Novel Ninja

Okay, geek fans. We all know that Firefly was one of the most awesome things in the history of geekdom.

And if for some reason you disagree, then *fingers in ears* LALALALALALA I CAN’T HEAR YOUUUUUU . . .

I could go into lots of reasons why it was a great show, but that’s not the point here. The point of this post is that there is a sort of shared community among Firefly fans that can’t ever be duplicated (well, except by Star Trek fans in the 70s . . . or Doctor Who fans in the 90s . . . never mind, you know what I mean). It’s a shared rapport over not just what it was, but what it could have been. There’s nothing more powerful than the imagination for that sort of thing.

And when you have a rapport like that, you tend to band together. And when you band together, you tend to find other fun things to share. And sometimes the people who help create those fun things show up too. And when that happens, you call it a convention.

And now Alan Tudyk and Nathan Fillion, with Gina Torres, Felicia Day, Seth Green, and James Gunn, are going to make a series about that experience. The show is being crowdfunded on Indiegogo, because of various technical reasons, plus (as they joke in the video) Alan Tudyk’s cancellation-related “trust issues.” However, kidding aside, it’s a great fit for a series like this. This is a show about fans. It’s a show about fans’ relationships with themselves, with actors and creators, with frustration and admiration for their fandoms, and — most of all — with the weirdness that happens at conventions.

Trust me, if you’ve never been to a convention, they’re weird. Also, amazingly awesome. (Even the really difficult ones.)

I don’t think that you’d get this with a traditional studio. There would be the inevitable problems with trying to match it to an audience, when the audience they want for this is already online. A lot of studios are still tied up in dinosaur media models (theater releases, the necessity of television formats fit for regular commercials and time-slots, marketing, life in a production bubble . . .) and all of these would be at odds with both the natural audience of this show as well as the natural format. The fans are already online. They’re already used to web shows. Exploit it!

And that’s precisely what they’re doing. It’s a model that was pioneered by Felicia Day, and popularized by Joss Whedon’s Dr. Horrible (itself directly inspired by Day’s The Guild), and it’s high time this sort of thing became mainstream. I’m always eager to see more of it, and this looks like it’s going to be a phenomenal success.

The fans think so, too. In the space since I read the campaign page and wrote out all the above words, Con Man has gone from 26% funding to 55%. It’s climbing fast, and while that initial funding is just for three initial ten-minute episodes, it looks like the fans agree about the demand for this sort of thing.

To be honest, if you like Firefly, this is a no-brainer. You’ll want to see this show. And you’ll see it eventually, even if you don’t donate. But if you like conventions, then even if you don’t like Firefly (because you’re allergic to fun or something), you’ll love this. If you’ve even been to one convention, you’ll know what it’s like. You know the sort of stories that can be pulled out of that delightful kind of organized chaos.

But if you’re still not sold on the campaign, watch their promotion video. And if you are sold on it anyway, watch the video. You’ll thank me later.