BDM Double Meanings

POSTED BY: DucesTecum
UPDATED: Saturday, February 18, 2006 21:41
VIEWED: 27933
PAGE 5 of 8

PREV PAGE 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 NEXT PAGE

LIMINALOSITY

Monday, October 10, 2005 9:00 PM

wooops, sorry, I meant to include this for inevitablebetrayal, cuz I wrote it down when I found it posted last week. I don't have the script yet, but this seemed pretty close...
'Love keeps her in the air when she ought to fall down, tells you she's hurting 'fore she keens. It makes her a home.'

SICKDUDE

Monday, October 10, 2005 10:31 PM

Completely agree with the theories on Zoe's "tore up" line, her "definition of hero", and River's "they don't lie down". As to the original thread's number two (gee, that sounds bad), "they won't see this coming". I thought that was a reference to his talk with Book and how Book says "they'll come at you sideways". Cap was saying that he could come at them sideways too, i.e. dish it out as well as they could.

As to number one, Book's statement that he doesn't need to know, I completely agree. Joss is saying the Book backstory will never get told, and isn't crucial to the story. However, here's something that didn't occur to me until the last screening: the element of re-birth. What we know about Book was that he was Alliance military, fairly high up, with a profound tactical knowledge. Then he left (dis-illusioned?) and wound up finding a new faith as a Shepherd. Well, that describes the Operative to a tee! The movie goes out of its way to say he strongly believes in his cause (not his actions). He gets dis-illusioned with the Alliance and everything he believed in to the point where he says "There's nothing here" about himself. Now he needs to find a new Faith (not Eliza Dushku, either), and he may well turn to religion and become a Shepherd himself. Voila, rebirth!

"Don't say 'ka' until you've tried it." Daniel Jackson

MRSEMBASSY

Monday, October 10, 2005 11:20 PM

I have a different take on Mal's conversation with Book. I've seen the film six times now, and I'm more and more convinced that Book isn't refusing to tell Mal his background; he's acknowledging that Mal already knows.

The exchange that immediately preceded those lines (Mal: "How does a shepherd know so much about that line of work?" Book: "I wasn't always a Shepherd.") is Book practically coming right out and TELLING Mal that he was an operative; so when Mal says, "You'll have to tell me about that someday," and Book replies, "No, I don't." He's basically saying, "No, I don't need to tell you... BECAUSE I JUST TOLD YOU."

The look that Mal gives him right after that seems to confirm this - it's very thoughtful, and serious; the two of them look at each other as if something very important bit of information was just exchanged.

That's how it looks to me, anyway!

-Mrs. Embassy

LEMMINGMAN

Monday, October 10, 2005 11:26 PM

Don't know if this exactly fits the topic but here goes.

Mal 'If I see you again I'll likely kill you myself'
Operative 'You won't'

Mal won't see him coming or won't kill him?

Just Lemming Man, no more no less

QUASARWINDS

Monday, October 10, 2005 11:50 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by DucesTecum:
I still want more from Zoe than an acknowledgement that "she's tore up plenty," but at least she's admitting that much.

How about this?

Mal: You think she'll hold?
Zoe: She's torn up plenty but she'll fly true.
Mal: Good. Make sure everything is secrue.
Mal: Could get a bit rough.
Zoe: Always does.

Im not sure if that was the exact quote but it was something along those lines.

What do you pay him for? Public Relations.

ORPHEUS

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 12:06 AM

Don't you all just love how deliberate all of these line readings are? It's almost like they're giving us permission to read too much into it. I'm definitely loving it.

DERANGEDMILK

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 12:55 AM

engineangel wrote:
WOW ... i love that explaination. It's amazing. WOW. good job!

DUDE!!! I got a kiss!!!!

ENGINEANGEL

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 3:03 AM

SORRY, THIS IS A LONG RESPONSE. I'VE JUST GOT TO ANSWER EVERYONE ELSE'S RESPONSES!!!

Quote:

written by Sickdude:
Completely agree with the theories on Zoe's "tore up" line, her "definition of hero", and River's "they don't lie down". As to the original thread's number two (gee, that sounds bad), "they won't see this coming". I thought that was a reference to his talk with Book and how Book says "they'll come at you sideways". Cap was saying that he could come at them sideways too, i.e. dish it out as well as they could.

this just came to me when i saw your response.

Mal says "they won't see this coming".

You thought that was a reference to his talk with Book and how Book says "they'll come at you sideways". You thought the cap was saying that he could come at them sideways too, i.e. dish it out as well as they could.

I think that you are right that he's thinking about what Book said, but I think Mal was thinking about how since the allience comes at people sideways, they wouldn't expect Mal to come straight at them (which he does: "Bastard's not even changing direction" - said by the operative.) I'm sure that he also meant "they won't think that the reavers are behind us." It also could be literal - there was a cloud distorting the allience's view of all of the ships.

