Heart of Gold. Interesting episode.

First, the notes I made last night, having watched:

Inara, especially-- I know some folks here don't like her, but I think she's getting more interesting every moment. She's running from something, she's conflicted, she's fallen for Mal, she's trying to leave... I just hope (since I know that next week's epsiode will be the last one t howls and weeping , and that due to my holiday, I won't see it for nearly two weeks) that we get at least a little closure on that in Objects in Space. And at the beginning, she was all teasing and snark with Mal and his guns. I wasn't sure about the crying scene at first, but it does sort of fit.

Wash and Zoe were great, too. My Zoe-has-a-baby fanfic just took a huge leap closer to canon! I've been, err, anti-jossed? The trap was great-- I actually had half my mind on wondering what they were burying a wire in the dust for, and suddenly-- pop! Answer! Chaos!

And Jayne, of course, and his girl-- I wish I caught her name, because she was fun, taking all the gun talk in her stride-- and Simon-- darling Simon, taking over from nearly-panicking Mal: I can deal with this, Captain.

The explanation for why the crew aren't using lasers satisfied me-- it was one of those things I'd decided to ignore in any case, because it wasn't spoiling anything, but to have an explanation is far preferable. I had one nitpick-- in the scene where Nanda(sp?) got shot, one minute there was a baby there, the next minute, Mal and Inara are looking at the body and there's no baby, no baby crying, nothing. I'm fanwanking that there was someone else behind for Inara to hand the baby to, but it looked odd.

The shiny house was good, too. Especially Jayne's reaction.

And I love the way Mal's attitude changed when they weren't just whores, they were independent whores.

And then replying to other people's comments:

"You're my kind of stupid" -- very Mal Reynolds.

Wasn't it just? And so wonderfully delivered.

If the planet is populated by misogynists who fixate on fatherhood issues, why are there male whores? The male members of the community would never allow for the women to visit the boys for fear of cuckolding.

For the male members of the community who happen to swing that way. Okay, that's a small section, but there were far fewer male whores than female.

As she said to Mal, part of her job is to be relaxed about sex. She's not supposed to get emotional, and when she saw what had just happened, she realised just how deep her emotions for Mal went, and that if she wanted to keep an emotional distance, she was going to have to leave Serenity. Much to be upset about, methinks, though why she feels the need to remain emotionally distanced, we'll never know, I'm guessing.

Wrod.

Yeah, okay, that jarred with me too. I'd been airbrushing over that in my recollection of the ep, but -- yeah. That was bad. Also inexplicable -- I can buy Jayne spending the night gleefully wallowing in shaggage, but I'd totally have expected Kaylee to stay in her own quarters rather than a tumbledown house. Probably Zoe and Wash too.

This is true.

The episode isn't "oh, wow!!!" in the way that, say, Out of Gas was. It's decent, good even, but not great. I enjoyed watching it, but it didn't ping the HSQometer even once, which suggests the plot wasn't as good as some have been. It's saying something, though, that this may be the worse episode of Firefly produced, and I still love it.

oh my god... just got completely hooked on firefly, woke up this morning singing the title music. Decided to find out who it was by and found out the show has been cancelled! The injustice of it all. I propose we barrage Fox with e-mails until a new series is commissioned. In all fairness though its probably my fault, everything I start liking seems to get finnished... crispy pancakes for example (but they're back now, apparently), and you try getting hold of a packet of seabrooks crisps in this day and age? By the way if anyone knows Joss's e-mail address can I have it cos A. I would like to pledge my undying support for the great show that is firefly and also my mum is an actress and would like a part.

Hi, wewantfirefly! Glad you're on board with the enthusiasm for the show -- take comfort in the fact that there will be DVDs coming out in the US later this year, with lots of commentaries and extras and suchlike (including the Blooper reel). From the foodstuffs you cite, I'm guessing you're British? I'd be surprised if SciFi doesn't rerun the show -- they've been promoting the pants off it, so you'll hopefully get to see it from the start. It's TOTALLY worth watching from the first episode onwards, because I'd agree that, much as I enjoyed it, Heart of Gold is probably the weakest episode in the series.

Although we've no reason to think that the show's going to be taken up again in the immediate future, there is some possibility of a movie -- Joss is working on the script, Adam Baldwin (Jayne) is hugely enthusiastic and so, it appears, is Alan Tudyk (Wash). Write to SciFi or Fox, maybe, rather than Joss - afaik nobody here has his email address, but he sometimes reads the thread & I'm sure he'll be chuffed by your enthusiasm. I know I am.

Griffyn -- I totally agree with your take on Inara. I'm boggled that my perspective on the character is so wholly at odds with Allyson's (and I know that many/most people agree with Allyson).

