Can’t Stop the Serenity

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Serenity Under the Stars: How Browncoats Held a Charity Screening During a Global Pandemic

Posted by Chris Tobias on April 24, 2021
Posted in: Good Works. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

(The following was written for Can’t Stop the Serenity at the request of CSTS Global Chair Matt Black in order to provide global event organizers with ideas for holding events during the current COVID-19 pandemic. Since I felt it might be of interest to Browncoats in general, I’ve decided to publish it here as well.)

image courtesy cantstoptheserenity.com

Not even a global pandemic could stop the Rivers & Bridges Brigade of the PA Browncoats from holding Pittsburgh’s 15th annual Can’t Stop the Serenity charity screening!

The Steel City’s 15th annual CSTS charity screening of Serenity was scheduled to take place in early July of 2020 at the Parkway Theater in McKees Rocks, PA, where we had held a successful event in 2019.  We had reserved the bar and movie theater for a Sunday matinee screening, but as the COVID-19 pandemic forced more and more shutdowns across the state, it became increasingly apparent that we were not going to be able to hold our event as we had planned it.

Our city has held a CSTS screening every year since the event’s inception in 2006, and global pandemic or not, as the current cap’n I was not keen on the idea of having Pittsburgh’s streak of CSTS events end on my watch.  A Zoom meeting was organized in late April, and the seven regular members of our CSTS Pittsburgh planning committee (a.k.a. “the crew”) met to discuss whether or not we could hold an event safely, and if so, what changes would have to be made in order to do so.

The crew expressed their concerns that the venue would not allow for social distancing, and even if we were able to enforce social distancing and mask regulations, the reduced capacity of the theater would not allow for a large enough crowd to bring in any real sizeable donation for Equality Now.  In addition, the Firefly- and Serenity-themed carnival-style games that had become a tradition at our events would only encourage attendees to gather in groups and pass game pieces like dice and rings from one person to another, which was definitely not sanitary given the situation.  It didn’t take long before we determined we were going to have to cancel the event as it was scheduled and look for other options.

Our first thought was a drive-in theater, but the vast majority of area drive-ins weren’t that close to the city, and most of them were still closed anyway, with no clear reopening date.  On top of that, word had begun to circulate that drive-ins were going to be considered as an alternative during the lockdown period not only for movies, but also for live events like concerts and comedy shows, and the feeling was that any drive-in that was open would not be willing to rent us space at a rate we could afford.

That’s when we came upon the idea of an outdoor screening in one of the county’s parks.  An outdoor screening had its advantages.  Social distancing would be much easier, and the general consensus of health experts was that outdoor gatherings were intrinsically safer than indoor ones anyway.  We also quickly discovered that renting a grove in one of Allegheny County’s parks would cost only a fraction of our regular rental fee at the Parkway Theater.  This was important because we really couldn’t be sure what kind of attendance we would have, and reducing the event’s overhead would serve to increase the amount that we’d be able to donate to charity (and mitigate any potential losses) in a year in which attendance and donations might be down.  Our CSTS Pittsburgh events had been held in the South Hills of Pittsburgh since 2013, so we decided that we would reserve a grove in Allegheny County’s South Park to serve as 2020’s alternate screening site.  My youngest brother Michael, who lives in South Park Township and has been on my crew for as long as we’ve been organizing CSTS events, agreed to scout locations for us, and we were eventually able to find a grove that was adjacent to a field where attendees could watch the film on blankets or lawn chairs and have plenty of personal space.  We reserved the facility for Saturday evening, September 5.

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Boom! Studios’ “Firefly: Brand New ‘Verse” Foreshadows Everything That Could Go Wrong with a “Firefly” Reboot

Posted by Chris Tobias on March 29, 2021
Posted in: Reviews. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . 1 Comment

by Chris Tobias

Last week Boom! Studios debuted a new Firefly spinoff series, Firefly: Brand New ‘Verse. Issue number one was written by Josh Lee Gordon, with pencils by Fabiana Mascolo and colors by Lucia DiGiamarino. The story in this ongoing comic picks up 20 years after the events of the original Firefly TV series and the motion picture Serenity, and while it may feature the same beloved ship and include a couple of the characters fans have come to know and love, harcore Browncoats may find it difficult to accept that this is where Serenity’s journey is destined to lead.

