"Serenity" or "The Train Job"? Which did it for you?

[BlasterBoy]

So, there are technically TWO pilots: "Serentity" (part one and two) and "The Train Job". Which is your favorite episode, not only as an episode, but also as a pilot?

I say "Serentity" all the way!

A truly superb episode and it set up the characters much more nicely than "The Train Job"! Characters weren't just thrown at you! Book and Simon came on in the middle, not at the beginning. The whole discovery of River was great, as well as The Alliance guy! Those twists were awesome! You would think Simon was the traitor at first. Then, the whole Mal just shooting the guy. Woah. It truly was an adventure and set up the characters/verse amazingly!

You?

[Risa]

I loved "Serenity" much more than "Train Job". It just had so much drama and odd humor in it. How could you not love it? One of the best parts is when Mal opens up the box containing River and he is like "hmmm" with one of his Mal looks. Another great part was when Simon was telling about the whole situation. I just like that part for some reason. I watched Firefly on dvd, so I just saw Serenity first then Train Job. I would have been seriously confused if i had not been able to see Serenity first.

[ShinyFirefly]

The fact that you keep spelling it "Serentity" is really throwing me off. ;)

I admit when I first started watching, it was "The Train Job" that got me into the show, particularly the end. I don't know, at the time I suppose I thought "Serenity" was a bit slow and seemed to drag in places. But as I became more of a fan and began watching the episodes over and over, "Serenity", especially the 2nd half, I see now as being far superior. But "The Train Job" wasn't a bad episode.

[redrevo]

I'm taking Serenity, but just by a little.

The Train Job has many, many more Joss quips than Serenity even though it's only half as long. "I'm thinking you weren't burdened with an overabundance of schooling" comes to mind, as does "He's my hero" and "Darn." It also had the intriguing ending with the government. But Serenity started out with a tad more action, and it introduced us to the characters much, much better than The Train Job. It also had some of the lines that I loved ("And we shall call it...this land," "Pain is scary.") In the end I thought The Train Job came on just a tad preachy, what with the exchange between Mal and the Sheriff. They both had a great western/sci-fi feel, but Serenity was a little more exciting from the outset and gets the nod even if The Train Job was more funny.

[Amber]

As a fan, I would definitely choose Serenity as the pilot, but as a casual viewer I would say The Train Job.

Now, for an explanation. Serenity had fantastic character setups, a really intriguing and awesome war backstory. It also gives us a little of the mean-spiritedness of Captain Reynolds that Fox wanted to do away with to make him more likable. I like it best when he's being a jerk. He's a mean old man, hehe. So, as a fan of Firefly and Serenity, it's an extremely neccessary episode. I mean, for the Simon and River story alone. In The Train Job, they don't establish hey, here's why these folks are here (and that includes Book). One would be left thinkin uhmmm okay why are these people just hangin around on this western theiving ship in space? I mean that's hard enough to understand..

Onto The Train Job. I can understand why they wanted The Train Job as the first episode, it has more action, and as Redrevo mentioned, the whole government thing. Buuuuuut, while The Train Job has some good quips, it's honestly one of my least favorite episodes. So I'm going to pick Serenity anytime.

[Eliza Lover]

I say Serenity! It's a wonderful episode!