just drive on by

I admit, there has not been a whole lot of Serenity-related news on this weblog for quite some time now, and I apologize for that. Do not get me wrong – the news has certainly been out there… I have just been lazy. In the spirit of trying to correct that, off we go.
First off, while it is not entirely Firefly-related, it does pertain to one of the actors in the film and series – Nathan Fillion. For those who were paying very, very close attention to their TV Guides/TiVos/newspapers a few months back, he happened to star in remarkably shortlived series entitled “Drive“. And when I say “remarkably”, I mean remarkably – a grand total of five episodes, including the pilot… even shorter than Firefly itself. The final two episodes of the “season” (who the hell ever heard of a six-episode “season”) were supposed to be aired on the Fourth… and then they were supposed to be aired on the 13th of July… And now? Well, now, they are gone.
Now, to the regular readers of this weblog, it is no great surprise that Fox and I do not get along… at all. The injustice they did to Firefly by showing it at all manner of odd hours, irregularly, and out of order doomed a great series before it even had a chance to gain public acclaim, and then the moronic producers at Fox, for whatever idiotic reason, proclaimed it a failure and canned it. Well no kidding, dimwits – if you screw over a series’ showtimes and order, ain’t nobody gonna pay attention to it. Talk about a self-fulfilling prophecy of literally galactic proportions.
Unfortunately, despite the massive fanbase Firefly has developed over the past few years, the praise it and Serenity have received from just about every angle, and the continual outrage over Fox’s actions… they still have not learned what amounts to be a very simple lesson. See, intelligent people learn from their mistakes – obviously the Fox executives fail that test, otherwise they would not have buggered another series’ chances on the basis of four real episodes.
Now, I admit, while my college degree does pretty much specialize in the careful application of probability and statistics, I really did not grasp either particularly well – seemed way to much like either magic, or just continually shaking the 8-ball until it gives you the answer you want. But trying to base any kind of statistical projection off a sample body of four? Hell, even I can tell you that is an idiotic move, regardless of the size of the group for which you are simulating. But, again, no one said the higher-ups at Fox were particularly bright… in fact, most loudly proclaim the opposite.
Any way you look at it, though, the cancellation of Drive is a shame. We hardly even got to know it, and now it is gone.
From the other side of the news spectrum, however, I bring you some good stuff. Primarily, I just happened to stumble across SerenityStuff.com. It’s name pretty much describes it perfectly, and while my Philosophy of Firefly CafePress store is not listed in their CafePress section (*nudge nudge nudge*), I certainly will not hold that against them. In fact, since they happened to direct me to both this, and these, they just got bumped over to the blogroll at the right. Oh, and if anyone wants to go halvsies on the props, I call Mal’s pistol and the grenade… Or you could just send me $100 and I will be your eternal friend. Either way.
Almost-finally, from the really-good side of things, Kate joined the losing (but still not convinced it’s the wrong) side of the War. I feel kind of bad that I did not introduce her to the series earlier, but, hell, any new Browncoat is cause for celebration.
And now finally, and categorized as “you probably do not care”, does anyone know a cheap way of putting together a decent-looking Firefly/Serenity-esque costume get-up. Abbyshot‘s Browncoat is flat-out gorgeous, but considering that I am having a hard time rationalizing the $100 for the props, something tells me another almost-$600 on top of that is not going to pull a leaf-on-the-wind maneuver. Anywise, if anyone has a quick-and-easy route, I am all ears… or eyes… or whatever. Just, be aware, me and knitting/sewing/stitching… yeah, let’s just not go there.
And just for the sake of being adorably awesome, I present you with Juggling Goslings.