Five years ago TODAY!

Five years ago tonight I was NOT watching Firefly. This is not strictly speaking my fault. I didn't really have television in the wild and woolly days of 2002.

I don't recall how I heard about ff. Probably because I had started watching buffy on DVD earlier that year. So thanks to DVD and Netflix (a new and exciting thing back in the day) I knew who Joe Sweedon was. (For those joining late, this is funny - cause, like, his name is really Joss Whedon, and if you run it together, it's Joe - oh, you got it? Good. I think it's funny and I keep using it...) Anyway - It was the Buffy guy doing spaceships! And it had Adam "I'm not a Baldwin" Baldwin and Ron "Harris from Barney Miller" Glass. Then I found out it was all westerny, which was just nifty. (Joe hadn't totally screwed with the way I talked yet - so it wasn't "SHINY". Note that I said things like "westerny" ALL on my own.)

So. Here's how it is: l'm going to recap these in broadcast order. Keep in mind that "Serenity (tv)" was shown LAST. There MAY be some ranting about The Powers That Be Fox. Maybe. I will leave any "future" spoilers to the end of each week.

The Train Job
Ahhh, the sonorous tones of Shepard Book. You DVD kiddies have no idea what I'm talking about. Each week opened with an into to the 'verse (that's Ff speak for universe of course). With clips from The Unaired Pilot, Book tells us of the war and how the edges of the System are a rough and tumble place. "Find a crew. Find a job. Keep flying." It bugs me to this day that these intros aren't on the DVDs. Especially since "Keep flying" became such an important part of Ff culture. (They ARE on iTunes along with the "Previously on...". This is the proper way of course.)



The Bar. Our intro to our Big Damm Heroes (ain't they just?). Note the western/Chinese fusion atmosphere. Very Casablanca with a Chinese accent. Did you see the covert and possibly criminal activity on the part of the dancer and the fellow in the brown coat?

"Your move." Whoa. This looks like a TOUGH game of Chinese checkers! The fellow that spoke seems gruff. "I live on the edge." Let's see how THAT works out. This is a Joss show and bravado is not usually rewarded in low stakes situations. See? So very quickly we establish one character as bold and brash, another as cool and competent, and a third as tough but dumb.

"A toast!" Hey! Exposition! More about this war. This big war they failed to win. Which is why Mr. Brown Coat might seem unhappy about it. Also our first Chinese as a co-spoken language. "Browncoats"! I get it!

"Captain." Oh yeah. We knew that from the intro that's not on the DVD.

Jayne. The man they call Jayne. I just saw a Q&A with Joe S. (hey - I'm still laughing) where he talked about how Adam B. kind of screwed things up. We weren't supposed to love Jayne. But we do.

Big Fight. Our Heroes are overwhelmed. Ah. These are THOSE kind of heroes. The lovable losers that are smart and scrappy.

Nice holo-window. Nice moon. It's SPACE!

Our first fiddles!

"We'll rise again." Subtle.

Annnnnd THERE'S our GIRL! She's still lovely, even in her pilot model shape. Guns blazing. Oh, wait... No guns? No space battles?

Wash! The Leaf on the Wind! More folk. Wash is married to the woman. Captain has a chip on his shoulder.

No sound in space!

You CAN'T take the sky! Just can't! Unless you're Fox.



I've always thought this ep was pretty masterful in it's own way. For us what watched it before Serenity TUAP (The UnAired Pilot - keep up) it had to do all the exposition. For you mugs that watched on DVD, it had to be a followup. I think it's grand as both. I never felt lost watching the first time through. A lot of the info from TUAP is doled out over this and other eps. It works as either exposition or recap. Of course this ep also marks a pretty big change in the flavor of the show. Mal wasn't near as funny in Serenity. Funny, but not AS funny. He was gruff and tortured. He'll get that way again, don't worry.

Ok, I wrote most of this on a flight a few weeks ago and forgot about it, so the rest won't be as shot-for-shot, Television Without Pity. (Sighs of relief, I know.) But The Train Job is a great yarn. It's got a TRAIN! In SPACE! And it's got SPACE gangsters! And a SPACE sheriff! It's still one of MY favorites. Even the people that weren't crazy for it when it aired loved it when Mal said "Darn." and kicked the fella through the engine. Wacky fun. I imagine if this really HAD been the second episode well and true, it wouldn't have changed much. They still would have recapped JUUUUUST enough in case you didn't watch last week or didn't remember none too well.

The scene that will be a recurring theme is when Mal is told that everybody sucks and that's just the way the 'verse is (more or less) by the sheriff. Mal essentially says "Oh no they don't either!" ("I do not hold to that," he might say.) He kind of wants it to be that way, because then his life would make sense. But it doesn't. And that's Mal. "You're welcome on my boat. God ain't." Book and Mal. MAN I wish they had had time to go somewhere with that!

Oh, and this ep introduces Adlai Niska. Not saying he'll be any trouble later on or anything...

Annnd we say good night with a shot of the Hands of Blue. As if airport security didn't make us jumpy enough! (Not a WHOLE lot of River in this ep. OR the UAP. She got brought on real slow.)

Next week: REAVERS!