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Article
Fighting a War You've Already Lost: Zombies and Zombis in Firefly/Serenity and Dollhouse
Science Fiction Film and Television
  • Gerry Canavan, Marquette University
Document Type
Article
Language
eng
Format of Original
32 p.
Publication Date
10-1-2011
Publisher
Liverpool University Press
Original Item ID
doi: 10.3828/sfftv.2011.12
Abstract

This article explores the use of zombie imagery in two sf narratives created by Joss Whedon: Firefly (US 2002–3), Serenity (US 2005) and Dollhouse (US 2009–10). The translation of the zombie from its traditional horror-movie context to the far-future space opera of Firefly/Serenity and the near-future cyberpunk of Dollhouse reveals the zombie's allegorisation of the consequences of biopolitical governmentality and neoliberal capitalism. In both series zombies function as a figure for both the dehumanisation caused by state and market forces and the possibility of Utopian resistance to these forces.

Comments

Accepted version. Science Fiction Film and Television, Vol. 4, No. 2 (Fall 2011): 173-204. DOI. © 2011 Liverpool University Press. Used with permission.

Citation Information
Gerry Canavan. "Fighting a War You've Already Lost: Zombies and Zombis in Firefly/Serenity and Dollhouse" Science Fiction Film and Television (2011) ISSN: 1754-3770
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/gerry-canavan/80/