can almost recite it by heart, I am not an objective observer. The only reason I can imagine for Whedon going back to Fox is a contract he can't get out of.

Argh! I have such hope for Dollhouse. it was the one show of the 2008-2009 season I was looking forward to with intense anticipation. Whedon and Dushku together again? Good times. Unless of course FOX gets their little mitts in it. I'm still holding out some semblance of hope. I mean, at least FOX picked up the show, so there's a possibility all will be okay? Right? Right? Please?

Why the hell does Whedon keep doing business with Fox?

From the interviews I've seen with Whedon, he really likes the studio people at Fox -- "Buffy" and "Angel" were both produced by Fox. The problem is the network people at Fox, who are a bunch of fucking morons.

Farscape.

Firefly was a space opera re-write of any of a half-dozen movies of the late 60s through mid-70s, built around the now wiser but golden-hearted Confederate army officer.
But certainly better than the fascist Battlestar Gallactica.

If you are going to post on Science Fiction (a good thing), please be sure to include books for those of us who love to read and don't particularly care for TV.

If you go the book route, you can't NOT read John Scalzi's blog Whatever. He's a successful sci-fi author himself, and he regularly gives space to new authors to allow them to introduce himself in a category called "The Big Idea."

I knew I liked Steve Benen on some level other than politics -- and this explains it.

Whedon fan here as well. Living in LA and working in Film, I typically don't get all worked up around 'celebrities.' But when I ran into Whedon at the comic shop I frequent, I was struck speechless with giddiness. He was purchasing a 4 inch stack of comics. Coincidentally, I had purchased the latest issue of The Astounding Xmen, which Whedon authored. A perfect opportunity to ask for an autograph. Regretably, my nerves and general disdain for autograph hounds prevented me from making that move.

I think Buffy is the best show ever, but I have a special place in my heart for Firefly. I think it was an excellent show, despite what some people here say, and I can't wait for Dollhouse.

FOX didn't make Joss Whedon scrap the pilot. That decision was his.
Joss's own words.

Quote: "R.D.A.: So they made you do another. It's Firefly all over again! Run! For the love of God, HE'S CALLING FROM THE HOUSE!!!

Joss: Wow. Good panic.

R.D.A.: I try. But I am genuinely concerned. Also your smooth skin and elegant hands are making me bi-curious.

Joss: Well, the idea to do a new first episode wasn't the network's. It was mine. I understood their consternation, and saw the gap between my style and their expectations, and I suggested I shoot a new ep and make the one I'd shot the second. It isn't going to be buried, like the pilot of Firefly. It's simply coming after another, slightly cleaner ep. And because unlike Firefly, it isn't a two hour epic which introduces everyone to each other, the onus isn't on the new ep to explain a million things."

But yeah, not so much with the optimism. But I'm right there with the wait and see.

I am not a huge fan of Whedon, so far I've only liked Angel of his projects, but Dollhouse pushes a lot of my psycho-sexual buttons so I'll be buying it on DVD regardless.

Too good to last I'm calling this!

Hmmm. Just blogged about my first time in the Whedonverse.

I honestly think teaming "Dollhouse" with Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chonicles will be good for both shows. It will create a great Sci-fi block along with BSG on the Sci-fi channel.

Why the hell does Whedon keep doing business with Fox?

I'm afraid Eliza Dushku is contracted to Fox and as Joss created the show for her he was forced to put a brave face on it and work with them again.

The Sarah Connor Chronicles is one of the 5 best shows on TV. Unfortunately, it might not make it past this season.

Hey, Steve, I'm one of your loyalists and my husband and I are also big Whedon (and sci fi) fans. So if people like Kevin can go off on cats once a week, some of us would appreciate a few sci fi updates...

Joss has only gone with FOX as a *network* once--Buffy was aired on the WB seasons 1-5 and UPN seasons 6 and 7, and Joss brought that one to a close successfully--or at least, the network didn't force cancellation (Sarah Michelle Gellar may have. Like Rob Lowe & the West Wing, she didn't know a good thing when she had it.) Angel was on the WB, which they foolishly cancelled at its peak in Season 5. It's Tim Minear, Joss' co-creator on Firefly, who's been repeatedly screwed by FOX (Firefly, Drive, Wonderfalls, K-Ville, Standoff), and, truth be told, it's only the first three one really misses.
Luckily, we live in a post-LOST, post-Heroes, post-iTunes universe, so it may be that Dollhouse has lower ratings requirements than its predecessors. We'll see.

Greg, you forgot The Inside in your list of Minear tragedies. I freaking loved that show and miss it something fierce, despite Fox only airing half the episodes they paid for. If the studio is smart, they'll put together a Tim's Cancelled Shows box set and smoosh all his partial seasons into one package.

I think for smart, quirky shows like the ones Whedon and Minear produce to succeed on Fox -- and I do think they could -- the network needs to either stop pretending that it can pull the same numbers as the Big Three, or actually air as much primetime material as they do. With only two hours of non-news programming in the evening, rather than three, the executives have a really itchy trigger finger if anything isn't a giant hit right away. The people in charge of such things are hinting that they're going to give their new Friday lineup more of a shot than they would've a few years ago, but no one is definitively saying that all of the episodes will air, and that makes me pessimistic.

I think Whedon names his shows so that no one would want to watch it.
An action movie called serenity? Buffy the vampire slayer? dollhouse?

Ah, Farscape. A fantastic show. I miss the old scifi Fridays, with funny stuff like Farscape, the Invisible Man, etc. Though I have to admit, I always tune in for the B Disaster Weekend days (there was one just yesterday). I love those movies in all there awesomely-bad glory. One of these days I am going to write one.

I've never been too big of a Joss Whedon fan, so I probably won't tune in to Dollhouse. But, folks seem to love love love his work (and what I have seen, has been good -- it just doesn't get me jazzed enough to actively tune in for some unknown reason...) so best of luck to him.

I hope that the pairing with SCC (Terminator) goes well. (Last week's time loop made my head hurt.) It's a good show (the best bit being the "Let's pretend Terminator 3 was never made" premise) and besides, who knew David Silver would grow up to be so fine? I'll be sad to see it lose its plum Monday spot but 24 is coming back soon and Jack Bauer is def. the king of the Fox lineup.

Is there really someone out there who doesn't wish that T3 was never made?