It CAN'T be true!!! *major movie spoilers*
POSTED BY: engineangel
UPDATED: Sunday, March 26, 2006 06:58
VIEWED: 45977
PAGE 8 of 13
Quote:
written by CHRISTHECYNIC
I want Wash back, but I don't want him to be resurrected, or be a ghost. I feel like that’s a disservice to Wash. Yeah, you died, but that doesn’t matter. I can just write a nice little plot device and now you’re back. Your death didn’t make any difference at all. I hate things like that.
there are ways to bring a character back without it being cheesy or making his death not have meant anything. Remember, even if he comes back, we have to deal with Zoe's pain and the rest of the crew trying to get on without him before that. That's why i like the "ghost that only River can see" idea. We can see everyone's reactions and how Wash's death affects everyone.
River: There's too much snow on top. It's going to cave in. His brain's in grave danger.
Zoe: River, honey, he's putting the hair away now.
River: It doesn't matter. It'll still be there. Waiting...
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Quote:
Written by ROBBS
Remember that the movie is some significant amount of time later than the series. Stuff has happened and members have split. Also, the captain's relationship with the doctor has gotten worse (not that it was ever good, but still!). So what are the odds that the sequel (there had better be a sequel! If we all see it five times and bring dates(?) would that bring in enough?) will take place in between the epic movie storyline and the semi-episodic TV storylines? It allows the deaths to be vast and tragic, yet allows us another glimpse or two at the whole cast. It's also sneaky and very comicbooky (both of which are Whedonish/Whedonesque/Whedonsomething).
i think that this might be fine for the tv series, but i don't like this idea as much as some others for the movie because as much as i want to see wash again, i want the firefly verse to move forward. i want to see what happens as time moves along.
please travelers. help me find a way to bring wash back or at least make his daeth make sense!
River: There's too much snow on top. It's going to cave in. His brain's in grave danger.
Zoe: River, honey, he's putting the hair away now.
River: It doesn't matter. It'll still be there. Waiting...
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Man, after Wash and Book are both killed I was half expecting Joss to kill Mal as well!
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Quote:I think you have to have that love, if you don’t feel like they’re real than the readers won’t, if you don’t love them than the audience can’t. Also if you don’t care about them what write the story at all?
Originally posted by AINTWEJUST:
As a writer myself, I have an unholy respect for my characters -- a love that some authors might find ludicrous.
Quote:A good way to look at it. I agree.
I don't believe they exist solely to advance the plot, anymore than human beings exist just to move along the action in everyday life.
Quote:The only way to look at it as far as I’m concerned.
It is their reaction to the challenges that moves the plot.
Quote:Here is where the two of us disagree. I don’t think Wash died for effect. Just because you can not trace a death to a single action doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a point. I wish we could point and say, “This is why Wash died,” I wish you could say, “He died doing this so the others could live,” or something like that, but even though that didn’t happen doesn’t mean he died just for effect.
But if you kill a character, it should be for something more than just for effect.
He died so that people could know. That may seem disconnected, but if River had died in her fight with the Reavers would it be any less abstract? What would you say, she died to save Simon? Well how does that add up? She would have died because Simon dropped the medkit, the door didn’t work properly, and no one had thought to make it so you could close it from the inside. How is any of that connected to saving Simon? It really isn’t. Not directly.
Yet had River died there people wouldn’t call it pointless, they wouldn’t say it was just for effect.
Wash died for a similar set of reasons, they intentionally brought the Reavers, they couldn’t get the backup on in time to make a more controlled decent, the ship turned making the cockpit face towards the Reavers, and the Reavers use spiky things. No less related to sending the signal than a faulty door is to saving Simon.
If you want to say that Wash’s death is just for effect then you can just as easily say that every death in every work of fiction is only for effect. Every violent death is a series of pointless coincidences, that’s how death is. The only death that couldn’t be avoided by a single variable being changed is old age.
The character Kyle from the series The Pretender died because he was one step too far forward to push his brother out of the way but in the perfect place to lunge in front of him and take the bullet in his brother’s place. That seems to be the kind of death people are complaining that Wash didn’t get, but it is no less pointless, if he had just been one step backwards they both could have lived.
Quote:
Originally posted by engineangel:
there are ways to bring a character back without it being cheesy or making his death not have meant anything. Remember, even if he comes back, we have to deal with Zoe's pain and the rest of the crew trying to get on without him before that. That's why i like the "ghost that only River can see" idea.
That is the only way I can see to do it that I would accept. Anything else just makes it pointless in my eyes, but having River see him is something that would fit in with the continuity, bring him back, and still leave him firmly dead.
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Quote:
Originally posted by christhecynic:
Here is where the two of us disagree. I don’t think Wash died for effect. Just because you can not trace a death to a single action doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a point. I wish we could point and say, “This is why Wash died,” I wish you could say, “He died doing this so the others could live,” or something like that, but even though that didn’t happen doesn’t mean he died just for effect.
I really couldn't've said it better... Likely would've said it much worse.
The way I saw it... Wash didn't die to prove that the movie was getting even more serious. He died because the movie was on a serious level to begin with (serious as in, anything can go). Trying to pinpoint a reason why he went is a bit futile; when people die in the real world, folks aren't always looking (and can almost never find) a specific reason behind a death. The crew was in an incredibly dangerous situation... it was probable from the beginning that someone wasn't going to make it. Just who, where, and how was variable; but beyond "they were knee-deep in Reavers", there's no "why".
I mean, if there's no apparent reason behind someone's death, that doesn't mean it's a plot device. KF
~Kaiser Farooque
ZOE: Preacher, don’t the Bible have some pretty specific things to say about killing?
BOOK: Quite specific. It is, however, somewhat fuzzier on the subject of kneecaps...
