Firefly

(S01E02) Not an episode that stands out above the rest, but it has its moments. We’re really getting a feel for who these characters are, what quirks they each have and who likes/dislikes whom. This episode also deals a lot with the Reavers, what they are (or actually, what they are not) and what they’re capable of.

We’re gradually being introduced to these mysterious Reavers, and in coming episodes we start to gain some understanding as to who or what these creatures are. Heck, even Jayne is afraid to death of these things, and the stories Mal tells seem to sound worse with every coming episode.

Something that had sometimes confused me about this show was how difficult it was to understand the scale of Serenity in relation to other things. We sometimes get a glimpse of the ship on the ground, but it’s not often you see the entire ship in relation to the size of a person. That is, until this episode, where Simon and River cling to the outside of the ship, the camera falling back to reveal not only how large Serenity is in relation to a person, but how so tiny Serenity is in comparison to a massive Alliance ship.

Something I loved about Firefly was the shots in space, sometimes as if the camera tries to zoom into a scene too quickly, making it out of focus just for a second; it somehow gives it an authentic feel. I’ve seen this same thing many times in the new Battlestar Galactica series, where the camera shot starts from a great distance, then closes in quickly on passing ships, almost as if a real person performed the shot (when in fact it’s all a matter of CGI). Was Firefly the first to do this sort of thing in CGI shots in space?

Doug Savant did a decent job of playing an Alliance officer. The interrogation scenes were some of the best stuff this show has to offer — Kaylee defending Serenity’s honor; Zoe not offering up any information about her relationship to Wash, while Wash fully divulges how Zoe’s legs are what attracts him to her first ... and the part that connects her legs to her back ... and everything above that; Jayne’s silence. These scenes really gave us more of a sense of the ragtag team we’re following.

A couple of other tidbits of note. We learn that Serenity was named after the battle we saw in the pilot episode. Also, the line Mal uses with Doug Savant’s character about there being "no children on this boat" just shows how slippery and smart Mal can be.

Jayne-ism of the episode: "Looked bigger when I couldn’t see him."