Misandry in Popular Culture, Part 4
This is the fourth installment about the anti-male culture in Firefly.
Many pictures under the cut.
Previous Installments:
Part 1: "Serenity"
Part 2: "The Train Job" & "Bushwhacked"
Part 3: "Shindig" and "Safe"
To Come:
Part 5: "Out of Gas" & "Ariel"
Part 6: "War Stories" & "Trash"
Part 7: "The Message" & "Heart of Gold"
Part 8: "Objects in Space" & extra
Part 9: Serenity (the movie)
I wrote this one while taking breaks from reading Candide en français. If my English is more screwed up than usual, it's because my brain was confuuused.
It took me about two weeks (ugh, homework) to write the part for "Our Mrs. Reynolds" and about one hour to write out the one for "Jaynestown." Very odd.
If you don't know why this post even exists, check this out.
Crazy Womyn did a "review" of "Our Mrs. Reynolds," but I haven't read it. Truthfully, I didn't even read the first post all the way through. I skimmed it, read the comments on the post in fireflyfans, got the gist from that, and wrote my first part.
(EDIT: Here's Crazy Womyn's review. Rather dull, it seems.)
My memory is really bad -- most quotes are taken from the shooting scripts that I found on Google. If the quotes don't match up exactly, that's why.
SPOILER ALERT: The actions described in this post might accidentally describe actions that happen in the real episode, so there may be spoilers.
BIG OBVIOUS DISCLAIMER: This is a joke, not serious. Don't be leaving comments acting like I really believe this. I'll just laugh at you!
My evil twin writes:
*****
My friends keep insisting that my analysis of the anti-male agenda of Firefly is fallacious, despite the misandric message of the show being so obvious! Why are they so blind?? I'll convert them yet!
They also said that I should learn the characters' names already if I'm going to continue with this "drivel" (their word, not mine!). Zoe, Wash, Inara, Kaylee, Simon, River, and Book. There I learned them! (Magical Flower and Big Dumb Muscle will never be Mal and Jayne to me, no matter how many times my friends try to correct me.) I hope that their majesties are appeased. Onward!
This next episode is one that my friends said was "so funny!" It's called "Our Mrs. Reynolds." Quite a baffling title.
The first image is of a wagon scampering freely in a stream. It's adorable and helps hammer into the viewers' brains that this show is heavily influenced by the western genre.
But, oh noes, the poor, innocent wagon is ambushed by a gang of MALE bandits!
Is it a surprise when the leader of the ambushing males is a complete idiot? Is it a surprise when our (male) main characters (on the wagon) show yet again that they're quite dumb, too???
If you said "yes" to either of those questions, you haven't been paying attention to Firefly.
LEADER: You're gonna give us what due us and every damn thing else on that boat, and I think maybe you're gonna give me a little one-on-one time with the missus.
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: I think you might wanna reconsider that last part. See, I married me a powerful ugly creature.
MAGICAL FLOWER: How can you say that? How can you shame me in front of new people?
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: If I could make you prettier, I would.
MAGICAL FLOWER: You are not the man I met a year ago.
What the hell?
OK, first of all, "on that boat"?? Just because something is splashing about in the water, that doesn't make it a BOAT! It's clearly a WAGON. I bet this leader person never even got out of Kindergarten! Geez, the males seem to be de-evolving on this show. It's very frightening to see.
Second, why have the men taken to wanting to rape each other?! "one on one time with the missus." I know exactly what that's implying, show!!
Third, when did Magical Flower and Big Dumb Muscle get married?! Their blooming romance and nuptials would have made for a better episode than any of the previous ones! They're a cute couple.
Lastly, once again we see a poor male being judged solely on the basis of his looks. It's like we entered a time machine and went back to the real Old West! I thought we were supposed to be civilized and beyond such things.
I don't care what Big Dumb Muscle says, Magical Flower is quite dapper in the pretty floral bonnet OF OPPRESSION!
I wonder who dressed him this day.
OK, so what have we had so far?
Was the intelligence of men insulted? YES!
Was some man relegated to being just eye candy? YES!
I guess that just leaves "Were some men killed?"
YES!
Can never have too much of that, eh?
All of this before the opening credits! Oh, yes, this is going to be a good one.
This show is not good for my blood pressure. :(
*****
For assisting in helping out some town by being an accessory the murder of those males, Magical Flower is given another decorative headpiece OF OPPRESSION as a thank you. This time, it's a flower wreath thing given to him by a pretty, EVIL FEMALE!!
Magical Flower is pleased with the gift (men have so little to live for), and Big Dumb Muscle clutches his rainstick, eying the wreath enviously.
You just know that Big Dumb Muscle stole the wreath in the middle of the night, and you just know that Magical Flower cried for hours over the theft.
****
It's the next day, and with the new dawn always comes new opportunities for wackiness!
