can't see...can't function
Aug. 19th, 2005 10:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinityvixenI couldn't help it. Between running back from work and out to hang with Adele and her super-cool friends and friends of friends, I watched "Out of Gas" and then promptly returned to be marginally social while actually ignoring everyone (including our guest, Jordan) to watch Firefly on my computer.
The last two discs were the best, for sure. As promised, the story and character development picked up tremendously (and seeing as the latter of which wasn't slouching in earlier episodes, that's saying a lot). And, also as promised, "Ariel" was probably one of the best of the last seven episodes. My opinion of Simon is not changed, but my respect for him has grown. Ever since![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ivy03 brought up the Jayne = Cordelia thing, I've been matching the relevant characters up to Buffy, and Simon is undoubtedly Xander in attitude and inability to not be incredibly awkward through (almost) no fault of his own. He is, however, an incredibly adept and intelligent Xander, but after yet another swing-and-a-miss with Kaylee in that episode with the corpse, yeah, Xander just the same.
It made it funny, too, because Kaylee is early Willow through and through, right down to the crush she has (not-so) secretly on Simon who can't pull it together to satisfy that fantasy for her. And man, I wanted to do a dance and run around when the flashbacks introduced her in "Out of Gas." In my trying to parse the psychoses of the characters, which, thanks to my 9th grade English teacher translates to "what sexual hangup do they have?, the game," I pegged Simon as either actually or virtually virginal but Kaylee as experienced, and I was right. Her attitude towards sex is fascinating because she's not quite as blase about it as Inara, and I doubt that she'd ever have been able to stand a Companion's life. She definitely likes to have fun, but I suspect that, on a ship where she's treated like a kid, she's been playing the role and getting a might frustrated by it. That's the only reason I could figure why she'd put up with Simon's attempts at wit and inadvertant slippages into arrogant nobility-speak.
On the subject of sexual hangups, the whore-house episode made me appreciate anew how complex a character Mal is despite the convention finally made explicit (two people attracted to one another hiding that interest in hostility and humor). Inara was great when she caught him outside of Nandi's room, and it was nice to see that, despite her heart-ache, she did actually seem happy for Nandi (and Mal, too, I guess). It's a testament to Mal's character that, though I disapprove of his bending his (as Inara says) puritanical notions about sex for money (okay, okay, so I'd have done him for free, too, if I were Nandi), I still understand why what happened did and that it wasn't out of character for him. Seriously, he's the only one who knows how to make that kind of relationship work who hasn't gotten any (Wash and Zoe are fine, Jayne's hooked up multiple times, Inara works; of the others, Book can't, River shouldn't and couldn't, Simon's just as bad, and Kaylee's barking up the wrong tree).
I tell you, though, it was seriously hard to take Nandi as she was, seeing as the actress played the zombie girlfriend from Return of the Living Dead Part III. I saw the kiss with Mal coming and was like "NO! She's going to give him the zombie and then I really will have to resort to necrophilia when I have sex with Mal!" Point of interest, in Return of the Living Dead Part III, her boyfriend's father was...dun dun DUN! Jack Crichton! YES! One degree of separation from Farscape! I knew it would have to happen sooner or later! Yes yes yes!
Speaking of guest stars being distracting, all through "The Message," I kept trying to figure out what show Womack was from. I could see the stupid side kick he had, hear the damn voice over that basically made him out of be the Million Dollar Man minus the implants, but not the name of that stupid UPN show. The Pretender kept popping up instead (chill,ivy03, I knew it was wrong as I was thinking it). It was only on the subway in this morning that it came to me: The Sentinel. And is there some rule that, now he's off Law and Order, Richard Brooks must play creepy as fuck characters in everything? It's the voice. Must be the voice. An interesting 11th hour, last episode casting choice.
