Howdy y’all! For those of you who’ve been here before, you’ll know that I’ll be going through the comments and removing spoilers! For those that are new here… I’ll be going through the comments and removing spoilers! This may include “clever” “hints” and anything from which I think Angela may intuit future events. Enjoy!
Have you, by any chance, seen Liam Duke's reactions to this and/or Buffy? I ask because he constantly refers to Kaylee (and Willow, and Oz, and Fred) as cinnamon rolls.
Ok nerd me has to correct, sorry it's "of we're very very lucky, they'll do it in that order" for some reason that lucky line is extremely scary. Gina delivers it so well.
As the story goes, when Summer Glau first got in the box, naked, and everyone was obviously a little awkward she broke the awkardness by saying, "Does this box make me look fat?"
"the one person you don't shoot or threaten is Kaylee. i'm already very protective of her." yep. we all are. she's the brightest ray of sunshine in the show, and i believe most fans see her as a little sister, despite being a fictional character. and we all feel equally protective of her.
@@Fanporium Very much so. I met him twice at Cons a few years apart and he remembered me from our first encounter which I didn’t think was all that memorable but he tried to remember all his fan encounters.
I'll never forget sitting on the back of the ship with Ron and Jonathan Woodward on the Browncoat Cruise, staring out at the nighttime sea, debating whether or not whales sleep. (I stand by my argument that yes, they do sleep, and they use manta rays as blankies.)
The Verse in Firefly is a trinary star system Humanity settled in. The reason they swear in Mandarin is because around half the population in the migration were Chinese (also it was a way to bypass the censor board with the swearing). The Crazy Ivan was a Soviet submarine maneuver that involved a sudden 180° turn and immediately turning on the active sonar. I believe it was first made famous 🎉in the Tom Clancy novel, The Hunt for Red October. I can heartedly recommend another shorted series (it really deserved at least a second season), Space: Above and Beyond.
Space: Above and Beyond was so great. Way ahead of it's time. It's all been HD remastered and posted on youtube if anyone's interested. ru-vid.com/group/PLMD9ghErEvtxvdsWQIoWqN2kPbl6nLKv2
Space: Above and Beyond what a great show! Character focused, world building. If Stallone directed Top Gun. Farscape- my favorite space romance Any campaign for Buckaroo Banzai?
"That man's psychotic!" - Mal was also testing Simon for his reaction to "Kaylee's dead". Simon wasn't thinking of himself. Simon was genuinely concerned for Kaylee. He passed the test. That concern is why Mal offered Simon the position to be a part of his crew.
@@francischambless5919 Yeah, Mal's way of judging someone's character is … unique … but seeing that this young man was more concerned for his patient than himself in that moment absolutely told Mal everything he needed to know about what kind of man Simon was. Mal is a bad man … but he's also a good man.
Wow...just....wow. I've lost count of the number of times I've re-watched this series, and I never considered that. And it makes sense, a very "Mal" way of testing someone's character.
The genius of the writers is demonstrated in how easily we come to understand the crew, their motives and their relationships with each other. While they grow in sometimes surprising ways, nothing they ever do seems out of character.
There is a deleted scene IIRC from this episode that you might check out, where Book tells Simon to look up the Battle of Serenity Valley. The basic idea being that Mal named the ship Serenity because in one sense Mal never left Serenity, he carries that valley with him. That helps inform so much of who Mal is.
The entirety of Fox's mishandling of Firefly was bonkers. The order that they aired the episodes was 2 - 3 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 4 - 5 - 9 -10 - 14 - 1 with episodes 11 - 12 - 13 never aired.
i remember catching the first episode that was aired, Train Job, when it aired on our local fox affiliate. I remember being blown away at the quality of the program and tried to make sure that I kept up with it. Not only did Fox screw everything up when they aired this, but I was in the bay area at the time and Fox covered the A's games. Oakland had made the playoffs that season, so two out of every three Friday's worth of episodes got pre-empted and bumped. It was impossible to follow the story and until I could rent it at blockbuster and see it as it was meant to, it was always this big regret of mine that I had somehow read a great book but read the chapters out of order and I only got to read each chapter once. This is the single greatest season of serial television of all time.
I really love Mal's "go run your little world" line. Patience talks about running her little world as if its something to aspire to, not realizing just how much Mal disdains that.