Firefly: Brand New ‘Verse #1 cover art (image: Boom! Studios)

In this new tale, Serenity has a new captain, none other than Zoe Washburne, who is now repeatedly referred to as Zoe Alleyne Washburne for some reason (even though she never felt the need to emphasize her maiden name in any of the original episodes of Firefly or the movie Serenity). Zoe has a completely new crew, as none of the original cast of characters whose chemistry made Firefly so special is still aboard Serenity. Instead, the ship is now run by a crew of four, all of whom are persons of color. Emma Washburne, daughter of Zoe and the late Hoban “Wash” Washburne, is Serenity’s new pilot/first mate, and her boyfriend, a young Asian man by the name of Lu Bao, serves as the ship’s mechanic. Rounding out the crew is Salo, a rather imposing fellow who speaks softly and likes to meditate yet still looks as if he could wield a big stick if he had to. Salo is no doubt meant to be an amalgam of Jayne Cobb and Shepherd Book, even though filling the shoes of just one of those two characters would be a gorram near impossible task.

From the onset, the story trots out every trope it can to make Browncoats feel at home– a ship in peril because of some mechanical failure, the humor and irony of a bickering crew frantically try to resolve the problem, disrespect for authority and an overbearing Alliance presence– all in the first nine pages of the book, as if the creative team wants to make sure it checks every box on the list and doesn’t forget anything.

The dialogue is a little too full of exposition and can at times be downright painful. Zoe and Emma refer to each other as “captain” and “first mate,” as if readers won’t be able to figure that out on their own, and the two characters spend most of the book bickering because Emma is upset that she’s not Serenity’s captain yet and she resents the fact that Zoe thinks she (and her boyfriend) still need looking after, while Zoe doesn’t think Emma takes her responsibilities to the ship and its crew seriously enough. The other two crew members spout out mostly throwaway lines, and Lu Bao’s contributions in particular make him sound like a clone of Kaylee Frye, albeit one that lacks her charm. When Inara Serra makes a brief appearance later in the story, even she reminds Zoe, “They call me priestess now.” I don’t recall Inara ever feeling the need to flaunt her status like that to any of the crew in the original series or film.

One positive aspect of the dialogue in Brand New ‘Verse that is lacking in Boom! Studios’ main ongoing Firefly comics series is the inclusion of Chinese in the dialogue, but even here this book falls short in its execution. That is because the Chinese dialogue is written in actual Chinese characters, and is therefore indecipherable to anyone who is not fluent in Mandarin! For the life of me, I can’t figure out why Gordon didn’t use a phonetic spelling of the Chinese words instead, which would certainly have been more readable and also more familiar to fans who were used to hearing certain phrases in the show and the movie. While it is a small nod to authenticity to include the Chinese at all, doing so in the form of characters that are nothing but random symbols to most readers comes across as somewhat lazy writing, in my opinion.

The young Ms. Washburne does two very questionable things in this issue, the first of which is intended as the catalyst for an action sequence yet nonetheless borders on far-fetched stupidity, and a second that is meant to show her independent spirit and initiative but instead has the effect of making her a little less likeable. Neither of them really does anything to move the plot along, though the reader is led to believe that the second will affect the story in issues to come.

It is actually Inara who provides the intel that leads the crew to work (though it appears she blatantly violates the client-confidentiality rule of a companion in the process), and the job involves actual piracy– something we never saw Serenity’s original crew engage in during the TV series or the motion picture, although it was hinted at from time to time. Zoe and Salo sneak aboard a Blue Sun cargo hauler and steal a container of Blue Sun loot right from under the noses of the ship’s skeleton crew, but when they open the crate, they’re met by a surprise that’s more than they bargained for– a revelation that sets the stage for the second issue while at the same time borrowing a bit too much from a certain big reveal in the original TV series.

