The Train Job

Big, major props to Strega. I'm assuming that she has handled the recaplet for this episode for me. I have to operate on assumptions at the moment, because as I write this, four days after moving into my new apartment across the country, I still have no phone service at all. Speaking of which, big, major anti-props to Verizon, the most incompetent utility company I've ever had to deal with in my life. Ever. The most incompetent company, period. And I've had to brave the IRS customer service line. Verizon sucks. When Verizon eventually files for Chapter Eleven, and they most certainly will, I will dance a happy dance of schadenfreude.

But enough about me; let's get to the latest chapter in the Book of Joss: Firefly. Will it breathe new life into the sci-fi genre and continue Mutant Enemy's string of modest successes? Will it crash and burn like every single drama that has been stuck on FOX's Friday-night schedule ever since The X-Files was moved to Sundays? Well, considering that one of the most creatively written and critically acclaimed sci-fi series to hit the air in the past five years was just unceremoniously canceled, I'm not exactly getting too attached to these characters. Plus, I've already seen the ratings for the premiere. Not good.

We open with some CGI shots of a ship flying past various planets and a caption indicating the year as 2517. In a voice-over, a man explains, "After the earth was used up, we found a new solar system, and hundreds of new earths were terraformed and colonized." "Used up"? Was this intro written by a second-grader? And which solar system has hundreds of planets? Apparently terraforming isn't what it's cracked up to be; we see shots of people wandering around some dusty desert town in drab Western clothing. The man continues, "The central planets formed 'The Alliance,' and decided all the planets had to join under their rule. There was some disagreement on that point." We see shots of the inside of an Alliance base, bustling with drones in the goofy-looking uniforms in neutral shades that are required by any credible futuristic oppressive empire. And an outside shot of the Alliance base shows that it looms impressively, like reputable evil space headquarters are required to do. As we see some brief shots of ships fighting and explosions, the narrator continues, "After the war, many of the 'Independents' who had fought and lost drifted to the edges of the system, far from Alliance control. Out here, people struggled to get by with the most basic technologies. A ship would get you work; a gun would help you keep it." We see more shots of people living in Western-style poverty. So if the planets at the edge of this gigantic solar system aren't really under Alliance control, then who really won the war here? Already this Civil War conceit is starting to fall apart. It would be like the U.S. government looking the other way at a little slavery still going on in the Florida Keys or something. Well, maybe I'm being a little harsh. Clearly we're in the futuristic equivalent of the Reconstruction. We see clips of the various cast members of our show in action as the narration concludes, "A captain's goal was simple: find a crew; find a job; keep flying."

We cut to the inside of a dusty, dirty bar, where gaps in the roof allow for shafts of natural light to shine down into the building, driving home the fact that the bar is full of dust and dirt. There's probably as much silicon floating through the bar as there is to be found in the breasts of the belly dancer who writhes around the tables while vaguely Arabic/Oriental music plays. It's all very "Indiana Jones meets with an old friend and contact who fills him in on the secret Nazi plans minutes before coming to an unfortunate end." The dancer writhes around for about ten minutes, the camera following her torso around (you are watching FOX!), and eventually makes her way over to a table in the corner. There, she slips a piece of paper into a man's hand with all the discretion of Suzy Jackson passing a note to Kelly Wood in third-period English to ask if Tommy McIntyre had asked her to go to the homecoming dance yet.

The woman writhes off, probably to wash all that dust off of her, and the camera focuses on the three folks sitting at the table. They are: the guy who played Johnny on Two Guys and a Girl; the woman who played Sydney's first nemesis on Alias; and Adam Baldwin (whom some of you may recall as Noel Roaawwwrr on The X-Files). Now I must confess, I've had a mad crush on Adam Baldwin for years. So you may ask yourself, "Will this affect Shack's objectivity and judgment in his recaps? Will his normal level of sarcasm be compromised every time Adam swaggers his way into a scene, with his effortless, beefy masculinity and charismatic smile that says, 'I'm a naughty, naughty boy -- and you love it,' while his eyes sparkle with a charm that he tries to pretend doesn't exist? Well? Will it?" Yes. Yes it will. Shut up. Anyway, the three of them are playing Chinese checkers, because everything is old-fashioned. Get it? They're not answering trivia questions on televisions hanging from the ceiling in order to win free Buffalo wings, because that's for fancy folks. They just get the Chinese checkers. Because they're poor and dispossessed.