Apparently, Magical Flower and Big Dumb Muscle divorced sometime between the male killing and the party. Tragic. :(
The males never get a break on this show. Example! Magical Flower's swinging single days didn't last long. The pretty, EVIL FEMALE (Saffron) who gave him the flower headpiece OF OPPRESSION immediately takes Magical Flower as a slave (or husband, if you will).
Just when you don't think the show could POSSIBLY sink any lower, you get this! Everyone thinks that the captain (the person whom they're supposed to respect!) being forced into marriage is HILARIOUS! Hehe, it's funny when men are traded like possessions!! Not like they should able to have any CHOICE in whom they marry -- it's first come, first serve! Magical Flower belongs to Saffron now, and that's the end of that.
I'm gagging on my own vomit right now.
You know it's bad when other men are laughing at you.
Poor, poor captain. He should toss all those ingrates into space! But it's a given that he'll just take the abuse. With this forced marriage, our hero has lost all of his dignity.
Kidding! He never had any dignity.
Those males, being abused so much, just love to attack the weaker when they can, and they don't get any more (emotionally) weaker than the captain at this point. The preacher gleefully says that Magical Flower is going to hell. Sickening. They should be helping his self-worth problem, not add to it!
Soo... Book's kinda creepy. Lurking in shadows, lying in wait, pouncing on anyone weaker who passes by to tell them that they're GOING TO HELL!
Why is the creepy guy the black guy? OHMIGOD!! This show is so racist...
*****
Saffron instructs her new slave on how she wants all of her meals cooked. You have to train them right away, or they'll never learn!
Zoe gets some pointers on how to make her rape victim a better servant.
After the cooking lesson, Magical Flower is allowed some free range time. He wanders a bit and meets up with his ex-husband.
Big Dumb Muscle is anxious to show that he's moved on with his life! He's even found a replacement for Magical Flower. The replacement love is a gun. A female (quelle surprise!) gun named Vera.
Deny all you want. You know that you miss your husband, your insides are all hurty.
And you just know that even a (female) gun will be able to oppress him with no problems.
This episode is heartbreaking.
Depressed from all the happenings that week, Magical Flower doesn't even make an attempt at standing up for himself. Not like he would put up any fight any other week, though...
Then there's a quick cut to some random males, who are aiming to do some harm to our dear, female Serenity. They're hiding in shadows, so that means that they're ugly. And that means that they're useless, and that they will probably end up dead. Betcha, betcha!
OK, enough of them. They're ugly males. They aren't important.
Now that his spirit has been completely broken, Saffron demands that the captain performs his husbandly chore.
He refuses to go over to her, so she has to go to him.
And he does not live up to her expectations.
She quickly rethinks her plan to keep him as a slave. She can find a better male to enslave in more pleasant circumstances!!
She knocks her husband out and tosses him aside. "Night, sweetie," she jeers at his prone form and flounces off.
Magical Flower lost two spouses in one week! THIS IS TERRIBLE!!
Poor thing was cast off, never a thought for his feelings. What kind of sadist writes this garbage?!
*weeps*
So Wifey flounces on to the cockpit area there. Ever lonely and ever pathetic, the pilot begins a speech on why it's awesome to be the first mate's favourite rape victim!!
No dignity whatsoever.
I also learned that not only do Zoe and Wash have some sort of twisted rapist-victim relationship, they're married. WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN?! It's like with Magical Flower and Big Dumb Muscle... this show needs to be clearer on who's with who.
Anyway, Wash is going on about how great enslavement is, how he's "madly in love with a beautiful woman who can kill [him] with her pinky." Yes, that is one healthy relationship there!!
Show, you suck!
So he blathers on for a while, blah blah blah. He's got the luckiest arrangement that a man could ever hope to have!! What is this show trying to teach us?!?!
He drones on and on. He says "I never did meet a woman quite like her. The, uh, the first time we met, she actually-" Saffron kicks him in the head before he can continue on with his pathetic "It's great to be enslaved and live in constant fear!!" speech.
Thank you, Saffron, for sparing us from that! This is the first time I've liked a woman on this show.
Well, briefly liked. I can't entirely forgive her for that forced marriage thing, but saving everyone from that speech was a VERY GOOD THING.
Saffron meets up with Inara, and Inara is pissed that Saffron took her favourite toy. EPIC SHOWDOWN?!
No, not epic. Saffron was high on adrenaline from kicking that sycophantic rape victim, and Inara's fighting skills were in a real decline from being on that ship with her sweet setup for so long. Saffron easily wins and prances off in to the sunset.
Inara goes to inspect her favourite toy, to make sure that he hasn't been irreparably injured.
He's OK! So he can be raped and beaten another day! Everything's looking up for Inara!
Saffron did something or another to the ship, as punishment for holding so many males who can't perform their husbandly duties that well.
Kaylee goes about fixing it, and Wash pretends to help.
