SERENITY will be coming this Friday, and I'm planning a bunch of movies going forward! (Yes...ALIENS will be one of them 😅) FALLOUT starts on Wednesday, and I'm hoping to start posting ARCANE next week, getting ready for season 2! Thank you for sticking around for Firefly! I've loved every second of this experience with you guys ❤ Stay shiny, Browncoats!
Oh hell yeah, looking forward to your Fallout reactions. I'm a giant fan of the games, and I loved it. It was as good an adaptation of that world as I could have possibly hoped for. The aesthetic and tone was absolutely NAILED.
Shiny! I start a week-long vacation on Friday and I'm hard-pressed to think of a better way to kick it off. Cheers and salutations, M'Lady, no power in the 'Verse can stop you. 🥃☮❤
Stages of a Browncoat 1. Watch the series 2. Watch the movie 3. Rewatch the series several times 4. Read the comics 5. Rewatch your favorite episodes when you have nothing else to watch 6. Find youtube videos of people watching the series for the first time so you can experience the series again through the eyes of a newcomer
8. watch all behind the scenes and "about the show" stuff, also commentary tracks. 9. watch 10 years of all comic-con panels of Joss and The Crew (with a lot of Nathan and Jewel pranking each other). 10. Watch Dr. Horrible's sing along blog.
Rewatch favourite episodes? You mean all of them? Pretty sure that's how it goes. Never read the comics. My brain just doesn't grok the graphic novel format. This is my 4th dip into watching the show again for the first time thanks to these wacky reaction things.
I think the coolest detail here is that during River's mind reading sequence, Kaylee is the only person she doesn't see anything with because Kaylee is always her authentic self
No, watch her face in that shot. It's stern, because (a) she is now scared of River because of the previous incident, and (b) loves Simon and understands how River's problem hurt him.
This made a better finale episode than some people seem to realize. It was significant and highly symbolic that River formally requested and received the Captain's permission to come aboard the ship - it's an old seafaring tradition. She ceased to be a burden, and became a part of the crew.
People before they watch firefly : "How can a show be that good if it got cancelled after half a season?" People after they watch firefly : "How can a show be cancelled if it got that good after half a season?"
I believe the fact that it got cancelled almost entirely due to internal FOX politics/sabotage began my utter hatred for FOX. The last couple decades just solidified that it I was right to heap disdain on them for so long.
@@miwright21 I'm gonna assume you are alluding to Rupert Murdoch and his effect on the 'news' channel. Obviously no direct correlation, but they've had their fair share of head office issues of all kinds. Points to a hell of a lot of incompetence at the very least.
@@miwright21 Angel season 6 got cancelled due to internal Fox politics too. Fox even said after that it was a mistake made in the heat of the moment that they regretted.
@@miwright21 If you ever saw the episode of Family Guy after Fox brought it back, Peter lists all of the shows that Fox had canceled in the previous 2 years or so, and it was a HUGE list. Fox has a long history of "trying out" shows, but also of quickly canceling them if they don't pull in huge ratings. As strong as we all feel about Firefly, the truth is that Firefly was just one on a very, VERY long list of other shows that Fox canceled. And, look more recently at The Orville - another Sci-Fi show that Fox canceled, even though the ratings were good and it was produced by one of their biggest money-makers (Seth McFarlane). I think we all know that Firefly would have grown a huge audience had it been given a couple of seasons to do so, but Fox has never been the kind of studio to be that patient. They were never a big supporter of SciFi shows even though they've green-lighted many of them. So, as much as we'd like to feel that Firefly was specifically targeted, there's plenty of evidence to show that Firefly simply succumbed to standard procedure at Fox TV - like dozen and dozens of others.
I've always felt that Mal and River are connected in some way. We get a glimpse of it when book is shot and rivers faltered. It was Mals distress theater tripped her up. We'll see it again in serenity.
The dude who played the bounty hunter was fucking amazing. He walked into this series 14 episodes deep, a series FILLED with amazing humongous personalities, and he stole the show.
That would be Richard Brooks, a multi-talented performer and producer who came to notice through the first seasons of the original Law and Order TV series.
This is what it meant when people say "touch grass". Because when we stay indoors, we're reduced to ego, when we go outside and into nature, we become fully human again.
I heard Jewel Staite say on a podcast recently that it only took 6 months to shoot the episodes for the series. Its crazy that 6 months of their lives has had such a massive impact for so many years to come. 🤯
I saw that same interview (with Katie Sackhoff) and I thought, damn, I bet the cast has spent more time at conventions, in interviews, etc talking about being in Firefly than the actual amount of time spent shooting Firefly.
I saw that interview with Katee Sackoff. It made me pause. It was only 6 months of their lives and it changed TV. It made the audience expect and demand better content.
you talk about how river was in this episode but stop and think hasn't everyone had thoughts as she did looking at the crew at some point in their lives, that they didn't belong or everyone else may have been better off without them? or maybe just me.
My favorite part of Brown Coat culture is that there is zero gatekeeping. You've seen Firefly 13 times? Browncoat. Once? Browncoat. Oh, you're on episode 2 and you love it? Browncoat.
"Watched X episodes and not a Browncoat yet? Well, when you get to [my favorite episode], you will be." Which brings up another point. . . it's a crazy sign of how ludicrously good this show is that for having so few episodes, each one is a banger and everyone has their favorite.
@@irrelevant_noobI was there. They started by airing the Train Job, and it felt like I’d missed something despite it being the series premiere. Then, it was impossible to watch consistently since it kept getting pushed around the schedule. It was never going to do well…
Objects in Space is my absolute favorite Firefly episode (one of my favorite tv episodes period, honestly). Summer Glau got to show off how incredibly graceful she is, just floating weightlessly through scenes, being ephemeral but still being a solid character, thoughts and reactions bouncing off of her and moving her along, just another object in space. And the way she was balanced on the railing, listening below the kitchen while the others were talking about her… a crazy silly martial arts-type thing, but so still and strong and connected to the ship. That full bend over to pick up the branch… the frame just her feet, her head and the floor… so good. This whole episode is so good. But yeah, it never aired. The studio probably never saw it, not even to run by the censorship department. Such a loss. Cinematically stunning, but tossed out because of some exec’s ego. But I’m so glad it got made, it exists in the world for people to love. Another object, hanging quietly in space, waiting for someone to find it and latch on.
"Well...here I am." The plaintive lament of all Browncoats, at the end of the series. We all felt just like Jubal Early. Cut adrift, lost, and wondering what's next.
Look at new/novel/interesting TV series and movies "out in the Black." That's how I "got on the Speedy Beaver bus to 'Gravity Falls" and am now in season three of "Amphibia" and season one of "The Owl House."
@@dresdencypher Being Allowed Onboard, and having Permission to Come Aboard are 2 different things. Permission to Come Aboard is a Formal request to the person in charge to be allowed to come aboard a ship. It is a tradition/custom that shows respect.
@@dresdencypher It's important because earlier in the episode, there was an open question as to whether they could risk keeping her on the ship. By her asking permission it shows that she wants to stay, and by Mal granting it, it shows that the decision has been made.
This show is special because you can tell that everyone (except the studio) put their heart into the series. The actors are phenomenal, even all the guest stars brought their A-game, and the behind the scenes crew too. The shots are so unique, the writing is great, the lighting is perfect, costumes, set design, soundtrack and effects, etc etc all top tier. They put so much of themselves into making this what it was and the fans can feel it, that's why we're all still upset decades later
Jewel Staite cannot be praised enough for her acting in this episode. Happy, sadness, curiosity and practically every emotion is fairly easy to emote. But not Terror. To look terrified is very difficult. To look terrified in a long take is VERY difficult. This is why horror films have so many quick cuts. But Jewel Staite sells the terror. The quiver in her voice, the shaking of her body it all sells the terror. Richard Brooks gets a lot of credit for that scene too. His cold delivery sets up Jewel's performance perfectly. I honestly believe Staite was afraid of Brooks in that moment not simply Kaylee was afraid of Early. Her performance really sells how terrifying Early is. I get a shiver every time I see that scene and I've seen it dozens of times. It is that good. People often think the scene went a bit too far especially with the threat of physical violation. But it was necessary because in the end Mal sentences Early to death by slow suffocation. That's a pretty horrific death. Early needed to be a genuine villain to deserve it. And his threats against Kaylee makes Early deserving of that sentence in the minds of the audience.
@@wesleyking6713 Yeah. You can try it yourself. Look at yourself in the mirror and try to look happy or sad or anxious. It's not that hard to hold that look for 30 seconds or more. Now try to look terrified. Try to hold that look for more than a second or two. And then try to speak while maintaining that look of terror. It's not nearly as easy as the other emotions. And the reason is simply. You "practice" looking happy or sad or confused or whatever all of the time. These are emotions everyone feels routinely. How many times have you been at a gathering and pasted a happy smile on your face? How many times have you been at a somber event and maintained a properly serious or sad expression? Terror is just something few people experience more than a couple of times in their lifetime. So, it's not easy for an actor to reproduce. This is why they do such fast cutting in horror films. They'll get a good "terror" look from an actor or actress and use it. But those are usually fairly brief due to the difficulty of maintaining that expression.
@@PenneySounds Yeah, "kill the dog" has become something of a trope lately. But Whedon is a good writer. He knew that if he didn't do something to make Early deserve to die by slow suffocation then the audience might think Mal went too far. I think they set Niska up to be a recurring villain and to receive an ultimately brutal final death when they had him torture Mal and Wash in _War Stories._ You don't want your "heroes" brutally killing the random foe. You want to save those moments for those that deserve it.
I had a choir director who, before we went on stage to start a weekend concert series, asked us, begged us, to be mindful of the moment and to realize how special it is, because it will never come again. I think about that a lot - you can get the exact same singers singing the exact same music in the exact same place with the exact same audience but have it be even 6 months later, and it really would not be the same. It would be different. It would still be good, and maybe even better, but when we talk about that moment in time, you can never get it back. And here we are - with this cast, these writers, this film crew, these stories, these relationships - it's a moment in time that we can never get back. And a thing can still have great meaning and beauty even if doesn't last, and maybe the meaning and beauty are still there because it was so fleeting. I think Firefly was ahead of it's time - even 5 years later, and I think it would have been welcomed with open arms. But then we have the Joss reputation thing, and the actors would have been different. I may be looking at this through hindsight, and maybe trying to rationalize all the events around this show that caused it to be cancelled, but I don't really care. I love this show, and it came at just the right time, because I don't think I want to live in a world where this experience didn't exist. Maybe we sometimes just have to embrace the moments we have and be grateful for them, and I am not saying you or anyone else aren't grateful - that isn't my point. I am just sharing how I deal with this pain. :)
Agreed. So much of what made it so good was the cast chemistry, and that's nigh impossible to replicate exactly. Even if the new cast had their own chemistry, it still wouldn't be the same as the original.
You could maybe get away with a spinoff, maybe something featuring YoSaffBridge as a major character (and who doesn't love Christina Hendricks) but it would take impeccable writing to pull off.
They could have brought it back in the following year or two, perhaps. But now I think it's best just left in its agonizingly incomplete glory. I can't imagine a reboot not being a disaster.
Whats worse is they didn't just cancel it. They basically spat on it, dragged it through the dirt, and then mercilessly slaughtered it in front of the whole line up. And the whole reason why was because they didn't understand it. The way it came about is based on the success of Buffy, and Angel Fox had contacted Joss to create a new show and basically gave him free reign. But after writing and shooting the pilot (the episode, Serenity), they told him it wasn't action-packed enough and gave him the weekend to write a new pilot, so over the weekend him and the writers wrote "The Train Job." After that, they started airing the episodes completely out of order with an irregular schedule confusing the people who loved the show and scaring off a lot of other potential fans. After all this, they moved it to what is known as the "Friday Death Slot" due to low viewership and canceled it without airing "The Message," "Trash," and "Heart Of Gold."