Overall, Brand New ‘Verse is a Firefly story with all of the trappings but none of the charm of the original source material. Unlike Boom! Studios’ recent original graphic novel Firefly: Watch How I Soar or the series of original Firefly novels from Titan Books, this story doesn’t really demonstrate a solid understanding of the characters on the part of the writer, and what’s more, there never seems to be any real attempt to address the elephant in the room– why Zoe is the only original member of the crew who is still aboard Serenity.

Browncoats know what happened to Wash and Shepherd Book, and we see Inara at a companion house in the story, but what about Mal, Kaylee, Simon, River and Jayne? It is particularly difficult to believe that Captain Malcolm Reynolds would ever leave his ship willingly, and Kaylee Frye also had a special relationship with Serenity. (She thinks of the ship as “her good girl,” after all). I honestly can’t see Kaylee or Mal ever willingly handing Serenity over to the care of anyone else. Can you? So where are they? Are these characters all dead? Mal is mentioned a couple of times in passing, but the others are never even given so much as a thought. And that’s a shame too, because as I read Brand New ‘Verse, I found myself missing the old Firefly ‘verse and its characters with every turn of the page, and I had to ask myself why I would want to spend $4.99 a month to read Firefly stories that won’t even include over two thirds of Serenity’s original crew.

The one bright spot is the artwork, which is some of the cleanest and most realistic of any Boom! Studios Firefly book to date. The cover art by Qistina Khalidah is especially shiny, and features a realistic painted image of the crew. (And if you’re willing to invest the coin and the time to track them down, there are several variant covers available in limited quantities that are even more gorgeous.)

When all is said and done though, I’m not sure what Boom! Studios meant to accomplish with this spinoff. Are they hedging their bets in case the day arrives when they feel they have no more stories to tell in the flagship Firefly series that takes place between the events of the TV series and the movie, or are they just trying to capitalize on the recent trendiness of “woke” pop culture? Personally, I hope they do not intend this series as an eventual replacement for their original ongoing Firefly series, because if the first issue is any indication, Brand New ‘Verse will likely find itself on the drift before too long. I can honestly say without hesitation that it is the most disappointing Firefly comic I have read, and it represents everything that could go wrong with a reboot of the original series if the wrong storyteller were allowed to slide into Serenity’s pilot’s seat. This Browncoat gives it a D-.

Firefly: Brand New ‘Verse #1 is currently available at your local comics shop. The cover price is $4.99.

(And speaking of local comics shops, I’d like to thank Impossible Dreams Comics in Bridgeville, PA for lending me a review copy of Firefly: Brand New ‘Verse #1. If you’re in the South Hills of Pittsburgh and looking to buy comics, please consider stopping at Impossible Dreams. They are a long-time supporter of Can’t Stop the Serenity Pittsburgh, and the owner, Lou Saut, has been a Browncoat since the days when Firefly was first on the air.)

“May Have Been the Losing Side…”

Posted by Chris Tobias on June 8, 2020
Posted in: Articles, Launches, Press Coverage. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

by Chris Tobias

COMMANDER HARKEN:  “Seems odd you’d name your ship after a battle you were on the wrong side of.”

MALCOLM REYNOLDS:  “May have been the losing side.  Still not convinced it was the wrong one.”

— Firefly, “Bushwhacked” (2002)

The event that we here at Take Back the Sky and many others in the aerospace community had been eagerly anticipating for close to a decade has finally came to pass.  At 3:22pm EDT on May 30, 2020, a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center in Florida and carried NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken to the International Space Station aboard the SpaceX Crew Dragon, the first private spaceship to take human beings out to the black.