Awww, isn't that cute. He's like a toddler who thinks he's "helping."
But this is Firefly, so he really is does have the mental capacity of a toddler...
Inara scolds the males for ever thinking of straying, and River stands by to beat them if they get too insolent again.
Then Kaylee, being in a playful mood, explains to the males what's going on (to laugh at their not-comprehending-ness), and as expected, they blankly stare back.
It's fun to mess with their teeny minds.
Ow, brain hurt!!
Thinking is harrrd!!!!
Hurr, it's funny when men try to think!!
This is idiotic!
Soo... the episode is coming to an end, and the ship is in peril!!
Of course, a female saves the day.
What would they have done without Vera?!
Can't have any of the males do anything useful...
Vera easily kills those ugly males that were seen earlier. FOR SHAME!!!
Oh, show, you're so predictable! The universe will not end if you go one episode without killing a man or let one non-attractive man be non-evil. It's the truth!!
The episode ends with Magical Flower throwing himself at the mercy of Inara, vowing to never stray and to always be the good, submissive man.
It's another happy ending for the women.
*vomit*
That quite possibly was the worst episode yet!!
The series is not quite yet half over, so there are probably some that will give it some stuff competition for that title!!
In continuing with the two-fer trend, let's check out the next episode: "Jaynestown" Jayne, as in Big Dumb Muscle? The title alone is giving me an ominous feeling.
(EDIT: I totally missed mentioning the scene at the very, very beginning of Kaylee telling Inara to "have good sex!" as Inara is going off to rape that boy! al;sdgjal;sdgja Disgusting!!)
Soo...
It starts with Simon shrieking about how his beautiful infirmary was dirtied. He spent hours fixing it up nice, just the way he likes it!! He tried to make it a nice, welcome place, but no one ever noticed his hard work and just went right on in and messed it all up!!
It's hard being the token male doctor.
Of course, this disrespect of the male is played for humour. Well done, show!
Venting his frustrations, Simon lashes out at another male (for he could never lash out at a woman - they'd hit him), shouting, "My God, you're like a trained ape, without the training!"
Now that is not a very nice thing to say!
It hurts my soul that these two don't get along. Stop your petty bickering, join forces, and overthrow the matriarchy!! Penis power!
Yes?
Well, that will never happen...
The audience is given a present of a half-naked male.
Males are only stupid eye candy on this show!!
So the scene continues with some banter between the hysterical man and the half-naked man. This is as good as it gets on Firefly!!
(Sidenote: What would be the correct oppressive alternative to "hysterical" that can apply to the men of this show? They don't have a uterus, so I'm making up a new adjective: "penerical", pertaining to the nuttiness of the penis!)
OK, banter example:
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: Listen, Mal, I was in Canton a few years back. I might have made me a few enemies thereabouts.
SIMON: Enemies? You? No! How can it be?
Oh, this witty, degrading humour. After Fox wisely canceled this show, they should have given these two their very own sitcom spinoff!!
The episode trudges onward, and we see where they dump all the unattractive males in the 'verse. It's a mudpit!
Those unattractive males get beauty treatments while serving their female overlords.
Kaylee and her harem stand and examine something by the pit. (Why is it always Kaylee with the harem of men?! Aren't the other women of Serenity also prolific male collectors?)
What are they staring at?
Why, it's a statue of Big Dumb Muscle!!
The statue doesn't have any spoken lines, but I'm a statue whisperer, so I shall relay to you all what it says: "Behold, my downtrodden brethren! I shall deliver you to freedom!"
The sun looks like a halo and everything...
I am surprised that the women allowed such a thing to stay up.
Lo, what is this!
This episode was directed by a woman. Suddenly, the half-naked male at the beginning makes more and more sense.
They left one male back on the ship. If the other four were to escape and flee to freedom, they'll always have at least one male enslaved.
So, Book is the one left. The preacher. River decided to destroy his moral by fixing destroying his Bible.
BOOK: River, you don't fix the Bible.
RIVER: It's broken. It doesn't make sense.
BOOK: It's not about making sense. It's about believing in something, and letting that belief be real enough to change your life. It's about faith. You don't fix faith, River. It fixes you.
Isn't that cute?
Sorry to tell you, Mr. Worthless Male, but there is no God or heaven for you. It's just something that women tell you to keep you from going crazy. You can tell yourself, "I have served by female masters, now I can look forward to my reward in male heaven... the gathering place for the souls of all males. Our final resting place."
Male heaven doesn't exist! But where do all the males go? They don't go anywhere! They just die!!
That religion and preaching thing is just to distract you, so you never think to rise up against your female oppressors!!
River rips his Bible to pieces.
And that isn't the only thing that is ripped to pieces in this episode.
We get a story; our main characters were supposed to meet some guy in a bar, but some other guy shows up and recounts the fate of the first guy.
