I love all things Joss and have serious doubts any reboot can capture his magical dialog style. Yes, it is adolescent. Yes, he does degenerate into hopeless melodrama after he starts to run out of ideas. I think though if you had a long talk with any real fan of Firefly, or Buffy, or Joss’ Marvel works, they would not argue for Firefly on the strength of the Western flavor he injected and defended, but rather we love the pithy dialog he gave almost every character. He is a dialog genius.
I disagree that Firefly didn’t have much competition. There’s a very strong argument to be made he demanded the Western flavor to distinguish Firefly from another show. The Brits were airing Starhunter at the time and it often looked like Whedon was busy correcting a great idea not done as well as he knew he could do it. If you’re not familiar find the two Starhunter series and binge watch. They’re not bad but Whedon’s dialog is obviously three steps up.
I’m not looking forward to the reboot. I’ll always love those characters and the life the actors gave them. I am also concerned Disney might bite off more than they can chew and wouldn’t they be better off restarting Rangers of the New Republic? Or is that back on the table? I’ve seen conflicting claims about Rangers.
. . .but if your hand touches metal, I swear by my pretty floral bonnet I will end you.