Ohhhh, and, while I'm on the subject of the finale, damn you Whedon, you pimp! Having shirtless Simon when I am watching that episode at 3 in the morning! Must revisit the finale, methinks. And, no, that has nothing to do with the muchos Simon love after discs three and four; muchos Simon love comes after his not threatening or killing Jayne in "Trash" despite being well within (my estimation thereof) his rights to do so. I had also decided from that episode on I could no longer ever be annoyed with River once she said, "I could kill you with my brain." ::dies:: I'm not sure how she got so scarily focused and able to psych out Early, though I'm going to just close my ears against the nagging voice of my brain telling me it's not possible for her to have recovered so much with no prelude and pretend it had to do with the crew (and her brother specifically) being in danger.
Anything I'm leaving out? Sheesh, you cover twice as much in one night and you miss things. Oh, the torture stuff wigged me, though Whedon did his best to distract me from it with Mal and Wash talking about Zoe and working out their problems (I died, died at the end of the episode: "Take me hard, sir."--Dear. Lord). I can see Niska was going to be like the Scorpius of the second half of the show that was never finished, and he wouldn't have been a bad choice, the accent, the smiling, the code of pain-inducing ethic, yeah, villainly bases covered. Mal's resilience in the face of it, and how he was keeping Wash conscious and protecting him from breaking didn't really hit me until Wash said it because I could have perfectly believed, seeing as we were dropped in the middle of the torture, that the two of them were hard-headed enough to actually do that while being electrocuted.
Saffron's come back. Yeah, glad that they had a back-up plan on her. It's just never going to work out with her, and yet, were she to appear again and again, Mal would probably still fall for her stupid schemes. I did feel terrible for the man who still loved her despite her treating him like shit and cheating on him, and I liked a lot that he, unlike Mal who isn't in love with her, was able to throw her treachery back at her before it could harm him. That said, yay for silly naked Mal in the desert (loved the tattoo, interesting choice for the location; wonder if that's the actor's own?) and Inara slapping the ho like John McEnroe. When she reappeared, I was reminded of "Our Mrs. Reynolds" in that great line he has after kissing her--"I'm gonna go to a special Hell"--and giggled myself senseless when he ended up naked in the desert.
"The Message" seemed like filler, even if it gave Mal and Zoe a chance to be as cold as possible. Tracey was right to say they sorta were suckers, but I like that their 'leave no man behind' attitude did not apply to people who were their men when their current crewmembers were at risk. I pitied Tracey only at the end, where he finds out his selfishness and stupidity are the only reasons their plan didn't work, mostly because I sympathize with the confusion when they have plans and don't keep others abreast of it.
That's all I can manage for now. Eyes are blurry, I need to be able to work. But hurrah! I can look up quotes and discuss without fear of spoilage! And fanfic! Bring on the fanfic recs, I require them!
The last two discs were the best, for sure. As promised, the story and character development picked up tremendously (and seeing as the latter of which wasn't slouching in earlier episodes, that's saying a lot). And, also as promised, "Ariel" was probably one of the best of the last seven episodes. My opinion of Simon is not changed, but my respect for him has grown. Ever since
ivy03 brought up the Jayne = Cordelia thing, I've been matching the relevant characters up to Buffy, and Simon is undoubtedly Xander in attitude and inability to not be incredibly awkward through (almost) no fault of his own. He is, however, an incredibly adept and intelligent Xander, but after yet another swing-and-a-miss with Kaylee in that episode with the corpse, yeah, Xander just the same. It made it funny, too, because Kaylee is early Willow through and through, right down to the crush she has (not-so) secretly on Simon who can't pull it together to satisfy that fantasy for her. And man, I wanted to do a dance and run around when the flashbacks introduced her in "Out of Gas." In my trying to parse the psychoses of the characters, which, thanks to my 9th grade English teacher translates to "what sexual hangup do they have?, the game," I pegged Simon as either actually or virtually virginal but Kaylee as experienced, and I was right. Her attitude towards sex is fascinating because she's not quite as blase about it as Inara, and I doubt that she'd ever have been able to stand a Companion's life. She definitely likes to have fun, but I suspect that, on a ship where she's treated like a kid, she's been playing the role and getting a might frustrated by it. That's the only reason I could figure why she'd put up with Simon's attempts at wit and inadvertant slippages into arrogant nobility-speak.
