Review

The first part of the pilot episode, Serenity, introduces us to the Firefly universe in a very broad way. We don't get a lot of details about what's going on and why everything is the way it is, but there are some pretty clear implications from various character dialog and events in the episode. It's pretty clear that there is no Earth any longer and that humanity must have left Earth at some point for whatever reason and that this show takes place deep in the future. The Alliance which governs the remnants of humanity is deeply flawed and as a result, the colonies which they do not have direct control over have degenerated into a sort of frontier land of outlaws similar to that of the ancient American west. Normally the genres of the Western and science fiction are polar opposites, but Joss Whedon's Firefly universe skillfully combines them in a very unique way.

Also, groundbreaking about Firefly is its use of Newtonian physics as well as far more realistic weaponry than most other science fiction shows. Like other sci fi, Firefly depicts the use of advanced energy weapons, but implies that they are only used for certain purposes by certain people and require certain resources that are not always present. So supplementing the lack of energy weapons' ability to be appropriate for every situation, more traditional chemically propelled weapons are used just prevalently if not moreso. In 1990s, Babylon 5 was a groundbreaking show because, among other things, it was the first show to heavily emphasize realistic physics in space. Firefly follows in Babylon 5's lead and not only places heavy emphasis on Newtonian physics, but takes it a step further with its more realistic weaponry, silent space scenes, and documentary style directing.

As for the plot itself, we open with an intense battle of proportions not quite understood, but at the same time, not necessary to understand. What matters is you're with the main characters in humble circumstances. They lose not only the battle, but the war itself in this very moment. The story jumps ahead six years, and you're still with the same characters still being humbled by their circumstances of now making a living as thieves. The circumstances become even more humbling as what seems to be their perhaps only employer cuts them loose for being seen by the Alliance. This changes the implied dynamic of what they've been doing for the past six years.

In addition to this, a new situation begins to brew. As the Serenity begins to search for new opportunities further and further away from the center of the planetary system, and thus further and further away from civilization they take on passengers for what little cash they can get out of it and one of the passengers is discovered to be an Alliance mole who is on an undercover mission to apprehend a fugitive, Simon, who is running from the Alliance for reasons not understood. The cliffhanger depicts Simon transporting a naked girl in cold storage for also reasons not understood. But it's made clear that whoever she is, Simon is willing to kill for her.

Overall, Serenity Part 1 comes off as kind of a jumble, but remains largely coherent despite a rather large set of characters, intentions, and settings. Humor is used effectively throughout without coming off as campy or lame, but the Western tone sometimes bleeds through too heavily, though not necessarily to the point of genre mashup nausea.

Review

In part one, we're given a very open book profile of the main characters and what they're about, what their histories are, and what their intentions are. But in part one, some new characters are introduced into the story that have mysterious backgrounds. Indeed, this episode is simply a story of mysteries. Right from the start, you're plunged into the mystery of just what's going on with Simon; his boxed girl is revealed to be his sister and that he has smuggled her out of a government institution in which she was being abused in some way presumably for the purposes of experimenting with her unusually high intelligence.

The next mystery introduced into the show is the reavers which in my opinion are not sufficiently explored. The basic problem is that the pilot attempts to do too much in only two episodes. The reavers are either painfully oversimplified or there is much more going on with them than the episode gives us. Unfortunately, given all else that was going on, there just wasn't a lot of time to explore the reavers in much depth. For example, why were the reavers not able to catch Serenity? Did the Crazy Ivan damage their engines? Did Serenity disable the reavers long enough to escape their tracking range? Are the reavers going to attack the village on the planet? These things should have been explored in greater detail.

Consequently, perhaps a better pilot would have simply sufficed to introduce the name of the reavers in casual dialog the first half so that the Badger and Patience storylines could have been more fleshed out to take the place of the arguably manufactured danger of the reavers. The scene in which there is a near miss with the reavers could have in fact been left in, so long as the direct confrontation was saved for an episode where they could be better explored and better explained.

As is evident, the conflicted nature and intentions of the various characters is a great strength for the show. Of particular interest is Jayne's seemingly mixed loyalties. He's far more of a mercenary apparently than any of the other characters and he seems to be much greedier than the other characters. This is a character that I doubt has much for the concept of honor in any way whatsoever.