The trio play and bicker and snark for a while, until a man at the bar tries to get everybody's attention in order to hold a toast. Hey, maybe the exposition will seem less awkward if we have some drunken idiot blurt it out? No, no it won't. The man drunkenly declares that today is an "asspicious" day. Strip-club announcers write that clever little word down for later use. The man continues that everybody knows what today is. Adam Baldwin asks Sydney's Nemesis what day it is. Before she can respond, Drunk Guy exposits that today is Unification Day. Today's the day the Alliance officially beat the "scumbag" Independents into submission. The rest of the bar appears to be ignoring him. Johnny heads up to the bar. Sydney's nemesis calls him "Captain." I don't know why I'm pretending that I don't know these characters' names, other than to try to recreate the experience of not having them officially introduced to us. Captain Johnny tells Sydney's Nemesis that he feels the need to get another drink. Adam Baldwin asks Sydney's Nemesis what month it is. I don't know if we're supposed to think he's dumb or just detached. Or maybe both.

Captain Johnny heads up to the bar to Drunk Exposition Guy and orders a drink in Chinese. Captain Johnny's proximity transforms Drunk Exposition Guy into Opening Conflict Guy. Opening Conflict Guy asks Captain Johnny if he's going to toast the Alliance with him. He exposits that The Alliance sent the "browncoats" of the Independents running six years ago. Then Opening Conflict Guy notices that Captain Johnny is dressed all in brown, including a knee-length trench coat. Of course, everything in this bar, including the very air, is brown, but whatever. Captain Johnny claims he got the jacket on sale. Opening Conflict Guy suggests that perhaps Captain Johnny was one of them thar browncoats. Captain Johnny responds that perhaps Opening Conflict Guy wasn't "burdened with an overabundance of schooling." Captain Johnny further suggests that the two of them simply ignore each other. But Opening Conflict Guy hasn't fulfilled his new duties as of yet. He sneers at Captain Johnny that the Independents were "cowardly, inbred pisspots." This guy's ranting would make more sense if he didn't look exactly like everybody else in the bar, including these Independents. At no point in this conflict is there any indication as to why this guy supports the Alliance, when clearly he's as dispossessed as all the other fringe folks out here. But you don't get the luxury of a complex characterization when you're just the Opening Conflict Guy. What you get is a fight scene. Captain Johnny slams down his beer and orders Opening Conflict Guy to repeat that insult to his face. Opening Conflict Guy does so, and asks Captain Johnny what he's going to do about it. Captain Johnny smirks and says, "Nothing. I just wanted you to face me so [Sydney's Nemesis] could get behind you." Opening Conflict Guy turns around, Sydney's Nemesis hits him in the mouth with the butt of her sawed-off shotgun, and he goes down. Mission accomplished, Opening Conflict Guy!

But why stop with just one punch? It turns out that, though everybody else in the bar was completely ignoring Opening Conflict Guy, suddenly they're all big Alliance supporters. Captain Johnny mutters something in Chinese while Sydney's Nemesis finally calls Adam Baldwin by his character's name -- Jayne -- when she asks him for help. I'd make fun of the character's name, but it's Adam Baldwin, and we've already established that whole thing. Jayne remains at the table and nonchalantly points out that he didn't fight in the war and wishes the both of them luck.

Then we cut to Captain Johnny getting tossed through the window of the bar into the dirt outside. Now, when I say tossed "through" the window, what I mean is that he goes through the window without anything breaking. That's because the window is a hologram. That's right -- somebody went to the effort of developing a holographic device to mimic something that's completely transparent. Don't think about it too much or your head might explode. If this is an indication of how these people prioritize their expenses, I think we might have hit upon the real reason they're all so poor. As Captain Johnny picks himself up off the ground, he pulls out a communicator and tells somebody with the improbable name of "Wash" that they've encountered some "local color" and could use a "grand entrance." Well, a decent bath might cheer these folks up, but I'm guessing Wash's name isn't meant to be taken literally.

