This news may be a little old, but I just found out today, via Ampersand who got it via Long Story; Short Pier. Here ’tis:
The short-lived TV series “Firefly” is moving to the big screen. After taking his “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” feature film and turning it into a successful TV series, Joss Whedon is about to do the reverse with another one of his creations. Whedon has teamed with Universal Pictures to turn “Firefly,” a TV cult favorite, into a feature film.
In addition to having adapted it for the big screen, Whedon will also make his feature directorial debut with the project. Plans are to see “Firefly” go into production in first-quarter 2004.
I was weirded out by the show’s whole western-sci-fi spin for the first couple episodes, but that’s all the time it took for the killer ensemble cast and sharp dialogue to win me over. Firefly died a tragically premature death — it was just working out its kinks and becoming something wonderful. Its best two or three episodes stand right up there with anything Joss wrote for Buffy. I’m a little worried that the things that made the show so good won’t translate as well to the big screen. And I’m worried that Joss won’t be as good a director as he is a writer. But I’ll still be tracking the film’s development like a class-A fanboy.