For just shy of eight years we have been doing everything in our power to lobby SpaceX, its CEO and founder Elon Musk and its president and COO Gwynne Shotwell to name the first Crew Dragon after Serenity, the Firefly-class transport ship in Joss Whedon’s sci-fi TV series Firefly and subsequent motion picture Serenity.  We created online and paper petitions, hosted panel discussions and tabled at science-fiction and comics conventions and science fairs and maintained a steady social media campaign.  We also encouraged members of the space community as well as Browncoats and fans of science-fiction in general to mount a steady letter-writing campaign asking for the name, just as Star Trek fans succeeded in doing in 1976, when it was announced that the first Space Shuttle would be named Enterprise.

As launch day approached, the name of the Crew Dragon remained a closely-guarded secret.  Astronauts Behnken and Hurley announced that they had selected a name for their ship, but they would only reveal it the day of the launch.  Those of us who were still holding out hope for Serenity were somewhat encouraged when the crew used a plush dinosaur as their zero-G indicator, the object in the cockpit that is traditionally left untethered so it will float when the ship reaches orbit.  After all, Serenity’s pilot Hoban “Wash” Washburne famously played around with toy dinosaurs while at the helm in the pilot episode of the TV series Firefly.  When the crew held their first media event from orbit, however, they welcomed the world aboard Crew Dragon Endeavour, a name they had chosen because it held deep personal significance to both of them since both men had previously gone to space aboard the Space Shuttle of the same name.  It was also revealed that the zero-G indicator, a plush apatosaurus named “Trimmer,” was chosen for the flight because both of their sons have an affinity for dinosaurs.

Out to the Black

Two Demo-2 launch dates meant over 15 hours of #NASASocial events and #LaunchAmerica coverage– and a whole lot of coffee.

It was hard not to be disappointed when the crew revealed that the ship’s name was Endeavour, not only because it meant that our campaign of 7+ years was unsuccessful, but also because they had chosen what could only be described as a traditional name for such a shiny new class of spaceship.  It was also hard to argue with their reasoning though, and at the end of three days of covering #NASASocial events as part #LaunchAmerica and nearly fifteen hours of following launch coverage across two launch dates (the mission had to be scrubbed due to inclement weather on May 27), whatever disappointment we felt was naturally overshadowed by the fact that the NASA Commercial Crew Program had succeeded in returning American astronauts to space from American soil, and we had backed the right horse to do it first in SpaceX.  It was also impossible not to be thrilled for Doug Hurley, who won the ultimate game of “Capture the Flag” by being the US astronaut to claim the very same American flag he himself had left aboard the ISS at the end of the final Space Shuttle mission with the understanding that is was to be brought home by the crew of the next US spaceship to dock with the station.  In the midst of a worldwide pandemic that had left millions out of work and virtually everyone stuck in quarantine and a week of the most widespread protests and riots the country had seen in decades, the story of Crew Dragon’s Demo-2 flight provided a beacon of light in some very dark times.  SpaceX and NASA had given us reason to be hopeful for America.

And yet, that didn’t change the fact that the Crew Dragon was not named Serenity, and that left me asking:  “What now?”

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The Browncoats Launch Party That Could Have Been

Posted by Chris Tobias on May 25, 2020
Posted in: Articles, Launches. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

by Chris Tobias

Even with the COVID-19 pandemic dominating the news these days, excitement and buzz continue to mount for the crewed demonstration flight of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon (DM-2), which is scheduled to launch on May 27 at 4:33pm EDT (2033 GMT) from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida and carry NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the International Space Station.

Since 2012, we here at Take Back the Sky have been lobbying for SpaceX to name this Crew Dragon after Serenity, the fictional Firefly-class transport ship in Joss Whedon’s science-fiction television series Firefly and subsequent motion picture Serenity.  We’ve traveled to sci-fi and comics conventions across the East Coast, and we launched two online petitions and conducted numerous pen-and-paper petitions at cons, science fairs, Can’t Stop the Serenity screenings and Browncoat Balls.  We also encouraged Browncoats and space enthusiasts to send letters, postcards and even leaves to SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk and president and COO Gwynne Shotwell asking them to christen the ship with that name.