Just then, Sydney's Nemesis kicks a few local-color asses out the door of the bar, and fisticuffs ensue. And thankfully, this all looks like a real fight that real people might have, and not the "if it looks cool in Tekken, wouldn't it look cooler if we did it live?" stuntwork we get on Buffy and Angel. Captain Johnny kicks a guy in the knee. Sydney's Nemesis throws dirt in a guy's eyes. Uh, what happened to Sydney's Nemesis's gun? Jayne, I guess, couldn't let the opportunity to hurt people pass, so he knocks a few guys out the front door of the bar with a stool and joins the fray. Unfortunately, our would-be intrepid anti-heroes find themselves outnumbered and backed up to the edge of a conveniently nearby cliff. Captain Johnny jokes to Sydney's Nemesis that this is why they lost the war in the first place. Sydney's Nemesis deadpans, "Thanks for the reenactment, sir." Opening Conflict Guy and two other fellows draw guns on our would-be intrepid anti-heroes. He suggests that the three of them need to be "put down." Captain Johnny responds, "I'm thinking we'll rise again." Do you get it? Do you? Do you? They'll rise again? Like the South? After the Civil War?

Before Opening Conflict Guy can call Captain Johnny's bluff, Wash arrives with the requested grand entrance. A spaceship the size of a large yacht rises up (get it?) from beneath the lip of the cliff to stare the gathered Alliance rednecks in the face. Over a speaker, Wash warns the men to go back in the bar or he'll "blow a new crater in this little moon." Having served their function, Opening Conflict Guy and his fellow conflicteers turn tail and return to the bar. The Fiddle Of Beating The Western Theme Into Our Heads plays as our trio of would-be intrepid anti-heroes jump onto a loading ramp and head into a storage bay. Jayne mocks the yokels because they don't know that their transport ship is totally unarmed. If the dumb, poor yokels support the Alliance, then who the hell were the Independents, other than these folks? The inside of this ship, by the way, is as dirty, rusty, and brown as the inside of the bar they just left.

Captain Johnny and Sydney's Nemesis head up some stairs to the "bridge" -- which looks more like an extra-large cockpit -- to thank Wash for the save. Wash is played by Alan Tudyk, an actor so Nordically pale that he probably glows in the dark. Captain Johnny asks after the other passengers, prompting a young woman to pull herself out from under a console she is repairing to tell him they're fine. This girl is a "Hollywood Geek" -- a pretty, pretty girl who is stuck into lumpy clothing, given an unflattering hairstyle, and denied make-up, all to try to convince us that she's not a pretty, pretty girl. Then, of course, she'll get all "gussied up" for some reason or another and knock everybody's socks off. Everybody, that is, who isn't already aware that this is already a pretty, pretty girl. And since this nonsense has been already been mocked in awful "comedies" like Not Another Teen Movie, I don't know why we're being dragged down this damned road yet again. Pretty Geek Girl asks what happened and whether there was a big brawl. There was. Wash asks if Captain Johnny is getting Wash's wife (meaning Sydney's Nemesis) into trouble again. Captain Johnny insists that he didn't start it. Sydney's Nemesis points out that they always seem to end up in an Alliance-friendly bar on Unification Day. Captain Johnny jokingly accuses Sydney's Nemesis of developing "space dementia" and paranoia. Pretty Geek Girl laughs, because she wants to be in with the cool kids. And finally they get to the point of this entire opening scene: that little note that was passed to Captain Johnny. He tells them all that he got them a job, and orders Wash to take them off-world: "We got us some crime to be done." The Banjo Of Shack Dreading The Pending Opening Theme Song plays as we end the intro with a shot of the ship flying off away from the planet, a wake of green vapors trailing behind it.

