RW354 - Firefly S01E10-11 - War Trash

In this weeks episode of The Firefly Rewatch, Cory and Tom strike back and go antiquing as they discuss episodes 10 & 11, "War Stories" and "Trash."

War Stories:

Episode Title: War Stories

Written by: Cheryl Cain

Directed by: James Contner

Original airdate: December 6, 2002 as episode 9

While River and Kaylee playfully run around the ship, Book talks with Simon about the state of River, referencing a psychotic dictator named Shan Yu, who said the only way to know someone truly is through torture and wonders if that is why she was subjected to the experiments, to which Simon disagrees, believing that there was another goal the Alliance had in mind. At the same time, Mal’s nemesis Niska, in the middle of torturing a new victim, received word that his men have found Serenity as he gleefully orders them to bring Mal to him. 

Wash shows signs of jealousy regarding his wife Zoe’s close and long relationship with Mal. Things get further muddled between Wash and Zoe when it’s revealed that Wash’s idea of selling their previously acquired medicine without using a middle man was shot down by Mal. Zoe had told Wash she hadn’t even asked Mal about his plan, revealing she had lied to her husband to spare his feelings, and leading her to explain that she didn’t think it was a good idea, leaving him hurt with the realisation that Zoe defers to her captain over her husband.

Elsewhere River talks with Simon, enjoying the freedom his treatments have brought her but suddenly breaks down knowing that it won’t last while Wash has acted out on his feelings and switched around the shuttle controls so that HE will have to be the one to accompany Mal on their next sales trip instead of Zoe, giving him a chance to create a few old war stories with the captain.

As Wash and Mal meet up with the prospective buyers, they find themselves being attacked by Niska’s men, eventually being overcome and taken to Niska. After a freak out from Wash, Niska enters and begins his torturing. In order to keep Wash awake and from breaking, Mal continues bickering with Wash, even going so far as to suggest he and Zoe had a sexual history as well. The two even make a deal that Mal should sleep with Zoe so she can get over her fixation on the captain. 

Back on board Serenity, Inara entertains a local counselor while Zoe starts to realize something is wrong when Mal and Wash are late from their trip. She, Book, and Jayne go to investigate and from what they see, Zoe surmises it was the work of Niska and hatches a plan to go and barter for Wash and Mal’s lives, taking all their profits from the medicine sales. 

Niska accepts the money but says it is not enough for both of them and asks her to choose to which she immediately picks Wash and the two leave but not before Niska cuts off Mal’s ear to give her a little refund from the money. 

Once back on board Serenity, Wash, impressed with Mal’s ability to not break, decides that they have to go back and get him, and the whole crew jumps in to assist, including Simon and River. 

Meanwhile, Mal continues being tortured horribly, and eventually dies but is quickly revived by Niska so he can drag out the pain for longer. Serenity’s crew manages to cut their engines and drift in silently to get the jump on Niska’s men, leading to a firefight in which Book effortlessly shoots off the enemy’s kneecaps and River, grabbing a gun from a shell shocked Kaylee, fires at several guards with her eyes closed, hitting them all and killing them instantly. 

The distraction of the attack allows Mal to get the upper hand with Niska, knocking him down but then results in him fighting with a henchman and Niska escapes. As Zoe, Jayne and Wash enter the room, Zoe tells them that Mal wants to handle the fight himself to which he quickly yells his disagreement and they all open fire, sending the henchman to his death. 

Back on board Serenity, his ear healed, Mal tells Zoe that he and Wash made a deal that the two need to have sex in order for the three of them to fix their relationship, to which Wash responds by quickly taking a Zoe away to their bunk.

Shiny Trivia:

James Contner is a director we’ve seen many times before; he directed The Flash ‘90 episode “Twin Streaks”, the Lois & Clark episode “Honeymoon in Metropolis” and the SeaQuest episode “Greed for a Pirate Dream.”

Cheryl Cain only has 3 writing credits on IMDb; this episode of Firefly, an episode of Roswell and an episode of Threat Matrix.

The counselor was played by Katherine Kendall, who is known for playing the Dorothy impersonator in Swingers. She’s had a handful of small roles but starred in Deep in the Valley with Chris Pratt, Tracy Morgan and Denise Richards (two guys get transported to an alternate reality based on porn plot lines). 

The Tortured Man was played by Johnny Shakespeare. He was in Fright House and Vampires, playing a workman in both. 