So, with the big revelation that River is psychic, rewatching the show hits different. Especially when Simon examines her brain and realises what was done to her. "She feels everything. She can't not."
And this is why River acts the way she does. This is what she sees, hears and feels ALL THE TIME. They don't realize that she's struggling constantly to sort out what's actually REAL. A stick is actually a gun, a t-shirt is the wrong color, she's reading people but doesn't know which are their conscious intentions and which are meandering background thoughts. Psychic but only after 14 episodes do the people around her realize it's not just INTUITION.
And when Jayne lies about the change of plans, the hologram of her brain lights up and goes crazy right before she screams, showing us her ability in real time and that she knew what was about to happen.
I always found Jubal Early asking "Have you ever been raped?" in such a casual manner to be one of the most unnerving threats I've ever seen in any cinema. Something about his delivery of that line made him such a disturbing villain to me. If something that bad is so off the cuff.... what happens when he really wants to hurt you? When you see the flashes of Jubal's mind, it wasn't looking into his mind as opposed to River's. Its still River looking into the minds of others. She can't choose to shut off her power (they tell you during Ariel that he amygdala has been tampered with so she feels it all), so she's often overwhelmed, as we see in the beginning of the episode. However, when she has purpose, she can use that power to great effect. This is what happens when she chooses to weaponize her power. She looks into his mind and sees exactly how to unnerve him, how to throw him off his balance, how to unfocus him so that his guard is down, when he steps out of the ship. And she looks in and sees exactly how well her plan is working.
Same, that moment made him the scariest villain to me. No emotion, just believable fact that it will happen. Kaylee's real looking fear is gut-wrenching.
"How do you have an episode like this and then CANCEL the show???!!!" Yep, right there with you! I have REALLY enjoyed watching your reactions Jacqui. You are such an awesome person! I look forward to Serenity and many other reactions! 🤗
This was an important scene in part because it STOPPED the idea that River was a Mary Sue who was potentially perfect at everything because she knew everything. As Early (a man who lived violently) knew very well, Simon was awaiting his moment to make a move on Early. River, amazingly, who should know Simon better than anyone, didn't see it coming. His attempt to take out Early was completely unexpected, certainly by Early, even by River, and maybe even by himself. River was as surprised by it as the rest of us. I think that says a lot about how being a part of this crew has changed him. River knows her brother inside out based on the life they shared before this few months on Serenity happened. Already he's become more like Mal, like Zoe, like Book, even like Jayne, than she anticipates. And I love that this idea that characters can change throws a bit of chaos into the plot that renders her amazing predictive powers a little bit imperfect. It makes for a much more interesting story, and would have if the series had gone on.
@@benswoboda2155As a real-time watcher of the series & someone who has been to Serenity premier in LV w/ Browncoats, who has a Firefly tattoo...the FEELS. I saw the Ariel ambulance after Browncoats saved it, I have Firefly chopsticks from the Serenity launch...😊
I was turned on to this show by one of the older men at work. So impressed by his enthusiasm for it I had to buy the series and binge. How did I ever miss this?! To thank him, for Christmas I built and super detailed a model of Serenity, in a display box.
The last 3 episodes were never broadcast. A year or so after the show was cancelled and the DVD came out they were just there. The Browncoats knew they had been filmed but I do not think anyone was sure if they were edited or had special effects done. I also want to point out something that makes the long complicated shots in Serenity possible. The ship was built as two large sets. The bridge, engine room and the other upper section was one set while the cargo bay, passenger rooms and the medical suite was another. There was no need for green screens or to build and tear down sets. They had the whole thing built and planned for shooting from the start. There's a BTS video that shows the crew filming on the set and it shows just how much thought and effort had gone into making this a truly great show to work on and one where quality work could be done on.
The unaired episodes were actually leaked before that, in very poor quality. I remember finding them, after the show was already cancelled, and it felt like finding a long lost treasure. It was bittersweet of course.
The three episodes that didn’t originally air were “Trash,” “The Message,” and “Heart of Gold.” The others aired as follows: “The Train Job” “Bushwhacked” “Our Mrs. Reynolds” “Jaynestown” “Out of Gas” “Shindig” “Safe” “Ariel” “War Stories” “Objects in Space” “Serenity” (the pilot 😳)
The opening is how River's mind-reading abilities manifest to her point of view. She sees people saying things; those things are inner thoughts that she's picking up. Glimpses into their hidden sides. When Mal says "None of it means a damn thing.", that's an expression of his nihilism. The Battle of Serenity Valley broke him deeply; it destroyed his sense of purpose and meaning. Serenity, the ship, and it's crew are Mal's attempt to forge meaning and purpose for himself; staying free, with his found family. But deep inside he still thinks that none of it actually means anything at all; that's why he could never admit to Innara how he feels about her. Because while he does care about her deeply, there's still no meaning to it.
I feel that Jacqui missed the single most important moment in the series, though Out of Gas is the best TV episode I have ever seen, Zoe explaining Serenity Valley to Simon is THE pivotal event! Everything about Mal is explained by the betrayal by his own side....
With River's insight to Book makes me want to know all the more about his real story. His comment was so incongruous to his nature -- it makes me think his entire character was a facade.
The unique methods by Whedon and the DP: He blocked the shots to force accepting the widescreen angle 16:9 instead of the tv standard 4:3 ratios. He also intended to have longer blackout frames to allow the filmmaking to impact the viewers deeper. He learned that as soon as the network detected the total blackness, they would cut to commercial (totally derailing the impact of the episode). The workaround was to find the darkest hue before the automated sensor read it as total black. Whedon secured the rights/patent/ trademark/ whatever so that the network could not adjust the sensor to trigger on the barely not-total black hue. The trend in equipment eas for the newest hi-def digital cameras, and Whedon and the DP opted to sell those and invest in older camera gear that could create lens flares. The music was crafted with purpose as well. Jubal Early had oboe music when he was onscreen. The background music in the snowy funeral scene was written as a eulogy for the show (and the crew cameoed as settlers of St. Albans, including Joss).
They tell you River is a psychic early in the episode which makes you doubt what you know about the world they're in, and then they tell you River became the ship.
Your reactions and comments have helped me see Firefly in ways I never saw it before. Thanks for pointing out all the camera and lighting, and all that stuff. I’m even more in love with the show than I was before.
The camera work in this show has been copied by many shows since. Battlestar Galactica and The Expanse in particular but also J.J. Abrams' Star Trek movies and others.
Thank you so much for sharing your Firefly journey with us! Just remember, the ending of your first watch-through is only the beginning of your second watch-through. Once a Browncoat, forever a Browncoat. See you for Serenity!
Now that it's over, I have to say that your commentary pointed out things I surely noticed but didn't truly appreciate. The cinematography, direction, and thematic decisions you pointed out over the course of these 14 episodes help me appreciate the show even more. It's easy to focus on the characters and writing because they're so good, but it's those elements you have gushed about that bring it together. I also think it's tragically beautiful that the final episode gave us some concrete answers and clear insight into River. The fact they got this episode in before the end allowed them more freedom in the movie, I think.
"If I had an actual brown coat, I would wear it." You had better believe that when I had a chance to see an early screening six months before Serenity's release, I wore a brown coat to the theater.
And here it is, my absolute favorite Firefly episode (and boy there are lots of contenders). Early was a fantastically interesting and complex villain, utterly reprehensible yet strangely endearing, and the directorial shots into River's mind were beautifully done. Thank you for the best set of reactions to Firefly I've seen, and I think I've watched just about every reactor's journey I can find - your combination of insight and empathy, plus your knowledge highlighting parts I'd missed myself, made this a joy to follow along with. Looking forward to Serenity!
I totally think he would have been brought back in future eps, if there had been. And that would have been pretty awesome - the Crew vs him again; and whether there were connectors between what happened to River and him
Reactors make you literally experience it all over again like new through their eyes It's why we all love them And like you I watch EVERY firefly reaction just for that purpose
I really love how you break down the scenes for me , helps me understand a lot that I have over looked . And I love your smile which is very radiant gives me that feeling of the Sun warming me up on a cold winter day . I missed this show
River's bare feet. Summer Glau started out as a ballet dancer. An early scene in the movie, "Serenity", uses a close-up of her bare feet as she's walking; fans commented that she should have gotten the Oscar for "Best Supporting Feet".
The cold open of this show is so creative - seeing the ship from the point of view of River's clairvoyance. Great point you made, that the camera angles reinforce this feeling
9:02 - a VERY popular gif! *WACKY FUN!*🤪 About River taking a knife to Jayne - she wasn't attacking HIM, but the LOGO on his shirt! *BLUE SUN* is the 'bad guys' who are stalking her.
5:20 remember, she feels what _everyone_ feels, as Simon said on Ariel, "she can't not". Also, I think the grating at least in part represents how fractured her mind and perceptions are, all those little holes representing the many pieces of her.
It was a the Fox network. Clearly they should have gotten out of the entertainment industry. They recently lost 785.5 million for their "entertainment" decisions.
My absolute favorite episode. Every bit of dialogue, every bit of character work, every bit of filmmaking style, just flawless. It has been so fun watching you discover this perfect show the past few weeks. I got into Firefly after it was cancelled, but right when it started becoming a cult hit. I went to DragonCon in 2005 and saw a panel with some of the cast, knitted my 9 month old a Jayne hat, all the fan stuff. But yes, this episode has always been the one that feels like a perfect short story, the kind that takes your breath away and won't leave your mind for weeks after, and my reaction after I watched it was pretty much yours here, "How in the world do you cancel a show after an episode like that?!"
Okay... So a couple episodes back during "The Message" I left a comment to take note of Jayne's comment about River being "A mind readin' genius". Yet it was this episode, two episodes later, that they figure out that she is a psychic reader. That is because Objects in Space is not the actual last episode. The Message was actually the last chronological episode. Earlier people mentioned about how the feelings during the funeral and the music was real because they got informed the series was canceled during the filming of the show. But what people also fail to realize is that the Message was actually the last episode. They didn't make two more after being informed of cancellation. People talk about 2 different orders for the episode. There are actually three. The two orders people talk about is the DVD set episode, and the TV air date version and everyone knows the air date version was messed up and showed out of order by the network execs (The pilot episode was the last episode aired for example) What people fail to realize is that the air date out of order was not out of order from the DVD set order... but from the actual chronological intended order. Objects in space actually is much earlier than The Message, which is why Jayne knew that she was psychic in The Message but only found out in Objects in Space. the last 4 episodes were rearranged from his intended order long after Series cancellation when Joss Whedon was putting together the DVD set. So, there is... 1) The chronological intended order (which is the episode production order) 2) The screwed-up Air Date order which the network screwed up 3) Then there is the rearranged DVD set order. Which Whedon created a few years after cancellation. Had the series never been cancelled, the Message would have been episode 14, not Objects in Space (which is Just after Heart of Gold, which itself is just after War Stories. Everything up to War Stories is in the correct order. But then the DVD order goes... War Stories Trash The Message* Heart of Gold Objects in Space* But the actual Chronological order is War Stories Heart of Gold Objects in Space* Trash The Message* Joss did this reordering from what was intended specifically because the show was cancelled. The actual final episode is literally a down beaten funeral. He did not want the series to end on that down note. It was only intended to be a single episode, and more episodes were to come after. But they got cancelled. But Objects in space ended on an upbeat. The final scenes aboard Serenity had a definite "These are the continuing voyages" kind of vibe to it. That even though the show is cancelled, that our ship and her crew continue. So Joss made a conscious decision to swap around Objects in Space and The Message so that the DVD order ended with Objects in Space and not with The Message. But he could not just swap those two by themselves. Each of those episodes are directly connected to the previous episodes. In The Message they referenced trying to fence the Lassiter from Trash. And in Objects in Space they reference Inara's decision to leave made at the end of Heart of Gold. But the reordering does leave a few Anachronistic goofs. Like Jayne knowing she is a mind reading genius before actually finding that out two episodes later.