Just this past weekend, the crew informed the media that they have in fact decided on a name for the spaceship, which they won’t reveal until the day on which she launches.  That means right up until launch day, we still have a chance of success in our labor of love of nearly eight-years, but ultimately, when Crew Dragon takes Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley out to the black, she’ll either be called Serenity or she won’t.

Jeff and I started this campaign eight years ago when we discovered we shared a common goal while posting about the topic on the Yahoo message boards of the Pennsylvania Browncoats.  From the very beginning, we talked about how positively epic the launch party for a spaceship named Serenity would be.  If there’s one thing Browncoats know how to do, it’s throw a mighty fine shindig.  Anyone who’s been to a Can’t Stop the Serenity charity event or a Browncoat Ball, or remembers the turnout at San Diego Comic-Con for the celebration of Firefly’s 10th anniversary, knows exactly what I’m talking about.  As someone who has been passionately involved with the Browncoat community for nearly a decade, I promised myself that I would personally see to it that a crewed spaceship named Serenity had a launch party that Browncoats everywhere in the ‘verse could not only be proud of, but would want to be a part of.

last-shuttle-launch-spectators-in-Titusville-

Crowds gather for the final Space Shuttle launch in 2011. (Photo: Tim Shortt/Florida Today)

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“Firefly: The Sting” Original Graphic Novel Is a Tale That Didn’t Need Tellin’

Posted by Chris Tobias on April 14, 2020
Posted in: Articles, Reviews. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

by Chris Tobias

If you are a fan of Joss Whedon who has been starved for more tales of the thrilling heroics of Captain Malcolm Reynolds and his crew, then the past few years have been a good time to be a Browncoat.  Fans have seen a whole passel of print hit the shelves– initially in several volumes of Serenity comics and graphic novels published by Dark Horse Comics, and more recently in the form of Firefly prose novels and reference works published by Titan Books and Insight Editions as well as a new ongoing Firefly comics series (and its accompanying one-shot stories and graphic novels) published by Boom! Studios.

The ongoing Firefly comics series from Boom! Studios made its debut in November of 2018, and is set between the events of the Firefly TV series and the motion picture Serenity.  It has introduced a number of interesting new characters and landed the crew in more than a few exciting situations in the 15 issues that have been published so far.  Despite some minor shortcomings (like the fact that it took no less than 13 issues for any of the characters to utter even a single syllable of Chinese), for the most part the plots have been entertaining and have managed to maintain the spirit of Joss Whedon’s original stories and characters– even though the creator of the Firefly ‘verse has had very minimal personal involvement in the project.  (Whedon is officially listed as a “story consultant” for the series.)  The same can be said of Boom! Studios’ Firefly spin-off comics… with one notable exception.

sting amazon

Image:  Amazon.com

In November of last year, Boom! Studios released Firefly:  The Sting, an original graphic novel (OGN) written by New York Times bestselling writer Delilah S. Dawson, whose numerous writing credits include several books set in the Star Wars universe.  (Dawson collaborated with no less than five different illustrators on this project, one for each of the book’s chapters, though it’s worth noting that the illustrators have similar pencilling styles and the book’s artwork is visually seamless from one chapter to the next.)  The book was announced in June of 2019 with a solicitation that included the following synopsis (as reported on newsarama.com):

“Saffron and the women of Firefly pull the ultimate heist! Saffron– the enigmatic rogue who captured the hearts of Firefly fans worldwide– returns to Serenity.  But this time, she’s got no time for Capt. Malcolm Reynolds, as she’s there to recruit the women of the ship to join her on a heist that has personal stakes for all involved.”

