FIREFLY (COWBOYS & ALIENS)

We'll stop you before you tell us: we know that Firefly doesn't have any actual aliens. The cast are all human, though they traverse about in spaceships to alien worlds. Despite the fact that the series only lasted a half season, Firefly is rightfully one of the most celebrated television shows of all time. Starring Nathan Fillion (Castle) as Captain Malcolm Reynolds, and featuring a cast of genre favorites such as Morena Baccarin, Alan Tudyk, Adam Baldwin, and Summer Glau, the series was a strongly written space western. Partially settled planets became settings for laser gunfights, complete with desert climates and ramshackle towns. And, unlike Cowboys & Aliens, it didn't feel remotely cobbled together or out of place. It all felt so natural, so right, that we're still not happy that the 2005 follow-up film Serenity might be the last we see of Captain Mal and his crew. If Cowboys & Aliens is a success, then darn it, Serenity 2: Mal Rides Again* will be too.

*Or Serenity 2: Return to Jaynestown.