The6 were also able to switch some scenes around as well. Both within each episode as well as move a scene filmed for one episode into another. Although I've always seen Jayne bitching about River as just him grumbling about nothing. So that mutting can slide under the header "Jayne being Jayne "
OK, I’ll bite… Inara announces “Heart of Gold” that she is leaving Serenity, yet stays on board three additional episodes, despite numerous opportunities to leave, and with no apparent action by Mal to take her to any specific place. Thoughts? Is it possible the episodes were simply filmed a bit out of order?
I don't know if it's still around but there was a website which had interviews with some of the writers where they talked about what was planned but not made. There were WTF things, but the one that really stood out to me as a "wow, I'm really glad it ended before *that* happened" was with Inara. Remember in the pilot when they think the Reavers are going to come on board and Inara opens up a box that has a syringe in it? People assume that she was going to kill herself, rather than die horribly, but that's not what that was. The episode was going to see Inara alone on Serenity when Reavers really did board. She was going to be trapped on there for hours. When the rest of the crew finally get to her they find tens, maybe even hundreds of dead Reavers. Turns out that the syringe was full of a drug given to Companions which they can inject into themselves and which makes anybody who has sex with them die. So Inara kills them all through the power of being gang-raped by hundreds of people. And *that* was going to be the catalyst for Mal actually treating her tenderly. IIRC, the scene was described as him gently picking her up and carrying her, as if the scene would somehow be romantic. Firefly's amazing. And I'm glad it was cancelled when it was, because I think the seeds for it becoming awful were already there. Especially when you consider the problematic elements of Dollhouse, and the subsequent revelations about Whedon himself. So it is what it is, and didn't have the chance to be a let-down.
Actually, IMO one of the most amazing things about Firefly is that it had its feet from the get-go. Many series' first seasons are really pretty lame, as the writers don't know the characters yet and so they pen pretty trite, pretty generic stories at the beginning, and it's only once the characters become defined that they start playing to those strengths. In Firefly, the characters were all whole from the beginning, allowing the show to start at its peak.
you just made me soooo happy! so many reactors DO NOT get this episode, at least on first watch and i feel it is such an important and FAN-FRIGGIN-TASTIC ep and so many are confused by it. I feel it requires...emotional intelligence as a lens to veiw it thru versus critical thinking, u have to FEEL what is happenning 'between the lines' as opposed to trying to reason it out. As much as i love every ep in this series, i think this is my fave. So psychological and cereberal in a way that i get can be hard to grasp but i've always understood it at an emotional level and it is so nice to see someone else get it immediately. I'm sure others have, ur reaction is just the first i've seen. As for Early, i have always thoughf of him as a clever, intuitive psychopath. Never thought of him as similar to River, just clever enough to foresee outcomes. he researched the crew very well and knew how everyone operated...except for River. She is pretty much an unfathomable enigma!
This is my favorite episode because it's so meta. For example, Jubal deals with each one individually based on their fears and weaknesses. The story starts when River gets the gun to fight him, but no touching. Then she had to psyc him out. She won the moment he bought her narrative by calling her Serenity.
Interesting. I never connected the idea of her having the gun with the idea of her knowing that she had an adversary coming. It makes more sense than her just having picked up a gun.
The last voice in the chorus when she opened her eyes I am guessing was Jubal and she didn’t recognize him. So she went searching the ship (psychically imo) for him picking up a gun along the way.
"It's getting very very crowded" as she exits scene. How about this theory. Inara fights with her words. Jubal saw her attack "I know you're tired" and instintively hits her and makes a remark of how he is stronger than her.
@@sean---the-other-one - yeah i don't think i ever connected before that what woke river up was the unfamiliar voice coming into her head. .. and then she goes looking for the source... finds a gun just in case... and comments 'it's getting very crowded in here".. because there's one more now than there was and so many overlapping thoughts for her.
Expanding on your thoughts about the camera angles: a lot of the camera angles around River in that opening are completely unique. Directly overhead, through the grates, under the stairs. To me, that's showing that she literally sees the world differently than everyone else. And in a funny way, this connects her to Early, because he also thinks about "objects in space" in a completely unique way.
Fox in the 00s had such a horrible reputation for creating the exact scenarios that left everyone saying "HOW?!?!?" both in how they could dare to cancel the series, or how could they meddle and destroy a show.
That was unfortunately due to a management change up that happened around that same time. Several of the executives who signed off on shows like Firefly were pushed out and the executives who replaced them instead sought to sabotage those shows in favor of their own programing (which included far too much reality show crap).
Such a horrible reputation, indeed. It was incredibly validating for me when Family Guy pointed it out during the first cold open after they were uncanceled.
They hadn't actually filmed this episode when they got cancelled. They were filming "The Message" when word came down. Shot the funeral scene at the end right after getting the news.
To me this brilliant episode, definitely my favorite after all these years, still feels like an ending. But more in a poetic way. There's so much to think about afterwards and the atmosphere keeps lingering. And finally River is also part of 'the family', the look of admiration in Mal's eyes outside the ship showed that.
Fox: Let's market it poorly, skip the pilot, air it out of order, and skip some episodes entirely. Also Fox: Why aren't we getting viewers? Cancel it before word of mouth can happen!
@@simonmunden5046 And the fun part is that by the time they did all this to Firefly they already had a track record for pulling exactly this to a ton of other great shows. Every time there's something great coming from Fox people were afraid it would come to this, and rightfully so. Luckily, Fox doesn't do great shows anymore, so they can't cancel them. That's Netflix' job now.... 🤮
Every time that I rewatch this episode I am reminded that it is possibly one of the best hours of television ever produced. And it hurts my heart more and more each time. I appreciate your commentary so much. You nailed it.
One of the most heartbreaking bits of trivia I learned, was that the scene where Mal tells Simon that it is a good day because they are still flying.. was actually one of the very last scenes shot for the show, and it was shot after they found out they had been cancelled.. so Natha Fillion mentioned how bittersweet working on that scene was.. because he KNEW they weren't "still flying".. and was heartbroken.. but still needed to deliver that line with the proper heart and hope it deserved.
I've enjoyed watching this series with you. I love a lot of the episodes but this one was always my favorite, which made it even more heartbreaking that it was the last episode. This one felt like it was a huge leap forward in the series' overall storyline and REALLY left me wanting more. re: River talked about Christmas in Ariel - she said "They took Christmas away". She was talking about the police reneging on the reward they offered Jayne - they took away the reward that he was promised and only left him "coal". If you rewatch that monologue it is INCREDIBLY pertinent to the situation that the characters are currently in, but using metaphor for the disappointment Jayne was feeling. I've read that Jubal Early was the name of a Confederate ancestor of Nathan Fillion, who happened to be deaf in one ear, hence the character mis-hearing things that were said to him in the episode. They definitely wanted to make him strange (licking the ship), his philosophical musings. I've read that they intended for Serenity to be a character in the show and they had River in constant direct contact with the ship to try to create that impression - walking barefoot through the ship, tracing her hands along the walls of the ship as she passed through it. Your observations based on your film studies have been fantastic and quite frankly I wish you would record a watch-through all of the episodes again just so I could hear your analysis when you aren't trying to also follow the storyline. Thank you for reacting to this series and I look forward to your reaction to the film Serenity. I'm as sorry as you are that your experience with this series is coming to an end.
Oh Lordy! Reading your comment suddenly gave me a very unexpected insight into River, which I admit may or may not be true, but if it is... *!* When you said "River talked about Christmas in Ariel - she said "They took Christmas away". She was talking about the police reneging on the reward they offered Jayne - they took away the reward that he was promised and only left him "coal." For some reason I suddenly thought "That's how you would talk to a child." Then I remembered Simon talking about how extraordinarily intelligent River is. How she was correcting his spelling at the age of three. How she wrote coded letters pleading for help. How she did the math in her head to kill Niska's goons with her eyes closed. How she says that Simon needs a lot of "taking care of". What if River has become so intelligent and aware psychically that all the people around her are like children to her?? o_0 🤯
Jubal's manerisms are interesting. He mishears people, his mind wanders and he get's confused, yet he's deeply threatning without raising his voice or physically asserting violence. If the show ever had a season 2, he totally should have come back.
Part of me has always wondered if his thoughts and responses weren't being messed with by River with some of her "powers". Example: "Am I a lion"? "I said Alliance". "Hmm that's weird". Much love and keep on keepin on J.
Yep I agree he would have come back in a later episode. He probably had set up a contingency plan where he says a code word over his comms like "Well here I am" and his ship comes to his location.
This show was a unicorn. Writing, Acting, Direction, Camera, Art, Sound, Score, Wardrobe, Continuity, Character Development, Humor, Darkness, World Building - Real - feels lived in. This show had it all and that was lightning that will never strike twice. Love this show and everything about it.
@@WasabiBomb I'm with you about a reboot. I am torn though with thoughts of a series that happens after the movie. If they had done so when the actors age would not have been too much of a factor would have been nice. Now though with so much time, maybe something 15-20 years later and focusing more on Wash and Zoe's child(a reveal that she was pregnant during the movie), a child or two from Kaylee and Simon. Could have the original cast in still on Serenity. Perhaps have the older cast retired with cameos and River is now the Captain of Serenity. Perhaps River and the younger main cast on their own ship and Serenity just makes appearances with the older cast now and then. I think there is a lot they COULD do without rebooting.
Yeah, reboot isn't possible. Even if you do a time skip. Most of the cast would be willing, but you would have to do a time skip. You couldn't start from square one. Not with Summer's age. She would already have gone through whatever program the alliance had planned. Jewel I don't think would be willing at this point. She doesn't like strawberries FYI, if you see her at a comiccon, don't give her one. She is Jewel, not Kaylee. I think that's her mindset at this point, wanting to move on and not live in the past. I can completely understand and respect that. She still seems to love the cast like family though. That hasn't change. All that being said. Recasting isn't an option either, that cast was lightning in a bottle and any attempt to recast would have them all living in the OG casts shadow of comparison. I wouldn't wish that on any actor. Not faced with a room of die-hard Browncoats. Most are the sweetest people you'll meet, but we've spent ALOT of time with that original cast and content. I worry what backlash would happen to a whole new cast trying to jump into that universe to tell it's tale, or worse attempt to replace the shoes of the original cast.
@@yevaud6 Agreed. Why I think just having the setting years after Serenity to account for the actors ages. Then introduce new characters. I think it would be awesome to have Zoe and Wash's child in it. Why I also think you can add child(ren) of Kaylee and Simon. - Whether you put that cast on a new ship and the show have the name of that ship, or you have Serenity inherited by River and a new cast, with the older cast retired or doing cameos. If River has a new ship and crew, they can still have Serenity do cameos with Mal and crew older. I think it could be successful.
The sound design is also on point here. The "Serenity hum" stops every time River has a... read. It just accentuates the otherness. With Wash and Zoe there is a wave as well. So good.
When Mal woke up in his cabin and spoke to 'Serenity', Summer Glau was sitting off camera on an apple crate reading her lines in response to his acting. (Notice his reaction when she said "Don't make faces".)
You earned the title of a Browncoat back in episode one. It is rare that we see a reactor who does not enjoy or appreciate the series that has become so close to our hearts! I enjoyed every single reaction from you, Jacqui ❤️
Some people always makes a connection between River and the Bounty Hunter (Jubal Early) since they both have mannerisms, but I highly doubt that they do. Had Jubal been a reader like River then Rivers whole plan would have fallen flat immediately. It is far more likely that his mannerisms are a combination of him being a psychopath and suffering from cabin fever from being all alone in space in that tiny space ship of his for endless time (which is a contrast with the crew of Firefly that is a whole family).