We cut to the dirty, grubby, poverty-stricken mining town of Paradiso, where the Alliance soldiers are overseeing the arrival and unloading of the passengers. Mal and Zoe wander among them, eavesdropping on a man ordering an investigation to find out what was stolen. It turns out that the crates were full of medicine that the town had been waiting for. Mal and Zoe look concerned, wondering why a psychotic mob boss who would kill his own relatives just for disappointing him would ever stoop so low as to steal medicine. There are lines, and then there are lines. Mal mutters, "Son of a bitch." This is what you get when you don't ask questions, "anti-hero."

Commercials. We return to the looming Alliance base. You know, I can see the appeal of living in poverty on the fringes of society if the alternative is to go around dressed like a bellboy. That appears to be the official uniform of the Alliance drones, as they buzz around some command center. A drone fills in the head bellboy about the theft of the medicine. The planet, by the way, is located in the "Georgia System." Do you get it? Do you? Do you? The medicine is something called Pescaline D. Head Bellboy exposits that it will be worth a lot of money on the black market. He orders the drone to tell the local authorities to handle it. The drone points out that there is a regiment of soldiers who were on the train at the time, on their way out to some installation. So it wasn't even an unusual event that there were soldiers on the train? Our anti-heroes aren't exactly burdened with an abundance of over-education, either, are they? Head Bellboy orders that the soldiers get back on the train and get it moving again. Drone explains that the local sheriff has asked for the soldiers' help in recovering the medicine. Head Bellboy doesn't care. Small-town sheriffs are lousy tippers. They can deal with their own problems.

Meanwhile, the ship -- oh, fuck it again; the ship is named Serenity -- has landed somewhere other than the appropriate rendezvous point. We know this because Jayne is sitting in the medical bay, having a fit about it while Simon tries to treat his wounds. Everybody is there. Wash and Jayne argue. Wash doesn't want to go anywhere until he recovers his wife. Jayne points out that Niska isn't known for his patience. Jayne tries to get up to leave, but he's still in too much pain and Simon hasn't stopped fondling him. Or treating him. Whichever. Simon goes through some medical supplies and worries out loud that the Alliance will find them when they look for the stolen goods. Wash assures him that they'll be able to hear any Alliance ships coming long before they get there. River decides to disrupt the flow of the argument with some of her nonsense. She starts sing-songing, "They won't stopwon't stopthey'll just keep coming until they get what you took. Two by twohands of bluetwo by twohands of blue." Jayne speaks for the viewers by spitting out, "How's about you shut that crazy mouth? Is that a fun game?" I'll put up with River as long as they keep Jayne around to tell her to shut up for me. Jayne Al Haigs some more that "[he's] in rutting charge." "Rutting"? Frell that. I don't know about the rest of you, but I intend to do my part to make sure the verb "to fuck" and all of its conjugations remains in our vocabulary for as long as possible. Jayne tells the gathered folks that Niska will turn them all into "meat pies" if they don't make the rendezvous. Simon heads back to Jayne and injects something into his arm as Book points out that Niska will be expecting the captain, and there may be bad consequences if Niska finds out that Mal is being held and could reveal who hired him. Book suggests that it would be better to be a little late than the alternative.

Back on Paradiso (oh, the irony), folks are gathered around in a dank hall, sputtering and coughing and being all sick. Mal and Zoe sit on a bench and watch everybody being sick. Mal calls it a nightmare. Zoe points out that there's no evidence that they were involved, but that's not what he means. Because he's a soft-hearted, hard-bitten cynic with a heart of gold. He tells Zoe, "No matter what happens, remember that I love you?" Zoe looks at him in confusion and asks, "Sir?" See, this was Mal's clever way of telling Zoe to pretend that they're a married couple. Zoe responds, "Right. Sir. Honey."

