Gaiman and Whedon Discuss the Rise of the Geek

CABridges writes "In a lengthy Time Magazine interview, Neil Gaiman ("Sandman," "American Gods") and Joss Whedon ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer," "Firefly") talk about their audience. Gaiman: "Mostly they're people. They're us. That's what they look like." Whedon: "They're a lot more attractive than I am, actually, which kind of disturbs and upsets me." Both men, known for their cult-favorite creations, have movies debuting this Friday. For Gaiman it's MirrorMask, for Whedon it's Serenity."

Comments

geek - the word has evolved...

[fak3r]

Here's what I had to say on my little bio site about myself: geek - while it used to be a four letter word, it is now a (somewhat?) coveted title. Either that or people just have short memories. Regardless, knowing about technology and having a desire to constantly improve it is now almost as accepted as jaywalking.

This may be redundant, but. . .

[portforward]

I got to see Serenity three weeks ago and it was GREAT!! Seriously, go tell everyone you know to see it because the movie business requires a great opening weekend or else they quickly disappear. And if it disappears, no sequels.

One of my acquaintances also saw the special preview and he went out and bought the DVD's of the series.

Quick question, I heard that there are eight different versions of the movie that they were previewing, and that they were going to gauge audience reaction before the final release. Is that true?

Re:This may be redundant, but. . .

[Bruzer]

Quick question, I heard that there are eight different versions of the movie that they were previewing, and that they were going to gauge audience reaction before the final release. Is that true?

No this is not true. I saw the screening last June, and I saw a screening Tuesday night. They were the same movie.

Serenity ROCKS and in 2 more days everyone else will know that.

Go out and see the movie. Slashdot the theaters.

      - Bruzer

Re:This may be redundant, but. . .

[portforward]

The more you know about the series the better you will understand what is going on. But really, that is more from a character perspective than a plot perspective. The movie happens six months after the last episode, and does a fairly good job of explaining what happened to whom. There may be a few spoilers of the series, but nothing too bad. Like I said, I saw an acquaintance at the preview and he went in to the movie knowing pretty much nothing about the show. He went to Best Buy the next morning to buy the DVD's.

Have fun!!

MirrorMask Show in Atlanta

[mrkitty]

Atlanta has a showing of mirrormask for 1 week only. The artist of mirrormask also does the sandman covers.

Movie Times: http://www.atlantamovietimes.com/movies/4798910.ph p?date=0

- z
http://www.cgisecurity.com/

Its all about control

[alnya]

What's awesome about these two movies is that the talents behind them (and I include Dave McKean here) had complete control of the movies. The scripts, the direction, the marketing - everything. And guess what, it works. They follow through on their vision, no compromise for execs who don't get it, and produce something faithful to what they want.

And they produce excellent movies. Thought-provoking, entertaining, well directed, beautifully shot movies (without any 6 figure salaries).

I was luck to see both Mirrormask and Serenity at the Edinburgh Film Festival this year and both were amazing films for completely different reasons. I realise some random comment on /. isn't going to make anyone pay 5 bucks for a movie ticket, but if Mirrormask is on near you, go see it.
If you haven't seen Firefly, and Serenity is playing near you, go see it.

This is the new age of the auteur :)

Rise of the Geek

[shudde]

That's the beauty of Whedon's work, he's the quintessential geek and he manages to showcase the self-deprecating humour so inherent in people with interests outside the mainstream.

Reading an outline for Buffy 10 years ago, you would have instantly assumed it was destined for a short-lived run and eventual shunting to a 2am timeslot before dissapearing into obscurity. Instead it became a cult hit, ran for seven seasons and spawned a massive franchise, including one of the few successful spin-off television shows.

Firefly, with it's mesh of sci-fi and old west, would have seemed likely to suffer the same fate. However after it's network axing, fan support (to which Whedon has paid tribute) has seen a movie release.

Both of these shows have succeeded, in part, due to Whedon's offbeat writing and his affinity for geek references. They've been elevated to cult status and after all, you can't beat a geek for obsessing about a television show.

Whedon's Work

[pieterh]

Joss Whedon has done some remarkable things. Probably none of these are original, but he's combined them consistently, into packages which are only less precious (like some entire series of Buffy) because of the sheer volume.

- He mixes long story lines with short ones so you can enjoy both individual episodes and entire series.
- He has unconditionally excellent camera work, with many long shots, excellent lighting, and hand-held effects that seem cheesy but actually work well.
- He makes great use of music.
- He develops stable groups of characters, bringing interesting social dynamics to the plots, and letting us identify with different characters. I'd like to be Spike, but I know I'm really Xander.
- He stays semi-real, semi-fantasy, allowing him to explore dark subjects (death and loss) in different ways.
- He brings big-screen production quality to every episode, so the DVDs are really worth having.
- His dialogues are usually so good that in the few cases where the characters become formulaic stand out.

On the downside, his work tends to be very politically neutral, which makes it safe, but bland. Serenity was cancelled because it was slyly political, Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham style. The shocker is that it managed to get aired at all, on Fox TV, which is basically a mouthpiece for the Sheriff.

The unfinished Serenity first series, by the way, was fantastic. A wonderful cast, and every single aspect of the production deliberate and perfect, as far as I could tell. I don't normally make an effort to see specific films but I'm eagerly waiting to see Serenity.

cult and indy != geek

[east coast]

I find tons of people into what have been labeled as "geek" passtimes from the entire d&d thing to the sci-fi fanatics but it seems that the more these people are into these "geek" activities the less they seem "geek" to me.

Am I expectiong too much out of the geek label? Or do I have the wrong definition? I always seemed to think of a geek as someone with a high technical/mathmatical/scientific proficency. It just seems the more "hardcore" fans of geek entertainment seem to be less into the logistical/technical aspects of life and more into simply the fantasy world that real geeks (by my standards only) often get lumped in with.

Just a Thought

[thebdj]

I am probably going to get modded down on this greatly as a troll or the like, but I have to say it so I will...

Everyone keeps talking about Firefly and Serentity as being wonderful and great programs. While I'll accept these as wonderfully fine opinions, it is important that some of you remember that this isn't what the majority of people are going to think, and don't be too surprised if the numbers for the movies are poor.

Just some thoughts on Whedon's 'great' shows: only one of them ever made it to a major network, Firefly, and we all know it didn't last long. Now it can easily be argued that this is because it was sci-fi or people can start the....the masses just don't understand...speeches, but in reality it might truly be a show that was never meant for network, or at least not the big four. We have all seen FOX makes some dumb decisions on shows (i.e. cancelling Family Guy) and making some dumb decisions on picking up shows. The truth of the matter is that FOX gambled on the show based on success of Buffy and/or Angel on their 2nd tier networks, and they lost.

I am not going to openly say that the show sucks, because some of what I watched of it I did enjoy, while other parts I trulty loathed, though that can possibly be said for other shows as well. It should also be noted that the movies launch date is post-Labor Day. With the exception of LotR in recent years, the movie industry makes its money during the summer run. So it might be possible for this to eke out a first or second place simply on your typical low fall movie turnout.

In the end I would like to see what more people say after seeing it, instead of just the people who went to the preview, most of whom have problem had the day circled on calendars for months. I also am tempted to see what the major movie critics say, because their opinions often influence the decisions of the masses. So there it is said, you can mod me up or down as you see fit...