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I can safely conclude that it's a movie, it's Hollywood, almost everything has a literary value, a metaphor, or done for an effect... No, I am not talking about absolutely everything like the color of underwear they are wearing, or how they blink/bat their eyelashes, or the placements of their cups on the table. I am talking about the particular swaggart a character carries, how they are dressed, the theme music(s), and believe it or not - what is shown to you during that small 2 hours. They only have 2 hours to tell you a story, why would you think that they would waste their/your time showing you insignificant things like walking around, randomly yammering at each other, sitting down eating, showering, bathing, reading a book? Every single frame committed into that final reel is there to convey something by the editor/director/filmmaker. And something *insignificant* as in a character death is either some sort of metaphor, some sort of plot device, or done to create an effect. I'm just saying how I perceived it, this is what I see - what I saw was a cheap stunt Halloween or Scream or I know what you did... would do - for a quick jolt/scare to spike up the tension or to quickly change up your emotions...
Pretty standard Hollywood gag... For me, this was out of place... On the other hand, parodied correctly, as in things like "Scary Movies X" it's funny... Great sight gags...
I mean, look at how the River character is dressed all the time, I bet a million different decision went into exactly how those scraps are draped onto her; but that's all also done for a particular effect, invoke feelings and emotions in you. What? in particular to have you feel the sympathy for how patheticly used she was. But overall, nothing sells in Hollywood like a skimpily clad perpetually dripping wet/damp hot chick.
come on, don't tell me you sat thru the thing like one huge Zen moment. It all washed over and around you, but you were not effected or unchanged.
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I understand exactly how you feel Duey. I had the same emotional response when Wash died. It has consumed me since I found out; hence my posting on this site, when I have never in my many years, posted on a site before. Scary.....as I think of myself as a very rational adult - not to be consumed by fictional characters.
However, I can tell you that there will be no repeat ticket sales from me. And, if Wash does not come back....please, no puns on my rational adult comment above... (oh, and no flashbacks or ghosts please); I can always pretend the movie never existed and treasure my Firefly DVD set forever.
Hope is the best and last of all things, without it, there is only time. And Death is the only escape of time.
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OGFM! I can't believe it! As my friend and I said after the movie, I strongly disaprove! I loved the movie, don't get me wrong, but Wash? I mean, they could've at least had him be able to say something before he actually died. Like saying 'I love you' to Zoe or something. But alas, I know it would lose it's effect. I do however like the ideas I've read other people bring up about Wash coming back as a ghost that River can see. I think that'd be kinda awesome. And have it to where Zoe can sometimes 'feel' or sense different signs of it, but never see anything. LOL. But...WHY!? After that, when ever someone else got hurt I'm like, what the hell? They already killed one major person, why wouldn't Simon or Kaylee die too? But they didnt....I liked that...if Kaylee died, I'd never see this movie again. Anywhoo, why Wash? What the hell did he ever do to anyone? 
O well, such is life I guess. I think how they left Zoe, hiding her pain and all was good in terms of her character, but I think we the people need to see her break down just a little bit. Like when she is alone in her bunk or something. My friend and I decided that if there is a sequel or something to that effect, Zoe should either be pregnant or be holding a baby because for a while, that's all Wash wanted, a child. I think that would be a partially nice thought....but I must agree with Zoe, not to sure about Serenity bein' the best place for a baby...but still...it would be a nice thought.
~*Rest in Peace Hoban "Wash" Washbourne*~
"Day is a vestigial mode of time measurement based on solar cycles. It's not applicable... I didn't get you anything."
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Quote:
written by MALICIOUS
What gets me most is that I can no longer enjoy episodes of Firefly, knowing what I know. Every ep is now shadowed with the thought, "Wash dies in the movie......Oh, God, WASH DIES IN THE MOVIE."
That was my problem, too. i share your pain. but i have learned to get past it ... i just really want to keep watching firefly. It's just like even though i wasn't sure i wanted to see the movie again because of what happend to Wash, i went the next day anyway because i just couldn't stay away.
keep flyin'
EngineAngel
please travelers. help me find a way to bring wash back!!!
River: There's too much snow on top. It's going to cave in. His brain's in grave danger.
Zoe: River, honey, he's putting the hair away now.
River: It doesn't matter. It'll still be there. Waiting...
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I'm going to throw out an idea here that occurred to me after my 4th viewing of Serenity, and I haven't seen mentioned in this or any other thread yet. It came from my mentally connecting two scenes in the film.
One scene is Wash's death. The other happened a few screen minutes earlier: the scene of Mal, alone on the catwalk, after having committed his family to a very, very dangerous course of action.
The connection came when I started wondering what was going through Mal's mind at that moment. By then, his fury at the Operative would have abated somewhat, and he would have started thinking more coolly about what he'd done, the path he'd chosen.
In fact, I think he would have been questioning himself: did I make the right decision? Have I put us on a path that will lead to the deaths of more of the people I love?
[Aside: in the shooting script, this mood was reinforced by a scene with Inara that didn't make the final edit.]
Given that context, Wash's death does play a role beyond film-school, cinematic shock value. It doesn't just raise the tension and stakes for us. It raises them for Mal. The loss of Book was one thing. But the moment that Reaver lance takes the life of his pilot, friend, and "brother-in-law", Mal's commitment is sealed.
That's why, ten minutes later, when the Operative asks Mal if he's willing to die for his belief, there's only one possible answer. You can almost see Mal think of Book and Wash in the little beat before he gives that inevitable reply.
So now I can say that I disagree with those who say Wash's death was pointless. It had a point (no sick pun intended). It was the point on the sword of Mal's determination. And it took me four viewings to get past my own self-centered shock at the loss of my fictional friend to understand that.
Shame on me. Shame on all us Browncoats who can't or won't grasp that.
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