He's, however, completely contrasted by Mal whose code of honor is made abundantly clear in this episode. He didn't kill Patience. He in fact, kept his deal with Patience. And he even directly outlined his code of honor to Simon at the end of the episode by telling him that any man he kills will be awake, facing him, and armed. It's worth noting that Dobson was in fact facing Mal, awake, and armed when Mal killed him.

Overall Serenity parts 1 and 2 are a solid pilot with only minor deficiencies.

Review

What we have here is a story of conflicted morals. Clearly Mal makes arbitrary decisions about what is and what isn't right which is an interesting character flaw for a leader that already know is deeply flawed in many ways but this episode and its moral dilemma leaves you wondering what you're supposed to take away from the supposed moral lesson presented in this story.

I think Mal contradicts himself pretty hard in this episode. He's trying to play both sides of the honorable thief coin. Some honorable thieves believe that their honor to their clients comes before everything else. Mal is clearly sitting in this zone at the beginning of the episode. And some honorable thieves believe that stealing is only right when those who are stolen from do not significantly suffer as a result. This axiom is evident the story of Robin Hood with the catchy phrase "steal from the rich and give to the poor." Mal clearly swings over to this side by the end of the episode.

In the end there's something unappealing about how Mal accepts the job then breaks his word after discovering the cruel details of the work. Either you respect your client's privacy about what is being stolen and do the job no matter what, or you don't and you ask prior to taking the job. This in between crap is not in my opinion acceptable. Mal says to Nishka's goon "we're not thieves. But we are thieves. The point is we're not taking what's his." This most certainly an ineloquent way of stating his principles which lead me to believe he really doesn't understand himself just what his principles are. And if there's anything to be certainly retained from this episode it's this.

The episode does however have a lot going for it especially spectacle value department. The special effects shots of the space station and the train job itself were extremely well done and the humor in this episode is even more effective than in the pilot. Beyond raw spectacle and amusing humor, however, the episode fails to make a point and comes off as average at best.

Review

Here we have another episode featuring the reavers plot thread, but only an unfortunately shallow exploration of what the reavers are all about. The only survivor of a ship ravaged by reavers was forced to witness terrible horrors so as a consequence he... becomes one of them? A completely ridiculous plot and Mal's explanation for as well as his intuition regarding why this would occur is equally ridiculous.

The second major gaffe this episode makes is to give us the first real filler of the season. The previous three episodes all advance major plot arcs in significant ways. In fact the previous episode leaves us with a rather interesting cliffhanger concerning River which isn't followed up on at all here. It makes sense that there are longer term plot arcs at work here which won't necessarily see action in every episode, but the fact remains, this episode contributes nothing to any of the larger arcs. You could probably skip watching it entirely and still miss nothing important.

Otherwise this episode moves at a rather slow pace, but oddly that is something of a compliment here as the best scenes are those which have nothing to do with the main plot. The various irrelevant character moments make this episode actually quite enjoyable to watch and once again the humor in the episode remains most effective. But these details aren't enough to save this rather pointless filler episode.

Review

An episode which is the complete antithesis of the mistakes of the last one, Shindig is a mighty fine outing. With the exception of the annoyingly irrelevant bar brawl teaser, this episode jumps off with marvelous continuity right from the start using the Badger character to set up the crew with some new smuggling work.

The resulting events give us a fascinating and highly entertaining look at Mal's, Inara's, and even Kaylee's characters as they attend the fancy party. Fascinating as well is the detailed depiction of Persephone's high society which, true to the Firefly universe, is delightfully anachronistic. A charming mix of the old American west and a technologically advanced society induced by scarce resources and scarce Alliance presence.

Mal's posturing for Inara makes much more explicit the previous implied romantic tensions between them. She wants him and he wants her but there is something stopping either of them from declaring it outright, perhaps their philosophical differences about what a proper career is. Mal sees himself as an honorable thief but Inara's career as dishonorable, despite being legal. Such unrequited love stories can be irritating but in this episode it's just as charming as the depiction of Persephone's high society.

All of this character exploration is cleverly wrapped up into the primary goal of Mal and crew securing new smuggling work and the respect of both a new client as well as an old client. Overall, Shindig is a great story and a lot of fun.