Part of what makes this show what it is, is the ensemble cast...these actors all love each other and their characters and I doubt that they could ever find a group as talented or passionate as this one in a reboot.
I'm a screen addict. Loved TV my whole life. So when I say this show was my peak experience, I think that you understand and sympathize. When I discovered that they had canceled THIS series, I unplugged my TV, and I've not plugged it back in since. Yes I moved my addiction sideways, and have been an internet addict since then. But my rage at the assinine decision, is indescribable, and was life altering. Not in a way that I would describe as good, or healthy. Thank you for having and expressing some portion of my permanent pain over this loss.
It really was criminal what they did to this fantastic, brilliant show. One of the greatest shows ever made, without a shadow of doubt. Everybody involved really should have all been sacked.
Just in passing: look at Kaylee's expressions during the whole episode, from the moment when she's truly afraid of River with that gun to the moment she looks down, ashamed of having doubt her friend as she hears the words of suffering through the intercom. I have no words to say just how moving I found Kaylee's slow but beautiful character growth in this episode.
My 4 favorite episodes (in no ranked order given) are: "Out of Gas", "Ariel", "War Stories", & "Objects in Space". EPISODE DISCUSSION: *River understands but she does not comprehend.* -- River was very aware of Jubal Early from the very beginning. Among the voices at the beginning scene where she woke up, she heard Jubal's voice. She broke into Jayne's storage and got Jayne's gun to "take care of Jubal". She was intercepted and told by Mal "No Guns". So she adapted a new plan to "take care of Jubal without guns". She even told Zoe "No Guns!" Jubal didn't stand a chance. -- Jubal Early is a great villain. He enjoys scaring people by behaving unstable while threatening them. River turned the tables by doing the same thing on him. First she let him know she was unstable. Jubal was surprised that River was able to hack his codes and get into his ship. Then River mentioned playing with his ship's buttons (weapons systems, perhaps?) which put real fear into him. -- Mal allows Jubal to turn around to face him before shoving him out into space. (No sneak attack from behind - callback to the pilot episode when Mal told Simon "If I were going to kill you, you would be armed and facing me"). --River to Mal: "Permission to come aboard?" This is the first time River was officially invited aboard Serenity. Until this moment she was technically still a stowaway. I find this dialog significant because she had been feeling like an unwanted burden. Now she is officially accepted & welcome by Mal, just like the rest of the crew. -- River was also able to patch up the rift with Kaylee. It was nice to see them playing together again. -- My speculation agreed with yours. I believe Jubal was intended to be another recurring villain. His suit had ship remote controls built in. He just needed time to fix the reprogramming River had done to his ship while "playing with the interesting buttons".
28:44 - *"HOW!!?!???!"* Easy. They never gave this masterpiece a glance, much less a second look. They tossed away the diamond in the rough before realizing its true value. And they told everyone the show was cancelled WHILE they were shooting this episode. Heartless gorram ... [mutters in bad Chinese]
@@primmoore6232 to be clear -- the show team literally found out while shooting _the message_ that it was the last episode they would ever shoot. the team then edited the last few episodes in post-production, reordering them and moving scenes, because they thought _the message_ would be a horrible note to end on.
this episode upholds a long-standing tradition of... if joss writes and directs... you're really gonna get something special! LOVE the surreal vibe of this one ♡
I remember actor Richard Brooks, who played "ADA Paul Robinette" in the early days of "Law and Order" before "moving to the dark side" as a defense attorney. If the "streaming video" companies tried to "re-spool" "Firefly," he could slip in as "Shepherd Early" after his "lost in space" experience.
28:36 Feeling like we all did at the time 😂 The joy we felt when we found out there was going to be a movie was indescribable. I saw that movie five times in the theater, and again a few years ago when it played again in my city. Browcoats never die. No power in the verse can stop us!
Fun "fact": Popular fan theory has it that Early would have been a recurring antagonist. He would have survived this episode because his last words weren't just him randomly talking, but a verbal code that would call his ship to him. Which is notable because previous episodes have shown that spaceships are VALUABLE. Logically speaking, the Serenity crew should have kept Early's ship, ensuring he dies to running out of air and making a nice bit of cash from selling his ship. Well unless fencing a hot spaceship would have drawn unwanted attention...
I did always think "You are throwing away his SPACESHIP?" For a crew that was always just barely scraping by (if that), not salvaging his spaceship just doesn't make sense. Surely there would be some disreputable individual that would give them something for it.
@@Educated2Extinction Not to mention the potential of some allies that may have reoccurred along the way - Sheriff Bourne, Sir Warwick Harrow, Murphy? (gentleman who defends Kaylee at the party) and Monty. The crew were building up a few useful friends along the way that may also have returned.
@@dargron7614 You kind of see a stop along that path in serenity: they have several "save havens", from friends they made along the way. It's easy to assume that all those that are mentioned in serenity would've had some role to play, had the series gone on longer. After all, the big points of serenity would've been season 2 or 3 finale. So [the bad guy] would do [what he did in serenity] to characters we've known, instead of places they just mentioned.
Your reactions to this series have been EPIC! I loved every single one. So many of your reactions absolutely mirrored mine on a deep level. Thank you so much.
Great reaction and honest. I feel this was Joss' Opus. You hit on it when you said "look at River. She's looking at it like it's a globe". The philosophical part of this episode is that when you really think about it, even on a planet we are all just "objects in space". The other delectable part of this episode is the insight to River's mind. Since none of us are psychic this was a fantastic theory on what it might look like inside her mind. Final thought not a SINGLE DAMN ONE OF Us didn't want to kill him after that line with Kaylee... Much love and keep on keepin on J.
I think you'd really appreciate Joss Whedon's DVD commentary for this episode. The whole thing is just him explaining the underlying meaning to it all for 45 minutes, and it gets quite abstract and philosophical. Since you enjoyed the episode so much anyway, and have so much interest in the creative choices and technical processes involved, hearing him explain what he was trying to do with it will add a whole new level.
You can never stop the signal because people like you always finding this show and become a fan . As much as we, the browncoats watched it and fell in love with the crew. I'm glad you enjoyed it. Shiney!😊
Mal and River cement their relationship in Serenity. Mal shows how Serenity is a family. Like in Lilo and Stitch; "family means no one is left behind".
SERENITY will be coming this Friday, and I'm planning a bunch of movies going forward! (Yes...ALIENS will be one of them 😅) FALLOUT starts on Wednesday, and I'm hoping to start posting ARCANE next week, getting ready for season 2! Thank you for sticking around for Firefly! I've loved every second of this experience with you guys ❤ Stay shiny, Browncoats!
Oh hell yeah, looking forward to your Fallout reactions. I'm a giant fan of the games, and I loved it. It was as good an adaptation of that world as I could have possibly hoped for. The aesthetic and tone was absolutely NAILED.
You can't stop the signal, Red. See ya starside ❤
Shiny! I start a week-long vacation on Friday and I'm hard-pressed to think of a better way to kick it off. Cheers and salutations, M'Lady, no power in the 'Verse can stop you. 🥃☮❤
Castle, with cpt Mal, was also a fun and actually a very good show, at least first few seasons, and it had a bunch of Firefly easter eggs...
Yay! Arcane is so good, I ignored it for a long time because "ewww League of Legends". Wow was I wrong.
Stages of a Browncoat
1. Watch the series
2. Watch the movie
3. Rewatch the series several times
4. Read the comics
5. Rewatch your favorite episodes when you have nothing else to watch
6. Find youtube videos of people watching the series for the first time so you can experience the series again through the eyes of a newcomer
8. watch all behind the scenes and "about the show" stuff, also commentary tracks.
9. watch 10 years of all comic-con panels of Joss and The Crew (with a lot of Nathan and Jewel pranking each other).
10. Watch Dr. Horrible's sing along blog.
@@neolynxer Touche!
11. Randomly google search if anything new is planned for the franchise
12. Buy the comics and the books, too...
Rewatch favourite episodes? You mean all of them? Pretty sure that's how it goes.
Never read the comics. My brain just doesn't grok the graphic novel format.
This is my 4th dip into watching the show again for the first time thanks to these wacky reaction things.
@@DTavona 13. Find videos of allusions to Firefly in other series (for instance the many found in Castle).
I think the coolest detail here is that during River's mind reading sequence, Kaylee is the only person she doesn't see anything with because Kaylee is always her authentic self
That's a nice to think of it, no secrets!
Wash and Zoey were also being their authentic selves. In that moment.
That and what was running through Kaylee's mind at that moment probably could not be shown on network TV
Never thought of that. Excellent point. It's a perfect reason why we love Kaylee.
No, watch her face in that shot. It's stern, because (a) she is now scared of River because of the previous incident, and (b) loves Simon and understands how River's problem hurt him.
14 episodes, 1 movie and a lifetime of withdrawal - welcome to being a browncoat!!! 🎉 😊😢🎉
One of us. One of us.
Your coat looks kinda brown.
Things called Graphic Novels do exist y'know.
@@DrJohnnyFever. It was on sale.
Facts
This made a better finale episode than some people seem to realize. It was significant and highly symbolic that River formally requested and received the Captain's permission to come aboard the ship - it's an old seafaring tradition. She ceased to be a burden, and became a part of the crew.
Agreed
Yeah, I’ve always found it very fitting.
Well, she *did* start off as a stowaway, after all
@@RJ3040 Is someone a stowaway if s/he is not aware that s/he is illegally inside a ship? Isn't River a "smuggled person" instead?
@@Asehpe She was literally stowed away, though
People before they watch firefly : "How can a show be that good if it got cancelled after half a season?"
People after they watch firefly : "How can a show be cancelled if it got that good after half a season?"
I believe the fact that it got cancelled almost entirely due to internal FOX politics/sabotage began my utter hatred for FOX. The last couple decades just solidified that it I was right to heap disdain on them for so long.
@@miwright21 I'm gonna assume you are alluding to Rupert Murdoch and his effect on the 'news' channel. Obviously no direct correlation, but they've had their fair share of head office issues of all kinds. Points to a hell of a lot of incompetence at the very least.
@@miwright21 Angel season 6 got cancelled due to internal Fox politics too. Fox even said after that it was a mistake made in the heat of the moment that they regretted.
But hey, they kept American Idol so....not all bad right?
So much /s
@@miwright21 If you ever saw the episode of Family Guy after Fox brought it back, Peter lists all of the shows that Fox had canceled in the previous 2 years or so, and it was a HUGE list. Fox has a long history of "trying out" shows, but also of quickly canceling them if they don't pull in huge ratings. As strong as we all feel about Firefly, the truth is that Firefly was just one on a very, VERY long list of other shows that Fox canceled. And, look more recently at The Orville - another Sci-Fi show that Fox canceled, even though the ratings were good and it was produced by one of their biggest money-makers (Seth McFarlane).
I think we all know that Firefly would have grown a huge audience had it been given a couple of seasons to do so, but Fox has never been the kind of studio to be that patient. They were never a big supporter of SciFi shows even though they've green-lighted many of them. So, as much as we'd like to feel that Firefly was specifically targeted, there's plenty of evidence to show that Firefly simply succumbed to standard procedure at Fox TV - like dozen and dozens of others.
My favorite scene in a strange way is when River tells Mal, “go now!” and he doesn’t hesitate. Mal trusts his crew.
I've always felt that Mal and River are connected in some way. We get a glimpse of it when book is shot and rivers faltered. It was Mals distress theater tripped her up. We'll see it again in serenity.
The dude who played the bounty hunter was fucking amazing. He walked into this series 14 episodes deep, a series FILLED with amazing humongous personalities, and he stole the show.
That would be Richard Brooks, a multi-talented performer and producer who came to notice through the first seasons of the original Law and Order TV series.
Does that seem right to you?