On the subject of sexual hangups, the whore-house episode made me appreciate anew how complex a character Mal is despite the convention finally made explicit (two people attracted to one another hiding that interest in hostility and humor). Inara was great when she caught him outside of Nandi's room, and it was nice to see that, despite her heart-ache, she did actually seem happy for Nandi (and Mal, too, I guess). It's a testament to Mal's character that, though I disapprove of his bending his (as Inara says) puritanical notions about sex for money (okay, okay, so I'd have done him for free, too, if I were Nandi), I still understand why what happened did and that it wasn't out of character for him. Seriously, he's the only one who knows how to make that kind of relationship work who hasn't gotten any (Wash and Zoe are fine, Jayne's hooked up multiple times, Inara works; of the others, Book can't, River shouldn't and couldn't, Simon's just as bad, and Kaylee's barking up the wrong tree).
I tell you, though, it was seriously hard to take Nandi as she was, seeing as the actress played the zombie girlfriend from Return of the Living Dead Part III. I saw the kiss with Mal coming and was like "NO! She's going to give him the zombie and then I really will have to resort to necrophilia when I have sex with Mal!" Point of interest, in Return of the Living Dead Part III, her boyfriend's father was...dun dun DUN! Jack Crichton! YES! One degree of separation from Farscape! I knew it would have to happen sooner or later! Yes yes yes!
Speaking of guest stars being distracting, all through "The Message," I kept trying to figure out what show Womack was from. I could see the stupid side kick he had, hear the damn voice over that basically made him out of be the Million Dollar Man minus the implants, but not the name of that stupid UPN show. The Pretender kept popping up instead (chill,
ivy03, I knew it was wrong as I was thinking it). It was only on the subway in this morning that it came to me: The Sentinel. And is there some rule that, now he's off Law and Order, Richard Brooks must play creepy as fuck characters in everything? It's the voice. Must be the voice. An interesting 11th hour, last episode casting choice.Ohhhh, and, while I'm on the subject of the finale, damn you Whedon, you pimp! Having shirtless Simon when I am watching that episode at 3 in the morning! Must revisit the finale, methinks. And, no, that has nothing to do with the muchos Simon love after discs three and four; muchos Simon love comes after his not threatening or killing Jayne in "Trash" despite being well within (my estimation thereof) his rights to do so. I had also decided from that episode on I could no longer ever be annoyed with River once she said, "I could kill you with my brain." ::dies:: I'm not sure how she got so scarily focused and able to psych out Early, though I'm going to just close my ears against the nagging voice of my brain telling me it's not possible for her to have recovered so much with no prelude and pretend it had to do with the crew (and her brother specifically) being in danger.
Anything I'm leaving out? Sheesh, you cover twice as much in one night and you miss things. Oh, the torture stuff wigged me, though Whedon did his best to distract me from it with Mal and Wash talking about Zoe and working out their problems (I died, died at the end of the episode: "Take me hard, sir."--Dear. Lord). I can see Niska was going to be like the Scorpius of the second half of the show that was never finished, and he wouldn't have been a bad choice, the accent, the smiling, the code of pain-inducing ethic, yeah, villainly bases covered. Mal's resilience in the face of it, and how he was keeping Wash conscious and protecting him from breaking didn't really hit me until Wash said it because I could have perfectly believed, seeing as we were dropped in the middle of the torture, that the two of them were hard-headed enough to actually do that while being electrocuted.
Saffron's come back. Yeah, glad that they had a back-up plan on her. It's just never going to work out with her, and yet, were she to appear again and again, Mal would probably still fall for her stupid schemes. I did feel terrible for the man who still loved her despite her treating him like shit and cheating on him, and I liked a lot that he, unlike Mal who isn't in love with her, was able to throw her treachery back at her before it could harm him. That said, yay for silly naked Mal in the desert (loved the tattoo, interesting choice for the location; wonder if that's the actor's own?) and Inara slapping the ho like John McEnroe. When she reappeared, I was reminded of "Our Mrs. Reynolds" in that great line he has after kissing her--"I'm gonna go to a special Hell"--and giggled myself senseless when he ended up naked in the desert.