It’d be hard for any dyed-in-the-wool Browncoat not to be intrigued by a story involving Saffron, the criminal-minded opportunist played so deftly by Christina Hendricks in the Firefly episodes “Our Mrs. Reynolds” and “Trash.”  But a heist for which she only recruits the women of Serenity? Sure, she and her “kinda husband” Malcolm Reynolds share a somewhat adversarial past, but if she’s desperate enough to include any members of Serenity’s crew in a scheme she’s conjuring (especially after her last attempt ended with Inara locking her in an automated trash bin), then what reason could she possibly have not to want a skilled pilot like Wash, or someone like Jayne who’d obviously be useful if things turned violent? And if things did go sideways and her gang ended up various degrees of bruised and bloodied, wouldn’t a man like Dr. Simon Tam be just the sort of person she’d want to have around?

This Browncoat was already skeptical, but I still ordered the book.  After all, for the past ten years, no single pop culture brand has meant more to me than the Firefly/Serenity ‘verse.  I have devoted countless hours to the Browncoats fandom, both as a local event coordinator for Can’t Stop the Serenity charity screenings and as co-founder of Take Back the Sky’s ongoing campaign to convince Elon Musk to name SpaceX’s first Crew Dragon space capsule after Serenity.  I count myself among the most passionate of Browncoats who, nearly two decades after Firefly’s debut on Fox, will greet each new official story or officially licensed Firefly or Serenity product with enthusiasm.  Besides, Boom! Studios’ Firefly books had a solid track record of good stories up to this point, and the writer was a best-selling author.

My copy arrived in time for me to take it along on a cross-country flight to the West Coast in mid-December 2019.  Our family was headed to Southern California so my son could play lacrosse in the Legends National Cup, which afforded me the opportunity to read the OGN in one sitting on a nearly five-hour flight from Chicago to San Diego.  I assumed that reading the story uninterrupted from cover to cover would allow me to appreciate the overall narrative better than if I read the chapters as installments.  Ultimately though, I’m not sure it mattered, because from the very onset, this Firefly tale just felt… off.

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One Browncoat’s Opinion: Please DON’T Bring Back “Firefly!”

Posted by Chris Tobias on August 27, 2019
Posted in: Articles. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

by Chris Tobias

If you spend any time at all online, you’ve probably seen speculation every so often about a possible return of Joss Whedon’s space western Firefly, the Fox series that was cancelled in 2002 after only 11 of its 14 episodes had aired– mostly out of order and with gaps in its weekly broadcasts due to Major League Baseball playoffs and holiday programming.

Fireflyopeninglogo.JPG(1)

image credit:  the Firefly and Serenity Database

And why not? The series only grew in popularity after its cancellation.  Its devoted fan base, who came to be known as “Browncoats” (taking their name from the Independent forces in the series who fought for their freedom against the corporate super-government known as the Alliance), spurred brisk sales of the series’ DVD box set, and Universal Studios greenlit a major motion picture, Serenity, that was helmed by Whedon himself and reunited the series’ original cast to tie up most of the show’s loose ends.

Serenity debuted in theaters in August of 2005, and although there was never a sequel, both the movie and the TV series that inspired it have spawned a number of additional stories set in the Firefly ‘verse.  There have been several comics series published by Dark Horse Comics and Boom! Studios that follow the exploits of the crew of Serenity, and publishers like Insight Editions and Titan Books have published numerous volumes covering every detail of the Firefly ‘verse, from handbooks and episode companions to prose novels and cookbooks.  It also seems as though Firefly- and Serenity-licensed merchandise is at an all-time high.  A quick online search will reveal clothing, board games, prop replicas, action figures and much more.

It’s obvious that the love of Browncoats the world over has kept Serenity relevant for nearly twenty years, so with reboots and revivals being all the rage in Hollywood these days, you’d think it would only be a matter of time until the executives at 21st Century Fox (now owned by the Walt Disney Company) decide to send Malcolm Reynolds and his crew back to the black.  I’m sure if that happened, there’d be more than a few Browncoats that would be all manner of glad to see it.

I just wouldn’t be one of them.