Well at least he stole something, because he failed at stealing River
Yeah, Richard Brooks's talent is no joke.
@@Vershond How can you steal a River? The more you tighten your grip, the more the water flows around it...
"They weren't cows inside. They were waiting to be, but they forgot. Now they see sky, and they remember what they are."
This is what it meant when people say "touch grass". Because when we stay indoors, we're reduced to ego, when we go outside and into nature, we become fully human again.
Maybe my favorite quote in the entire series...
"Is it strange that I understand what she means?"
I heard Jewel Staite say on a podcast recently that it only took 6 months to shoot the episodes for the series. Its crazy that 6 months of their lives has had such a massive impact for so many years to come. 🤯
I saw that same interview (with Katie Sackhoff) and I thought, damn, I bet the cast has spent more time at conventions, in interviews, etc talking about being in Firefly than the actual amount of time spent shooting Firefly.
I saw that interview with Katee Sackoff. It made me pause. It was only 6 months of their lives and it changed TV. It made the audience expect and demand better content.
you talk about how river was in this episode but stop and think hasn't everyone had thoughts as she did looking at the crew at some point in their lives, that they didn't belong or everyone else may have been better off without them? or maybe just me.
How do people on youtube end up replying in a completely wrong thread? What the fork?
@@nfboogaard Fat thumb syndrome
My favorite part of Brown Coat culture is that there is zero gatekeeping. You've seen Firefly 13 times? Browncoat. Once? Browncoat. Oh, you're on episode 2 and you love it? Browncoat.
When we are all subject to the torture of not having any more Firefly, there’s no reason to beat each other up!
@@TheAdventuresOfBlink well there is that one joke
"Watched X episodes and not a Browncoat yet? Well, when you get to [my favorite episode], you will be."
Which brings up another point. . . it's a crazy sign of how ludicrously good this show is that for having so few episodes, each one is a banger and everyone has their favorite.
@@chaosminer65vodsTOO SOON!
Welcome to the fellowship of Browncoats. Membership dues: 10 Hours and 57 Minutes of bliss all for a lifetime of withdrawl.
Damn... that's a critical truth!
"WHY DID THEY CANCEL THIS???"
Early: "Strains the mind a bit, don't it?"
Eh, the ratings were poor... They couldn't not be.
Ratings were actually good. Fox Executives during this time were idiots. @@irrelevant_noob
It was 'canceled' before it aired. Moving it from slot to slot, night to night. Out of sequence. FOX wanted this dead.
@@irrelevant_noobI was there. They started by airing the Train Job, and it felt like I’d missed something despite it being the series premiere.
Then, it was impossible to watch consistently since it kept getting pushed around the schedule.
It was never going to do well…
"How do you have an episode like this and then cancel the show?" yeah 20 plus years later and we're all still pissed off and questioning that.
Answer... the show was canceled during filming of episode 12.. but 13 & 14 were far enough along they were allowed to finish the half season.
Objects in Space is my absolute favorite Firefly episode (one of my favorite tv episodes period, honestly). Summer Glau got to show off how incredibly graceful she is, just floating weightlessly through scenes, being ephemeral but still being a solid character, thoughts and reactions bouncing off of her and moving her along, just another object in space. And the way she was balanced on the railing, listening below the kitchen while the others were talking about her… a crazy silly martial arts-type thing, but so still and strong and connected to the ship. That full bend over to pick up the branch… the frame just her feet, her head and the floor… so good. This whole episode is so good.
But yeah, it never aired. The studio probably never saw it, not even to run by the censorship department. Such a loss. Cinematically stunning, but tossed out because of some exec’s ego. But I’m so glad it got made, it exists in the world for people to love. Another object, hanging quietly in space, waiting for someone to find it and latch on.
"Well...here I am."
The plaintive lament of all Browncoats, at the end of the series. We all felt just like Jubal Early. Cut adrift, lost, and wondering what's next.
That line reminds me of the quote "No matter where you go, there you are."
Look at new/novel/interesting TV series and movies "out in the Black." That's how I "got on the Speedy Beaver bus to 'Gravity Falls" and am now in season three of "Amphibia" and season one of "The Owl House."
@@hua_man
"The Deuce you say!"
Love that! Very true.
Exactly 💯
Doc: "I can't keep track her when she's not incorporeally possessing a space ship"
21:15
Until that last moment... River never had "permission to come aboard" as she arrived as cargo.
She left the ship several times since then and went back on. So she had permission to
@@dresdencypher Being Allowed Onboard, and having Permission to Come Aboard are 2 different things. Permission to Come Aboard is a Formal request to the person in charge to be allowed to come aboard a ship. It is a tradition/custom that shows respect.
@@dresdencypherbut this was the first time she asked permission to come aboard.
@@phobiaone306 I don’t remember that being something given to everyone else so I’m unsure why it’s so important
@@dresdencypher It's important because earlier in the episode, there was an open question as to whether they could risk keeping her on the ship. By her asking permission it shows that she wants to stay, and by Mal granting it, it shows that the decision has been made.
We all just witnessed Jaqui go through every emotion we've all felt about _Firefly_ being cancelled... all at once.
This show is special because you can tell that everyone (except the studio) put their heart into the series. The actors are phenomenal, even all the guest stars brought their A-game, and the behind the scenes crew too. The shots are so unique, the writing is great, the lighting is perfect, costumes, set design, soundtrack and effects, etc etc all top tier. They put so much of themselves into making this what it was and the fans can feel it, that's why we're all still upset decades later
"Curse their sudden but inevitable betrayal!" That line hits different once you finish the series.
"Take my love, take my land..."
Fox Execs: Don't mind if we do!
Jewel Staite cannot be praised enough for her acting in this episode. Happy, sadness, curiosity and practically every emotion is fairly easy to emote. But not Terror. To look terrified is very difficult. To look terrified in a long take is VERY difficult. This is why horror films have so many quick cuts.
But Jewel Staite sells the terror. The quiver in her voice, the shaking of her body it all sells the terror. Richard Brooks gets a lot of credit for that scene too. His cold delivery sets up Jewel's performance perfectly. I honestly believe Staite was afraid of Brooks in that moment not simply Kaylee was afraid of Early. Her performance really sells how terrifying Early is. I get a shiver every time I see that scene and I've seen it dozens of times. It is that good.
People often think the scene went a bit too far especially with the threat of physical violation. But it was necessary because in the end Mal sentences Early to death by slow suffocation. That's a pretty horrific death. Early needed to be a genuine villain to deserve it. And his threats against Kaylee makes Early deserving of that sentence in the minds of the audience.
Yes. Cannot say it better, nor can I add. A perfect comment.
It's like when movies have a villain kill a dog. The whole audience goes "Okay. He dies."
I hadn't thought about it before, but I think you might be right about conveying terror. Good food for thought. Thanks.
@@wesleyking6713 Yeah. You can try it yourself. Look at yourself in the mirror and try to look happy or sad or anxious. It's not that hard to hold that look for 30 seconds or more. Now try to look terrified. Try to hold that look for more than a second or two. And then try to speak while maintaining that look of terror. It's not nearly as easy as the other emotions.
And the reason is simply. You "practice" looking happy or sad or confused or whatever all of the time. These are emotions everyone feels routinely. How many times have you been at a gathering and pasted a happy smile on your face? How many times have you been at a somber event and maintained a properly serious or sad expression?
Terror is just something few people experience more than a couple of times in their lifetime. So, it's not easy for an actor to reproduce.
This is why they do such fast cutting in horror films. They'll get a good "terror" look from an actor or actress and use it. But those are usually fairly brief due to the difficulty of maintaining that expression.
@@PenneySounds Yeah, "kill the dog" has become something of a trope lately. But Whedon is a good writer. He knew that if he didn't do something to make Early deserve to die by slow suffocation then the audience might think Mal went too far.
I think they set Niska up to be a recurring villain and to receive an ultimately brutal final death when they had him torture Mal and Wash in _War Stories._
You don't want your "heroes" brutally killing the random foe. You want to save those moments for those that deserve it.
I had a choir director who, before we went on stage to start a weekend concert series, asked us, begged us, to be mindful of the moment and to realize how special it is, because it will never come again. I think about that a lot - you can get the exact same singers singing the exact same music in the exact same place with the exact same audience but have it be even 6 months later, and it really would not be the same. It would be different. It would still be good, and maybe even better, but when we talk about that moment in time, you can never get it back.
And here we are - with this cast, these writers, this film crew, these stories, these relationships - it's a moment in time that we can never get back. And a thing can still have great meaning and beauty even if doesn't last, and maybe the meaning and beauty are still there because it was so fleeting. I think Firefly was ahead of it's time - even 5 years later, and I think it would have been welcomed with open arms. But then we have the Joss reputation thing, and the actors would have been different. I may be looking at this through hindsight, and maybe trying to rationalize all the events around this show that caused it to be cancelled, but I don't really care. I love this show, and it came at just the right time, because I don't think I want to live in a world where this experience didn't exist.
Maybe we sometimes just have to embrace the moments we have and be grateful for them, and I am not saying you or anyone else aren't grateful - that isn't my point. I am just sharing how I deal with this pain. :)
Beautifully said!
Firefly was lightening in a bottle. A reboot would never measure up the same way a Buffy reboot wouldn't.
💯 a reboot would only ruin the original work. No thanks
Agreed. So much of what made it so good was the cast chemistry, and that's nigh impossible to replicate exactly. Even if the new cast had their own chemistry, it still wouldn't be the same as the original.
You could maybe get away with a spinoff, maybe something featuring YoSaffBridge as a major character (and who doesn't love Christina Hendricks) but it would take impeccable writing to pull off.
Don't know about a reboot. How about a spin-off? Pick it up from "Firefly: Brand New Verse"?
They could have brought it back in the following year or two, perhaps. But now I think it's best just left in its agonizingly incomplete glory. I can't imagine a reboot not being a disaster.
Whats worse is they didn't just cancel it. They basically spat on it, dragged it through the dirt, and then mercilessly slaughtered it in front of the whole line up. And the whole reason why was because they didn't understand it. The way it came about is based on the success of Buffy, and Angel Fox had contacted Joss to create a new show and basically gave him free reign. But after writing and shooting the pilot (the episode, Serenity), they told him it wasn't action-packed enough and gave him the weekend to write a new pilot, so over the weekend him and the writers wrote "The Train Job." After that, they started airing the episodes completely out of order with an irregular schedule confusing the people who loved the show and scaring off a lot of other potential fans. After all this, they moved it to what is known as the "Friday Death Slot" due to low viewership and canceled it without airing "The Message," "Trash," and "Heart Of Gold."
So, with the big revelation that River is psychic, rewatching the show hits different. Especially when Simon examines her brain and realises what was done to her.
"She feels everything. She can't not."
A psyker that cant wall off every emotion and memory, even every emotion and memory of those around her.
And this is why River acts the way she does. This is what she sees, hears and feels ALL THE TIME. They don't realize that she's struggling constantly to sort out what's actually REAL. A stick is actually a gun, a t-shirt is the wrong color, she's reading people but doesn't know which are their conscious intentions and which are meandering background thoughts. Psychic but only after 14 episodes do the people around her realize it's not just INTUITION.
So well said! @@duanevp
i knew she was psychic the very first time I watched the series. so many obvious clues in teh show.
And when Jayne lies about the change of plans, the hologram of her brain lights up and goes crazy right before she screams, showing us her ability in real time and that she knew what was about to happen.
I always found Jubal Early asking "Have you ever been raped?" in such a casual manner to be one of the most unnerving threats I've ever seen in any cinema. Something about his delivery of that line made him such a disturbing villain to me. If something that bad is so off the cuff.... what happens when he really wants to hurt you?