SOME OTHER GUY: He was a good middle-man. Low profile, didn't filch. But last week, the factory foreman and his prod crew heard he was moving contraband through town and gave him a peck a' trouble for it.
MAGICAL FLOWER: What kind of a 'peck' was that?
SOME OTHER GUY: 'Kind where they hacked off his hands and feet with machetes and rolled him into the bog.
WASH: They peck pretty hard 'round here.
SWEET MERCIFUL CRAP!!
That is an incredibly gruesome thing to do to a man, even for this show!! It's just getting more and more malicious!!
Then to cap it off, one of the other males serves as comic relief and makes a bad pun about the HORRIBLE fate of that poor, unfortunate man!
WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?!?!
So close to stopping and tossing out the rest of the series...
No, no, must go on...
must show them all...
Need to spread the word!!
taking a breather...
breath in, breath out... OK, good to go!
After that APPALLING story, there's a little song! About Big Dumb Muscle or something...
Kaylee finds it amusing, Simon is hurt that he doesn't have a song.
My heart isn't in this anymore, that story broke it...
:(
Back on the ship, we get a Hi-Larious scene of the women mocking their enslaved male's bad hair day!!
Stop giving the males bad self esteem!!
...
The males guzzle some of that sweet life-giving alcohol to give them the strength to finish this episode.
I think I'll have to use the same method...
Yum, alcohol!
Then some guy offers his son to Inara, so she can rape him and take all of his money.
This place is so far gone from civilization that males are selling out their own children!!
I hate this show with the power of a thousand stars!!
*kicks it*
Cut back to Simon ranting about that "box dropping, man-ape-gone-wrong-thing" a.k.a., Big Dumb Muscle.
Quit this nonsense! You mustn't be enemies!
Meanwhile, Kaylee is plying him with alcohol.
Drinnnkk, precious, DRINK!
Getting 'em drunk makes for an easier molestation! Way to teach the impressionable youth of the country, Firefly.
Everything about this episode disgusts me!!
Magical Flower looks on jealously as she molests him.
And Simon wasn't the only male to get raped that night!!
Look, Kaylee didn't even stick around to buy Simon breakfast!! He has to eat alone, and the male in the bar doesn't even know what a "menu" is.
A MENU!
Oh, comedy.
Look, that boy was successfully raped.
NO PENIS PERSON IS SAFE!
All of their sacred gifts from GAWD are being stolen!!
I weep openly for these men.
*weep*
Big Dumb Muscle is pleased that he is apparently a hero on this backwoods planet.
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: I don't know, you think we should be using my fame to hoodwink folks?
MAGICAL FLOWER: You better laugh when you say that.
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: No really Mal, I mean maybe there's something to this. The mudders, I think I really made a difference in their lives. Me, Jayne Cobb.
MAGICAL FLOWER: I know your name, jackass!
You know, Magical Flower, I gave you the name of "Magical Flower" to help your self esteem, and this is how you repay me! For once, a man is feeling good about himself! It makes me happy. But then you have to go and be a pissy little sycophant, slapping down your comrade in order to endear yourself to the woman.
Well, I'm a woman, and you're not endearing yourself to me. To hell with you! I don't think you deserve the name "Magical Flower" anymore! I'll have to think of something else...
grrr...
They have a good laugh at the man who thought he should have any self worth.
FOOL!!
Then...
AAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!
Woah, look at that guy! That is one ugly, UGLY male!! How long do you think he's going to last???
Ugly and beats Simon around for the amusement for the audience.
This guy just has a bullseye on his head.
OK, then...
Big Dumb Muscle tries to give a speech to his less fortunate brethren i.e., the males too ugly for a woman to enslave them.
CHECK IT OUT!!
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: Far as I see it, you people been given the shortest end of the stick ever been offered a human soul in this crap-heel 'verse. But you took that end, and you - well, you took it. And that's - Well, I guess that's somethin'.
Merr?
That's a TERRIBLE speech!
It should have been a rallying cry to break out of their shackles! DEMAND TO BE TREATED AS PEOPLE!! Say what the statue would say.
I shouldn't expect anything like that from this show, though...
Instead, Simon gets beat around some more for our amusement.
Oh, that's just great.
stupid show...
Then ugly guy gets killed.
How surprising.
Then to up the body count, some other random male is killed.
Firefly episodes are always awash with the blood of innocent men.
Why does anyone watch this? Severe sadists, them all...
Mercifully, the show reaches its end with Big Dumb Muscle summing it all up: "Don't make no sense."
Truer words have never been nor ever will be spoken on this show.
Just to end with something somewhat happy, I must say that I'm pleased that Big Dumb Muscle and "Magical Flower" seem to be no longer bitter over their divorce and can hang out civilly!
It gives me some hope, so I must continue!!
Next up: we find out how some of the males came about being enslaved by the women!
I can hardly wait.
EDIT [just after midnight 27 April]: because of annoying things irl, this thing is being put on hiatus for a couple of weeks or months....