Review

Safe is a sort of jumble of different stories. The focus on River is quite prominent here; this episode finally gives us some insight on what the government was doing to her as she has displayed some evidence of psychic abilities. This is something that has been building for quite a while actually. In previous episodes, River seems to have been having parallel emotional responses to things going on elsewhere that she could not have possibly been aware of any other way. This happens again in this episode as well. Also, in Shindig, River seemed to have a lot of knowledge of Badger she shouldn't have. That scene was somewhat ambiguous as to the reason, but events of this episode seem to make it pretty clear that she reads minds.

Unfortunately, aside from some interesting exposition concerning the long term plot arc regarding River, this episode's jumble of plot ranges from fairly interesting in some places to downright annoying in other places. The other most interesting plot thread is the revelation that Book has some sort of high profile connection to the Alliance which entitles him to first class medical care. While this makes his character a lot more interesting, the fact that he is not inclined to explain the reasons for this is rather irritating. That and Serenity's rather routine contact with Alliance ships is also becoming something of a cliche at this point. Though they sure are pretty to look at.

The most irritating aspect of this episode was the run down town that wanted to torch River because they thought she was a witch. In particular, the patron's reaction to his secret of his murdering the previous patron made the town look even more like a bunch of idiots as he said in response that River is "a witch that reads minds and spins falsehoods." Strictly speaking, if River outing his secret convinced him and thus the rest of the town that she could read minds, then the rest of the town should not have been so easily swayed that what River said was false. The town was given direct evidence that their patron murdered his predecessor, but as soon as he denies it, everyone buys it without giving it a second thought. Indeed a town of idiots.

Aside from those blemishes though the rather fast pace of the episode is enjoyable and while the flashbacks to Simon's and River's childhoods are questionably relevant, they are fun and fascinating to watch. Finally, Mal's affirmation of loyalty for his crew is true to his character and nice to see in that warm and fuzzy kind of way.

Review

A fun but fairly shallow episode. No long term plots get serviced here; instead the point of the story is to laugh at the absurdity of Saffron's character. Both at her extreme domesticity and then later at the extreme measures she takes to be a successful con artist.

Interestingly, the penultimate scene of the episode seems to imply that she does the con artistry not necessarily for the reward, but for the fun of it, which makes her motives actually something that might have been interesting to explore in more depth. However, by the time we get to that scene the episode is essentially over.

Particular kudos should be given to the way the crew solved their electric death net problem which was grounded in very real science and portrayed very realistically. Other than that, the episode has little else to offer except some petty Inara / Mal failed romance scenes and some immature humor rooted in sexual tensions.

Review

Another humor episode which contributes little to the larger arcs (with the exception of the Kaylee / Simon romance), but perhaps the most effective humor episode yet. Jayne's song is irritatingly catchy, to the point where it gets in your head and stays there for uncomfortable periods of time. Or at least it does for me. What strikes me most about this episode though is how effective all the various plot threads weave together to make a strong, central point.

What we have here is a story about faith. Each plot thread reinforces this theme; Inara teaches Mr. Higgins' son to have faith in himself, Book explains to River why his faith in god is important to him, and the mudder town very clearly needs to have faith in their hero Jayne in order to press on in their hard lives. What happens in town and the resultant discussion Mal and Jayne have about it is also quite touching, elevating the episode a bit above simple, fun humor.

Overall, a fine piece of storytelling.

Review

Normally I dislike the format of flashback storytelling because it can often be disjointed and confusing and indeed, at times, it is in this episode. However, the flaws are few and the story is touching despite the format. This episode establishes explicitly the fact that was previously implied that Mal purchased Serenity because he wanted to live on the frontier to be as far away from the Alliance as possible. As this episode demonstrates quite well, living on the frontier is not without its risks, but they are well worth it for Mal who clearly values his freedom far more than his safety.

More than that though, Mal seems to be valuing his crew more and more. They're becoming ever closer to him, like family. The way he handles the crisis aboard ship shows Mal to be both commanding as well as caring and the flashbacks to how they all met added a nice personal touch to their relationship as well as a morbid sense of finality to the events of the episode as it was clear that Mal was recalling the events which brought him to this point.