I know what you’re thinking:  “How could you say that, Chris? You’re a hardcore fan.  There aren’t many folk out there whose coats have a more brownish color than yours.  You’ve even spent the past seven years spearheading a movement to convince Elon Musk’s company SpaceX to name its first Crew Dragon after Serenity.  Why wouldn’t you want to see Firefly on the screen again?”

Well, read on and I’ll explain.

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Browncoat Ball Comes to Las Vegas this September

Posted by Chris Tobias on July 8, 2019
Posted in: Articles. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

by Chris Tobias

In 2004, the Chicagoland Browncoats decided to hold a one-night banquet that was planned as a formal Sino-Western ball like the one in the Firefly episode “Shindig.”  The event was such a hit that Browncoats decided not only that they would do it annually, but also that they would host it in a different city every year.  This unique shindig, officially dubbed the “Browncoat Ball,” has moved from location to location, year after year, and has gradually evolved into a full weekend of social activities, sightseeing at local tourist attractions and celebrating all aspects of the Firefly and Serenity ‘verse.

Previous Browncoat Balls have been held in Chicago, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Austin, Portland, Charlotte, Warwick (RI), Albuquerque, Phoenix, Greenville (SC), Virginia Beach, Salt Lake City, Gettysburg (PA) and most recently Washington, DC.  This year’s Browncoat Ball will be held September 27-29 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Browncoat-Ball-2019-Favicon

image courtesy browncoatball.com

The 2019 Browncoat Ball is the result of a joint bid by the Las Vegas Browncoats and the Pennsylvania Browncoats– the first of its kind.  It is also the third time that the PA Browncoats have organized a Browncoat Ball, and the third time that the Delaware Valley Brigade, more commonly known as the Philadelphia Browncoats, have played a major role in the preparations.

Matt Black is the head of the planning committee for this year’s Browncoat Ball and a friend of many of us here at Take Back the Sky since 2013, when we spent a weekend working side-by-side at the Browncoats tables at Wizard World Philadelphia Comic Con.  You may recall that back in 2017 we asked him to answer some questions about the Browncoat Ball, that particular year’s host city of Gettysburg and why he thinks naming a SpaceX Crew Dragon Serenity would be all kinds of appropriate.  If you haven’t read that interview, we’d encourage you to take a few moments to do so.

But seeing as how Matt’s back at the helm this year again for Browncoat Ball Las Vegas, we decided to ask him if he would talk to us once again and tell us a little bit more specifically about this year’s shindig.  He was kind enough to answer a few of our questions…

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Browncoat Ball Offers a Unique Opportunity for Fans to Celebrate Their Love of Firefly and Serenity

Posted by Chris Tobias on August 12, 2018
Posted in: Articles, Con Presence. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . 1 Comment

by Chris Tobias

In 2004, the Chicagoland Browncoats decided to hold a one-night banquet that was planned as a formal Sino-Western ball like the one in the Firefly episode “Shindig.”  The event was such a hit that Browncoats decided not only that they would do it annually, but also that they would host it in a different city every year.  This unique shindig, officially dubbed the “Browncoat Ball,” has moved from location to location, year after year, and has gradually evolved into a full weekend of social activities, sightseeing at local tourist attractions and celebrating all aspects of the Firefly and Serenity ‘verse.

Great-Seal-of-the-Browncoat-Ball-2018

Previous Browncoat Balls have been held in Chicago, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Austin, Portland, Charlotte, Warwick (RI), Albuquerque, Phoenix, Greenville (SC), Virginia Beach, Salt Lake City, and most recently Gettysburg, PA.  This year’s Browncoat Ball will be held August 17-19 in Washington, DC.

I attended my first (but hopefully not only) Browncoat Ball last year, and after my weekend at the Gettysburg shindig, I am convinced that every serious fan of Firefly and Serenity should make it a point to attend this event at least once.  While every ball is different, I hope that the following account of my time at last year’s ball might give you some idea of what to expect if you decide to go.