Many pictures under the cut.
Previous Installments:
Part 1: "Serenity"
Part 2: "The Train Job" & "Bushwhacked"
Part 3: "Shindig" and "Safe"
To Come:
Part 5: "Out of Gas" & "Ariel"
Part 6: "War Stories" & "Trash"
Part 7: "The Message" & "Heart of Gold"
Part 8: "Objects in Space" & extra
Part 9: Serenity (the movie)
I wrote this one while taking breaks from reading Candide en français. If my English is more screwed up than usual, it's because my brain was confuuused.
It took me about two weeks (ugh, homework) to write the part for "Our Mrs. Reynolds" and about one hour to write out the one for "Jaynestown." Very odd.
If you don't know why this post even exists, check this out.
Crazy Womyn did a "review" of "Our Mrs. Reynolds," but I haven't read it. Truthfully, I didn't even read the first post all the way through. I skimmed it, read the comments on the post in fireflyfans, got the gist from that, and wrote my first part.
(EDIT: Here's Crazy Womyn's review. Rather dull, it seems.)
My memory is really bad -- most quotes are taken from the shooting scripts that I found on Google. If the quotes don't match up exactly, that's why.
SPOILER ALERT: The actions described in this post might accidentally describe actions that happen in the real episode, so there may be spoilers.
BIG OBVIOUS DISCLAIMER: This is a joke, not serious. Don't be leaving comments acting like I really believe this. I'll just laugh at you!
My evil twin writes:
*****
My friends keep insisting that my analysis of the anti-male agenda of Firefly is fallacious, despite the misandric message of the show being so obvious! Why are they so blind?? I'll convert them yet!
They also said that I should learn the characters' names already if I'm going to continue with this "drivel" (their word, not mine!). Zoe, Wash, Inara, Kaylee, Simon, River, and Book. There I learned them! (Magical Flower and Big Dumb Muscle will never be Mal and Jayne to me, no matter how many times my friends try to correct me.) I hope that their majesties are appeased. Onward!
This next episode is one that my friends said was "so funny!" It's called "Our Mrs. Reynolds." Quite a baffling title.
The first image is of a wagon scampering freely in a stream. It's adorable and helps hammer into the viewers' brains that this show is heavily influenced by the western genre.
But, oh noes, the poor, innocent wagon is ambushed by a gang of MALE bandits!
Is it a surprise when the leader of the ambushing males is a complete idiot? Is it a surprise when our (male) main characters (on the wagon) show yet again that they're quite dumb, too???
If you said "yes" to either of those questions, you haven't been paying attention to Firefly.
LEADER: You're gonna give us what due us and every damn thing else on that boat, and I think maybe you're gonna give me a little one-on-one time with the missus.
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: I think you might wanna reconsider that last part. See, I married me a powerful ugly creature.
MAGICAL FLOWER: How can you say that? How can you shame me in front of new people?
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: If I could make you prettier, I would.
MAGICAL FLOWER: You are not the man I met a year ago.
What the hell?
OK, first of all, "on that boat"?? Just because something is splashing about in the water, that doesn't make it a BOAT! It's clearly a WAGON. I bet this leader person never even got out of Kindergarten! Geez, the males seem to be de-evolving on this show. It's very frightening to see.
Second, why have the men taken to wanting to rape each other?! "one on one time with the missus." I know exactly what that's implying, show!!
Third, when did Magical Flower and Big Dumb Muscle get married?! Their blooming romance and nuptials would have made for a better episode than any of the previous ones! They're a cute couple.
Lastly, once again we see a poor male being judged solely on the basis of his looks. It's like we entered a time machine and went back to the real Old West! I thought we were supposed to be civilized and beyond such things.
I don't care what Big Dumb Muscle says, Magical Flower is quite dapper in the pretty floral bonnet OF OPPRESSION!
I wonder who dressed him this day.
OK, so what have we had so far?
Was the intelligence of men insulted? YES!
Was some man relegated to being just eye candy? YES!
I guess that just leaves "Were some men killed?"
YES!
Can never have too much of that, eh?
All of this before the opening credits! Oh, yes, this is going to be a good one.
This show is not good for my blood pressure. :(
*****
For assisting in helping out some town by being an accessory the murder of those males, Magical Flower is given another decorative headpiece OF OPPRESSION as a thank you. This time, it's a flower wreath thing given to him by a pretty, EVIL FEMALE!!
Magical Flower is pleased with the gift (men have so little to live for), and Big Dumb Muscle clutches his rainstick, eying the wreath enviously.
You just know that Big Dumb Muscle stole the wreath in the middle of the night, and you just know that Magical Flower cried for hours over the theft.
****
It's the next day, and with the new dawn always comes new opportunities for wackiness!
