Joss Whedon: Unsung Genius

Joss Whedon: Unsung Genius

TV is a crucial element of society today. Just about everyone watches it, and just everyone en joys at least one thing on that magical box in their living room. But people all have different tastes, so there are a lot of different TV shows. Some are awesome, some are not-as-awesome, and some just need to die. Sometimes, though, awesome TV shows are killed before they ever have a chance to start living. And no one knows how unfair a situation like that can be better than a wonderful man named Joss Whedon.

If you're any kind of nerd, even in the slightest, you just started screaming in agreement. For those of you who don't know, Joss Whedon is quite possibly the coolest person in existence. If he's not THE coolest, he's definitely in the top five, right there next to Stan Lee and Batman.

Some of you are still majorly confused, and that magical box in your living room is starting to look pretty good, so let me fill you in; Joss Whedon is the man who single handedly responsible set the Standard of Awesomeness that all science-fiction TV shows are now held to.

Joss Whedon created the rarely-heard-of and severely under-praised, yet totally awesome shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer (ok, that ones the exception to the stuff I just said), Firefly, Dollhouse and Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along-Blog (technically, that's online). Show of hands, how many of you have heard of any of the shows I just mentioned? Oh wait, never mind. I can't see you. I'll just continue under the assumption that you've never heard of any them. Just know that they are pretty much all awesome. Don't believe me? Fine. Check out the proof.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992 [film], 1997-2002 [TV series])

First of all, it's about a girl that runs around SLAYING VAMPIRES. The very title implies awesomeness, especially with today's current definition of vampires and the way Tweens are a bit obsessed with the concept of marrying them. Besides, Sarah Michelle Gellar is not a bad thing for TV in anyway.

He is though. KILL IT, BUFFY! KILL IT!

Now I only ever saw a couple episodes of Buffy in its heyday (I was a little too busy being 5), but Wikipedia tells me What Makes It Brilliant:

The Movie
Joss Whedon initially wrote and made a movie called Buffy the Vampire Slayer in 1992, about a California "valley girl" who learned it was her destiny to slay vampires (So, she learned her destiny was to BE AWESOME?). The movie was designed to spoof the clichés in horror movies and make them funny (kind of like the Scary Movie franchise has been failing to do for years. It obviously hasn’t taken the hint). While this film didn't become majorly popular, it did spawn the more "critically-acclaimed" TV show of the same name.
The TV Show
The TV version of Buffy was much darker than it's movie inspiration and followed a girl named Buffy Summers (played by Sarah Michelle Gellar), who is the next in the line of Slayers, a group of hunters who are called by fate to hunt demons, vampires and other spirit creatures. Like every Slayer before here, Buffy was accompanied by a Watcher, who guided her and helped her when she needed it. Unlike the other Slayers, Buffy surrounded herself with a group of close friends. I would then suppose that these friends eventually all found out about her destiny and helped her kick major vampire butt.
Sounds awesome, right? I think so. I just added it to my Netflix Queue; that's how much I think so. Further proving my point of Joss Whedon’s genius, Buffy won an Emmy for Outstanding Writing in a Drama Series in 2000. THE EMMY'S THOUGHT THIS MAN WAS OUTSTANDING! So should you.

Firefly
Oh, Firefly, you were so mistreated by the evil FOX network. Firefly told the tale of a cargo ship's outlawed crew and their adventures that come along with trying to survive in space. The show took place in space or on outer planets in a time after the world was “used up”. The worlds they visited were occasionally primitive and had a western feel. So, umm, the show is kind of about….Space Cowboys. But, it is SO MUCH COOLER THAN THAT.

What Makes It Brilliant
Firefly dove headfirst into a rather foreign territory by trying to bring a Star Wars type epic to the small screen (Think Han Solo with a crew that consisted of more than one overgrown dog-monkey). Malcolm Reynolds is the captain of the ship, Serenity, a cargo vessel that occasionally (translated: all the time) smuggles frowned upon cargo past the tightly wound government (NOT the Empire). Joss Whedon wrote it beautifully, setting up an amazing story arc that had potential to be the greatest science fiction television show ever.

And it might have succeeded, if the FOX network didn't hate every viewer it's ever had.