Speaking of events which bring us to this point, the faulty compression coil is something Kaylee had been warning Mal about since the pilot for anyone who's been paying close attention up to this point. Interestingly, despite this, Kaylee still takes the blame for Serenity's malfunction, chiding herself for not taking better care of the ship. I find it somewhat annoying that Mal didn't acknowledge that he should have listened to her originally, but I'll take what continuity I can get.

Overall, Out of Gas is one of the better episodes so far for the first meeting flashbacks alone, much less the riveting story of Serenity's breakdown.

Review

Continuity comes together in quite a nice way in this episode which puts the River arc and Jayne's fragile loyalties at the forefront of the story. We finally learn something concrete about what was done to River now that Simon has done a proper diagnostic of her and this episode creates hope that he will one day cure her of her issues. Aside from that it's always nice to see the Alliance; the stark contrast between how they live and how the border planets live is quite striking.

Also striking is the lengths to which the Alliance will go to get River back. Those blue-gloved guys are creepy to the extreme and that little bleed-someone-to-death device is certainly a chilling piece of technology. It makes you wonder if they had that kind of technology at their disposal, what could they possibly find so interesting about River?

But the most interesting part of this episode for me is the character development for Jayne. Throughout the episode he's easily the most annoying character. Impeding the progress of our heroes for his own selfish gain. But the last scenes of this episode not only redeem Jayne's character in my eyes, they grow him beyond the simpleton we knew him to be previously. Now we know that Jayne values what the rest of the crew thinks of him, despite his cavalier attitude. This makes him far more likable.

All in all, Ariel is a fine episode.

Review

Another fine piece of storytelling hinging on continuity. Many arcs in fact get served here, some better than others. Some nice stuff: Jayne is being awfully generous to the rest of the crew to make up for what he did in the last episode, Book displays creepily deep knowledge of crime as well as some damn fine marksmanship in this episode, and River, well, that was just crazy. And awesome.

Finally, Wash's previously very subtly hinted at jealousy surrounding Mal's and Zoe's old war buddy status comes out in full force in this episode, perhaps overly so. Here Wash is jealous of Zoe's experience with Mal during the war to such an extent that he even trivializes her reminiscing about the war. That scene and many more like it make me thoroughly unsympathetic toward Wash's character.

They turn him more or less into a petty douchebag and I only started to like him again while he and Mal were being tortured, and only because the scene was just so damn charming. What really redeemed his character for me though was his desire to join with his wife and lead the charge to rescue Mal. I suspect Wash got over his pettiness quickly after this episode, though I wish it had been done in a less immature manner. I felt that this sort of stuff was overdone.

The continuity with Niska was also appreciated, though he seemed less nuanced in this episode than in The Train Job because he appeared as little more than a mustache twirler here despite the attempt to add layers to him by having him cite the works of Shan Yu in parallel with Book. All we really see of him here is an extended version of what we saw in The Train Job when he tortured somebody briefly to demonstrate his resolve to Mal. I was hoping for more depth.

In total, however, once again, Firefly delivers another terrific episode.

Review

Trash is the first lackluster episode of Firefly in quite a while. Picking up the Saffron character again is a worthwhile idea and we get some of the depth here in this episode that was unfortunately missing from that one. However, there isn't much more depth to have. Her performance is largely a repeat of her previous one with little else to distinguish it.

The most annoying aspect of the plot is how it relies so heavily on misdirecting the audience. At the beginning of the episode it is implied that everything went terribly and that teaming up with Saffron in the first place was an ill-conceived notion resulting from Mal and Inara arguing with each other.

However, in the end it turns out the crew was playing Saffron from the start, as well as the audience. This kind of storytelling significantly reduces the impact of the drama since it hinges so much on audience surprise. However, there are quite a few scenes which make this episode well worth watching.

Particularly interesting is the fact that River could tell, perhaps telepathically, that Jayne had betrayed her and Simon. She then proceeded to tell Simon about it. I enjoyed Simon's response to this which was to let Jayne know that he knew, but do nothing else. It's both true to his character and true to his Hippocratic Oath.

