Firefly ep by ep; rewatch and reviews

Discussion in 'Science Fiction & Fantasy' started by saturn5, Aug 4, 2010.

  1. Trekker4747

    Trekker4747 Boldly going... Premium Member

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    The text you posted this morning was filled with with size, font, and other tags. Which, given they don't work on this board, made the post a cluster-fuck of shit.

    The cleaned up post is vastly better.

    It was explained somewhere in the Behind the Scenes stuff/interviews it is explained that energy weapons aren't common in the 'rim' (the outer, still "wild" planets of the Alliance of Planets) because they're too complex and expensive to maintain, repair and charge. Think about it. A gun is some springs, metal, and pins. Not much complex there. A laser gun is going to have circuitry, batteries and lots of other things to limit its ability as a weapon. If you firing your laser pistol and dies you're fucked. If you've a enough bullets on you, you can fire a gun forever.

    We do see a laser weapon in an upcoming episode and even get a hint of how "useess" they can be in the fronteir. Hell, we even get a glimpse of that when Jayne grows frustrated with the Alliance stun-gun in "Ariel" he calls it a "high-tech piece of crap" when it fails to effect a locked door.
     
  2. saturn5

    saturn5 Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    What IS the default font?
     
  3. Pemmer Harge

    Pemmer Harge Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Looks like Verdana to me, but you shouldn't need to specify a font.
     
  4. Forbin

    Forbin Admiral Admiral

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    I said out, dammit!
    Yah, you don't need to specify a font at all. You CAN'T specify a font. Just put words down, the board takes care of the font.

    btw, what's a "projectile energy" weapon? ;)
     
  5. I am not Spock

    I am not Spock Commodore Commodore

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    ^A railgun, like in Quake 2? ;)
     
  6. saturn5

    saturn5 Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    A death ray, lasers, phasers etc

    Well obviously I do need to know what it is, I'll try veranda
     
  7. Skellington

    Skellington Part-time poltergeist Rear Admiral

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    Great list. Nice to see Vincent And The Doctor there; it's the kind of thing that genre TV is all about, in a way.
     
  8. Forbin

    Forbin Admiral Admiral

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    I said out, dammit!
    Those would be energy weapons, but not projectile weapons. It's one or t'other.
     
  9. ljrashkin

    ljrashkin Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    No you don't that's the point. Even if you try to set the font to the default, the board won't understand what you are trying to do and the [Font=____] and [/Font] will still appear in your post. If you are posting first somewhere else you are going to have to use CTRL-F to find and delete them.
     
  10. Trekker4747

    Trekker4747 Boldly going... Premium Member

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    It would suck if before every post I had to tell the post-window what font the board is using. Which I don't

    Just type your post. That's all you have to do. You cannot change the font, the size, or the color. Just. Type.

    The only thing you can do is Bold, Italicize, and Underline.
     
  11. Mal

    Mal Commodore Commodore

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    ^ All this formatting info would be moot if saturn5 would just use the Preview button, and, you know, preview what the post will look like before hitting Submit.

    Oh, and the posts are much better. I would LOVE it if you could leave out the Whedon Alumni. Unless it's a really big deal, just leave it out. Please. Pretty please.
     
  12. Trekker4747

    Trekker4747 Boldly going... Premium Member

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    She could really just leave out all of the statistics, countings and such as they're irrelevant to anything at all.

    But she doesn't need to use the "Preview post" button. Just don't use the "font" or "size" tags at all. They don't work. Period.

    Double-Hard returns between each section, bolden or underline the subject headings (highlight then hit the appropriate button) and hit submit. Then maybe look over the post to see if there's a formating issue.

    I don't know if anyone saw it the other morning, when I made my comment, but the post made the other day practically every single line had a dead tag in it.

    It looked a lot like this

    For the whole post.
     
  13. Mal

    Mal Commodore Commodore

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    This is going to be hard for you to appreciate, but I vividly remember crying after watching Trash, The Message, and Heart of Gold, when they were posted to the Internet.

    You see, Trash (and the others) were not broadcast on TV. The last episode aired second week of December 2002, but even before that, we knew the show was on it's last legs. A week after Objects in Space, the show was dead.

    And then like manna from heaven, Trash and the other two were posted online. And for a moment it was like we were still flying. And so, when Mal said Good Day, Good Day, I just couldn't contain myself.

    It was eight (eight!) years ago. But it feels like yesterday.
     
