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Date Posted: 20:07:19 12/20/02 Fri
Author: JM
Subject: Re: I was absolutely, totally wrong, and so was Fox (Serenity spoilers)
In reply to: Darby 's message, "I was absolutely, totally wrong, and so was Fox (Serenity spoilers)" on 19:15:31 12/20/02 Fri

Know what you mean Darby. Haven't generally agreed with you on the FF boards (too much of a Joss "ambassador" for that), but I was enlightened tonight too. I thought that "Train Job" was a hoot and the atmosphere sold me on the first ep. I just loved the Western with sci-fi mix. Finally a Western I could relax and enjoy. The first 30 minutes of "Serenity" I certainly appreciated but could totally see Fox's point. It did seem slow. But then . . .

Every thing from this season has so much more resonance. There's a wasting sadness about Mal that's hinted in the other eps, but it's front and center here and it makes everything mean so much more. The quippy captain is so far at odds with what is really in his soul. Not even "War Stories" or "Ariel" displayed it so well. It needed atmosphere as well as examples to come across.

And the episode gives "Ariel" so much more context. The betrayal was so much more than Jayne getting stupid. It was revenge he's been plotting, dreaming of, tasting since Simon came on board. His family's been threatened, disrupted. (That scene with him peeking through the airvent at the infirmary just broke my heart. He's still on the outside, but he's hooked like a fish into their pain.) In "Ariel," he finally has a way to clean up, without crossing the one line he won't ever. Turning on the captain. What he couldn't say in that last scene with Mal came through to me. There isn't enough money. Not to cross his captain, not even a few hours after the man humiliated him.

It's the sentiment that should have informed the airlock scene, even though it was powerful without it. "It's not like I turned on you." The audience would have understood that Jayne can't turn on the captain, even if Mal doesn't entirely. It wasn't the fact that the money wasn't good enough that makes him walk out, it was the fact that Dawson says, yes, you would have to turn on him.

Sorry, I'm probably not making a whole lot of sense, but I'm just floored by how different "Ariel" and "Safe" are with Simon and River not hapless victims but the reason everyone's lives are that much tougher. And I don't care what Kaylee said, Simon would have let her die. He traded her life for River's. He is fully as tough as the few hints since have implied. Just because he's vulnerable doesn't change anything. The weight, and grief, of this episode would have changed everything for those of us who might have seen it.

Joss is right, Fox was wrong.

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