Apparently, Magical Flower and Big Dumb Muscle divorced sometime between the male killing and the party. Tragic. :(
The males never get a break on this show. Example! Magical Flower's swinging single days didn't last long. The pretty, EVIL FEMALE (Saffron) who gave him the flower headpiece OF OPPRESSION immediately takes Magical Flower as a slave (or husband, if you will).
Just when you don't think the show could POSSIBLY sink any lower, you get this! Everyone thinks that the captain (the person whom they're supposed to respect!) being forced into marriage is HILARIOUS! Hehe, it's funny when men are traded like possessions!! Not like they should able to have any CHOICE in whom they marry -- it's first come, first serve! Magical Flower belongs to Saffron now, and that's the end of that.
I'm gagging on my own vomit right now.
You know it's bad when other men are laughing at you.
Poor, poor captain. He should toss all those ingrates into space! But it's a given that he'll just take the abuse. With this forced marriage, our hero has lost all of his dignity.
Kidding! He never had any dignity.
Those males, being abused so much, just love to attack the weaker when they can, and they don't get any more (emotionally) weaker than the captain at this point. The preacher gleefully says that Magical Flower is going to hell. Sickening. They should be helping his self-worth problem, not add to it!
Soo... Book's kinda creepy. Lurking in shadows, lying in wait, pouncing on anyone weaker who passes by to tell them that they're GOING TO HELL!
Why is the creepy guy the black guy? OHMIGOD!! This show is so racist...
*****
Saffron instructs her new slave on how she wants all of her meals cooked. You have to train them right away, or they'll never learn!
Zoe gets some pointers on how to make her rape victim a better servant.
After the cooking lesson, Magical Flower is allowed some free range time. He wanders a bit and meets up with his ex-husband.
Big Dumb Muscle is anxious to show that he's moved on with his life! He's even found a replacement for Magical Flower. The replacement love is a gun. A female (quelle surprise!) gun named Vera.
Deny all you want. You know that you miss your husband, your insides are all hurty.
And you just know that even a (female) gun will be able to oppress him with no problems.
This episode is heartbreaking.
Depressed from all the happenings that week, Magical Flower doesn't even make an attempt at standing up for himself. Not like he would put up any fight any other week, though...
Then there's a quick cut to some random males, who are aiming to do some harm to our dear, female Serenity. They're hiding in shadows, so that means that they're ugly. And that means that they're useless, and that they will probably end up dead. Betcha, betcha!
OK, enough of them. They're ugly males. They aren't important.
Now that his spirit has been completely broken, Saffron demands that the captain performs his husbandly chore.
He refuses to go over to her, so she has to go to him.
And he does not live up to her expectations.
She quickly rethinks her plan to keep him as a slave. She can find a better male to enslave in more pleasant circumstances!!
She knocks her husband out and tosses him aside. "Night, sweetie," she jeers at his prone form and flounces off.
Magical Flower lost two spouses in one week! THIS IS TERRIBLE!!
Poor thing was cast off, never a thought for his feelings. What kind of sadist writes this garbage?!
*weeps*
So Wifey flounces on to the cockpit area there. Ever lonely and ever pathetic, the pilot begins a speech on why it's awesome to be the first mate's favourite rape victim!!
No dignity whatsoever.
I also learned that not only do Zoe and Wash have some sort of twisted rapist-victim relationship, they're married. WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN?! It's like with Magical Flower and Big Dumb Muscle... this show needs to be clearer on who's with who.
Anyway, Wash is going on about how great enslavement is, how he's "madly in love with a beautiful woman who can kill [him] with her pinky." Yes, that is one healthy relationship there!!
Show, you suck!
So he blathers on for a while, blah blah blah. He's got the luckiest arrangement that a man could ever hope to have!! What is this show trying to teach us?!?!
He drones on and on. He says "I never did meet a woman quite like her. The, uh, the first time we met, she actually-" Saffron kicks him in the head before he can continue on with his pathetic "It's great to be enslaved and live in constant fear!!" speech.
Thank you, Saffron, for sparing us from that! This is the first time I've liked a woman on this show.
Well, briefly liked. I can't entirely forgive her for that forced marriage thing, but saving everyone from that speech was a VERY GOOD THING.
Saffron meets up with Inara, and Inara is pissed that Saffron took her favourite toy. EPIC SHOWDOWN?!
No, not epic. Saffron was high on adrenaline from kicking that sycophantic rape victim, and Inara's fighting skills were in a real decline from being on that ship with her sweet setup for so long. Saffron easily wins and prances off in to the sunset.
Inara goes to inspect her favourite toy, to make sure that he hasn't been irreparably injured.
He's OK! So he can be raped and beaten another day! Everything's looking up for Inara!
Saffron did something or another to the ship, as punishment for holding so many males who can't perform their husbandly duties that well.
Kaylee goes about fixing it, and Wash pretends to help.
Awww, isn't that cute. He's like a toddler who thinks he's "helping."