I always thought that opening scene was so much about the depth of Mal’s character. You literally see his heart break and him lose his faith in the closing seconds as the overwhelming power of the Alliance rains down on everything he’s been fighting to save and destroys everything he believes in.
When watching this show, you have to keep "space cowboy" in mind as the theme. That's what they were going for, thus the theme song, guitar riffs when space sh*t happens, etc. This series is excellent, albeit prematurely cut short. Followed by Serenity the movie, which kind of wrapped things up after the series. So glad you're reacting to this series. It's definitely one of my favorites.
and if you like the whole Space Cowboy thing, then I would suggest the Classic Anime Cowboy Bebop. A Jazz inspired Space Western following a group of Bounty Hunters.
This was one of Morena’s earliest rolls and she just kills it. I’m new to your channel but your reactions are so much fun, so real and clearly you have a passion for science-fiction. Please continue to bring us amazing content!!
I had the DVD set. Some ahole on a boat I worked on stole it. That was ten years ago. A couple of years ago I bought it again. Best sci fi series ever, then Voyager.😮 Props to the casting director. Whedon's directing style combined with the chemistry of the cast made this series pure magic. Everyone that I have gotten to watch this series have become fans.
Loved your reaction. Your character focused comments are exactly what I'm here for. 24:28 "They can stay on the planet and eat Patience" gets the award for the best comment on Reavers I have ever heard
The in-universe reason for them speaking mandarin: China was one of the big influences in molding this futuristic culture, and people tend to use it in passionate situations The actual reason: They get to say things that the sensors wouldn't normally allow on TV
Wash playing with dinosaur toys was the moment all of fandom fell in love with Alan Tudyk. It was such an awesome scene. I so love this show and it is always nice to see someone experience it for the first time.
The Old West setting: a quote from an early interview, "If you were going to settle on a planet that might not see a supply ship for years, would you rather have a tractor that needs refined fuel and manufactured parts you can't make, or a horse that can eat the grass and make more horses?"
This is not a spoiler, but it helps to know a few things. Humans left earth, because it was "used up". They found another solar system with dozens of planets and moons to live on. The two main languages are English and Chinese. That's why you hear them speaking Chinese. And it's usually some sort of cursing.
Just to add on, the reason for Chinese and English being the two languages was only the USA and China developed the ships to be able to make the trip. Plus, the words said in Chinese was a way of dodging network censor. The writers assumed they wouldn’t check into what they were saying. So it’s not just cursing, they wrote the most offensive, vulgar lines imaginable, in Chinese.
@@jfu6413 Yeah, there's a whole in world reasoning, but let's face it Joss seemed to enjoy getting cursing past the sensors. I mean, they did it with British curse words on Buffy. It took me years to realize how many terrible words I learned and thought were basically "heck".
If there's one thing Joss Whedon does amazingly well, it is making every character incredibly compelling and pretty much right away. That's been my impression with each show he's done. Every single character in this show is memorable to me, no matter how small the role. This crew on the Serenity, I have no doubt you'll fall in love with very quickly. You might not agree with every choice they ever make, you might be angry with them sometimes, or frustrated, but you will love them. You can't not care about each and every one of them.
Nathan Fillion was in a series called "Castle" in 2009 with Stana Katic. During one episode, he dressed as a space cowboy for Halloween, and it was the outfit he wore as Malcolm Reynolds in "Firefly". Just one of those fond memories of the nod to the "Firefly" series.
Bonkers behind-the-scenes tidbit for this episode: The head writer explained years later that the syringe Inara pulls out (which never appears again in the show, so this isn't a spoiler) wasn't actually a suicide pill. Instead, it would've been revealed in a future season that it's a special Companion poison that kills anyone who sexually assaults her. Kinda glad we never saw that, as -- even for a show that doesn't shy away from the dark -- that feels like a bridge too far. Plus, the obvious reading that she'd rather kill herself than fall victim to the Reavers is incredibly effective, IMO.
I think Tim said that it was last case scenario for Ambassadors like Inara to take down the Reavers in case she unfortunately get jumped by them and is subjected to all the horrifics. Man I so wish this show gets renewed somehow in the future. I sometimes wonder that out in the multiverse there are universes where Firefly wasn't cancelled and there were more seasons that the fans would have loved and universes where Joss Whedon wasn't so awful in the future. Aah, what I wouldn't give up to have that universe!
