Firefly

I knew I had to see Firefly when I saw it mentioned everywhere. And I saw photos of people I respect wearing the "Joss Whedon Is My Master Now" t-shirt. Haha. I'm glad to say that the series did not disappoint, and I really enjoyed it.

Firefly is a Space Western. The concept is a spaceship called Serenity of the Firefly class, which is owned by Captain Malcolm Reynolds, that flies around with its crew taking on missions of questionable repute. They are criminals technically, but they are mostly relatively moralistic nonetheless.

The crew includes pilot Wash, his wife and second-in command, Zoe, Jayne the fighter, and Kaylee the mechanic. There are a bunch of other characters on board as well: Inara the Companion, or courtesan, who rents one of the ship's shuttles. Then there's the priest, Shepherd Book, who travels with them. And finally the doctor Simon and his sister River, who are fugitives.

The diverse crew and the world allow for many interesting missions.

Here's what I really liked about it:

• The setting and genre: Space Western is an interesting combination. It's just so imaginative.
• The characters. A lot of story is focused on character development, so it is very good that the characters are vivid and dynamic.
• The spaceship itself: Firefly is simply a really cool spaceship design. 
• The writing: The episodes are each written by a different person. On the one hand, this means the voices aren't 100% consistent, but it does mean that there are a lot of different ideas floating around about story and character.
• Humor. It was funny sometimes, and it was just serious enough to take seriously.

Firefly is excellent, and I would definitely watch it again. I also want to find out what happens in Serenity, the movie that was released after the show was cancelled. Since it's short, it made it easy to watch 14 episodes without having to commit to a long series, but it really could have gone on for another few seasons.