Excellent writing, intriguing characters, smart dialogue, engaging plot lines… of course “Firefly” was cancelled. We are talking about Fox here, friends. Now I remember why I don’t watch TV. “Firefly” is smart; it’s too good for TV.

Or, at least, Fox TV.

I’m far too idealistic, because it truly bothers me to know that keeping a TV show on the air on one of the major networks has nothing to do with the innate coolness of the program in question. It’s numbers, marketing research, ad revenue…money. But I hope there are some TV executives out there quaking in their Uggs when they look on the might of the growing number of Serenity fans.

While watching one of the few pre-screenings of the upcoming Joss Whedon-helmed Serenity on Thursday night, May 26, 2005, I realized the power of numbers, of fandom. I felt an instant camaraderie with these strangers, these possible friends gathered around in a stuffy, overcrowded theatre. It was one of those moments I’ll never forget: a moment of understanding that things are different. I’ve had other such moments when encountering art.

When I was 14, I read Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. And when I was done, I couldn’t believe the world could be the same. Everything was different. I was different. When I read Kant 10 years later, again I felt as though the ground had given out under me. I was changed.

These events happen every so often in my life, being touched by art. Usually, a book, movie, or TV series entertains me for a time, and I move on, always seeking something that will again give me a little jolt, knock me out of my complacency a bit and get the wheels turning. I love that little feeling, the feeling of flux, the hum of altered speeds, the slight braking before the turn onto a different set of coordinates.

You see, it is my firm belief–nay, my new religion, that the TV industry is in for a big change. A shakedown. Why? Because we have the money. And there are lots of hands out there, wanting to dig deep into our wallets.

In the last few months, the cultural conscience has spoken pretty damn loudly in favor of cinematic quality. Many of us are so tired of being sold these summer blockbusters that are put together by pollsters and Hollywood number crunchers, trying to market to our demographic.. But then along comes a quirky little movie based on a show cancelled by the FOX network, about a bunch of cowboys and ne’er-do-wells and other criminal-type elements in spaceships. And it’s going to do well in the box office. Really well. Why? I’ve got a theory; it could be bunnies. Oh, wait, that’s not right.

It’s a longing whose pulse I can hear distinctly, rising above the cacophony of the mundane. A desire for the quixotic, for the reemergence of the cowboy, the hero, the bad boy who does the wrong things for the right reasons. We want a hero. We want character and substance, and we want it with some style. Whedon delivers the whole package throughout the only season of “Firefly” (available on DVD, go get yours now if you haven’t already). But in Serenity, he does something a little more. He makes us hunger, and then he feeds us.

The fans of “Firefly” have hungered for years–yes, plural–to know where this story, these characters were going. We weren’t going to just let it go, because we are starving for story. So, too, do the characters in Serenity hunger. They’re downright gaunt. They’re on the blunt edge of destruction and despair when we first get a glimpse of them in the movie. Like Six Characters in Search of an Author, these nine people look like they’ve been waiting for us so they can go on with their story. It’s a good place to start. I’ll say no more about the film. Except: go see it. Tell everyone you know.

We have a mighty roar.