Things are crappy on the Angel front, but Joss Whedon’s brilliant Firefly is still flying, in spite of having been canceled by Fox before it even completed its first season. First, a really fine set of DVDs collecting all fifteen existing episodes and cool extras came out (mandatory viewing if you have a brain), and then reports were that Universal had wisely bought the rights and hired Joss to write and direct a Firefly feature film for theatrical release.

Recent developments on that front are very promising.

First, Joss has reportedly finished a script. One more finished piece of writing by Joss Whedon in the world is always a good thing.

Then, back on the 17th, a poster on one of the sites tracking Firefly matters had this to say:

This weekend through professional contacts at a trade show, I was able to spend an hour or so with someone who does licensing for Universal.

I brought up the movie project rather slyly, and this is what she said:

1. Definitely in the works.

2. First film meeting was last week.

3. Working title is “Serenity.” (“That’s the name of the ship,” she said.) :-)

4. They are “very excited to be working with Joss Whedon.”

The latest is that not only is Serenity now actually listed on the “Coming Soon” list at Universal’s web site (along with Peter Jackson’s King Kong), Universal has registered the web domain name “serenitymovie.com.”

So, The WB and Fox may be full of fuckwits, but there are still at least a few folks out in L.A. with some class and brains.