When you see the flashes of Jubal's mind, it wasn't looking into his mind as opposed to River's. Its still River looking into the minds of others. She can't choose to shut off her power (they tell you during Ariel that he amygdala has been tampered with so she feels it all), so she's often overwhelmed, as we see in the beginning of the episode. However, when she has purpose, she can use that power to great effect. This is what happens when she chooses to weaponize her power. She looks into his mind and sees exactly how to unnerve him, how to throw him off his balance, how to unfocus him so that his guard is down, when he steps out of the ship. And she looks in and sees exactly how well her plan is working.
Same, that moment made him the scariest villain to me. No emotion, just believable fact that it will happen. Kaylee's real looking fear is gut-wrenching.
I just love how Shepherd Book and Jayne are workout buddies!
Who else has the patience to spend time with Jayne?
"How do you have an episode like this and then CANCEL the show???!!!" Yep, right there with you! I have REALLY enjoyed watching your reactions Jacqui. You are such an awesome person! I look forward to Serenity and many other reactions! 🤗
The corollary to "How do you have an episode like this and then CANCEL the show???!!!" is: Why can't I hit that 'Like' button fifteen more times??!
"I'll be your bounty, Jubal Early." - one of the most heartbreaking lines in science fiction history.
I don't disagree on any particular point, but her saying, "I'll just fade away", always hit me a little bit harder.
This was an important scene in part because it STOPPED the idea that River was a Mary Sue who was potentially perfect at everything because she knew everything. As Early (a man who lived violently) knew very well, Simon was awaiting his moment to make a move on Early. River, amazingly, who should know Simon better than anyone, didn't see it coming.
His attempt to take out Early was completely unexpected, certainly by Early, even by River, and maybe even by himself. River was as surprised by it as the rest of us. I think that says a lot about how being a part of this crew has changed him. River knows her brother inside out based on the life they shared before this few months on Serenity happened. Already he's become more like Mal, like Zoe, like Book, even like Jayne, than she anticipates. And I love that this idea that characters can change throws a bit of chaos into the plot that renders her amazing predictive powers a little bit imperfect. It makes for a much more interesting story, and would have if the series had gone on.
"I'm a leaf on the wind."
@@benswoboda2155As a real-time watcher of the series & someone who has been to Serenity premier in LV w/ Browncoats, who has a Firefly tattoo...the FEELS. I saw the Ariel ambulance after Browncoats saved it, I have Firefly chopsticks from the Serenity launch...😊
The Dark Lord of the Sith, Lord Vader, would like to throw his four word sentence into consideration… 😝
I was turned on to this show by one of the older men at work. So impressed by his enthusiasm for it I had to buy the series and binge. How did I ever miss this?! To thank him, for Christmas I built and super detailed a model of Serenity, in a display box.
Great gift!
Awesome! What a great gift!
The last 3 episodes were never broadcast. A year or so after the show was cancelled and the DVD came out they were just there. The Browncoats knew they had been filmed but I do not think anyone was sure if they were edited or had special effects done.
I also want to point out something that makes the long complicated shots in Serenity possible. The ship was built as two large sets. The bridge, engine room and the other upper section was one set while the cargo bay, passenger rooms and the medical suite was another. There was no need for green screens or to build and tear down sets. They had the whole thing built and planned for shooting from the start. There's a BTS video that shows the crew filming on the set and it shows just how much thought and effort had gone into making this a truly great show to work on and one where quality work could be done on.
Actually the last three episodes were aired on the Sci-Fi Channel before all of the episodes were released on DVD.
Almost. Objects in Space was aired. The 3 episodes before it were not.
@@Madbandit77 I think you're talking about them being shown on the UK channel. The Sci-Fi channel airing happened years after the DVD release.
The unaired episodes were actually leaked before that, in very poor quality. I remember finding them, after the show was already cancelled, and it felt like finding a long lost treasure. It was bittersweet of course.
The three episodes that didn’t originally air were “Trash,” “The Message,” and “Heart of Gold.”
The others aired as follows:
“The Train Job”
“Bushwhacked”
“Our Mrs. Reynolds”
“Jaynestown”
“Out of Gas”
“Shindig”
“Safe”
“Ariel”
“War Stories”
“Objects in Space”
“Serenity” (the pilot 😳)
The irony of the last words of this series being "Well, here I am." is not lost on me.
No matter where you go, there you are.
The opening is how River's mind-reading abilities manifest to her point of view. She sees people saying things; those things are inner thoughts that she's picking up. Glimpses into their hidden sides.
When Mal says "None of it means a damn thing.", that's an expression of his nihilism. The Battle of Serenity Valley broke him deeply; it destroyed his sense of purpose and meaning. Serenity, the ship, and it's crew are Mal's attempt to forge meaning and purpose for himself; staying free, with his found family. But deep inside he still thinks that none of it actually means anything at all; that's why he could never admit to Innara how he feels about her. Because while he does care about her deeply, there's still no meaning to it.
Thank you for this perspective
I feel that Jacqui missed the single most important moment in the series, though Out of Gas is the best TV episode I have ever seen, Zoe explaining Serenity Valley to Simon is THE pivotal event! Everything about Mal is explained by the betrayal by his own side....
With River's insight to Book makes me want to know all the more about his real story. His comment was so incongruous to his nature -- it makes me think his entire character was a facade.
My interpretation is that he feels there no sense in Innara's decision to leave.
"Mal, you don't have to die alone!"
"Everybody dies alone."
The unique methods by Whedon and the DP: He blocked the shots to force accepting the widescreen angle 16:9 instead of the tv standard 4:3 ratios.
He also intended to have longer blackout frames to allow the filmmaking to impact the viewers deeper. He learned that as soon as the network detected the total blackness, they would cut to commercial (totally derailing the impact of the episode). The workaround was to find the darkest hue before the automated sensor read it as total black.
Whedon secured the rights/patent/ trademark/ whatever so that the network could not adjust the sensor to trigger on the barely not-total black hue.
The trend in equipment eas for the newest hi-def digital cameras, and Whedon and the DP opted to sell those and invest in older camera gear that could create lens flares.
The music was crafted with purpose as well. Jubal Early had oboe music when he was onscreen. The background music in the snowy funeral scene was written as a eulogy for the show (and the crew cameoed as settlers of St. Albans, including Joss).
Don't be sad that it's over.
Be glad that it happened in the first place.
...Which I paraphrase for new "Gravity Falls" fans who find out "see you next summer" won't/didn't happen.
They tell you River is a psychic early in the episode which makes you doubt what you know about the world they're in, and then they tell you River became the ship.
Your reactions and comments have helped me see Firefly in ways I never saw it before. Thanks for pointing out all the camera and lighting, and all that stuff. I’m even more in love with the show than I was before.
The camera work in this show has been copied by many shows since. Battlestar Galactica and The Expanse in particular but also J.J. Abrams' Star Trek movies and others.
Thank you so much for sharing your Firefly journey with us! Just remember, the ending of your first watch-through is only the beginning of your second watch-through. Once a Browncoat, forever a Browncoat. See you for Serenity!
Now that it's over, I have to say that your commentary pointed out things I surely noticed but didn't truly appreciate. The cinematography, direction, and thematic decisions you pointed out over the course of these 14 episodes help me appreciate the show even more. It's easy to focus on the characters and writing because they're so good, but it's those elements you have gushed about that bring it together.
I also think it's tragically beautiful that the final episode gave us some concrete answers and clear insight into River. The fact they got this episode in before the end allowed them more freedom in the movie, I think.
I'm so happy you finally met Jubal Early, my absolute favorite non-main cast member of the show. What a fantastic episode.
"If I had an actual brown coat, I would wear it." You had better believe that when I had a chance to see an early screening six months before Serenity's release, I wore a brown coat to the theater.
It was on sale?
Ditto.
First thing said after the end of the finale by every reaction channel.
"THATS IT?!"
Followed by "HOW/WHY'D THIS GET CANCELLED!?!?
And here it is, my absolute favorite Firefly episode (and boy there are lots of contenders). Early was a fantastically interesting and complex villain, utterly reprehensible yet strangely endearing, and the directorial shots into River's mind were beautifully done. Thank you for the best set of reactions to Firefly I've seen, and I think I've watched just about every reactor's journey I can find - your combination of insight and empathy, plus your knowledge highlighting parts I'd missed myself, made this a joy to follow along with. Looking forward to Serenity!
I totally think he would have been brought back in future eps, if there had been. And that would have been pretty awesome - the Crew vs him again; and whether there were connectors between what happened to River and him
Reactors make you literally experience it all over again like new through their eyes
It's why we all love them
And like you I watch EVERY firefly reaction just for that purpose
@@luveniwai Joss Whedon has said he planned on Jubal being a recurring character.
@GeraldTodd-r4z not surprised. He layed down too much character for Jubal to only be there once
This is the only reaction channel watching Firefly that I have seen, glad that she's the best 😊
I really love how you break down the scenes for me , helps me understand a lot that I have over looked . And I love your smile which is very radiant gives me that feeling of the Sun warming me up on a cold winter day . I missed this show
River's bare feet. Summer Glau started out as a ballet dancer. An early scene in the movie, "Serenity", uses a close-up of her bare feet as she's walking; fans commented that she should have gotten the Oscar for "Best Supporting Feet".
I was always of the opinion that when she was walking around barefoot, she was more in tune with her psychic abilities.
And she even hasn't played in a Quentin Tarantino movie....
"She always did love to dance . . ." 🙂
@@VerMaarte Lol, I was looking for a QT comment. I am not disappointed! Well played! :D
Thank god Quentin Tarantino never got a hold of them.
The cold open of this show is so creative - seeing the ship from the point of view of River's clairvoyance. Great point you made, that the camera angles reinforce this feeling
9:02 - a VERY popular gif! *WACKY FUN!*🤪
About River taking a knife to Jayne - she wasn't attacking HIM, but the LOGO on his shirt! *BLUE SUN* is the 'bad guys' who are stalking her.
[NODS] Same reason she takes all the labels off the cans in an earlier ep.
5:20 remember, she feels what _everyone_ feels, as Simon said on Ariel, "she can't not".
Also, I think the grating at least in part represents how fractured her mind and perceptions are, all those little holes representing the many pieces of her.
yeah, the ones who decided to cancel it clearly should not be in the entertainment industry.
Whoever made that decision should be demoted…and maybe flogged.
Well...on the other hand...we never had to witness the gradual degradation of this series either...if it would have ever happened.
My guess is they have hands of blue and are a part of the Alliance cover up.
@@dutchbosoxfan8919
As if that was something they had to worry about this early in the season. And while Buffy and Angel were both thriving.
It was a the Fox network. Clearly they should have gotten out of the entertainment industry. They recently lost 785.5 million for their "entertainment" decisions.
My absolute favorite episode. Every bit of dialogue, every bit of character work, every bit of filmmaking style, just flawless. It has been so fun watching you discover this perfect show the past few weeks. I got into Firefly after it was cancelled, but right when it started becoming a cult hit. I went to DragonCon in 2005 and saw a panel with some of the cast, knitted my 9 month old a Jayne hat, all the fan stuff. But yes, this episode has always been the one that feels like a perfect short story, the kind that takes your breath away and won't leave your mind for weeks after, and my reaction after I watched it was pretty much yours here, "How in the world do you cancel a show after an episode like that?!"
It felt as if a billion brown coats all cried out at once...
And the needs of the few, out weighed the needs of the many!
Okay...
So a couple episodes back during "The Message" I left a comment to take note of Jayne's comment about River being "A mind readin' genius".
Yet it was this episode, two episodes later, that they figure out that she is a psychic reader.
That is because Objects in Space is not the actual last episode.
The Message was actually the last chronological episode.
Earlier people mentioned about how the feelings during the funeral and the music was real because they got informed the series was canceled during the filming of the show. But what people also fail to realize is that the Message was actually the last episode. They didn't make two more after being informed of cancellation.
People talk about 2 different orders for the episode. There are actually three.
