Last Episode

POSTED BY: Lawman
UPDATED: Wednesday, March 14, 2007 15:37
VIEWED: 8484
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CAUSAL

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 3:42 PM

One more thing, though, Gwek: if they just happened to film The Message last because that would be the most fun for everybody (or the most satisfying, or whatever) why's the episode number last in numerical order?

In any event, what do you suppose it means when Joss says the episode is "last?" Last in the series because he jiggered the order around to make it feel like it at least had some sort of resolve? Or last in 'Verse-chronology?

Hell, I'll be if we try hard enough we could make the case, based on subtle little nothings, that Serenity Parts 1 & 2 were actually the last episode! (Or, at least, not first.)

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CAUSAL

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 3:56 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by GWEK:
Contradictory dialogue aside, I think there's very solid circumstancial evidence that The Message should precede OiS AND that there should be additional episodes between them (had the series continued).

Take a close look at the Simon-Kaylee dynamic in OiS. There's something amiss there in that there appears to be an escalation of comfort level between the two of them.

Strikes me that there's been an escalation of their relationship that we haven't been privy to. While awkwardness is again introduced later in the episode, the dynamic between them in The Message would be step back from where they are in OiS. If you consider things in DVD order, though, the progression of their relationship from The Message to OiS (via some "missing footage" makes more sense.

But the reason that circumstantial evidence is inadmissible in law courts is that it can be interpreted in a variety of ways. Consider your supposed "escalation" of Simon and Kaylee's relationship from The Message to OiS. I could take just exactly the same evidence and say, "Look: in OiS they are just in the hanging-out phase. But by the time we get to The Message, they're actually going on dates (and Simon's paying!)." In addition, people who are more emotionally invested in each other tend to be more hurt during fights, not less. So Kaylee's cold shoulder toward Simon after his insensitivity about her being the only girl he knows could be explained by the fact that it hurts her more given their increased intimacy (dates!) and she'd be likely to be even more harsh (perhaps even going so far as to wonder if perhaps she might be happier with someone else). And in any event, with the same kind of reasoning you could say, "Jaynestown must come close to the end of the series because of the comfort level between Simon and Kaylee: they fell asleep in each other's arms!"

And why are you so quick to dismiss "contradictory dialogue?" Take Heart of Gold and Our Mrs Reynolds. If someone suggested that OMR came after HoG, we'd say, "No! Mal makes reference to the goodnight kiss, so HoG must come after OMR!" And yet you're dismissing Jayne's dialogue: he clearly has the idea in his head that River is, in addition to being a genius (from the pilot), a reader. Now where would he get such an idea? Surely he didn't puzzle it out for himself from little hints dropped in previous (i.e. non-OiS) episodes. This is Jayne we're talking about here, the guy who can't figure out why Kaylee's mad after Mal compares her to a barn-yard animal. He's not exactly quick on the uptake (ref the conversation over Saffron's plan in Trash). But somehow, he's gotten it through his thick-yet-lovable skull that River's psychic. How would that happen? Well, golly, I imagine that even Jayne, dim-bulb though he is, couldn't miss the point after an extended conversation about it in OiS. You couple that with the fact that The Message episode number is last (1AGE13), and the fact that The Message was shot last, well, there's the case. If Firefly had been shown on the perfect network, just the way Joss wanted, and gone for a few seasons, what would the first-season order have been? I'd be willing to bet that the episodes would have aired in the order they were numbered, and shot, because that's how the events unfolded in the 'Verse.

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GWEK

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 4:04 PM

ZEKE: I'm sorry to say that you're logic current logic is flawed.

Heart of Gold (in which Inara says she's leaving) MUST precede Objects in Space (in which Inara and Mal discuss her leaving).

CASUAL: I think the problem here is that "last episode" can be defined in different ways. If you're talking chronologically, there can be some debate (more in a moment). If you're talking about the final episode of the series and the episode one "should" watch last, it's Objects in Space (I think there can be very little debate to this, as Joss as stated it).

With respect to chronology, I don't think there's any debate that places an episode besides OiS or The Message last, is there?

It seems to be that the evidence for The Message being last boils down to two specific pieces (each, admittedly, very compelling):

1-Jayne's line about River.

2-The script numbering.

(Again, more in a moment).

The COUNTER-argument, I submit, is equally compelling, if more circumstantial: this can primarily be found in the interplay between Kaylee and Simon and Mal and Inara. In both cases, if The Message is placed after Objects in Space, things don't add up.

No matter how you slice it, SOMETHING doesn't make sense. Based on Jayne and River, The Message should come second. Based on Mal and Inara, The Message should preceded Heart of Gold (ie, DVD order=chronological order).

There may be a very simple solution to why things don't make sense: Because Joss screwed up. That's right. Joss made a mistake (WHICH mistake, is still open to interpretation).

It's happened before with Firefly, in that an actual chronology of the series is technically IMPOSSIBLE, if we assume the episodes appear occur in the "obvious" order. Check out various timelines of the episodes, and you'll see that they can't possibly all happen as the "cues" in the episodes indicate, so I'd like to suggest that there is, in fact, precedent for Joss and Crew screwing up little details that make continuity almost impossible to logically nail down.

Having said that, let's look at the two key pieces of evidence in favor of The Message-as-later:

1) Jayne's line about River.

The counter to this, as I say, is the dialogue between Inara and Mal and, to a lesser extent, between Kaylee and Simon. Simply focusing on Inara and Mal, where they are in The Message is the "wrong place" for them to be following the awkwardness of HoG AND OiS. (Yes, you can argue that perhaps they "made up", but I find that as weak an argument as I'm sure you would my idea that Jayne's line could be based on River's "I can kill you with my mind" comment in Trash).