Quote:

written by Sickdude:
As to number one, Book's statement that he doesn't need to know, I completely agree. Joss is saying the Book backstory will never get told, and isn't crucial to the story. However, here's something that didn't occur to me until the last screening: the element of re-birth. What we know about Book was that he was Alliance military, fairly high up, with a profound tactical knowledge. Then he left (dis-illusioned?) and wound up finding a new faith as a Shepherd. Well, that describes the Operative to a tee! The movie goes out of its way to say he strongly believes in his cause (not his actions). He gets dis-illusioned with the Alliance and everything he believed in to the point where he says "There's nothing here" about himself. Now he needs to find a new Faith (not Eliza Dushku, either), and he may well turn to religion and become a Shepherd himself. Voila, rebirth!

Wow!! I completly agree with your analysis of Sheperd Book being an Operative in the past. Remember, the operative in the movie "didn't know the secrets, he just had to keep them." It "wasn't his place to ask what was going on", but once he found out he was "no longer they're [the allience's] man."

Quote:

written by LEMMINGMAN
Ma:l 'If I see you again I'd like to kill you myself'
Operative 'You won't'
Mal won't see him coming or won't kill him?

The operative says: "You won't. There is nothing left to see." I'm pretty sure he's saying "you won't see me again."

Quote:

written by QUASARWINDS
Mal: You think she'll hold?
Zoe: She's torn up plenty but she'll fly true.
Mal: Good. Make sure everything is secure.
Mal: Could get a bit rough.
Zoe: Always does.

I'm not sure if that was the exact quote but it was something along those lines.

You got it mostly right. The end is actually:
Mal: It could get Bumpy.
Zoe: Always is.

Quote:

written by ORPHEUS
Don't you all just love how deliberate all of these line readings are? It's almost like they're giving us permission to read too much into it. I'm definitely loving it.

Of course!!! I am in love - with Joss Whedon's writing.

keep flyin'
EngineAngel

"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how i soar."
Wash, you were the best gorram pilot in the verse. Rest in Peace (and then come back again!!!)

SIGNINE

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 4:01 AM

Well, since this thread is spoilertastic I guess I don't need to hide anything anymore, do I?

So I've got an interesting one for you, it's been mentioned that Wash will appear in any sequel to Serenity. It would follow then that we're either going to have a crazy Whedon moment (Wash's clone! Wash was a robot and the real Wash is in captivity! Wash's Ghost!), actually that would be a crazy writing moment, apart from Whedon, or Wash survived.

I know, his death was too perfect, it pulled my heartstrings, got a tear, but also ultimate respect.

On the other hand, I don't know if it was intended this way or not, but when River and Mal take Serenity up (after presumeably weeks of repairs), you see the dinosaurs still on the console. I don't know about you, but I instantly read into this in a couple ways. Serenity was Wash's best friend (other than Zoe). After the crash sequence, we all thought Serenity was dead. One of her engines flew off, things were torn apart, there were holes and broken glass everywhere, things didn't look good.

Then Wash gets impaled, and we thus assume he is dead as well, we even see his grave.

On the other hand, we never see the crew return to Serenity, we only see her taking off after repairs are complete, and those silly dinosaurs are still on the console. Is that Mal giving props to Wash, did everyone just forget about that? Is Zoe cool with seeing reminders of her dead husband everywhere? Serenity was fixed up, isn't it possible Wash could have been? I can see him demanding having a grave if he couldn't show up for the funeral.

It makes sense to ME anyway.

UNICORN

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 4:44 AM

Okay. I'll number my submissions to this thread in the text. Spoilers aplenty!

Wash's last words? That's an awful lot like a Samurai warrior speaking a poem before he commits sepuku, or ritual suicide by self-disembowelment. (Wash had a good death (1), the very kind the Operative was talking about, and run through the middle, too!)

Structurally, his death was necessary to make sure we all knew that Joss has no "token deaths," those red-shirted characters other people create to signify the seriousness oif a situation. Wash's death made sure everyone in the theatre thought, "Oh God, Oh God, They're all going to die!" (2) For the next twenty-five minutes, we all wondered if Joss was going to let all of our heroes die. Wash's death gave the last siege an enormous intensity, that was its purpose.

But this too, mirrored reality, in a sense; we all thought F*x had killed our beloved 'Verse, had run it through and vanquished it forever. We were all afraid that it would never return, that we would never see our heroes again. But just as F*x failed to destroy our show, so the Alliance forces ultimately failed to kill Serenity, and the crew pull through, just barely, to see another day (3).

This whole movie was a big screw-you to F*x, by my way of thinking; "No matter what you throw at us, we're still here, and you can't stop the signal, (4)" Joss was saying to them.

There is no such thing as a weed.

Serenity is here. 9/30/05

PREV PAGE 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 NEXT PAGE