The two orders people talk about is the DVD set episode, and the TV air date version and everyone knows the air date version was messed up and showed out of order by the network execs (The pilot episode was the last episode aired for example)
What people fail to realize is that the air date out of order was not out of order from the DVD set order... but from the actual chronological intended order.
Objects in space actually is much earlier than The Message, which is why Jayne knew that she was psychic in The Message but only found out in Objects in Space.
the last 4 episodes were rearranged from his intended order long after Series cancellation when Joss Whedon was putting together the DVD set.
So, there is...
1) The chronological intended order (which is the episode production order)
2) The screwed-up Air Date order which the network screwed up
3) Then there is the rearranged DVD set order. Which Whedon created a few years after cancellation.
Had the series never been cancelled, the Message would have been episode 14, not Objects in Space (which is Just after Heart of Gold, which itself is just after War Stories.
Everything up to War Stories is in the correct order.
But then the DVD order goes...
War Stories
Trash
The Message*
Heart of Gold
Objects in Space*
But the actual Chronological order is
War Stories
Heart of Gold
Objects in Space*
Trash
The Message*
Joss did this reordering from what was intended specifically because the show was cancelled.
The actual final episode is literally a down beaten funeral. He did not want the series to end on that down note. It was only intended to be a single episode, and more episodes were to come after. But they got cancelled.
But Objects in space ended on an upbeat. The final scenes aboard Serenity had a definite "These are the continuing voyages" kind of vibe to it. That even though the show is cancelled, that our ship and her crew continue.
So Joss made a conscious decision to swap around Objects in Space and The Message so that the DVD order ended with Objects in Space and not with The Message.
But he could not just swap those two by themselves. Each of those episodes are directly connected to the previous episodes.
In The Message they referenced trying to fence the Lassiter from Trash.
And in Objects in Space they reference Inara's decision to leave made at the end of Heart of Gold.
But the reordering does leave a few Anachronistic goofs.
Like Jayne knowing she is a mind reading genius before actually finding that out two episodes later.
The6 were also able to switch some scenes around as well. Both within each episode as well as move a scene filmed for one episode into another.
Although I've always seen Jayne bitching about River as just him grumbling about nothing. So that mutting can slide under the header "Jayne being Jayne "
OK, I’ll bite… Inara announces “Heart of Gold” that she is leaving Serenity, yet stays on board three additional episodes, despite numerous opportunities to leave, and with no apparent action by Mal to take her to any specific place. Thoughts?
Is it possible the episodes were simply filmed a bit out of order?
36:09 very true, that Firefly never had the time to jump a shark. If anything, it was only finding its feet and getting up to speed.
I don't know if it's still around but there was a website which had interviews with some of the writers where they talked about what was planned but not made. There were WTF things, but the one that really stood out to me as a "wow, I'm really glad it ended before *that* happened" was with Inara.
Remember in the pilot when they think the Reavers are going to come on board and Inara opens up a box that has a syringe in it? People assume that she was going to kill herself, rather than die horribly, but that's not what that was.
The episode was going to see Inara alone on Serenity when Reavers really did board. She was going to be trapped on there for hours. When the rest of the crew finally get to her they find tens, maybe even hundreds of dead Reavers. Turns out that the syringe was full of a drug given to Companions which they can inject into themselves and which makes anybody who has sex with them die. So Inara kills them all through the power of being gang-raped by hundreds of people.
And *that* was going to be the catalyst for Mal actually treating her tenderly. IIRC, the scene was described as him gently picking her up and carrying her, as if the scene would somehow be romantic.
Firefly's amazing. And I'm glad it was cancelled when it was, because I think the seeds for it becoming awful were already there. Especially when you consider the problematic elements of Dollhouse, and the subsequent revelations about Whedon himself. So it is what it is, and didn't have the chance to be a let-down.
Actually, IMO one of the most amazing things about Firefly is that it had its feet from the get-go. Many series' first seasons are really pretty lame, as the writers don't know the characters yet and so they pen pretty trite, pretty generic stories at the beginning, and it's only once the characters become defined that they start playing to those strengths. In Firefly, the characters were all whole from the beginning, allowing the show to start at its peak.
Previously, a Whedon series hit its stride in the 3rd or 4th season. The first 2 seasons were the intro & the setup.
you just made me soooo happy! so many reactors DO NOT get this episode, at least on first watch and i feel it is such an important and FAN-FRIGGIN-TASTIC ep and so many are confused by it. I feel it requires...emotional intelligence as a lens to veiw it thru versus critical thinking, u have to FEEL what is happenning 'between the lines' as opposed to trying to reason it out. As much as i love every ep in this series, i think this is my fave. So psychological and cereberal in a way that i get can be hard to grasp but i've always understood it at an emotional level and it is so nice to see someone else get it immediately. I'm sure others have, ur reaction is just the first i've seen. As for Early, i have always thoughf of him as a clever, intuitive psychopath. Never thought of him as similar to River, just clever enough to foresee outcomes. he researched the crew very well and knew how everyone operated...except for River. She is pretty much an unfathomable enigma!
This is my favorite episode because it's so meta. For example, Jubal deals with each one individually based on their fears and weaknesses. The story starts when River gets the gun to fight him, but no touching. Then she had to psyc him out. She won the moment he bought her narrative by calling her Serenity.
Interesting.
I never connected the idea of her having the gun with the idea of her knowing that she had an adversary coming.
It makes more sense than her just having picked up a gun.
The last voice in the chorus when she opened her eyes I am guessing was Jubal and she didn’t recognize him. So she went searching the ship (psychically imo) for him picking up a gun along the way.
"It's getting very very crowded" as she exits scene. How about this theory. Inara fights with her words. Jubal saw her attack "I know you're tired" and instintively hits her and makes a remark of how he is stronger than her.
@@sean---the-other-one - yeah i don't think i ever connected before that what woke river up was the unfamiliar voice coming into her head. .. and then she goes looking for the source... finds a gun just in case... and comments 'it's getting very crowded in here".. because there's one more now than there was and so many overlapping thoughts for her.
Perfect wording... "How do you have an episode like this...." You were spot on!!!
Serenity. Closure.
As we say in Texas; y'all be safe.
Expanding on your thoughts about the camera angles: a lot of the camera angles around River in that opening are completely unique. Directly overhead, through the grates, under the stairs. To me, that's showing that she literally sees the world differently than everyone else. And in a funny way, this connects her to Early, because he also thinks about "objects in space" in a completely unique way.
13:43 That pause and stare at each other is so funny. You can almost hear Mal's mind playing the modem dial-up sound.
Fox in the 00s had such a horrible reputation for creating the exact scenarios that left everyone saying "HOW?!?!?" both in how they could dare to cancel the series, or how could they meddle and destroy a show.
Yeah, Fox has cancelled some really nice shows, not only Firefly.
That was unfortunately due to a management change up that happened around that same time. Several of the executives who signed off on shows like Firefly were pushed out and the executives who replaced them instead sought to sabotage those shows in favor of their own programing (which included far too much reality show crap).
@@kmac169 Yeah, that happens all the time, but it happened consistently for about 10 years at Fox from 2001-2012 or so.
@@krillgar Don't I know it. Firefly wasn't the only show I enjoyed that suffered this fate around that time, it was just the one I loved the most.
Such a horrible reputation, indeed. It was incredibly validating for me when Family Guy pointed it out during the first cold open after they were uncanceled.
They hadn't actually filmed this episode when they got cancelled. They were filming "The Message" when word came down. Shot the funeral scene at the end right after getting the news.
Firefly did win a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Visual Effects for a Series.
If it had been allowed to continue it could have won so many more awards.
To me this brilliant episode, definitely my favorite after all these years, still feels like an ending. But more in a poetic way. There's so much to think about afterwards and the atmosphere keeps lingering. And finally River is also part of 'the family', the look of admiration in Mal's eyes outside the ship showed that.
Fox: Let's market it poorly, skip the pilot, air it out of order, and skip some episodes entirely.
Also Fox: Why aren't we getting viewers? Cancel it before word of mouth can happen!
You forgot “Oh, and stick it in a graveyard slot when no one’s watching anyway”.
@@simonmunden5046 And the fun part is that by the time they did all this to Firefly they already had a track record for pulling exactly this to a ton of other great shows. Every time there's something great coming from Fox people were afraid it would come to this, and rightfully so. Luckily, Fox doesn't do great shows anymore, so they can't cancel them. That's Netflix' job now.... 🤮
Also, changing the nights it was aired too
Let's remember how they screwed up Dollhouse. The last two episodes were compressed into one with no expectations.
@@DaveSlate-q9x Ugh, that too! And Dark Angel, and Terminator... I'm CERTAIN I'm forgetting several more 😂😭
Every time that I rewatch this episode I am reminded that it is possibly one of the best hours of television ever produced. And it hurts my heart more and more each time.
I appreciate your commentary so much. You nailed it.
last episode and the film and then it's all over, you'll never recover.
As you are, we once were
As we are, you will soon be
One of the most heartbreaking bits of trivia I learned, was that the scene where Mal tells Simon that it is a good day because they are still flying.. was actually one of the very last scenes shot for the show, and it was shot after they found out they had been cancelled.. so Natha Fillion mentioned how bittersweet working on that scene was.. because he KNEW they weren't "still flying".. and was heartbroken.. but still needed to deliver that line with the proper heart and hope it deserved.
Don't underestimate the rewatchability of this show 😉
I've enjoyed watching this series with you. I love a lot of the episodes but this one was always my favorite, which made it even more heartbreaking that it was the last episode. This one felt like it was a huge leap forward in the series' overall storyline and REALLY left me wanting more.
re: River talked about Christmas in Ariel - she said "They took Christmas away". She was talking about the police reneging on the reward they offered Jayne - they took away the reward that he was promised and only left him "coal". If you rewatch that monologue it is INCREDIBLY pertinent to the situation that the characters are currently in, but using metaphor for the disappointment Jayne was feeling.
I've read that Jubal Early was the name of a Confederate ancestor of Nathan Fillion, who happened to be deaf in one ear, hence the character mis-hearing things that were said to him in the episode. They definitely wanted to make him strange (licking the ship), his philosophical musings.
I've read that they intended for Serenity to be a character in the show and they had River in constant direct contact with the ship to try to create that impression - walking barefoot through the ship, tracing her hands along the walls of the ship as she passed through it.
Your observations based on your film studies have been fantastic and quite frankly I wish you would record a watch-through all of the episodes again just so I could hear your analysis when you aren't trying to also follow the storyline. Thank you for reacting to this series and I look forward to your reaction to the film Serenity. I'm as sorry as you are that your experience with this series is coming to an end.
Oh Lordy!
Reading your comment suddenly gave me a very unexpected insight into River, which I admit may or may not be true, but if it is... *!*
When you said "River talked about Christmas in Ariel - she said "They took Christmas away". She was talking about the police reneging on the reward they offered Jayne - they took away the reward that he was promised and only left him "coal." For some reason I suddenly thought "That's how you would talk to a child."
Then I remembered Simon talking about how extraordinarily intelligent River is. How she was correcting his spelling at the age of three. How she wrote coded letters pleading for help. How she did the math in her head to kill Niska's goons with her eyes closed. How she says that Simon needs a lot of "taking care of".
What if River has become so intelligent and aware psychically that all the people around her are like children to her?? o_0 🤯
Jubal's manerisms are interesting. He mishears people, his mind wanders and he get's confused, yet he's deeply threatning without raising his voice or physically asserting violence. If the show ever had a season 2, he totally should have come back.
Richard Brooks absolutely slayed in this role.
Part of me has always wondered if his thoughts and responses weren't being messed with by River with some of her "powers". Example: "Am I a lion"? "I said Alliance". "Hmm that's weird". Much love and keep on keepin on J.
Yep I agree he would have come back in a later episode. He probably had set up a contingency plan where he says a code word over his comms like "Well here I am" and his ship comes to his location.
