SERENITY - HD DVD review

Every great once in a while, fans are rewarded in one way or another. Joss Whedon's "Serenity" is a reward that fans of the "Firefly" television series may never have expected and a reward that is seldom given out in Hollywood. You see, "Firefly" was unceremoniously dropped after a short run of eleven episodes had aired. They were shown out of sequence and with little help from the marketing department. However, those eleven episodes were enough for the show to grab a solid cult following and incite a riot of sorts among the disappointed fanbase who watched "Firefly" crash and burn after such a short flight across the airwaves. They made a lot of noise and that noise was heard by Universal, who greenlighted a feature film based upon the characters of the television show.

Now, before I dive into my review of the "Firefly" film, "Serenity," I will come clean and tell you I have never seen an episode of "Firefly." Not one. In fact, the film held very little interest for me upon viewing the theatrical trailers. The tale of an entire ship risking their lives and causing others to lose their lives for the sake of a somewhat attractive seventeen year old was just not appealing enough to me. Had they been trying to save Uma Thurman - maybe. Summer Glau - not interested. A coworker at the time consistently told me that the forthcoming "Serenity" would be the absolute best film of the year. I wrote his fanboyism off as sheer madness.

So why the interest in making "Serenity" my very first HD-DVD review? Simple. I heard from a few friends that had seen the film that were not "Firefly" fans, that the film was entertaining. They told me I would relate to the ship's captain, Malcom Reynolds (Nathan Fillion). I heard enough of a positive buzz from others that I figured I would pick up "Serenity" when it was in the $10 DVD bin somewhere or I would take a peek when it graced the menus of In-Demand. Then came HD-DVD and my need to secure a title or two for my shiny new Toshiba HD-DVD player. There was "Serenity" and I thought I'd love to see those space explosions in glorious Hi-Definition. Was my purchase worth it? Let's find out.

"Serenity" begins with Simon Tam (Sean Maher) rescuing his younger sister, River Tam (Summer Glau) from a science experiment of sorts. Just before they are captured, a starship rescues them from their would-be capturers. Of course, that starship is the Serenity. However, the escape witnessed on the screen was a security recording being viewed by a man with no name and rank (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and will stop at nothing to bring River back into Alliance custody. This person is a ruthless killer who has shaped some of his lifestyle to that of the ancient samurai warriors and feels his actions are for the greater good of mankind.

The crew of the Serenity are a band of space-pirates and are led by captain Malcolm Reynolds (Nathan Fillion). "Mal" fought against the Alliance in the Serenity war and became a war hero. Now, he will take any job to earn a buck, but his crew has come across hard times and is having difficulty finding work. The rest of the crew consists of pilot Wash (Alan Tudyk), gun-happy merc Jayne (Adam Baldwin), sexy mechanic Kaylee (Jewel Staite) and Zoe Washburne (Gina Torres). Wash and Zoe are husband and wife and the sanest members of the crew. Kaylee is cute and easy going and doesn't quite fit the mold of either a pirate or a starship mechanic. Jayne is all about his own skin and how many weapons and grenades he can carry to any situation. Mal comes across as a hard-to-like individual that will do what he can to cover his own ass first, his crew and limited number of friend second and anybody else if they have money or he has some spare time.

Mal and Jayne are of the same mind that River and Simon do not belong on Serenity and they decide to drop them off at the first starport. However, at a bar at the starport, River goes from young and naïve to a killing machine in under a second and decimates the bar. In the process, she brutalizes Jayne and beats Mal to the draw. Simon conjures a few words that knock her out cold and prevents her from giving Mal another facial orifice. River is not what she appears and the crew takes her and Simon back aboard the Serenity and high tails it back into space.

As the film progresses, the crew of the Serenity find out that there is more to River and Simon and they discover more about themselves. They must travel through the deep space lair of the "Reavers", a band of cannibalistic psychopaths who bring back memories of the film "28 Days Later" and find the root of nightmares that River is having and discover why the Alliance assassin is trying so hard to get River back. Not having watched the series, I don't know what loose ends from the series are tied in the two hour sci-fi epic, but there are definitely moments of closure for some of Serenity's crew.

Once the film gets past the ‘get re-acquainted with the crew' storyline and offering enough background for the non-fan (like myself) to feel somewhat comfortable aboard the Serenity. There is a lot of history behind "Serenity" and there are a billion questions I wanted answered after the first half hour. For instance, is Mal always despicable? It is not an easy task to bring new viewers up-to-speed with just thirty minutes of background information. You risk alienating your veteran viewers by rehashing or giving too much ‘we known this already' type of info. Even though this is a film for the fans, one needs to make money and to do this, one needs to educate new viewers. "Serenity" does an admirable job attempting to do so.