(Griffyn, the UK's over 8 hours ahead of board time, btw, so it was around 2am here when you posted your Inara comment. Although I must admit, I was awake and I read it, but I didn't have anything to add beyond "wrod".)

The problem I think with HOG -- I mean aside from its relatively mundane plotting -- is that it deals textually with sex and power roles, and it fails terribly in its job.

• Have you noticed how only the male characters got any nooky? Kaylee talked about it, but didn't partake. So only brutes (Jayne) and sad, conflicted men who need sexual healin' (Mal) can partake of freely offered, no-strings sex. Oy.
  
• Hello! I am your $10 whore for the night. Do you have a psychological problem? I can fuck it out of you! And you know what? I am a saintly, wonderful person who has no psychological problems of my own. I exist only to help you!
  
• Here we are, a bunch of evil misogynist guys. Let us go burn down the house of the only whores on this continent. Surely they will want to have more sex with us then! It would have made more sense and been a more interesting thesis if the band of evil men had been teetotalers or stick-up-butt crazies. Allowing them to be presumptive users just foregrounds the fact that whoring is the business of being used.
  
• Like Suela, I'm still not seeing the cultural difference between a companion and a whore. Is it the tea??
  
• Griffyn's theory about Inara's past isn't illogical, but it's pretty damned elaborate. We shouldn't have to wank that hard to have a character make sense.

She's not supposed to get emotional, and when she saw what had just happened, she realised just how deep her emotions for Mal went,

This strikes me as a huge cliche. Actually, as someone who actively dislikes the Inara character, there's practically nothing they could do with that plot setup that wouldn't be annoying, but my eyes practically rolled out of my head when they ripped off Willow from S3. It was pale imitation, and it made the Willow scene somehow less than it used to be. Maybe if Inara had been sarcastically cruel, I could have cottoned to the character having an emotional reaction; but running away crying? Hello to the high school! Hello to the not understanding a thing about what being a sex worker means!

It just felt very unironically 20th century. Like something taken out of a Lifetime ("women's television") movie, riddled with irritating stereotypes. I expect better.

The Firefly verse take on Companionship seems to blend elements of the Priestess Prostitutes and the Japanese Oiran and Tayuu, and indeed Geishas.

This seems optimistic. My own interpretation of the same textual data is that the people who voiced objections to the companion concept early on were right -- it is nothing more than a fantasy out of the pages of Maxim magazine; it isn't well thought-out; it doesn't make any sense; and it can't work in dialogue with current concepts of sex, sexism and sex workers. All those little hints like "priestess" and so forth? Are nothing but window dressing on the same old hooker.

Actually, it was in the middle of this episode that I was suddenly reminded of all the icky things I've heard out of M.E., about sex and gender. How Tim came here, and attempted to argue that women don't have the same heart of darkness that men do; Tim's story of talking with Joss circa Angel S3 and saying, "Darla came back in a box; how about we put something in her box?" -- That kind of stuff. I suddenly didn't feel like I could trust them to tell a story that wouldn't offend me, much less a story that was well thought out. I hate that feeling, and that's what that episode made me feel.

Like Suela, I'm still not seeing the cultural difference between a companion and a whore. Is it the tea??

It's like a lot of class distinctions. It's total bullshit. There IS no substantive difference.

It's like a lot of class distinctions. It's total bullshit. There IS no substantive difference.

And yet, also like other class distinctions, it means a lot to those who are on one side or the other of the boundary.

Nutty, I'm sorry to admit it because it's not exactly what I'd like to think, but all your points are valid ones. Well said.

Thanks, Am-Chau. I have liked Firefly a lot, and really loved some of the episodes. But HOG really made me doubtful, and not in a plotty, angsty way.

I propose we barrage Fox with e-mails until a new series is commissioned.

That's a good idea! Then we can collect funds, take out a full page ad in Variety, schedule viewing parties all over the country, send 8,000 postcards to advertisers, FOX, SciFi...

Oh. Wait. We already did that.

Sorry, love. We did all we could, all we managed to get were some DVDs and the faint hope that there may be a movie someday.

I feel bad that a whole other country has to feel cheated.

We did all we could, all we managed to get were some DVDs and the faint hope that there may be a movie someday.

Believe me, Allyson, when I say that I, for one, am glad you did what you could at the right time, before I could have known that it should be done. You tried. There is faint hope. That's all we can really ask for (edit: and expect to get. We can ask for the series back, for lots of movies, for a pony...)

We can ask for the series back, for lots of movies, for a pony...

I just want a Zoe action figure with a gun that shoots real rice sized bullets and a Wash action figure that can fly my cat.