@@DhavalShukla I think Joss Whedon is getting a bad rap. From what I have researched, he said some hurtful things to people on set, called two pregnant women on set "Fat", was a bit of a bully and was "verbally abusive" to actors/actresses dating back to his days of "Buffy" But here is the thing, in our current "Social/Political" climate what isn't considered "Rude/Inappropriate/Hurtful/Homophobic/Transphobic, This That and the Other" It almost is a given that if you say more than three words there will be people who take offense to two of those words. Everyone's a victim, Everyone's Offended, White people are the Worst and of course since Joss Whedon is a ---------> Straight, White, Rich, Man, Then he is the worst human being to ever walk the face of the Earth. During the whole #Metoo uproar Joss Whedon's name was never mentioned, which should say a lot about him, but "OMG he is a dick to people on set!!!" People need to lighten up, you think Tarantino never yelled at someone on set? Scorsese? Spielberg?
Nathan has been in many shows including Buffy, Two Guys a Girl and a Pizza Place with Ryan Reynolds, Castle 8 seasons, The Rookie 5 seasons and counting, Con Man with Alan Tudyk and many Firefly costars. Many Firefly costars also appear in Castle and The Rookie, with Firefly Easter eggs everywhere. Thanks to Nathan! ❤ Shiny, Let’s be Bad Guys!
One of the things that I really liked about Castle was seeing the Firefly actors show up. Clearly this group bonded. I don’t know how common that is, but it warms my heart
I actually remember him introducing Ryan Reynolds to twitter, being like “hey my old 2ggpp costar is joining show him some love”, well before the deadpool thing
One thing that makes me happy is how well this cast got along with each other. Gina's Tores in an interview revealed the cast STILL have their own secret chain email going between them. 😀
Always good to hear. I feel this happens more often with scifi shows, I dunno why. And those with a lot of theater background actors/actresses usually bond more. More mainstream sitcom type shows seem to be pretty cuthroat and filled with awful people. Some of the more dramatic shows with a lot of money seem to have some big egos and aggressive personalities. But I usually hear about people liking each other a lot and staying friends after science fiction shows wrap.
Fun fact about Summer Glau: Firefly was her second role. Her first acting role was on another Joss Whedon show actually: She was in an episode of Angel.
I watch Firefly once a year and then I randomly choose a reactor to watch after episode. I thoroughly enjoyed your reaction and personal take on this episode! Looking forward to seeing your response to the rest of the series.
The Algorithm brought me here and this was fun to see. One of the things I love about Firefly is that so many of the characters get into conflict because they're being who they are.... and get out of it because they're being who they are. So much of it feels really organic in a way that so few shows pull off.
Nathan Fillion also worked with Ryan Reynolds on the TV show Two Guys, A Girl and A Pizza Place. Later called Two Guys and A Girl. So Ryan Reynolds has worked with both Nathan and Morena
Angela: "I like shows with heart" Welp... you are probably going to fall in love with this show then. Thanks for these reactions. I love this show so much and I love seeing others react to it for the first time.
a series that reminds a lot of farscape: many original and well-played characters, premature termination, followed by a movie that gives some kind of closure to things (farscape - two movies)..And Summer Glau was really great in the Sarah Connor Chronicles!and the only ballet dancing terminator in history!
You know how most shows have a couple of strengths, but noticeable weaknesses in other areas? What I think makes Firefly so great is that they "hit" on everything! Casting, acting, music, plot, dialog, etc. They got it right in all of it.
Oh man I'm so excited for you to watch this show. The fact that it only got one season is still one of the biggest shames in television history. This and Serenity you have to do on the channel. You don't do movies all that often, but this is one you have to do.
@@funnylilgalreacts watching the series, then the movie and then (I know they can be found on youtube) the series extras called the river tam files, only about 15mins but really impactful for showing a lot of Rivers character and past, it adds to the overall visual of the story.
A 'Crazy Ivan' is actually a real maneuver that Russian sub captains would do during the Cold War. But yeah, it was brought into the public consciousness from Hunt for Red October. Clancy would do that alot...bring real world, declassified info (some not so declassified...apparently he had a LOT of inside contacts in the US military) and put it into his novels. Obviously he'd spice it up to make it more exciting, but there was a surprising amount of reality in his novels.
