That explains why I'm so familiar with boomer shows and movies, despite being a millennial. There was a lot of old content and remakes on TV then.

We don't talk about that.

With blackjack, and hookers!

I was so disappointed by the ready player one film and was absolutely flabbergasted when I learned the author was actually actively involved in the film.

This is how I've always felt about it too. All of Whedon's other shows had twists that made the audience hate entire seasons; there's no reason to believe Firefly would have escaped that pattern.

So instead of being sad it died early, we can be glad we can still imagine where it could have gone in the best case scenario. The vision in our minds will likely be better than what we would have got if it'd continued.

No need to worry about Jayne's inevitable face-heel turn, or whatever other terrible subplots could potentially have cropped up in later seasons like River developing explicit (rather than merely suggested) incestuous feelings for Simon, or Inara betraying the crew for a cure to her disease (before being welcomed back a season later), or Kaylee getting killed off out of nowhere because Whedon loves doing that to characters of her archetype, or YoSaffBridge becoming a core crew member after we learn her tragic backstory even though her awful personality hasn't changed at all.

And that's not even getting into what the network execs, who hated the show, would have done with their meddling. Things could have been so much worse. Fans should console themselves with the fact that the show at least died with its dignity intact, and we even got a movie that resolved a few of the major hanging threads.

No one talks about famous actor James Dean becoming an ultraconservative asshole, being closeted racist, or a serial abuser of women. He died before anything like that could happen. Firefly is the same way.

Something like this would have happened even if Joss Whedon wasn't revealed to be a scumbag. Adam Baldwin, the actor who played Jayne, went on to become a major mouthpiece for the alt-right and a mainstay of conservative Twitter. IIRC he's even the one who named GamerGate (not that the name required even a modicum of creativity).

Yeah, but half a season?

If you want to know how the series would've been if it had stayed on, you can read the comics.

Also see Life on Mars, Journeyman, Freaks and Geeks, Pushing Daisies, and Freaking Firefly.

None of this is new.

Star Gate Universe finally hit its stride in its final season but too late to prevent cancelation

Really Star Trek in general....

Same. If you haven't seen made in America, I highly recommend it. It's like how it's made, but better, like it also includes interviews with workers and executives.

Yeah. That first season was really good! And Kate Mara!

My guess is that if you didn't like the dog scene, you wouldn't like the rest of the show. The tone is the same.

Its the idea that not every character should be likeable and not all media should be without friction.

I... generally think stuff like that in the first few episodes is really stupid. Mostly it just turns things into misery porn and is a great way to alienate your audience. I think a much better approach is to lure the audience in so that they don't quite realize when Walter/Saul/Kim became truly irredeemable monsters... even if that tends to lead to people never realizing it.

And I think it is extra disingenuous to pretend that House of Cards was some daring show that bucked all the norms. It wasn't HBO levels of sexposition but they definitely were playiing up the "you can't watch this on network TV" from the first episode.

Print, not TV, but one of my favorite authors is Harry Connolly and his Twenty Palaces series had a pretty infamous chapter that was all one long run on sentence (I forget how many pages but I want to say 5-10?). You don't necessarily realize it in the moment but it is a hard read that is mentally tiring and it perfectly suits the contents of the chapter. Apparently basically every single beta reader hated it and he has alluded to it being why his Agent and Publisher dropped him and... I probably would too. I loved it but it very much hurt the overall pacing of the book to a large degree.

But that was also 3 or 4 books in. Not the first chapter of the first book (which was a child burning to death horribly... Yup. Connolly definitely got a hold of some incriminating photos or something).

They do if you're streaming. If you're pirating, then you're worthless.

I used to hate the weekly model when streaming became popular, but I think people are better viewers when they watch weekly. It's easier to have ongoing water cooler conversations about each episode, so your show gets consistent buzz. Plus you don't have the extreme of a whole year+ to wait between seasons. If a classic show ended in May you could start a new season in September. By the time most modern shows have new seasons, I forgot 40% of what I saw last season.

Dude id be fine with like 3 per week... if they do 13-14 episodes then they guaranteed two months streaming income. As it is... yes im gonna just keep rotating streaming services.

There's so many shows that I watch one episode of something with the wife every night, and we haven’t run out of stuff to watch in years. We like to watch one show at a time till we finish the season before we move on to something else, so we just wait till the show or season is over

I spread it out regardless, I just don’t want to pick up a show without a conclusion.

I much prefer one episode a week. However the wife doesn't. This is the main reason we never finished Flash. Also because she felt we had to watch all the arrow verse shows in order to watch Flash and she decided it wasn't worth it once to do that you'd have to watch one episode of Arrow than one of Flash, then one of DC's Legend of Tomarrow.

Yes, it was a guaranteed paycheck... until the show ended. And doing a movie in the off months basically only worked for a Clooney level talent where anyone who ever interacted with him realized he was a generational talent that guys and gals would swoon for. Everyone else MAYBE could get a bit part if they knew the production crew (see: The Schwim on Band of Brothers). And then, if you were lucky, you were basically typecast by the time the show ended and stuck either playing the same character or needing to find a company that wanted to take a chance on you reinventing yourself... which lined up with the weinsteins of the world.

And all of that assumes that you aren't in a role that requires you to spend most of your off time staying in shape and having more or less the same appearance in case pick-ups are required. Otherwise you have entire VFX teams working to... remove a mustache.

That is why there is increasing pushback to Marvel Movie contracts from a lot of actors. Yes, it is a guaranteed paycheck (although those get smaller and smaller with each geneartion) but it is also the only thing you can really do for however many years in case you get called up that you just got one of your appearances added to a TV show everyone will hate.

Which is more or less where we are at. Sure you sometimes have something like a Zendaya where the Disney Channel actress you got for your lead suddenly becomes the most popular actress on the planet and you have to work around her schedule AND all the supporting actors who became high B listers. But mostly you are just dealing with talent who care more about their careers than making sure they are available for the one episode you want them to come back next year.

Its why so much of the Game of Thrones fandom (and original creator...) clearly don't have much production experience. Yes, it would have been cool to have arcs like Lady Stoneheart. But the chances of Michelle Fairley being interested in coming back four years later for two episodes is nigh zero AND would have given her way more negotiating power than studios want. Same for all the other one off characters who come back two books later.