Objects In Space

Previously on Firefly: The Dishwashers of Doom came to escort River back into the kitchen, but she escaped; Simon discovered that the mysterious Academy had been picking around in River's brain; Jayne betrayed River and Simon for a large sum of money, but was then told that the check was in the mail; Mal almost killed Jayne when he realized what Jayne had done, but didn't; Kaylee wasn't a big fan of real-world first-person shooter games, but River helped her out with her Jedi mind tricks. Incidentally, following up on a recent comment from Sars, "Jedi" is in Microsoft Word's dictionary. Scary, huh?

Serenity soars through space, past a rainbow-colored planet. Suddenly, the camera starts hurtling toward the ship, passing through the wiring and ducts, stopping with a strange "schoop!" sound effect at a mesh grid in the ceiling overlooking River's bed. She lies there with her eyes closed. We hear the muttering of voices as Radio KRZY prepares for its evening broadcast. River opens her eyes as a man's voice declares, "We're all just floating." Not for long. Sorry. All my gay jokes are likely to be replaced with cancellation jokes in this recap. I'm not sure whether you'll find that an improvement or not.

River slides open the door to her quarters and wanders out into the common area, where Simon and Kaylee are hanging out, talking. Simon's telling Kaylee a story about how he and some other guys who had just made surgeon pulled some stunt where they stood around naked on a statue of Hippocrates and sang. And they took turns sitting on his caduceus. Okay, maybe a couple of gay jokes. Simon's sitting on the couch in total casual attire -- just a long-sleeved shirt and some Old Navy cargo pants. I miss the vests. Kaylee's resting with her legs in his lap. Neither of them seems to notice River. She teases him about imagining him naked in a flirtation that's about as subtle as offering him a blowjob. She tickles his face with her bare foot. Ew. Simon pretends that he's not repulsed at a girl touching him (with her foot! Ew!) and explains how the feds showed up when he started singing. He claims they were just singing the national anthem. I'm thinking it was something by Freddie Mercury. Simon and Kaylee giggle until Simon notices River standing there. There's a slight whooshing sound effect and a quick cut; suddenly Simon and Kaylee are looking at her, stone-faced. Simon says, "I would be there right now." Then suddenly we cut back to Simon and Kaylee laughing some more. River turns and walks up some stairs, looking a little hurt, as Simon tells Kaylee about bribing the feds not tell his dad about his gay surgeon orgy. I thought River wasn't allowed to leave the room?

River heads down a corridor in her pretty pink sundress, barefoot. She wanders into the mess area, where Book and Jayne are talking about the fact that Book's taken a vow of chastity. Jayne is cooking and wearing a little apron. See, I told you he's total bottom. Jayne is predictably appalled at the idea of giving up sex. He asks Book if he's still got his goodies. Please don't talk about Book's goodies. Book says he does. Can we leave it at that and move on? Jayne asks about Book's urges. Book says that he directs his urges elsewhere. Jayne responds, "You mean like masturbatin'?" Gah. How is it that I've gone blind? River starts walking up to them as they discuss the risible idea of Jayne joining an Order. I think Jayne would have some interesting sermons. And the collection plate would be passed around at gunpoint. Suddenly, Jayne turns to River and says, "The money was too good. I got stupid." This was the exact thing he said to Mal when he admitted his betrayal in "Ariel." Book angrily spits at River, "I don't give half a hump if you're innocent or not. So where does that put you?" Cancelled. Oh, sorry. Suddenly they're laughing again, and River walks away in shock as the two of them ignore her and discuss the potential future sainthood of Jayne. No, see, we worship him because he's not a saint.

River leaves and wanders down another corridor until she can get a look through the doorway to the bridge. In there, Wash and Zoe are making out heavily. For some reason, River hears the sounds of the ocean (complete with seagulls) as she watches the two of them go at it. She makes ecstasy faces. Wash is going to be disappointed when he finds out that he actually had a three-way and didn't even know it.

Elsewhere, Mal and Inara walk across a catwalk, arguing. Inara's mad because she can't seem to get any quality clients on Mal's route these days. Mal gives a lengthy response that can be summarized as "tough patooties." River wanders down some stairs nearby. Suddenly, Inara turns to River and says, "I'm a big girl; just tell me." Okay. You've been cancelled. Sorry. Mal, arms folded, mutters, "None of it means a damned thing." Is that a meta comment?

A confused River rushes down the stairs to the cargo bay as KRZY continues to pipe soothing ocean sound effects into her head. Suddenly she steps on what appears to be a tree branch on the floor of the cargo bay, and the noises all stop. It's actually the first time she has actually interacted with anything in this segment. She leans down and picks up the branch. We pull back and see that the floor of the cargo bay appears to be covered with fallen leaves. She holds the branch and says to nobody in particular, "It's just an object. It's not what you think."

