Who's For Dinner: Joss Whedon

I’m starting a new feature here. Who’s For Dinner? No, I’m not into cannibalism. LOL On Fridays, my guests will tell who they’d like to have dinner with. The person could be real or fictional, living or dead. It could be a dinner party with many guests or a single person.

 

photo: IMDB

Since it’s my blog, I’m going first. I’d like to have dinner with Joss Whedon. He’s a screenwriter, director, and producer, most notably for Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, The Avengers: Age of Ultron., Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. And, my all-time favorite, Firefly (TV) and the spin-off movie Serenity. What I didn’t know is that he wrote the screenplay for Toy Story and many other movies and television shows.

photo: IMDB

 What would we talk about? I’d ask him why (spoiler alert) he killed off two characters in Serenity. That meant, if he ever brought back the Firefly crew, those two wouldn’t be in it. Unless he did a prequel series. But after fourteen years, I guess that’s not a possibility. For those of you who don’t know about Firefly, the science fiction adventure series lasted only fourteen episodes in 2002-2003 before the network killed the show. Then it became like Star Trek with an avid following.

Firefly’s appeal (to me and I’m sure to others) was the humor. Look how that humor shows up in his other shows and movies. More importantly to me as a writer of science fiction romance was the dichotomy of the worlds. Firefly takes place 500 years in the future with a central government (“civilization”) and on wild Old West-type outer planets. The firefly (a type of transport ship) was crewed by renegades who tried to avoid any contact with the government.

I would thank Mr. Whedon for his inspiration that encouraged the writing of my Outer Rim series. When I began writing The Pilot, my critique partner couldn’t believe I’d never seen Firefly. In fact, she gave me the Serenity DVD so I could see the similarities. Holy cow! I then found the DVD with all the Firefly episodes and I was hooked. Though late to the party, I became an avid follower of not only Firefly but all of his work. He is so creative and versatile.

Not to stay in the past, I’d ask him what’s coming up. Considering how prolific he is, I’d ask how he balances work and family. I will try not to fawn over him, but I’m sure I’ll act like a total Fan Girl and gush.

My Outer Rim series:

The Outer Rim series, standalone books in digital and printer editions, are available at most online retailers.

I hope you’ll come back next week. Patricia Kiyono will be here with her guest.