The Serenity Logo: Otherness and Inauthenticity

Benson, Eric

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/126071 Copy

Description

Title

The Serenity Logo: Otherness and Inauthenticity

Author(s)

Benson, Eric

Issue Date

2022-12-06

Keyword(s)

• Branding
• Design
• Race
• Typography

Date of Ingest

2025-02-28T19:57:00-06:00

Abstract

This paper explores and critiques the typographic and design decisions made in the creation of the logo and brand for the 2005 film Serenity by Joss Whedon and how the choice of the Papyrus-inspired typeface used in the logo perpetuates the potential for orientalist, racialized stereotypes, and material dishonesty previously seen in the film’s casting, props, and story critiqued prior in Serenity scholarly literature. In addition, this paper explores how the choice of Papyrus leads to the conflation of Asian visual culture and stereotypes throughout the entire brand of Firefly and Serenity. Scholar Carrie Rose Evon best explains this false pluralism: [T]he representation of “Chinese” culture in Firefly and Serenity is actually a representation of a blend of Asian cultures that do not reflect a focus on China by Whedon. The culture of China becomes the culture of Asia that a white American man thinks is Asian enough.

Publisher

Slayage: The International Journal of Buffy+

Series/Report Name or Number

20.2 [56] Summer/Fall 2022

Type of Resource

text

Genre of Resource

article

Language

eng

Copyright and License Information

Eric Benson

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