Rating the minor characters

POSTED BY: shambleau
UPDATED: Monday, January 12, 2004 14:00
VIEWED: 3194
PAGE 1 of 2

1 2 NEXT PAGE

SHAMBLEAU

Saturday, January 10, 2004 8:03 PM

First, the ones with major roles.

1. Nandi. A fully lived-in character, beautifully brought to life and sexy as hell.

2. Tracy. A guy whose charm is only equaled by his rotten judgement. Woodward brought out the lostness, the pathos and the carelessness of other people that define Tracy. Great job.

3. Early. It takes repeated viewings to see that the guy's crazy as a loon from the start, which is a tribute to Richard Brooks. When I first saw the ep, I was uneasy about the guy, didn't quite know what to make of him, since, yeah, bad guy, but in an odd way. A one-of-a-kind villain.

4. Badger. A fun little weasel. "Sad little king" indeed.

5.SafYoBridge. Interesting take on a con-woman with a crazy side, a common affliction of Firefly villains. I put her above Niska because the character is slightly less cliched.

6. Niska. Well-acted villain, but in the too-much-traveled, sadistic European mode.

7. Inara's customer in Shindig. Can't remember his name, which says something about the performance.

8.. Rance Burgess. Cliched AND badly acted. Worst of the villains, in the wrong way.

Minor Characters

1. The sheriff in TTJ. Could have been a cliche. Wasn't. A shrewd, decent guy realized in just a few scenes.

2. Bester. Even fewer lines, and a great comic performance.

3.The Alliance commander in Bushwhacked. Although I didn't buy that this guy would let Mal and the crew go, it was a wonderful performance nonetheless.

4. The other captain in OOG. Mal without the conscience. I'd love to see him again.

Anybody got any others?

shambleau

MANIACNUMBERONE

Saturday, January 10, 2004 10:48 PM

who's SafYoBridge?

oh wait... I thought better of that question.

SHAMBLEAU

Saturday, January 10, 2004 11:19 PM

Aaargh!

I forgot Patience! One tough old bird, but I think it'd be fun to have a drink with her, as long as, you know, I was paying. She should be number one on the minor characters list.

The Blue Hand guys were effectively scary, so they should be listed. And Crow. All stereotypical, though.

And I'd add the corrupt Alliance cop of The Message to the list. Probably next-to-last, though, after Crow. Well-acted, but been done and done.

Which is one thing I'm noticing as I write this up. The villains seem to be stock figures too often. Patience and Early are more nuanced and they're at or near the top of my lists. Firefly hadn't come up with a great continuing villain by the time it came to an end.

Oh, and some very very small roles that made an impression with almost no lines: the female deputy in TTJ, the nurse who sent Mal and the others to the morgue in Ariel, the old guy who helped Kaylee with the socialite bitches in Shindig, and Rance Burgess's wife.

shambleau

SLOWSMURF

Saturday, January 10, 2004 11:26 PM

Firefly really wasn't written, like buffy or angel, to HAVE continuing villians.

Randomly coming across(or ending up in circumstances to) a person a few times is understandable, but more than that is just becoming rediculous. Especially since if nothing else it'd be a stretch as to why the villian continued to live.

And I feel stupid, I'm just drawing a blank as to who "Crow" is?

SAINT JAYNE

Saturday, January 10, 2004 11:42 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SlowSmurf:
I'm just drawing a blank as to who "Crow" is?

Why, Crow's the best darn engine cleaner in the 'Verse! Got oily build-up in your engines? Let them eat Crow.

SLOWSMURF

Sunday, January 11, 2004 12:09 AM

That really didn't help lol.

SERENITYVALLEY

Sunday, January 11, 2004 1:15 AM

Crow's the guy from Serenity. Niska's henchman guy right?

And Inara's client in Shindig is Atherton Wing. I remember that b/c of "Can I call you Ath?" and when his name appears, it sort of looks like Atherton Wind.

Personally, my list would go:
Badger
Tracey
Early

Hey, what about Lawrence Dobson?

http://www.simple-assault.com/Firefly.htm

KAYLEESSTRAWBERRY

Sunday, January 11, 2004 1:41 AM

I loved seeing that other crew in Out of Gas. It made the void of space seem less empty, to see other crews out there. Speaking of which, there's Monty and his crew as well. I'd love to see either one of them come back: the Out of Gas crew as a foil, and/or Monty's crew as temporary partners.

SEVENPERCENT

Sunday, January 11, 2004 7:10 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SlowSmurf:

Randomly coming across(or ending up in circumstances to) a person a few times is understandable, but more than that is just becoming rediculous. Especially since if nothing else it'd be a stretch as to why the villian continued to live.

Depends how big that character's story arc is, I think- Niska is the one villain I could see running into quite a bit- He's a major force in the dark side of what Mal does (smuggling, salvage, etc) and where Mal does it, and it's established that Mal crossed him and got away with it (twice even) - He's the type that would return again and again until he had what he felt was owed him (Serenity's crew on stakes) - I could see him turning up, assuming a one season story-arc, maybe 4 times without it being overkill; maybe 6 or seven times over a two season arc- A char. like SaffYo, it might be nice to see her every season or two in a show-

Niska ranks first on my major minors list, I would say, followed by Early, then by SaffYo- On the minor minors list Patience and Badger-
And I agree that the Officer in Message was a cardboard char., as someone in an earlier thread said-

He looked bigger when I couldn't see him.

SPIKEANDJEZEBEL

Sunday, January 11, 2004 8:47 AM

I rewatched "Ariel" today, and noticed that the actress who plays a nurse in the hospital (when Simon saves the live of the dying patient) is the same actress who plays Xander's real estate agent in "The Replacement" in season 5 of Buffy.

1 2 NEXT PAGE