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A Firefly and Serenity Timeline

Posted by Chris Tobias on May 14, 2018
Posted in: Articles. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . 1 Comment
by Chris Tobias
In the wake of this weekend’s successful Bangabandhu-1 mission, which featured the successful launch and landing of the new Block 5 Falcon 9, SpaceX is taking a full eight days off between launches.  (Let that sink in for a minute.  We now have a private space company that’s basically launching once a week… but I digress.)  Since we have a little time before we have to discuss the specifics of the next mission, I figured I’d devote some space (yes, the pun is always intended) to a Browncoat-themed post.
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Take Back the Sky is not the only cause to which this Browncoat devotes his time and energy.  Since 2013, I have also been the organizer of the annual Can’t Stop the Serenity (CSTS) charity screenings of Serenity (and occasionally Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog) for the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  As a CSTS organizer, I have access to the global CSTS message boards at www.cantstoptheserenity.com, which really have a plethora of great information in their archives that any hardcore Browncoat would love to read through if he or she had the time.  In fact, it was on these very message boards that Jeff first proposed the idea of lobbying SpaceX to name its first Crew Dragon after Serenity.
Since only the organizers or co-organizers (think captains and first mates) of local CSTS events have access to the boards’ archives, I think it’s a shame that a lot of Browncoats will never have the chance to read some of the interesting things that are contained there.  So, seeing as how I’m an organizer who has that virtual all-access pass, I decided to share one of them with you.
The following is a chronological list of important dates in the history of Firefly and Serenity, presented in calendar format.  It appears almost exactly as it was originally posted on the global CSTS message boards, though I have made a few minor modifications for the sake of clarity and ease of reading.

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A Fond Look Back at “Sending a Wave”

Posted by Chris Tobias on April 29, 2018
Posted in: Articles, Press Coverage, Updates. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

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(Image:  Sending a Wave)

by Chris Tobias

On March 31, the UK Firefly and Serenity podcast Sending a Wave announced that it was coming to an end after twelve years of keeping Browncoats around the world up-to-date on all the latest conjurings in the Firefly fandom throughout the ‘verse.  Sending a Wave will always be very special to all of us here at Take Back the Sky, because the podcast was the first media outlet to interview Jeff and me (way back in the 2012) about our efforts to convince Elon Musk and SpaceX to name their first Crew Dragon Serenity.  Not only did our interview on Sending a Wave spread the news of what we were doing to a worldwide audience, it also gave our campaign a level of legitimacy in the Browncoat community that it hadn’t had previously.  This was especially crucial to the success of our first online petition to SpaceX, which ended up with thousands of signatures from every continent except Antarctica, accompanied by comments in multiple languages.

About a year later we had the pleasure of meeting Wendy Scott, co-creator and host of Sending a Wave, in person at Wizard World Philadelphia Comic Con in June of 2013.  At the con that weekend, Wendy interviewed me again about my work as the event coordinator of Pittsburgh’s Can’t Stop the Serenity charity screenings, and together we attended the Firefly panel that featured Adam Baldwin, Summer Glau, Jewel Staite and Gina Torres.  Wendy is a lovely woman who is tremendously knowledgeable about science-fiction and the film industry and an absolutely fascinating person to talk to.  One of my favorite things about Wendy, both as a podcast host and as a friend, is that her “BS-meter” is finely-tuned, and she’s not afraid to call anyone out if their story has the odor of a fabrication or a retcon.  (If you don’t believe me, you can hear her give me a much-needed history lesson upon our first meeting in Sending a Wave Episode 93:  The One with Dragons!)

When I heard about the end of Sending a Wave, I contacted Wendy to ask her if it would be okay if I achieved some closure of sorts by bringing things full circle and interviewing her about what had been great run of a groundbreaking Firefly and Serenity podcast.  She graciously agreed, and on April 28 we spent nearly three hours on Skype talking about everything from the podcast itself to geek culture, science-fiction of all kinds, Joss Whedon, CSTS, the current state of the film industry and even American and European politics.  As you can guess, that conversation meandered in many different directions.  The following is a transcript of questions Wendy answered that were specific to Sending a Wave:

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