A “Crazy Ivan” is a submarine term for clearing baffles. Baffles are the sonar dead spot behind the boat due mostly to the noise of the screw. This is accomplished by changing course a specific amount of degrees so the passive sonar array can check the area that was previously to the rear (aft) of the sub. This is a highly fictionalized term coming from books and movies when NATO subs are covertly trailing Russian or Soviet Era subs and they clear their baffles. A lot of SCI-fi programs implement Naval traditions and terminology into their lexicon.
@@arklytte The Red October shouldn't have needed to perform a Crazy Ivan. She was a fictional 'improved' Typhoon class. They are fitted with a towed-array sonar. The Los Angeles fast attack boats are as well. Towed array sonar was worked on in WW1, but dropped and picked up on again in the 60s or something. Your most effective passive sonar array, it is towed at anything up to miles behind the submarine or ship it is fitted to, where the noise from your own travel is minimised. The dead zone for your towed array is directly in front of itself, where your ship is stirring up the ocean. It hears perfectly well astern and you would always have it deployed if you have any sort of depth under your keel to stop it dragging. So following a submarine directly astern of it is not something you would do since the invention of the towed array. You are in the best spot for it to detect you and the worst spot for you to detect it. My guess is you would try to shadow it off to one side, attempting to maintain a solution on it. Someone in another comment suggested part of the Crazy Ivan was to start pinging active sonar when you turned, which would indeed be 'Crazy'. But it would certainly illuminate anything stealthing along behind you. I don't know if there is any mention in the book or movie about Red October not having one, but the LA Class following it couldn't have known that I don't think.
Glad you're enjoying the show! Just an FYI, it's a misconception that there is one season of Firefly, they were actually cancelled before they could finish the season. I just want you to be prepared
This is my all-time favorite show! I was having a very rough day, but to end it with one of my favorite reactors reacting to my favorite show makes it better!
I accidentally landed on your review of SERENITY and watched the whole movie with you. I laughed, and when you cried, I cried, Books death affected you the same way it affected me,and I decided to rewatch FIREFLY,only I don't have Hulu so I looked it up on RU-vid and it brought me back to you. So I said fine I'll check out this person's page. And holy crap!! You watch a lot of my favorite shows!! 😂 So thank you! I have my day planned! Keep it up and keep having great taste!!
@@aboubenadhem9066 you aren’t wrong. I was referring more to the presentation as the big, “dumb,” occasionally terrifying and occasionally comedic meatheat archetype. Amos took it to a deeper level, and in doing so, yeah more like River
My favorite moment of the episode is the final dialogue between Book and Inara.. they have so much respect for each other, it was very heartwarming. And the way she says "maybe you're exactly where you ought to be." And my favorite character is Kaylee (ok, it's an easy choice, but she really have something)
Nathan starred in "Castle" and, currently, in "The Rookie". In the former, he's a successful author of crime novels who accompanies a team of police detectives (lead by Detective Kate Beckett) for inspiration for his newest book. Hilarious and tense at the same time. Great ensemble chemistry. "The Rookie" is about Nathan as a mid-forties divorcee who decides to join the police and undergoes a rough first year at the LAPD. The Chinese in "Firefly" is there to circumnavigate any restrictions on heavy cursing, BTW. So happy to watch this gem again alongside you. P.S.: You are going to watch the movie, "Serenity", too, I assume?
I'm thrilled you're reacting to this awesome show! Those of us who watched it when it first aired on broadcast TV never actually saw this pilot episode until after the show had been cancelled. The Fox execs didn't like it. Said it was too slow and they wanted more action, plus some other complaints. They told Joss Whedon on a Friday that he had until Monday morning to provide them with a new pilot script or they wouldn't be picking up the show. So Whedon and Tim Minear locked themselves away in a hotel room and spent the next two days writing a second "pilot" episode. That episode (the one you'll be reacting to next) is actually the first Firefly episode that aired. Fox then proceeded to air some of the other episodes out of order, didn't air three of the episodes at all in the US (we only got to see those when the DVD was released), and finally aired this original pilot at the tail end of the show's run. The mind still boggles at how hard those execs tried to sabotage this show. (They also switched time slots and pre-empted it fairly often to air sporting events in its place.)