Suddenly we shift back to reality to see everybody in a panic around River in the cargo bay. It turns out that the branch she's holding is actually a handgun. Simon tries to calm her down. Kaylee looks particularly freaked out and backs away. Simon asks River where she got the gun. She mutters that it was in her hand. Mal finally manages to get the gun away from her, then notes that it was fully loaded with the safety off. He asks Simon if River understands how "unpleasant" what she just did could have been. River responds, "She understands. She doesn't comprehend." Eh? Mal says, "Well, I'm glad we made that distinction." Did we? Mal, speaking like a particularly rude Amazing Race contestant to a non-English-speaking taxi driver, leans over and demands, "No touching guns, okay?" River responds, "No touching," and starts to walk away. Simon tries to speak to her, but she shouts, "It's getting very, very crowded!" and runs out of the bay.

After she leaves, Mal tells Simon he thought River was getting better. Simon medibabbles about difficulties with the drugs. Mal angrily points out that River could have shot Simon, and if she had, there wouldn't be anybody to patch him up because they're out in space. Or as Mal puts it, on the "corner of 'no' and 'where.'" Just like the show's ratings! Sorry. Mal insists that Simon take better care of River, because they're "all alone out here." Everybody knows that an ironic segue is coming now. People who don't even know what the words "ironic" and "segue" mean know that it's coming. Certain species of mollusk know an ironic segue is coming. Is it still "ironic" if we all know it's going to happen? We cut outside Serenity for the ironic segue to see a smaller ship flying just behind it.

Credits. You can't take Phillip J. Fry from me. Oh, who am I kidding? FOX does whatever the hell it wants. Bastiches.

NOOOOOOOOOOOO! Those damned "Bod" commercials are back. The torment never ends.

We return to The Sinister Oboe (Or Possibly Clarinet) Of The Villain Of The Week. Inside the ship tailing Serenity, a man in a red suit reminiscent of Michael Jackson's Moonwalker days (does anybody else remember that video game?) peers over a bunch of pictures of River, including wanted posters.

Inside Serenity, on the bridge, Wash wonders to Zoe what crazy thing River is going to do . Zoe says, "Either blow us all up or rub soup in our hair. It's a toss-up." Wash hopes it's the soup thing, because it's funny and nobody dies. Well, there's no reason why she can't rub soup in some people's hair and blow up the others. Zoe expresses sympathy for River's situation. I just realized that we never really knew how Zoe felt about River's plight until now. Wash mutters about some funny "heat bounce" off the ship's wake. He figures it to be a screwed-up sensor. That's about as much explanation as we're going to get as to how the second ship is following them without them noticing. Considering that ginormous, city-sized Alliance dreadnaughts have managed to sneak up on them, I guess it's no big deal. They really should look into rearview mirrors, though.

Zoe asks if Kaylee understands what she's telling them. Jayne snarkily responds, "What? She killed him with mathematics. What else could it have been?" I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss that theory. My AP calculus final put me in a coma for a week back when I was a senior in high school. Kaylee insists that none of them could have done what River did and says, "Nobody can shoot like that that's a person." Simon asks if Kaylee's saying that River's not a person, then. As Kaylee stammers and backtracks and tries to un-insult Simon's sister, we pan down below the deck to see that River is eavesdropping on their discussion from underneath the room. She's standing with her feet on each of the handrails on a catwalk over the cargo bay, giving her the appearance of floating at first glance. Kaylee goes on to explain that after River killed the guys, she acted like the two of them were "just playin,'" and it scared her. I don't know. I didn't see River having much of a playful expression there. Book points out that River probably saved Kaylee's life. Kaylee starts to explain that she's not saying she didn't or anything like that, but then Simon interrupts to say that River probably didn't even know what was going on and thought it was a game. Jayne responds, "Later on, you can explain to me how that's a comfort." I haven't been able to get a close look at it, but I think the iron-on patch on Jayne's shirt has a rainbow pattern and little flowers. Seriously.

Mal takes control of the discussion and tells everybody that they're there to discuss the fact that there's somebody on the ship that may be a danger to them. This, of course, triggers a pan upward so that we can see the intruder on the outside of the ship, eavesdropping. Mal talks about how some of them have grown attached to River, but she does have an "oddness" about her. You guys just don't understand her! She's lived a hard life and that's why she's so confrontational and you have no right to judge her! She still has a lot to learn! She reminds me of myself at that age! Oh, I'm sorry. This whole conversation just reminded me of the inevitable meeting in every season of The Real World where they spend an entire episode arguing about whether to toss one of the members out for being violent and stupid, as opposed to just stupid. Mal points out that River seems to know things that she shouldn't or couldn't possibly know. Jayne asks if they're saying she's a witch. Oh, Jayne's shirt has a rainbow pattern, little flowers, and a nekkid woman. That makes more sense. Wash snarks back at Jayne, "Yes, Jayne. She's a witch. She has had congress with the beast." Hey, that's no way to talk about Tara! Phoebe, on the other handa befuddled Jayne says, "She's in Congress?" Wash snarks, "How did your brain even learn human speech? I'm just curious." Jayne angrily tosses something on the table at him as Inara says something in Chinese ("Combining milk with Babassu Oil from the Amazon, our Babassu Milk Bath provides a fragrant and moisturizing bath experience.") and judgmentally reminds them all that they're talking about their lives, along with River's. Mal's old lady's such a downer.