But this is Firefly, so he really is does have the mental capacity of a toddler...
Inara scolds the males for ever thinking of straying, and River stands by to beat them if they get too insolent again.
Then Kaylee, being in a playful mood, explains to the males what's going on (to laugh at their not-comprehending-ness), and as expected, they blankly stare back.
It's fun to mess with their teeny minds.
Ow, brain hurt!!
Thinking is harrrd!!!!
Hurr, it's funny when men try to think!!
This is idiotic!
Soo... the episode is coming to an end, and the ship is in peril!!
Of course, a female saves the day.
What would they have done without Vera?!
Can't have any of the males do anything useful...
Vera easily kills those ugly males that were seen earlier. FOR SHAME!!!
Oh, show, you're so predictable! The universe will not end if you go one episode without killing a man or let one non-attractive man be non-evil. It's the truth!!
The episode ends with Magical Flower throwing himself at the mercy of Inara, vowing to never stray and to always be the good, submissive man.
It's another happy ending for the women.
*vomit*
That quite possibly was the worst episode yet!!
The series is not quite yet half over, so there are probably some that will give it some stuff competition for that title!!
In continuing with the two-fer trend, let's check out the next episode: "Jaynestown" Jayne, as in Big Dumb Muscle? The title alone is giving me an ominous feeling.
(EDIT: I totally missed mentioning the scene at the very, very beginning of Kaylee telling Inara to "have good sex!" as Inara is going off to rape that boy! al;sdgjal;sdgja Disgusting!!)
Soo...
It starts with Simon shrieking about how his beautiful infirmary was dirtied. He spent hours fixing it up nice, just the way he likes it!! He tried to make it a nice, welcome place, but no one ever noticed his hard work and just went right on in and messed it all up!!
It's hard being the token male doctor.
Of course, this disrespect of the male is played for humour. Well done, show!
Venting his frustrations, Simon lashes out at another male (for he could never lash out at a woman - they'd hit him), shouting, "My God, you're like a trained ape, without the training!"
Now that is not a very nice thing to say!
It hurts my soul that these two don't get along. Stop your petty bickering, join forces, and overthrow the matriarchy!! Penis power!
Yes?
Well, that will never happen...
The audience is given a present of a half-naked male.
Males are only stupid eye candy on this show!!
So the scene continues with some banter between the hysterical man and the half-naked man. This is as good as it gets on Firefly!!
(Sidenote: What would be the correct oppressive alternative to "hysterical" that can apply to the men of this show? They don't have a uterus, so I'm making up a new adjective: "penerical", pertaining to the nuttiness of the penis!)
OK, banter example:
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: Listen, Mal, I was in Canton a few years back. I might have made me a few enemies thereabouts.
SIMON: Enemies? You? No! How can it be?
Oh, this witty, degrading humour. After Fox wisely canceled this show, they should have given these two their very own sitcom spinoff!!
The episode trudges onward, and we see where they dump all the unattractive males in the 'verse. It's a mudpit!
Those unattractive males get beauty treatments while serving their female overlords.
Kaylee and her harem stand and examine something by the pit. (Why is it always Kaylee with the harem of men?! Aren't the other women of Serenity also prolific male collectors?)
What are they staring at?
Why, it's a statue of Big Dumb Muscle!!
The statue doesn't have any spoken lines, but I'm a statue whisperer, so I shall relay to you all what it says: "Behold, my downtrodden brethren! I shall deliver you to freedom!"
The sun looks like a halo and everything...
I am surprised that the women allowed such a thing to stay up.
Lo, what is this!
This episode was directed by a woman. Suddenly, the half-naked male at the beginning makes more and more sense.
They left one male back on the ship. If the other four were to escape and flee to freedom, they'll always have at least one male enslaved.
So, Book is the one left. The preacher. River decided to destroy his moral by fixing destroying his Bible.
BOOK: River, you don't fix the Bible.
RIVER: It's broken. It doesn't make sense.
BOOK: It's not about making sense. It's about believing in something, and letting that belief be real enough to change your life. It's about faith. You don't fix faith, River. It fixes you.
Isn't that cute?
Sorry to tell you, Mr. Worthless Male, but there is no God or heaven for you. It's just something that women tell you to keep you from going crazy. You can tell yourself, "I have served by female masters, now I can look forward to my reward in male heaven... the gathering place for the souls of all males. Our final resting place."
Male heaven doesn't exist! But where do all the males go? They don't go anywhere! They just die!!
That religion and preaching thing is just to distract you, so you never think to rise up against your female oppressors!!
River rips his Bible to pieces.
And that isn't the only thing that is ripped to pieces in this episode.
We get a story; our main characters were supposed to meet some guy in a bar, but some other guy shows up and recounts the fate of the first guy.
SOME OTHER GUY: He was a good middle-man. Low profile, didn't filch. But last week, the factory foreman and his prod crew heard he was moving contraband through town and gave him a peck a' trouble for it.
