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She starred alongside hubby Morpheus in the Matrix sequels but now her own sci-fi franchise has reached the big screen.
Gina Torres plays Zoe, the ship's Amazonian first officer.
Sum up the character of Zoe.
Zoe is first mate to Mal. She is his right hand. Often his better half. A career soldier. She fought side by side with Mal
in the war against the Alliance, which was a very bloody battle, and they are bonded together through violence and friendship
and…war. And of course a common cause: to…survive.
What do you like most about her?
I think the thing that sticks most about Zoe is her strength, and her commitment to her relationship. Not just her relationship
with the captain, but her relationship to her husband. This is a woman that is struggling at all times- with her job and her
belief system but also in a very complicated relationship. It's a marriage, it's a real marriage, and I think that makes her
very interesting; certainly it's a timely battle for women, especially in this day and age where you try to figure out how
to have it all, and Zoe's struggling with that. In a sort of larger-than-life way.
What was your first reaction when you heard of the plan to make Serenity?
I just didn't know how he was going to do it. I read the script and I wasn't worried or nervous anymore. I didn't care, I
was just like 'Let's go, let's play!'. It was just such a joy to know that I'd be working with these people again that…I
didn't think about it.
When did Joss first give you a hint that there could be more?
He never quite let us go. He kind of kept us tethered to the idea and to the hope that we'd go on from here. How? With, like,
monthly calls! And I got a call to be on Angel, and Nathan got a call to be on Buffy, so he kind of kept this family close.
Then about a year went by, and this film being fully realised started getting closer and closer and closer - I was just curious
as to how he was going to pull it off. What happens is that it's so hard to mourn, and let go of a show that's in mid-stride.
I mean we were just hitting our stride as a television series. You get so attached to these people, you want to know what's
next. So the idea of seeing that was very exciting.
What do you think are the story's unique selling-points?
What attracted me to it was that it takes the sci-fi genre and strips it down to its core, so yes there are space-ships and
space travel, but there aren't any…there aren't any puppets, there aren't any mutants, there aren't any aliens or anything
that takes you out of what's essential. There's not the eye-candy that we've become so spoiled by when it comes to sci-fi:
the next big effects shot. It's still about the people, it's about the story. And I think why it was so popular and why it
gained speed, even after we were cancelled, was that people enjoy spending time with these nine fringe-dwellers who are just
trying to make a better life for themselves. That's who we all are - in core, in essence. We're just trying to get to the
next place, where maybe we can get a really great job and relax for a minute and get something nice we saw in a window, or
just to feed ourselves. I think it just speaks to the best of our nature.
And Joss' universe?
It makes perfect sense if you consider the idea of 'the last frontier'. Joss is very, very specific about…it's not that
technology doesn't exist, it's just that not everybody gets it. Not everybody can afford it. And isn't that the truest case?
I mean we have that reality right here. I mean we've got people living in boxes, in squalor. Why should that change 500 years
into the future?
What was biggest difference between working on the Firefly TV set and the Serenity film set?
Time. And this is the case not just on this movie. When you're doing a TV show, you shoot on average six to eight pages a
day. When you're shooting a movie, you shoot one and a half to two pages a day.
And of course you're married to Laurence Fishburne, who's done some sci-fi films himself…
Yes, just some small little indies- I don't think anyone really has heard of them [laughs].The irony is that I kind of jumped
into the whole fantasy sci-fi world before he did. We kind of talk about the fanbase, and how loyal the fanbase is. And he
being known as more of a serious actor and doing very specific roles, he just thought, 'wow, that's freaky, that's weird.
I don't get that at all…like, Trekkies, right?' So when The Matrix exploded in the way that it did, he said, 'this is
really weird! This is insane!' and I was like, [smug] 'mmmhmm'. So there was kind of this area of knowledge which I was privy
to and he was not. But then action just shifted after The Matrix, and I started doing more Matrix-like stunts in the jobs
that I was getting, but it wasn't about comparing notes, it was more about comparing bruises and the uncomfortable nature
of the harnesses and all that.
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