I always tell my son, "never yell at someone, instead lower your voice so they have to lean in to hear your anger. It is much more intimidating."
@@the_algorithm
Either that, or yell so loud their ears ring. 😁
This show was a unicorn. Writing, Acting, Direction, Camera, Art, Sound, Score, Wardrobe, Continuity, Character Development, Humor, Darkness, World Building - Real - feels lived in. This show had it all and that was lightning that will never strike twice. Love this show and everything about it.
Totally agree that it should be left alone and appreciated for what it was. DO NOT REBOOT!
There's no way a reboot could be anywhere near as good. A sequel series, set thirty years later, on the other hand? Now THAT I'd watch.
@@WasabiBomb I'm with you about a reboot. I am torn though with thoughts of a series that happens after the movie. If they had done so when the actors age would not have been too much of a factor would have been nice. Now though with so much time, maybe something 15-20 years later and focusing more on Wash and Zoe's child(a reveal that she was pregnant during the movie), a child or two from Kaylee and Simon. Could have the original cast in still on Serenity. Perhaps have the older cast retired with cameos and River is now the Captain of Serenity. Perhaps River and the younger main cast on their own ship and Serenity just makes appearances with the older cast now and then. I think there is a lot they COULD do without rebooting.
Yeah, reboot isn't possible. Even if you do a time skip. Most of the cast would be willing, but you would have to do a time skip. You couldn't start from square one. Not with Summer's age. She would already have gone through whatever program the alliance had planned. Jewel I don't think would be willing at this point. She doesn't like strawberries FYI, if you see her at a comiccon, don't give her one. She is Jewel, not Kaylee. I think that's her mindset at this point, wanting to move on and not live in the past. I can completely understand and respect that. She still seems to love the cast like family though. That hasn't change.
All that being said. Recasting isn't an option either, that cast was lightning in a bottle and any attempt to recast would have them all living in the OG casts shadow of comparison. I wouldn't wish that on any actor. Not faced with a room of die-hard Browncoats. Most are the sweetest people you'll meet, but we've spent ALOT of time with that original cast and content. I worry what backlash would happen to a whole new cast trying to jump into that universe to tell it's tale, or worse attempt to replace the shoes of the original cast.
@@yevaud6 Agreed. Why I think just having the setting years after Serenity to account for the actors ages. Then introduce new characters. I think it would be awesome to have Zoe and Wash's child in it. Why I also think you can add child(ren) of Kaylee and Simon.
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Whether you put that cast on a new ship and the show have the name of that ship, or you have Serenity inherited by River and a new cast, with the older cast retired or doing cameos. If River has a new ship and crew, they can still have Serenity do cameos with Mal and crew older. I think it could be successful.
The cast was such a big part of what made this show amazing. Rebooting would not work because new people would not have the same chemistry.
The sound design is also on point here. The "Serenity hum" stops every time River has a... read. It just accentuates the otherness. With Wash and Zoe there is a wave as well. So good.
My friend referred to Shepard Book as a Doc-blocker after watching this episode
When Mal woke up in his cabin and spoke to 'Serenity', Summer Glau was sitting off camera on an apple crate reading her lines in response to his acting. (Notice his reaction when she said "Don't make faces".)
You earned the title of a Browncoat back in episode one.
It is rare that we see a reactor who does not enjoy or appreciate the series that has become so close to our hearts! I enjoyed every single reaction from you, Jacqui ❤️
Some people always makes a connection between River and the Bounty Hunter (Jubal Early) since they both have mannerisms, but I highly doubt that they do. Had Jubal been a reader like River then Rivers whole plan would have fallen flat immediately. It is far more likely that his mannerisms are a combination of him being a psychopath and suffering from cabin fever from being all alone in space in that tiny space ship of his for endless time (which is a contrast with the crew of Firefly that is a whole family).
"Why did they cancel this?"
"Doesn't seem right to me."
Fox TV could have "done the right thing," but they didn't. Does that seem right to you?
fox put show on air out of order, didn't care to highlight the show either. Great show and sucked it didn't get what it deserves
Fox buried the show in the lineup, too.
"Can I mop your brow? I am at the ready with the fearsome brow mop!"
The single-most Wash thing, that Wash ever said.
Part of what makes this show what it is, is the ensemble cast...these actors all love each other and their characters and I doubt that they could ever find a group as talented or passionate as this one in a reboot.
I'm a screen addict. Loved TV my whole life. So when I say this show was my peak experience, I think that you understand and sympathize. When I discovered that they had canceled THIS series, I unplugged my TV, and I've not plugged it back in since.
Yes I moved my addiction sideways, and have been an internet addict since then.
But my rage at the assinine decision, is indescribable, and was life altering.
Not in a way that I would describe as good, or healthy.
Thank you for having and expressing some portion of my permanent pain over this loss.
It really was criminal what they did to this fantastic, brilliant show. One of the greatest shows ever made, without a shadow of doubt. Everybody involved really should have all been sacked.
Your reactions definitely brought me even more appreciation for this show from a cinematography and industry perspective
It took River becoming the ship Serenity for Jacqui to forgo her usual cuss words for full on swearing.
Noticed that 😂
Just in passing: look at Kaylee's expressions during the whole episode, from the moment when she's truly afraid of River with that gun to the moment she looks down, ashamed of having doubt her friend as she hears the words of suffering through the intercom. I have no words to say just how moving I found Kaylee's slow but beautiful character growth in this episode.
My 4 favorite episodes (in no ranked order given) are: "Out of Gas", "Ariel", "War Stories", & "Objects in Space".
EPISODE DISCUSSION:
*River understands but she does not comprehend.* -- River was very aware of Jubal Early from the very beginning. Among the voices at the beginning scene where she woke up, she heard Jubal's voice. She broke into Jayne's storage and got Jayne's gun to "take care of Jubal". She was intercepted and told by Mal "No Guns". So she adapted a new plan to "take care of Jubal without guns". She even told Zoe "No Guns!" Jubal didn't stand a chance.
-- Jubal Early is a great villain. He enjoys scaring people by behaving unstable while threatening them. River turned the tables by doing the same thing on him. First she let him know she was unstable. Jubal was surprised that River was able to hack his codes and get into his ship. Then River mentioned playing with his ship's buttons (weapons systems, perhaps?) which put real fear into him.
-- Mal allows Jubal to turn around to face him before shoving him out into space. (No sneak attack from behind - callback to the pilot episode when Mal told Simon "If I were going to kill you, you would be armed and facing me").
--River to Mal: "Permission to come aboard?" This is the first time River was officially invited aboard Serenity. Until this moment she was technically still a stowaway. I find this dialog significant because she had been feeling like an unwanted burden. Now she is officially accepted & welcome by Mal, just like the rest of the crew.
-- River was also able to patch up the rift with Kaylee. It was nice to see them playing together again.
-- My speculation agreed with yours. I believe Jubal was intended to be another recurring villain. His suit had ship remote controls built in. He just needed time to fix the reprogramming River had done to his ship while "playing with the interesting buttons".
I suspect Jubal was supposed to ultimately become the villain we got in Serenity. They're somewhat similar in personality.
I just noticed your Moniker, so now I have a new earworm for the evening. :P
@@HareDeLune 👍
Clear light on a slick palm
As I mis-deal the day
Slip the night from a shaved pack
Make a marked card play ....
@@dunringill1747
"We'll watch the old ghosts play, by Dunringill, oh by Dunringill..."
Dammit! 🙃 😆
@@HareDeLune 🤣🤣 It's too GOOD!
Thank you for taking this journey with us. Just a little bit further. This series breaks your heart, but you never regret a second of it.
28:44 - *"HOW!!?!???!"* Easy. They never gave this masterpiece a glance, much less a second look. They tossed away the diamond in the rough before realizing its true value. And they told everyone the show was cancelled WHILE they were shooting this episode. Heartless gorram ... [mutters in bad Chinese]
No.. they got told they were cancelled whilst shooting 'The Message'. You can see it in their faces in the final scene.
@@Garryck-1, right! I forget which happened when.
It's worse than that. It was intentionally sabotaged and cancelled as soon as they could do it.
@@primmoore6232
to be clear -- the show team literally found out while shooting _the message_ that it was the last episode they would ever shoot. the team then edited the last few episodes in post-production, reordering them and moving scenes, because they thought _the message_ would be a horrible note to end on.
this episode upholds a long-standing tradition of... if joss writes and directs... you're really gonna get something special! LOVE the surreal vibe of this one ♡
This is such a great episode of television. The actor playing the bounty hunter absolutely kills it, so disturbing.
I remember actor Richard Brooks, who played "ADA Paul Robinette" in the early days of "Law and Order" before "moving to the dark side" as a defense attorney. If the "streaming video" companies tried to "re-spool" "Firefly," he could slip in as "Shepherd Early" after his "lost in space" experience.
28:36 Feeling like we all did at the time 😂
The joy we felt when we found out there was going to be a movie was indescribable. I saw that movie five times in the theater, and again a few years ago when it played again in my city.
Browcoats never die. No power in the verse can stop us!
Fun "fact": Popular fan theory has it that Early would have been a recurring antagonist. He would have survived this episode because his last words weren't just him randomly talking, but a verbal code that would call his ship to him.
Which is notable because previous episodes have shown that spaceships are VALUABLE. Logically speaking, the Serenity crew should have kept Early's ship, ensuring he dies to running out of air and making a nice bit of cash from selling his ship.
Well unless fencing a hot spaceship would have drawn unwanted attention...
I did always think "You are throwing away his SPACESHIP?" For a crew that was always just barely scraping by (if that), not salvaging his spaceship just doesn't make sense. Surely there would be some disreputable individual that would give them something for it.
So much potential. Early, Niska, Badger, Yo Saf Bridge, Patience, Atherton, etc, all had great mix & match potential as villains.
@@Educated2Extinction Not to mention the potential of some allies that may have reoccurred along the way - Sheriff Bourne, Sir Warwick Harrow, Murphy? (gentleman who defends Kaylee at the party) and Monty. The crew were building up a few useful friends along the way that may also have returned.
@@dargron7614 You kind of see a stop along that path in serenity: they have several "save havens", from friends they made along the way. It's easy to assume that all those that are mentioned in serenity would've had some role to play, had the series gone on longer. After all, the big points of serenity would've been season 2 or 3 finale. So [the bad guy] would do [what he did in serenity] to characters we've known, instead of places they just mentioned.
Your reactions to this series have been EPIC! I loved every single one. So many of your reactions absolutely mirrored mine on a deep level. Thank you so much.
Great reaction and honest. I feel this was Joss' Opus. You hit on it when you said "look at River. She's looking at it like it's a globe". The philosophical part of this episode is that when you really think about it, even on a planet we are all just "objects in space". The other delectable part of this episode is the insight to River's mind. Since none of us are psychic this was a fantastic theory on what it might look like inside her mind. Final thought not a SINGLE DAMN ONE OF Us didn't want to kill him after that line with Kaylee... Much love and keep on keepin on J.
I think you'd really appreciate Joss Whedon's DVD commentary for this episode. The whole thing is just him explaining the underlying meaning to it all for 45 minutes, and it gets quite abstract and philosophical. Since you enjoyed the episode so much anyway, and have so much interest in the creative choices and technical processes involved, hearing him explain what he was trying to do with it will add a whole new level.
Welcome to the club. That feeling of missed potential and grief never goes away... 😞
You can never stop the signal because people like you always finding this show and become a fan . As much as we, the browncoats watched it and fell in love with the crew. I'm glad you enjoyed it. Shiney!😊
Seeing you experience this series for the first time was a treat . Welcome to the Browncoats.
Mal and River cement their relationship in Serenity. Mal shows how Serenity is a family. Like in Lilo and Stitch; "family means no one is left behind".