Cause and effect in Ariel

POSTED BY: niknak
UPDATED: Saturday, February 12, 2005 17:50
VIEWED: 6621
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NIKNAK

Saturday, November 27, 2004 2:03 AM

I've been wondering this for a while: Does River stab Jayne because he's going to betray her or does Jayne betray River because she stabbed him? Or did neither event cause the other?

I think the stabbing was put in the story by the writers to help people understand Jayne not liking River and because it would be harder for the audience to forgive Jayne if money was the only factor. Of course the writers' motivations are separate from the Characters'.

SERGEANTX

Saturday, November 27, 2004 2:10 AM

It's been mentioned that she was specifically aiming at the blue sun emblem on his shirt... but she surely sensed that he wasn't her biggest fan.

SergeantX

"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock

POTEMKINVILLAGER

Saturday, November 27, 2004 2:55 AM

It's what I like best about the possible story arc: wide open. River's psychcic/telepathic/intuitive knowledge that Jayne would betray her for lotsa bucks, and the coprporate conspiracy angle involving Blue Sun's symbyotic relationship with the Alliance. Jayne was wearing a t-shirt with the Blue Sun logo. It was a government, ergo Alliance "school" that messed with River.

Still trying to figure out what is meant by River's response: "He looks better in red." Any ideas?

Seems to me the writers were creating new arcs to follow up on, to be slowly resolved as the series went on. The kind of plotting which really drew my interest (way after the fact, cuz I never heard of Firefly until abaut a year after Fox cancelled it). Sadly, such resolutions are not to be.

MINIME

Saturday, November 27, 2004 3:22 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by PotemkinVillager:

Still trying to figure out what is meant by River's response: "He looks better in red." Any ideas?

Always assumed that it meant that red blood was better than blue sun. the colour thing.
subtle.
or possibly my misinterpretation.

EMBERS

Saturday, November 27, 2004 3:27 AM

well Jayne was talking about turning her in for the $ right from the pilot episode...so the cut was immaterial IMO

But I do think that River wasn't cutting Jayne, I think she was cutting the Blue Sun symbol on his shirt (I was watching Shindig, trying to figure out which cans she took the lables off of...could they have been cans w/Blue Sun logos?)

River did say that Jayne looked better in red
LOL

ODDNESS2HER

Monday, November 29, 2004 7:36 PM

If River knew what Jayne was going to do, why didn't she warn Simon not to trust him?

POTEMKINVILLAGER

Monday, November 29, 2004 11:50 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by oddness2her:
If River knew what Jayne was going to do, why didn't she warn Simon not to trust him?

Let's be fair: those of us who like this show do so despite the many and varied holes in the plots. Don't shoot me, that's just a feeling I get. Probably a thread or dozen -- likely archived, too -- dealing with awkward plot holes. To be fair, Whedon & co., aside from the not-so-soon to be coming movie, never got a chance to resolve a lot of ambiguities. That, and they only had 46 minutes per episode in which to tell stories.

Additionally, I tend to think River's kinda got the hots for Jayne. Opposites attract, that sort of thing. Buffy/Angel-Spike, anyone? Doesn't mean River expresses such feelings in any rational way: she's just a kid.

Blah, blah, etc.

"The trouble with normal is it always gets worse."

THEREALME

Tuesday, November 30, 2004 12:12 AM

Well, we sort of got a glimpse of what River's world is like at the beginning of Objects In Space. I'm not sure that she has any control at all, or even recognizes everything that she sees for what it is.

She might not even understand that she slashed Jayne.

Maybe if the Academy had completed her "training", then she would have been able to function better.

The Real Me

EMBERS

Tuesday, November 30, 2004 12:35 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by oddness2her:
If River knew what Jayne was going to do, why didn't she warn Simon not to trust him?

I think that River was too incoheret before they went to Ariel...
it was after Ariel that Simon got her on better medication, and actually even afterwards she wasn't always able to communicate clearly...
but way better than she did before then!

DIEGO

Tuesday, November 30, 2004 4:03 AM

You know, this is precisely the paradox I saw when I first saw Ariel. My visceral response was that River was punishing him before the fact, which then went ahead and gave Jayne another reason to betray them. Inverted logic? Yup.

I eventually rejected the idea. The more parsimonious explanation that she was reacted to the Blue Sun sign made a lot more sense to me. Having effects cause causes is the sort of stuff you see in Voyager and Enterprise.

On the other hand, sometimes in Real Life (TM) effects precede causes. A friend of mine was trying to find her keys one day. We tried all the logical places, and then traced her steps. Our campus building was locked because it was a weekend. So when she realized she had lost her keys she walked around the building and threw rocks at the windom of another friend's office. I walked around with her, and right where she stooped to pick up rocks. . . were her keys.

In short: she went to find another way into the building because she had lost her keys, and in so doing — lost her keys!!!

Anyway, I meandered off-topic a bit. But my main point is that I quite understand why you would get the feeling that River was reacting to something that hadn't happened yet, and in so doing, cause that thing to happen. But I think there's a danger of reading too much into River.

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