  14. saturn5

    saturn5 Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    I'll meet you halfway and just post the latest Whedon Alumni. And I did try the preview option and that's WHY the entire post post was in Font Italics and unreadable. I had to edit and repost. Still, only three more reviews to go anyway;


    THE MESSAGE

    [FONT=Verdana]The good;
    Love the ice planets, someone should make those for real. We see more of Mal and Zoe during the war pre-Battle of Serenity and nobody pines as well as Kaylee does (except Willow?)

    The bad;

    Kinda a weak story with not that great a denoument.
     
    Best line;
    Zoe (to Tracey); "The first rule of war is never to let them know where you are"
    Mal (exposing himself to the enemy and firing wildly) "Here I am! Here I am!"
    Zoe; "Of course there are other schools of thought"
    also like;
    Jayne (non-plussed by Tracey's unexpected ressurection but observes) "Spry for a dead fellow!"
    and
    Tracey; "Do you think I'm stupid?"
    Mal; "In every possible way"
    not to mention
    Mal; "There's always someone out there keeping a bullet with your name on it. The secret is to die of old age before they get a chance to use it"
    which leads to;
    Tracey; "You killed me"
    Mal; "You killed yourself, I just carried the bullet for a while"

    Packing heat
    ;
    Mal's still trying to offload the Lassiter from Trash but he may have to wait a while until the heat cools off. Jayne takes the opportunity to load up with ammo at the spaceport, considering all the different types of guns they use bullet resupply must be a nightmare. We see Zoe take a H&K G36 from the Alliance soldier she kills, the type of weapon we later see her and Mal use in the battle of Serenity. The Browncoats seem to use M16s and Mal has a H&K UMP submachinegun. Tracey takes a H&K P9 pistol from the crew.

    Kinky dinky
    ;
    Jayne infers that seeing corpses puts him in the mood for sex but is quick to deny necrophilia. Naked Tracey.
     
    Notches on the Serenity bedpost;

    Inarra;3+1 possible, Atherton.
    Wash; 1-the missus
    Zoe; 1-the hubby
    Kaylee;1-Bester

     
    Capt subtext
    ;
    Womack threatens the postman with homosexual rape in prison. Mal straddling naked Tracey.

    How'd they get away with that?

    Simon cutting Tracey, yeesh!

    Total Serenity crew; 9-
    Mal, Zoe, Jayne, Wash, Kaylee, Inarra, Simon, River, Book



    Whedon cliches
    ;
    Devoted siblings, haunted charismatic leading man. Teenage girls with superpowers. Hookers. Babbling insane girls with truth in their madness. Fake cockneys. Misguided religious zealots. Numbered t-shirts. Girls with botanical names (Willow, Saffron, Jasmine). Absent fathers. Clever use of extensive flashbacks. Women in boxes.

    Bondage
    ; I've been reminded that I didn't include Mal and Wash tied up by Niska in War Stories so...
    Mal; 2
    River; 1
    Simon; 1
    River; 1
    Jayne; 1
    Wash; 1

    Knocked out
    ;
    Book; 2
    Simon; 2
    Kaylee; 1
    Jayne;3
    Mal; 2
    Wash; 1
    Inara; 1
    Zoe; 1
    River; 1
     
    Kills; Zoe kills 2 Alliance soldiers during the war. Mal kills Tracey who seems very resilent, perhaps due to his organ smuggling surgery?
    Mal; 12-
    Zoe; 12-
    Jayne; 11-
    Wash; 2
    River; 3
     
    Whedon alumni-
    Jonathon Woodward; 3-as observed in the commentary, a hatrick (but not the only one), the vamp Holden Webster whom Buffy slays in 'Lies my parents told me', the traitorous Knox in season 5 of Angel and now Tracey in Firefly, each character seeming good but betraying everyone at the end.

    Alliance good or bad?;

    Inara seems to be suggesting she return the Lassiter for a reward but Mal won't hear of it, maybe to avoid her getting in trouble or maybe he just couldn't stand dealing with the Alliance?
    Womack is operating by himself as obviously the Alliance consider organ smuggling illegal although it doesn't seem to bother Mal and co.

    Missing scenes;
    One rumoured storyline for later in the season is that Mal is approached to join a group of ex-Browncoats who want to restart the war and destroy the Alliance. He is then faced with the choice represented by Zoe on one side who wants to go back to the war and Inara on the other who says that would be madness.