Eventually, the man who was overseeing things at the train station comes over to greet them. Zoe and Mal pretend they don't know what's going on. He brings them over to his desk for an interview. They pretend that they're newlyweds, and that Mal's uncle paid for the tickets for them to come to Paradiso to look for work. This guy, by the way, is the local sheriff. Mal overplays his hand and mentions that his "uncle" told him that he knew one Joey Bloggs, who may have an opening. They chat some more. Mal asks him about all the sick people. The sheriff explains that there's been an outbreak of Contrivance. The symptoms include weak characterizations, spotty plotting, and sucking holes of predictability. Actually, there's a degenerative disease called Bowden's Malady, which affects the townsfolk of Paradiso because of some technobabble involving the local mines. The medicine that our anti-heroes stole is the treatment for the sickness. Mal points out that there were Alliance soldiers on the train as well. The sheriff bitterly tells them that the soldiers left without helping them recover the drugs. Mal takes the opportunity to badmouth the Alliance. Sheriff agrees that the Alliance isn't much use out here in the hinterplanets, but points out that they're not the ones who stole the medicine, and when he gets his hands on the ones who did, he's going to seal them in the mines. The sheriff asks Mal when he last talked to Mr. Bloggs. Recognizing the trap, Mal explains his uncle did all the talking. The sheriff reveals that Bloggs committed suicide eight months ago. Without missing a beat, Mal asks if Bloggs's position is open.

Back on Serenity, it's Jayne vs. everybody, Round II. He limps his way up to the cockpit and insists that they're going to take off without Zoe and Mal. Wash refuses. Jayne tells him, "You know what the chain of command is? It's the chain I go get and beat you with until you understand who's in rutting command here." Ooh, kinky. Do they have to call you "Daddy," too? Jayne insists that they have to drop off the cargo; then they can come back and try to get Zoe and Mal. He adds, "We can't change that by gettingallbendy" Everybody looks confused, including Jayne. He starts babbling about lights on the consoles and how they "shine like little angels" as he tries to grasp at invisible things in the air. Then he collapses with a heavy thud. Wash: "Did he just go crazy and fall asleep?" Kaylee realizes that Simon doped up Jayne when he was tending his wounds. Simon apologetically explains that he didn't feel comfortable with Jayne in charge; he hopes that everybody's okay with that. The remaining crewmembers brainstorm in order to find a way to get Zoe and Mal out. Kaylee points out that they can't just waltz in and get them. Book points out that somebody "respectable" might be able to.

And what's more respectable than a guild-approved space hooker? The Sitar Of Poorly Planned Gender Role Subversion plays as Inara walks into the sheriff's office in a cleavage-enhancing red faux-Oriental dress. Mal stands up and is about to ask Inara what she's doing there when she slaps him hard across the face and warns him not to say another word. Inara pretends that Mal and Zoe had tried to steal money from her and were only posing as a newlywed couple to escape attention. Inara explains that Mal is her "indentured man" with three years left on his "debt." So hookers can have slaves? How enlightened. Inara notices that everybody in the office is staring at her. The sheriff apologizes because they don't get "registered companions" out here in Paradiso. They just have to muddle through by getting to know each other and falling in love or maybe just getting drunk and all that troublesome nonsense. Inara offers to take Mal and Zoe off his hands, unless there was some other problem. The sheriff mentions that there was a problem with the Mal's story, but of course, Inara's lie covers their lie, so everything's okay.

Inara's shuttle returns to Serenity, and there are greetings all around. Wash gives Zoe a big hug. Jayne is lying on the one of the landings of the stairwell, semi-conscious. Kaylee explains that they tried to get him to the infirmary, but he was too heavy. Wash says that the ship is ready to go, but Mal has changed the plans. They're giving the medicine back. See, people need it, so they're going to give it to them. I guess they normally steal things that nobody wants. No wonder life is so hard for them. It's not easy being a soft-hearted, hard-bitten cynic with a heart of gold. Believe me, I know. Through partially paralyzed lips, Jayne expresses surprise that they're giving it back, and lies that he waited for them. Wash asks about Niska. Mal says they'll give the money back to Niska and explain and everything will be fine, because apparently Zoe wasn't joking when she told Mal he had a problem with his brain being missing. Wash informs Mal that they're about to get the opportunity to explain everything right now; Crow and his crew and his bad-ass tattoo have just found them.

