Of all the various TV shows that have abruptly cancelled, none have quite reached the level of infamous disappointed to that of the 2002 space fairing Fox show, Firefly. Based around a group of rebels smuggling through space avoiding the gaze of a domineering alliance, Firefly was an amazing hit among fans, even managing to earn itself a Primetime Emmy even after its short 11-episode lifespan before Fox cancelled the show. With the show feeling incredibly unfinished and people ravenous for more, writer and director Joss Whedon, who also helped with Marvel’s avengers, worked together with Universal Pictures to produce Serenity, a film that would try to wrap up a handful of the unanswered questions the show left behind. Set in a futuristic world where space travel exists but aliens don’t, siblings Simon and River (played by Sean Maher and Summer Glau) are now runaways from the corrupt Alliance as River was experimented on to be used as a super weapon. Hitching a ride on the cargo ship called Serenity led by captain Mal (played by Nathan Fillion) along with a bunch of other characters on-board, the team soon discover that an evil assassin named The Operative (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor) is hunting down River and is willing to destroy anything or anyone in his path to get to her. Discovering a secret that could destroy the alliance forever, the team have to elude the Operative and set out to find a hidden planet occupied by crazed and cannibalistic humans named Reavers. For a movie based on a heavily popular TV that’s main premise was just as an apology for its sudden departure, the film manages to create a likeable film that would more than likely draw people into the show. It probably doesn’t give enough pay-off of the show’s story to reach the astronomical expectations fans placed onto it, but as a sample taster for a famous show, it works quite nicely.

The movie manages to work both as an extra long epilogue to the TV show’s first season, and as its own separate stand-alone film. The movie quickly gives audience members a brief enough description of who and what is important that it can tell its own story without being too held back by any background law or required previous knowledge getting in the way. Since the show was mainly a episodic Han-Solo type series with a hint of a story trying to get itself going, the film packs itself without enough set-up, pay-off and structure that it can work for both old veterans looking for some kind of pay, and newcomers being introduced for the first time. The actual narrative of the movie is developed and initiated in a slow but effective pace that allows people to breath in what’s being told and is directed and show in a smart but simple enough way that its not to confusing to understand. The movie feels in tune with the show’s tone, world and atmosphere, but with a better budget and a condensed story as well, allowing for the best of both worlds. Now its true that the story itself doesn’t have enough time to flesh out everything the fans would want answered, only two big elements are revealed in the movie that fans would know about. This also means that certain character decisions and choices that can’t be developed strong enough in such a short amount of time that most people would care about unless they have the previous knowledge, which can be a bit of a hamper when it comes to the film’s climax. Also the last third of the movie does get pretty lost as it tries to finish; the story takes a drastically new direction out of nowhere, elements about the Sister (who was the main focus of the movie) seems to get disregarded pretty quickly, the climax has the empty feeling that doesn’t quite hit the level its hoping to receive, the Reavers are pretty well built-up and have an okay enough pay-off, but it still comes to late in the film to feel really worth anything, and without giving much away, despite the film’s darker tone, the movie could have benefited from a full-blown Rogue One type ending, instead of what was actually given.

The characters are simple enough that they don’t need much of a plot dump to fully understand them but that does come with its own set of problems. While most of the actors are actually really good, the show didn’t really develop most of these characters to the point where even fans would know that much about them. Because of this, the movie doesn’t try to do much with about half of the cast on the ship, making them feeling pretty pointless overall beside from the fact that they were featured in the show. The ones that are given focus are actually handled in a relatively good way; mainly the brother and sister. The sister, who is the focal point around the whole series, is the best part of this movie; the story around is an interesting one even if it doesn’t have that much of a concrete answer, the actress for her is really good at conveying several different ranges and emotions without feeling annoying or over-the-top, and she’s part of some really good actions scenes that are probably the best looking and staged in the whole film. The rest of the characters are okay but kinda weak and pointless; the captain is pretty standard and even pretty unlikeable and unfocused, the pilot played by Alan Tudyk is really annoying and not funny, and the rest of the crew are perfectly fine and well-acted but lack enough characteristics and a strong enough connection to care that much about them. The villain is played pretty well by Chiwetel Ejiofor, but even he simmers out by the end with no backstory and lacking a strong enough motivation.

With a tv show transferring into the movie template comes a bunch more advantages like a bigger budget and therefore, better looking effects. While the effects in the show were a bit fake looking but work enough for the show itself, here they look a lot better and allow for some nice-looking scenery shots whenever the spaceship is shown. There’s nothing that spectacular shown visually wise outside of a few moments in the climax that warrant any special effects, but for what they are they look pretty good. The fights can be a bit mixed in quality; on the one hand, any fight with the sister is pretty cool as it’s usually a group against one and the stunts feels real enough, and even a speed-boat chase in the opening works pretty well, the other fist fights in the movie feel a bit more slow and more clumsy than refined. They work fine enough in the moments, but they’re nothing special. While the show was more of a comedy sci-fi show than anything else, the movie itself doesn’t have that many moments that are that funny, but regardless it still has an upbeat enough feel that nothing feels dead or lifeless, it feels real enough that it can show the lighter moments well and the darker moments effectively as well.

Serenity came out about two years after the show was cancelled, thankfully not leaving people too long in the dust to get some form of answers, which does soften the blow a bit when its revealed that this movie doesn’t do much of that either, what it does do is gives a fairly entertaining movie that will make newcomers get interested in the fan-favorite show and make them want to see more, so in that regard it payed off pretty well. It has a grabbable spirit and atmosphere that can easily entrance people like the show itself can do, but this smaller condensed story does do a better job weaving in a story into a usually episodic TV show. While most of the character’s are pretty useless and the ending does fall out from under its feet by the end, it still has some interesting enough moments, a few cool fights scenes and some great actors that makes it worth a viewing. Not the answers people were looking for, but maybe the movie it needed at the moment, Firefly was able to blast off for its final times in a charming enough light to make it worth a watch.