The film itself is entertaining. More so than I expected. I am a "Star Wars" baby and was brought up on the original trilogy. "Star Trek" is a bore to me. I loved Kirk for all his bravado and alien arse-kicking charm. The rest of it put me to sleep. I expected "Serenity" to be much more like "Star Trek," but even though there are a lot of similarities, the show has its own appeal to it. Mal, I did not care for much until the end of the film. I wanted to see Jayne kick much "Reaver" tail. Kaylee is much easier on the eyes than Scotty. The film fast paced and its two hour running time moved quickly. I feel the creator could have made a much better picture had he focused more on the "Reavers" and the reavers always seemed to be slighted on camera time when they were part of the story. They were only seen in MTV-style cuts during the fights scenes. More of a horror/sc-fi element would have sent me out to purchase the "Firefly" DVDs.

The special effects were very good. This film surely looked better than something that came from television. I expected visual cheese. Aside from a landing sequence or two, "Serenity" looked solid. Especially in High Definition. The film felt very polished and had the appeal of a high-budget Hollywood blockbuster and not the $40 million dollar film (as stated by imdb.com). In fact, the only cheese in the film was a couple lines by Mal, but if I was more familiar with the character, they may have been good lines. The sets were absolutely gorgeous. The commentary with Whedon stated a few shots were overhead, because they couldn't afford the green screen effects, so I suppose a lot of credit goes to Whedon for knowing how to use his budget to make a bigger film.

After viewing "Serenity," I will not say that I am an instant "Firefly" fan. However, if given the chance to view the DVDs I just may do so. I had very low expectations for the movie and I ended up liking the film. The whole 17-year old in distress by the creator of "Buffy" had me worried, but it was played well. This wasn't a ‘teenage romp in space' and the characters were varied and had good depth. Granted, I still have no clue why River was dreaming of Reavers and if she had been on the planet before and I REALLY wanted to see more of the crazed cannibals from space, but "Serenity" entertained me. I have questions I still want answered. So, anytime a film leaves you wanting to know more could be considered a good thing.

Video

So, how does HD-DVD look? In a word -- phenomenal. Having watched broadcast HDTV for the past couple years, I am no stranger to the wonders of 1080i or 720p. Being an avid Xbox 360 player, I know how colorful and wondrous HD can be. Still, the picture quality of HD-DVD impressed me. The compression artifacts and ‘noise' of cable broadcast. The image was insanely detailed and as stable as can be. Unfortunately, I could not secure a regular copy of "Serenity" to review on DVD and I don't know how much of an improvement the quality is over the original release. There is also no current ‘bar' for HD-DVD and it will be very difficult to accurately score the first few releases, as there is nothing to compare it against. Compared to the three DVDs I watched ("The Last Samurai," "Phantom of the Opera" and "Serenity"), "Serenity" fell in the middle. It wasn't as jawdroppingly beautiful as "Phantom", but it was an overall better picture than "Samurai." They all looked great, but "Serenity" was not as impressive as "Phantom of the Opera."

If you have never seen a properly mastered HD film, it is hard to convey just how gorgeous the colors are and how crystal clear the image clarity is. The amount of detail in "Serenity" was very stunning. From each harsh angle on the "Firefly" class starship to each imperfection of the actors skin, HD-DVD and its higher resolution bring "Serenity" to new heights. Shadow detail and black levels were deep and true. The 2.35:1 image on my Samsung LCD was as black as the border surrounding the widescreen image. Science Fiction films can have a tendency to suffer during space scenes, but "Serenity" did not. The darkness of space was black and the stars twinkled and shined brightly. The impressive special effects of the film held up well throughout the entire picture and were not betrayed by the new technology. I fear some of my favorite old science fiction films and how HD-DVD may show their imperfections. Light grey boxes around Tie Fighters anyone?

Sound

Problems here. "Serenity" is mastered in Dolby Digital Plus. However, the Toshiba HD-A1 does not transmit the Dolby Digital Plus soundtrack over the digital connections. The six-channel analog outputs need to be used. However, the Toshiba sends out a ‘default' DTS 5.1 signal over the digital outputs. The packaging does not list DTS, so my initial assumption was that Dolby Digital Plus was somehow being handled by my receiver as a DTS track. John J. Puccio and I discussed the digital sound problem and everything fell into place. Currently, my DVD-Audio/SACD player inhabits my receiver's lone six-channel input. A switchbox is coming, but "Serenity" will be reviewed for its DTS track that is sent out through the optical connection as I was uninspired to take the hour or so of time to rewire my receiver and then have to do it again after the switchbox arrives and though I liked the movie, I did not want to sit through it a second time.