MAGICAL FLOWER: What kind of a 'peck' was that?
SOME OTHER GUY: 'Kind where they hacked off his hands and feet with machetes and rolled him into the bog.
WASH: They peck pretty hard 'round here.
SWEET MERCIFUL CRAP!!
That is an incredibly gruesome thing to do to a man, even for this show!! It's just getting more and more malicious!!
Then to cap it off, one of the other males serves as comic relief and makes a bad pun about the HORRIBLE fate of that poor, unfortunate man!
WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?!?!
So close to stopping and tossing out the rest of the series...
No, no, must go on...
must show them all...
Need to spread the word!!
taking a breather...
breath in, breath out... OK, good to go!
After that APPALLING story, there's a little song! About Big Dumb Muscle or something...
Kaylee finds it amusing, Simon is hurt that he doesn't have a song.
My heart isn't in this anymore, that story broke it...
:(
Back on the ship, we get a Hi-Larious scene of the women mocking their enslaved male's bad hair day!!
Stop giving the males bad self esteem!!
...
The males guzzle some of that sweet life-giving alcohol to give them the strength to finish this episode.
I think I'll have to use the same method...
Yum, alcohol!
Then some guy offers his son to Inara, so she can rape him and take all of his money.
This place is so far gone from civilization that males are selling out their own children!!
I hate this show with the power of a thousand stars!!
*kicks it*
Cut back to Simon ranting about that "box dropping, man-ape-gone-wrong-thing" a.k.a., Big Dumb Muscle.
Quit this nonsense! You mustn't be enemies!
Meanwhile, Kaylee is plying him with alcohol.
Drinnnkk, precious, DRINK!
Getting 'em drunk makes for an easier molestation! Way to teach the impressionable youth of the country, Firefly.
Everything about this episode disgusts me!!
Magical Flower looks on jealously as she molests him.
And Simon wasn't the only male to get raped that night!!
Look, Kaylee didn't even stick around to buy Simon breakfast!! He has to eat alone, and the male in the bar doesn't even know what a "menu" is.
A MENU!
Oh, comedy.
Look, that boy was successfully raped.
NO PENIS PERSON IS SAFE!
All of their sacred gifts from GAWD are being stolen!!
I weep openly for these men.
*weep*
Big Dumb Muscle is pleased that he is apparently a hero on this backwoods planet.
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: I don't know, you think we should be using my fame to hoodwink folks?
MAGICAL FLOWER: You better laugh when you say that.
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: No really Mal, I mean maybe there's something to this. The mudders, I think I really made a difference in their lives. Me, Jayne Cobb.
MAGICAL FLOWER: I know your name, jackass!
You know, Magical Flower, I gave you the name of "Magical Flower" to help your self esteem, and this is how you repay me! For once, a man is feeling good about himself! It makes me happy. But then you have to go and be a pissy little sycophant, slapping down your comrade in order to endear yourself to the woman.
Well, I'm a woman, and you're not endearing yourself to me. To hell with you! I don't think you deserve the name "Magical Flower" anymore! I'll have to think of something else...
grrr...
They have a good laugh at the man who thought he should have any self worth.
FOOL!!
Then...
AAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!
Woah, look at that guy! That is one ugly, UGLY male!! How long do you think he's going to last???
Ugly and beats Simon around for the amusement for the audience.
This guy just has a bullseye on his head.
OK, then...
Big Dumb Muscle tries to give a speech to his less fortunate brethren i.e., the males too ugly for a woman to enslave them.
CHECK IT OUT!!
BIG DUMB MUSCLE: Far as I see it, you people been given the shortest end of the stick ever been offered a human soul in this crap-heel 'verse. But you took that end, and you - well, you took it. And that's - Well, I guess that's somethin'.
Merr?
That's a TERRIBLE speech!
It should have been a rallying cry to break out of their shackles! DEMAND TO BE TREATED AS PEOPLE!! Say what the statue would say.
I shouldn't expect anything like that from this show, though...
Instead, Simon gets beat around some more for our amusement.
Oh, that's just great.
stupid show...
Then ugly guy gets killed.
How surprising.
Then to up the body count, some other random male is killed.
Firefly episodes are always awash with the blood of innocent men.
Why does anyone watch this? Severe sadists, them all...
Mercifully, the show reaches its end with Big Dumb Muscle summing it all up: "Don't make no sense."
Truer words have never been nor ever will be spoken on this show.
Just to end with something somewhat happy, I must say that I'm pleased that Big Dumb Muscle and "Magical Flower" seem to be no longer bitter over their divorce and can hang out civilly!
It gives me some hope, so I must continue!!
Next up: we find out how some of the males came about being enslaved by the women!
I can hardly wait.
EDIT [just after midnight 27 April]: because of annoying things irl, this thing is being put on hiatus for a couple of weeks or months....