Quote -
"The Box" movie and the Twilight Zone (80s) TV episode were based on a Richard Matheson short story originally published by Playboy in 1970.  He was the writer responsible for some of the better episodes of the original Twilight Zone that Rod Serling hadn't written.

That makes sense... didn't know that, but it makes a ton of sense.

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Quote - And thus - for about a season or two - the series is interesting and halfway decent, until the executive producer get's a call from big chief numb marbles over at corporate - who starts telling him how to change his show to keep the sponsors happy and to appeal to the lowest common denominators possible to boost viewers, to drag in new viewers who may not have been into it before by introducing lame angles, and to stimulate the bottom line.

You know? That would explain why Mr. Whedon decided to stop doing Firefly episodes after the first season... (and in some ways I'm kind of glad he did stop it where he did, in spite of wanting more of them). Keeps the whole story nice and fresh, and left a ton of possibilities open in the mind. Think Star Trek, right after the original series ended.

The killing off of a lot of main characters in the movie was at once refreshing (Holy crap! The good guys do get klilled out there!) and at the same time, it was (IMHO) a deliciously raised middle-finger to the corporates out there thinking of continuing/resurrecting/whatever the Firefly story. It was like he was daring them to bring it back without him. :)