Granted, Firefly did have a slightly slow pilot, but it was some of the deepest character exploration and best plot set up I’ve ever seen in a TV show. Not that anyone who ever watched it on the network would know.

FOX basically decided that Firefly would fail before it even aired. Acting on their own assumption, they decided that no one would notice if they aired the episodes in random order. However, people did care, but not for long because they gave up when they couldn't figure out what the heck was happening.
As a result, FOX cancelled Firefly after only 11 of the seasons 14 episodes aired. And just to throw salt in the wound, they aired the 90-minute pilot episode LAST.

Fighting back, Joss Whedon quickly released the full season of his brilliant creation on DVD where it exploded. Firefly became and remains a cult phenomenon that only certain awesome people know about (like this blog). It became so popular after the DVD release that Joss was able to create several graphic novels and a big screen movie to serve as a conclusion, both of which he called Serenity.

Due to the fact that the Serenity movie basically started where the show left off, anyone who hadn't seen the show didn’t know what was happening (they just knew they were watching one of the best sci-fi movies ever made), and the ratings for the movie were less than acceptable for Hollywood’s standards of awesomeness.

Serenity was a great conclusion and successfully answered a lot of the shows remaining questions, but I doubt any fan would complain if Joss announced a second season.

Dollhouse
Dollhouse is yet another show of brilliance from Joss Whedon's amazing mind. It focuses on a secret company (the Dollhouse) full of men and women whose minds are capable of being erased and rewritten with new information, allowing them to become a new person at anytime. The Dollhouse then rents them out to clients for various purposes. Throw in an FBI agent who's bent on finding the place, a villain and a couple conspiracies and BOOM you've got another amazing show on your hands.
What Makes It Brilliant
Once again, Joss dove into a foreign area, pushing the limits of science fiction and encouraging people to actually use part of their brains when watching TV. Each episode of Dollhouse always had a few twists to it, as well as a continuing, underlying sub-plot that moved forward every episode and enough action to make Bruce Willis happy.
Joss trusted this creation to FOX once again, apparently deciding to give them a second chance. He added a little more women and sex to this show (FOX's weakness) and succeeded in getting two seasons of Dollhouse to air on television. Apparently, FOX also had the decency to let him know before they cancelled this show and he was able to wrap it up rather nicely.

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along-Blog
Dr. Horrible is the final proof needed to convince you of Joss' genius. He created a musical; a musical about superheroes. And this wasn't another crapfest like "Superman: The Musical". This was amazing, featuring the talents of Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion (star of Firefly) and Felecia Day (featured in several episodes of Buffy). It focuses on the exploits of one Dr. Horrible (Harris), an amateur supervillian who's desperate to make it into the Evil League of Evil and become awesome. First he must defeat his nemesis, Captain Hammer (Fillion) and win the girl of his dreams (Day).
What Makes It Brilliant
Joss brings his unique flair to the Internet, introducing a villain as the good guy, and a "hero" who really just doesn't care about actually saving the day. It humanizes the supervillian and just gives an awesome and refreshing and funny spin on the classic battle of good vs. evil. Oh, and the girl of the supervillian’s dreams? She’s a humanitarian vegetarian who helps the homeless. This is the awesomeness only Joss can think of. Keep in mind, all of this done while they burst into some pretty awesome songs. And not any Disney High School Musical, “We’re All In This Together” crap either. The finale is Dr. Horrible singing about his plan to burn the world down.
Joss scored by avoiding network TV totally and targeting the trolls of the internet who discovered it and launched it into fame. It's now on DVD, iTunes and even available on Netflix' Instant Streaming service (so go watch it if you haven't seen it yet).

Now, if you don't agree that this man is an awesome genius that FOX hates as much as they hate the rest of the world, you have a serious problem. Joss Whedon is amazing and deserves to be praised and thanked for his awesome contributions to the world of science fiction and to society as a whole.
I'm not the only one who believes this either.

He is the director and writer of the upcoming Avengers movie, a task only given to the most worthy of candidates, lest Hollywood face a nerd riot, and he has a theater released Dr. Horrible 2 in the works. Not to mention the EMMY HE WON (Wait, Emmy's are a big deal right?). He also writes music. You heard me, ladies...
So heres to you, Joss; may your genius be recognized as you continue to bless the world with awesomeness.

Thank you. Thank you, good sir.