So how did the compressed DTS 5.1 track sound? It was good. The sound was very clear and quite impressive. Bass was booming and deep. The big space battle towards the end of the film that saw the Reavers and the Alliance blow each other out of orbit brought a smile to my face. The explosions shook the room and the sound of the Serenity navigating the battlefield was solid. "Serenity" is not an all-out assault on one's senses like "Attack of the Clones," but the moments it does get noisy is quality enough to show off HD-DVD to your friends using this title. Out of the three titles I watched, the battle scene in "Serenity" was the audio highlight. One other note of importance is that the 5.1 DTS track of the Universal title was a solid 10-15 decibels louder than the two Warner Bros. titles.

Extras

The HD-DVD release of "Serenity" features all of the supplements found on the original DVD releases of the film. They are mastered in 480i. There are nine deleted scenes that can be played with or without commentary by creator/director Joss Whedon. A lot of these scenes deal with Inara and Mal and add more depth to these characters. The scenes are of rough quality and are much closer to VHS than they are HD-DVD in appearance. The deleted scenes run for about ten minutes. There are some outtakes that run for six minutes and consist of the usual flubs, mistakes and mishaps that occur during filming. They give a look at the humorous side of the film's cast. "Future History – The Story of Earth That Was" is a four minute featurette on "Serenity" that offers up insight on how Whedon came about writing the story of "Firefly." "What's In A Firefly" is a six and a half minute long look at the Firefly class of starship that Serenity belongs to and also focuses on the visual effects of the ‘Mule Skiff Chase' scene with the hovercraft from the early parts of the film and the crash scene of the Serenity towards the film's conclusion.

Other good stuff includes "Joss Whedon Introduction." This four minute introduction appears halfway through the list of supplements and is Whedon's introduction to a screening audience of a rough cut of the film and he explain's how "Firefly" was brought back to life as "Serenity." He discusses the ‘browncoats' that worked so hard to support "Firefly." "Relighting the Firefly" discusses in more detail for about ten minutes of how the "Firefly" show went from being a failed television series and released as a major motion picture. Whedon's says "At what point does this stop being CPR and become necrophilia." His love for the show and the cast's love for the show is apparent and watching this feature really drives home how odd and wonderful it was for the fans and cast of the show to see their story returned. Joss Whedon also provides a feature commentary. Whedon is very knowledgeable, considering he created the show in addition to directing it. There is so much information given in the commentary and I'm sure what Whedon says will be a real treat for everybody who loves the show. The box art promises "and much more," but I could not find anything additional after the previously mentioned features. Regardless, it is quite impressive that this much content easily fits onto a single-layered HD-DVD title.

At this point, I should probably spend a brief moment talking about the menu system of HD-DVD. Unlike DVD, where you must stop the film and go to the menu screens to select inputs, HD-DVD delivers the menus as overlays to the film and you can navigate the menus to select the setup parameters or choose a special feature while you are watching the film. "Serenity" does start by bringing the viewer to a menu screen, while the Warner Bros. titles jump right to the film, but with HD-DVD, you now have the ability to change sound settings and such on-the-fly and while you watch the feature presentation. In the future, there will be video overlays and pop-ups that add information to the picture. Cool stuff indeed.

Parting Thoughts

The "Serenity" HD-DVD release was my introduction to High Definition DVD. It was also my introduction to the "Firefly" saga and Joss Whedon's wonderful creation. It is also my return to the world of DVD journalism since January 19, 2004. Please, pardon my rustiness and my lack of knowledge on "Firefly." I can say that after watching "Serenity," I do have some interest in the world created by Whedon. By saying that, I am also giving this film my recommendation. "Serenity" was not a huge performer in the box office. However, by releasing this title as their very first HD-DVD release, fans may find some comfort that Universal is committed to the film and perhaps a sequel is in the wings. "Serenity" is a good story that exceeded my initial expectations. I was expecting "Buffy In Space" and I was rewarded with a much hipper version of "Star Trek." It really is difficult to rate the video and audio of the disc, but "Serenity" is a great looking and sounding film. It does show off the benefits of the fledgling format and gives a taste of good things to come. The number of supplements are solid. The problem is that they are identical to the DVD. For those that own the original disc, the $35 price tag of the new disc will only get them the improved picture and sound HD-DVD has to offer.