Browncoats: Redemption Online Premiere from browncoatsmovie on Vimeo.
First, this is a sequel to a five-year-old movie which wasn't exactly a blockbuster. Serenity didn't make back the producers' investment domestically, but foreign distribution and DVD sales helped it eventually make a profit. It was no Star Wars or Star Trek.
That movie was itself only made due to widespread fan support for Firefly, a TV series canceled after only thirteen episodes (while being preempted and bounced around the weekly schedule, and shown out of chronological order, with the pilot episode shown last).
Second, this is a feature-length fan-made film. It's all the result of donations and volunteer effort. Nobody's getting paid for this. Look at the production values. This is easily comparable to Star Trek Phase II.
With distribution like this blog and others, and with the film (and music) production and distribution tools available to everyone with a computer, are we seeing an end to the big entertainment empire system? Could it be that someone with a good story can get it made into a movie all by themselves? (and of course, collect all the merchandising profits, something the fans can't do in this case) It would be like unleashing a million Clerks-era Kevin Smiths making do on even smaller budgets or no budget at all.
I was a fan back in 2005, showed Firefly to anyone who would watch, was on the Browncoats forum, went to the bloggers' pre-screening of the movie Serenity, and have waited in vain for more.
And now after five years of nothing from the Universal Studios, the fans themselves stepped up to make a sequel.
Awesome.
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