The most interesting detail however is River's line to Jayne that she could kill him with her brain. This line was spoken in jest, but given how often Firefly likes to misdirect the audience, and particularly in this episode, it would not surprise me if this were actually true. Otherwise, however, this episode significantly fails to measure up to the quality of most of what's come before.

Review

Another lackluster offering, The Message repeats the common cliche of a romance strained by pure pettiness this time between Kaylee and Simon, as we must endure Kaylee's fleeting fancy for Tracey just because Simon is clumsy around women. More importantly though, Tracey himself just failed to be a very compelling character, and he drags the episode down quite a bit as a result.

Much of the fault for this lies instead on the plot though rather than the character. The unforgivable sin committed by the plot in this episode is the fact that nobody bothered to let Tracey know that when they were planning to let the cops board the ship, it wasn't with the intention to give Tracey up, but rather to call the cops' bluff by letting the cops know that Serenity's crew is well aware that the cops were operating well out of their jurisdiction.

Given that info, it's doubtful Tracey ever would have pulled a weapon on Mal and his crew and they all had plenty of time to clue him in on the plan. Not doing so forced Tracey's hand. Instead of feeling stupid just before he died, he should have felt betrayed, due to this unnecessary misdirection. It is unfortunate that the crew must now begin acting stupid in order to satisfy Firefly's fetish for misdirecting the audience.

Aside from this, it's a bit irritating that we hear the message itself replayed no less than three times in the episode. Really, once would have been enough. Overall, aside from a few amusing moments of comedy, this episode is quite a disappointment.

Review

Heart of Gold is an episode with lots of wasted potential. Once again failed romance is the central theme which by this point is a tired plot. So tired in fact that the ultimate result of yet another failure is the departure of a great character from both the ship and the show, all because the two romantic combatants can't speak plainly about their desires for each other.

Also once again paralleling Mal and Inara's troubles is Kaylee and Simon, who still haven't gotten over Simon's most recent faux pas in The Message. A second parallel is also present with Zoe and Wash quibbling over whether or not to have a child, though I must admit that I find that particular dilemma far more compelling than any of the other romantic failures present in this episode.

Aside from this, another missed opportunity was not seeing Serenity strut her stuff during the battle, something which I wonder may have been done for budgetary reasons. The graphics on the laser weapon were also somewhat cheesy compared to similar, better looking renditions on Star Trek, but it was nice to finally see one in action here up close.

In all, aside from serving as a plot device to write Inara out of the show and delivering a less than moving rendition of Amazing Grace, this episode has little to offer. Bonus points for some great humor scenes though, as usual.

Review

Easily the best episode, Objects in Space finishes off Firefly in style. Unfortunately, due to Firefly's cancellation, it was not possible to quite wrap up all the ongoing long term plot threads. In fact, this episode further complicates them with regards to Book and River to some extent while leaving others hanging such as Mal and Inara. However, were the series allowed to continue I'm sure these issues would have been dealt with.

Instead, I choose to grade this episode solely on its own merits and it has merits aplenty. Firstly, this episode finally gives us a much fuller profile of just who River is and what was done to her. It has been fairly obvious for some time that she has some sort of psychic ability and this episode further confirms it as she's seen directly reading the minds of the crew. In doing so, she comes across one interesting piece of new information when Book thinks to himself: "I don't give half a hump if you're innocent or not. So where does that put you?"

The meaning of that statement is ambiguous but it lends weight to the pre established idea that Book has a rather colorful and less than honorable past. The line from Early "that ain't a shepherd" also speaks to this idea. Speaking of Early, he is easily the most compelling antagonist depicted on the show. Between his quirky dialog and the well crafted music underscoring his actions, he comes across as a combination of fascinating, menacing, and hilarious all in one. His role in the story and what it does for River's character easily earn this episode its perfect score.

Overall, it is sad that this amazing show was canceled, especially so early in its production. Personally, I believe Firefly had the potential to be one of the greatest science fiction shows in history if its first fifteen episodes were any indication. It had a few duds, but the overall quality of the storytelling easily rivaled some of the best of Star Trek. Nevertheless, we can all continue to enjoy what episodes were completed and hope some day that the series is reborn in some fashion. No television series deserves to be brought back to life more than Firefly.