The torturer was John Dunn who had a small part in the sequel to Hard Ticket To Hawaii called Picasso Trigger.

Shanyu or Chanyu, was the title used by the rulers of the Xiongnu, a nomadic Altaic people. Thus Shan Yu may be named after Modu Chanyu the Hun, though he does not appear to be the same individual. Shan Yu is also probably based on Xiang Yu, a Qin Dynasty era Chinese military leader and political figure. In popular culture, Shan Yu is also the villain in the Disney movie Mulan.

Trash:

Episode Title: Trash

Written by: Ben Edlund & Jose Molina

Directed by: Vern Gillum

Original airdate: July 28, 2003 (second run in the UK) as episode 13

Mal faces off against Saffron once again when she turns up married to an old friend of his during a routine drop off. The two spar before Mal’s friend breaks it up and takes off, leaving Mal to deal with her, which he does by ordering her to leave but  she seems to pique his interest regarding an item she had heard of and foolproof plans of how to get it.

Mal returns to his ship and visits Inara who had requested he stop by. She suspects that Mal has been finding less jobs in order to impact her finding less clients to which he denies. As they argue, Inara insults him by calling him a petty thief, getting under his skin enough so that he reveals to the crew that he has brought Saffron aboard inside a cargo crate to explain her plan to steal a valuable laser from a man named Durran. While the crew wants a high paying job, they make their misgivings about Saffron known, ending with Zoe punching her, and Inara insulting them for trusting the con artist. 

As the plan begins, Mal and Saffron easily locate the laser but are caught by Durran in the room. While it looks like all is lost, the man changes when he sees Saffron, calling her Yolanda and thanking Mal for returning his wife to him. 

Meanwhile, Jayne is attempting to replace a circuit board on a trash receptacle, part of the plan to order the bin to their own chosen set of coordinates after Mal and Saffron toss the laser in the trash after stealing it. Unfortunately he gets knocked out from a shock and is left incapacitated, leaving Kaylee and Zoe to attempt it. 

After Durran leaves the room in order to get Mal a reward, he begins disabling the security around the laser, commenting that he thinks Durran is actually her true husband to which she responds by holding him up at gunpoint. Durran returns  and while Saffron tries to explain it away, he reveals that he notified the authorities as soon as he had seen her, via a silent alarm on his ring. Saffron ends up knocking him out as Mal and her begin to try to escape the building while the alliance begins to pour into it, eventually getting away. As the two talk on the shuttle, she manages to dupe Mal again  and gets his pistol, ordering him to strip down and then leaving him on the planet below.

Meanwhile, Kaylee managed to get the circuit board in place just in the nick of time, sending the garbage off to their rendezvous point while Jayne awakes immobilized in the med bay. Simon explains that he did that to Jayne so that he wouldn’t further hurt his spine after his fall earlier. Simon then reveals he knows that Jayne ratted them out back on Ariel, but despite that and what may happen in the future, he won’t harm Jayne because he is a doctor. River adds that if Jayne ever did plot against them, that she could kill him with her brain, which leaves him shook while Kaylee deals with a sabotaged engine due to Saffron’s earlier machinations. 

Back at the rendezvous point, we see Saffron desperately searching the garbage bin for the laser, looking disheveled and dirty, when Inara appears and holds her at gunpoint, explaining that the whole plan was a ruse in which the Serenity crew had actually duped Saffron, as she closed the garbage bin lid, waiting for pickup from the authorities, as Mal returns to the now working Serenity, commenting on the successful heist.

Shiny Trivia:

Franc Ross played Monty Reynolds. We’ve seen him before in the Sliders episode “The Other Slide Of Darkness” as Billy T. He’s had bit parts here and there, including 15 episodes of Days of Our Lives.

Durran was played by Dwier Brown. We’ve seen him in the Quantum Leap episode “Promised Land” (3 brothers in Sam’s hometown trying to rob a bank). He’s had some lead roles in movies like The Intervention and Rip Girls, as well as supporting roles like House and House II and guest spots in TV shows.

Nathan Fillion wore a picture of director Joss Whedon over his private bits during some of the nude scenes. For other takes, he wore a sack displaying a figure reminiscent of Wilson from the film Cast Away (2000).

The tattoo visible on Mal's hip is an Egyptian glyph meaning peace. Nathan Fillion got it at the age of 19 and reportedly regrets it.

Whats Next?

Cory and Tom will be discussing episodes 12 & 13, "The Message" & "Heart of Gold."

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