    Firefly speak;
    Gorram=goddam.
    Weak tea=not good
    Back birth=idiot
    Companion=high class courtesan
    Gengish=competent
    Doh-ma=understand/understood?
    Rutting=bloody (or perhaps 'fraking'?)
    Chin-cha-da=hell
    Purple belly=officious bureaucrat
    Ta-gow=Oh god!
    Won-gwa-pee= to urinate or defecate
    Gosa=excrement
    Tien-sha-duh=rubbish
    Los-soh-ret=crap
    Dien-dyododo-chowen=bastard
    Wah=what the hell?
    Mah song=quickly
    Jin-seen-yung=idiot
    Nu-shu-quong=nice going
    Mai-hong=hello
    Sheinou-niou=no good
    Mei, mei=little sister
    Niou-se=lame
    Hey-shu-peegou=dumbass
    Moon brain=inbred?
    Jus-sa-gran=dupes/suckers
    Swa-shi=petty, small time
    Trim=sex
    Roller=tank or armoured vehicle
    Jon-su=bitch/hardass
    Wetware=smuggled organs

    Shot;
    -Wash shot in the face
    Mal; 2-
    Kaylee;1-
    Jayne;3-
    Book;1-
    Wash;1-
     
    Reminds me off;
    The spaceport very reminiscent of Blade Runner whilst the post office scenes are reminiscent of season 4 of Babylon 5 (goverments rise and fall but the postal system is forever). The police craft if reminiscent of the former US Navy F14 Tomcat fighter.
     
    Questions and observations;
    No aliens in the Fireflyverse, much like BSG. Simon just seems to live with his foot in his mouth (even River thinks he's a 'boob'). I guess being such a goodlooking guy and a successful surgeon he never really had to try to get girls before. His observation that every other woman in his extremely limited social circle is married (Zoe), a professional who refuses to 'service the crew' (Inara) and his sister leaving Kaylee as a last resort is about as sensitive as bombing Hiroshima.
    Jayne has a mother (and possibly a sister?) whom he sends money to. Jayne wears a hat which is unusual, in Firefly it's mostly the bad guys who wear hats. A very different version of pre-Serenity Mal here, funloving and seeming to think of the war as a great big game. Kaylee has rigged a hammock in the engine room, perhaps because of the events of Out of Gas? Or because that way Simon can just walk casually in on her which he couldn't in her room cabin?
    The mule has survived it's use as a kamikaze in War Stories and is lodged in the Serenity's hold. Interestingly Jayne who we think of as a tactically shaven gorilla shows suprising sensitivity, removing his hat at the sight of the corpse and telling Book that seeing the dead makes him value life all the more. Nice mention of Saffron, Mal&co thinking that the Feds are after the Lassiter because she sold them out.
    Shepherd once again shows an interesting depth of knowledge of the Alliance police.
    .
    Marks out of 10; 6/10 A little disappointing after the quality of the preceding eps, largely rescued by a few good lines.
    [/FONT]
     
  15. Deckerd

    Deckerd Fleet Arse Premium Member

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    What does butterface mean?
     
  16. Forbin

    Forbin Admiral Admiral

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    I said out, dammit!
    Old Male Chauvenist Pig saying: "She has a nice body, but her face ain't that great." The whole sentence shortened to just the code word "butterface."

    IMHO, of course.
     
  17. Deckerd

    Deckerd Fleet Arse Premium Member

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    I knew it would be something like that.

    A band called the Monks brought out a lovely single called "Nice legs, shame about the face" back in the day. They would get booed off nowadays.
     
  18. Trekker4747

    Trekker4747 Boldly going... Premium Member

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    For the zillionth time, you DO NOT HAVE TO DO THIS!

    Do you think before everytime I've made a post there I've had to tell the system what font to use?

    No.

    Just.

    Type.

    Your.

    Post.

    You do not have to tell the system what font to use, it already knows and you cannot change it no matter how hard you try.

    Just. Type. Your. POST!

    Nah. I think she's a "butterface" too. Infact, I'm not even a big fan of her body, there's moments in her "naked scene" where she looks less like a "average-sized woman with big tits (the only reason anyone ever gives her any second thought whatsoever)" and more like "fat woman."
     
  19. Alex1939

    Alex1939 Captain Captain

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    With few episodes left to review, what's the point in keep harping on this?

    Besides, it must be from copying the entire text from another source, no?



    And you guys are crazy about Saffron. Gorgeous all around.
     
  20. saturn5

    saturn5 Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    I write the review out on Word first so I HAVE to choose a font!
    As for Saffron her face looks fine to me. Her body? Well, she's nice but not Pamela Anderson/Lynda Carter