Oh nice! Firefly's a legendary show! Btw Zoe (Gina Torres) is Keeper Yennen in Legend of Vox Machina. This show is the reason Whedon was given the Avengers job. Nathan Fillion (Malcolm Reynolds) also did a show called Castle which has numerous Firefly callbacks Morena Baccarin (Inara) plays Lee Thomkins in Gotham, criminally underrated show
Yes! Firefly, you're going to love this Serenity crew. Excellent followup series to do after "The Expanse". Its a short series, so maybe Battlestar Galactica after this?
30:52 The problem with the food bars was that they were "imprinted", meaning tagged at the molecular level as Alliance property, presumably with a particular arrangement of isotopes.
Sweet Angela, Im glad you're giving this show a watch. Fillion was probably second best known for a TV show called Castle, and currently he stars in a show called The Rookie. You might also have seen him as Hermes in the 2nd Percy Jackson movie back in the day.
I hope you continue to enjoy the show! Tudyk and Fillion are good buddies who have done a few shows together, including Nathan doing some voice acting on Alan's latest show, Resident Alien.
My reaction when I first saw this episode, was a massive WTF! Watched it on Fox(where tv series go to die) back in the day, and as has been mentioned by others. It did not air in the proper sequence, so by the time I saw this. I was pissed, confused, and entertained because I was liking the cast and the stories. It tells you just how good this show was, that despite the best efforts of Fox. It developed the fan base that it did, and Whedon was able to get a deal to do the movie Serenity!
@@funnylilgalreacts Both of these shows stand up to multiple rewatches AND have non TV media to fill the void. Looking forward to watching this along with you :)
Hello! New to the channel, was on a firefly reaction binge for some reason and that's how I found you. Interesting fact, there is a Weyland-Yutani Corp. symbol on the turret that Mal uses to shoot down the Alliance Gunship in the beginning battle. Excited to see your reactions on the journey to becoming a Browncoat for life!
It was not coined for Red October - it was a standard tactic of the USSR submariners to randomly turn 360 degrees every now and again to see if anyone was following them in the dead zone behind their towed array sonar (the baffles). US navy termed the move "Crazy Ivan" because it was unpredictable (the point of the exercise)
@@womblissimo6666 I think I mean it entered the sphere of being known through The Hunt for Red October. For sure, it's an actual thing. Tom Clancy researched well. 👍
Adam Baldwin was in Independence Day. He was also a main character in the show Chuck as a federal agent (definitely smarter than Jayne but still obsessed with guns). He also does some audiobook narration. One book even involves him reading about President Adam Baldwin in one universe
Oh, you're going to fall in love with the entire crew! This is an AMAZING show and wraps up beautifully with the movie. Looking forward to watching your reaction journey on this one! =)
This makes me very happy that you're watching this series. One of my all time faves and a fantastic story. Best reason to watch it again along with your reactions. 🔥
Randomly came across your reaction to "War Stories" and decided to check out the whole playlist! Always great to see someone's first introduction to this 'verse.
You mention having seen Jayne somewhere else. He is Animal Mother in Full Metal Jacket. And he is Chad in Day Break, the TV series with Taye Diggs. He is really good in that one! And it has Jonathan Banks in it, you know, Mike from Breaking Bad.
I don't know why but I had assumed you must have seen this show already. It seems so much a fit with what I have seen of your personality and what gets you engaged that it just seemed natural you would have found this already. I'm so pleased to be wrong and see you discover one of my all time favorite shows (of any genre). It's gonna be fun for you and us.
@@funnylilgalreacts This show came out 20 years ago. I'm guessing you were pretty young - maybe too young for it. But really, not many people found it when it was on TV. That's why it was cancelled. Most of the fans found it later, when it was on DVD, or even later when it made it on streaming services. (I saw a few episodes when it was on TV, but between the way FOX scheduled it and other things going on in my life at the time I didn't really get invested in it until later.)
@@hkpew Yeah, I have been a die-hard sci-fi fan since Star Wars came out when I was six, and when Firefly was on the air, I thought it was a western. Their ad campaign was just terrible.
BTW, Nathan Fillion played the lead roll in Castle, another amazing TV show (at least the first 5 seasons or so,) where he plays a mystery writer who helps a detective solve crimes. The first 3 seasons are absolutely amazing, plus there are a bunch of easter-eggs referring to Firefly!!! A few years after Castle ended, he starred in "The Rookie," a show about a middle-aged man who goes through a mid-life crisis, and decided to join the LAPD! It's also a terrific show! I believe that The Rookie is still being filmed.