Commercials. When we return, Crow and his crew and his bad-ass tattoo stride up the loading ramp into the ship. Crow holds a big, oddly shaped knife. He asks them why they aren't at the planned rendezvous point. Mal says they hit some complications. Crow suggests they were planning to hightail it with Niska's merchandise. Mal insists that he wasn't. He does, however, attempt to cancel the deal, telling Crow that they've changed their minds. Crow's not having it. He wants the medicine. Mal tries to offer the money back and wants to call it even. Crow says that there is no "even." Mal asks, "Is that right?" Crow's response is to throw his knife into Mal's shoulder. Ouch. That's the first thing in this incredibly predictable episode that surprised me. The other men draw guns and open fire. Zoe does as well, and immediately takes a man down. Inara pulls Kaylee away from the gun battle as Mal fights with Crow. A man tries to rush Zoe, and she knocks him out with the butt of her gun. Wash sneaks over to an ATV. Mal and Crow fight some more. Wash peels off in the ATV and knocks out another of Crow's crew. Crow and Mal fight some more. Crow knocks Mal down and is prepares to finish him off when a gunshot rings out and hits Crow in the leg. Crow goes down. Mal looks up to the stairway and says, "Nice shot." Half-paralyzed Jayne (he looks like a stroke victim here) holds a gun and drawls, "I was aiming for his head."

Out on a dirt road, Zoe and Mal drive the cargo back toward Paradiso with the help of an ATV. They stop and plan to drag the medicine the rest of the way to a spot near the town, and inform the sheriff once they make it out to space. But out of the darkness, the sheriff's voice says, "Why don't you tell him in person?" See, he figured it all out becausewell, because. Zoe and Mal are surrounded by armed townsfolk. A woman looks over the medicine and determines that nothing is missing. The sheriff gives a vague speech about the fact that he understands that times are tough, and he realizes that Mal took this job without knowing all the details. Once he found out the details, he made the choice to do the right thing. Then he lets Mal and Zoe go. Because, like them, the sheriff is a soft-hearted, hard-bitten cynic with a heart of gold.

Back at the ship, Crow is foaming at the mouth and giving looks that kill to everybody within eyesight. Mal has him chained down on his knees; he waves the money at Crow and tells him he needs to explain to Niska that they didn't steal anything that was his, and that they're going to stay out of his way from now on and they expect him to do the same. Not that I'm on Niska's side here, but even though they didn't take anything that Niska wanted, they actively prevented him from receiving it, so I can see why Crow and Niska wouldn't see things as being "even." Crow makes his way back onto his feet and starts up a big rant, telling Mal to keep the money to buy a funeral because he and Niska aren't going to let this go and they're going to hunt him down and blah blah blah.

And then Mal kicks Crow in the direction of one of the ship's turbines, which sucks him in, killing him instantly. Whoa. That's the second (and the last) thing in the episode that surprised me. After witnessing Mal's seriously watered-down version of an anti-hero for the whole hour, I didn't think he actually had the stones do anything like that. Zoe drags up one of Crow's crew, who is more than happy to take the money and return to Niska and say nothing but lovely things about Mal and his crew if it means he doesn't get sucked into a turbine.

The Fiddle Of Transitional Foreshadowing plays as the ship takes off from the planet. In the sick bay, Simon sews up Mal's wounds. Mal compliments Simon's ingenuity in doping up Jayne, but warns him that he hasn't exactly made a friend for life. Simon says he'll "deal with [Jayne]." I wonder what that will involve, and find my mind wandering far, far off into slashfic land. Mal asks how River's doing. Simon says she hasn't improved. Sometimes she's cogent; sometimes she babbles. I vote that they only show her when she's cogent. But no, as Simon explains that he has no idea what the Academy was trying to do to River or whether or not they were successful, we pan over to a tiny sleeping quarters, where River is cowering to the bed, muttering, "Two by two, hands of blue," over and over again.

We cut to the Alliance base, where the Head Bellboy is meeting with two Men In Black. The Head Bellboy apologizes for keeping them waiting. The men explain that they've flown all the way out to the base because of the recent theft. They're looking for a girl. And as one of the men slides a picture of River across the meeting table, we see that he's wearing blue gloves on his hands. Both men are. That would have been shocking ifno, that would have never been shocking.

week: A salvage mission doesn't go as planned. Do they ever?