"The Message" seemed like filler, even if it gave Mal and Zoe a chance to be as cold as possible. Tracey was right to say they sorta were suckers, but I like that their 'leave no man behind' attitude did not apply to people who were their men when their current crewmembers were at risk. I pitied Tracey only at the end, where he finds out his selfishness and stupidity are the only reasons their plan didn't work, mostly because I sympathize with the confusion when they have plans and don't keep others abreast of it.
That's all I can manage for now. Eyes are blurry, I need to be able to work. But hurrah! I can look up quotes and discuss without fear of spoilage! And fanfic! Bring on the fanfic recs, I require them!
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no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 04:41 pm (UTC)And...I just got issue 2 of the Serenity comic in the mail today (had to order it direct since all the comic shops were completely sold out!). :)
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Date: 2005-08-19 06:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 06:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 06:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 07:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 07:09 pm (UTC)"Oh my god," Wash said in mock horror. "Jayne's been zombified!"
"C'mon, Wash, that's just --" Mal started to argue, then stopped right quick when Zoe quirked an eyebrow. "Zombified?"
"Don't rightly know," Zoe said, watching Jayne raggedly turn the corner that led to the crew quarters. "Could be he's been zombified."
"Ain't no such thing," Mal scoffed.
"Braaaiiins," Jayne said, and fell down the ladder leading to his quarters.
Hee.
no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 07:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 07:33 pm (UTC)Yeah, the dialogue is crackin' in spots and all of their idiosyncracies are there, like with Kaylee and Mal. The bonus, of course, is that it's all uber-hilarious. ;D
no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 07:29 pm (UTC)Right. Onward disconnected thoughts.
Re: Early. I adored this character, even if I was left unsatisfied by his "demise." (Actually, my problem has more to do with his having the bright idea of leaving the ship to go to his own, which is a huge lapse of logic in light of his actions up to that point. Makes no damn sense.) The scene where he threatens Kaylee has to be one of the most horrifying I've ever seen, TV or film. Genuinely disgusting and frightening.
Re: The "torture" episode, the name of which has temporarily flown from my brain. Do you want to know my favorite part? At the end, where there's The Dramatic Escape, and the Moment of Truth and Payback offered, and Mal's reaction is what anyone's would be: "Oh, no, that's fine -- please kill him now. Ear-less and much with the pain here, wanna go home." Love that.
Re: Simon's sparing of Jayne.
This is my favorite moment in the entire series, believe it or not. Between this scene and Simon's calculated criminal leanings in the hospital break-in, I fell hard for him. When you take in the scope of the series, I think Simon's development is the most interesting, and heartbreaking. For me, what makes River so interesting in the end is in comparing/contrasting her with her brother, and what he's done for/is still trying to do for her. My preference for incest-y fic aside, the big tragedy is River's awareness of Simon's pain, and Simon's helplessness in being able to help her. Part of him has accepted tha he can only do so much, but he's never once stopped trying to help her how he can. But anyway, his sparing Jayne and telling him why has less to do with scare tactics (besides, that's River's job, hee) than it does a genuine weariness of spirit and hardening will. [insert shallow fangirly flail here] Mal appeals to me as the Big Damn Hero with shadows in his corners, but Simon appeals to me on that base human level, I guess. Ah, the angst...!
And I completely agree with you concernnig "The Message." Not a bad episode, but strangely unfulfilling.
no subject
Date: 2005-08-19 09:47 pm (UTC)I agree 100% about Early threatening Kaylee. The way he broaches the subject of physical violence upon her...gggguuuugggarrraaggghh. He's just unforgiving, and after he beat up Mal in two second and dangled his body on one arm...do not mess with Early, I got it. I actually read a few Kaylee-feels-guilty-about-not-raising-alarm fics and I didn't buy it. Ain't nobody'd have blamed her a bit, viewers least of all.
I liked Zoe going "This is something Mal has to do for himself," and him shouting "No, it's not!" Fantastic turning-on-the-head. I <3 you, Joss.
And I agree with you on the men folk. Hopeless, aren't we?