Here, then, we have a contradiction that cannot be resolved. I posit that if we'd seen Trash aired, this conundrum might well have been resolved with a minor edit in the same way that OiS was edited when Joss was not able to air HoG befire OiS. In this way, Joss keeps his options open (with a minor edit, The Message can reasonably occur before OR after OiS), presumably because he didn't know how many eps he was going to get.

It's also possible that Jayne's line was WRITTEN AFTER Objects in Space, and was a simple gaffe because Joss wasn't thinking straight and his head was still on OiS. At the time Joss would have been writing The Message, he was running three shows, trying to wrap-up Buffy, keep Firefly from being cancelled, and figure out what to do with the show if it was. One can EASILY imagine that a line or two got screwed up under those circumstances and was never caught. (To be honest, the editing on all three ofthe unaired episodes seems a little less tight than those that were aired).

So, based SOLELY on Jayne's one-off line, I think a pretty solid argument can be constructed that the joke is simply a piece of either very clever or very poor editing (much as I love Firelfy, this wouldn't be the first case of the latter).

2) The shooting script number: To me, this is far more compelling evidence on it's own... BUT the fact that Trash ALSO follows OiS would seem to run counter to flow of the tone or Mal

LAWMAN

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 4:54 PM

how excellent. i'm proud to have started this thread. not sure why i get such a thrill from reading all the details and the intricate facets of just a few episodes. but the story line of the verse impacts plot and character development so much. i saw serenity before i saw the series. now, after i've seen movie and series over 15 times, i think i enjoy it more than before. a bit obsessed. i do like the fact that one can see a quick 35-40 min episode of the series, and go on with one's day. obsession should never conflict with one's day job.

everybody dies alone

GWEK

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 5:17 PM

Sorry, just realized that you posted a few more responses while I was working on my "thesis."

While your correct that my argument wouldn't hold up in a court of law (neither would yours, for that matter!), we're discussing a topic that we can, at best, make best-guesses about.

Although I hadn't your second and third responses, I think that most of these issues are addressed in my "thesis."

Quote:
Originally posted by Causal:
One more thing, though, Gwek: if they just happened to film The Message last because that would be the most fun for everybody (or the most satisfying, or whatever) why's the episode number last in numerical order?

As stated in the longer message, I think that The Message was simply "less important" for Joss to film than OiS, so it became an "optional" episode. In other words, "If Fox cancels me, I'll fight for OiS and HoG, but I don't think I can fight for all FOUR eps..."

I'm assuming you've listened to the commentary with the DVDs, so you may realize this is exactly the kind of tactic Joss would pull (placing OiS earlier in the order than he planned in order to convince Fox to let him air to AT LEAST that episode). In the pilot, for example, he wanted to air in widescreen, and Fox initially said no, so he filmed a number of key shots such that widescreen was NECESSARY, leaving Fox with the option of either airing WS or paying for reshoots.

Quote:
In any event, what do you suppose it means when Joss says the episode is "last?" Last in the series because he jiggered the order around to make it feel like it at least had some sort of resolve? Or last in 'Verse-chronology?

The more I explore this issue, the more I become convinced that FOR JOSS, DVD order=chronological order=the order he would have LIKED them to air on Fox (doesn't mean they would have).

Quote:
Hell, I'll be if we try hard enough we could make the case, based on subtle little nothings, that Serenity Parts 1 & 2 were actually the last episode! (Or, at least, not first.)

That's an argument I'd like to see.

www.stillflying.net: "Here's how it might have been..."

GWEK

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 5:43 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Causal:
[But the reason that circumstantial evidence is inadmissible in law courts is that it can be interpreted in a variety of ways. Consider your supposed "escalation" of Simon and Kaylee's relationship from The Message to OiS. I could take just exactly the same evidence and say, "Look: in OiS they are just in the hanging-out phase.

Watch the scene closely. Kaylee's lying with her bare feet in Simon's lap, she puts her toes in his face, AND implies that she's seen him naked. They're not "just hanging out".

Quote:
And in any event, with the same kind of reasoning you could say, "Jaynestown must come close to the end of the series because of the comfort level between Simon and Kaylee: they fell asleep in each other's arms!"

See, now you're just being silly.

Quote:
And why are you so quick to dismiss "contradictory dialogue?" Take Heart of Gold and Our Mrs Reynolds. If someone suggested that OMR came after HoG, we'd say, "No! Mal makes reference to the goodnight kiss, so HoG must come after OMR!" And yet you're dismissing Jayne's dialogue: he clearly has the idea in his head that River is, in addition to being a genius (from the pilot), a reader.

As I said, I'm not dismissing the line out of hand, but if that's ALL that the argument of The-Message-as-later hangs on, then I think it's very likely the line was, as I've said, a mistake (or a clever "placeholder" edit.

By shooting the episode as he did (with the contradictory scenes), Joss has actually created an episode where The Message can go before OiS (ie, "the DVD order", as he said he'd originally intended) or AFTER (as he'd implied to Fox it should be placed).

Quote:
You couple that with the fact that The Message episode number is last (1AGE13), and the fact that The Message was shot last, well, there's the case.

Unfortunately, that case also means that Trash was the second-to-last episode, and that's much harder for you to prove. In analyzing the eps over at www.stillflying.net, we've learned that it's just as important to look at what the characters DON'T say as what they do. Had Inara been planning to get off the ship at this point, that fact would almost certainly have come up during some of the Mal-Inara banter, and it does not. Couple that with the fact that no one addresses the fact that River might be a telepath in this episode (when it would be oh-so-obvious to mention the idea of having River read Saffron), and I think there's very little case to be made for Trash occurring after OiS.

If Trash occurs BEFORE OiS, the numbers don't mean a thing, and your argument hangs on Jayne's line.

I'm not saying that there's no change your right, just that I don't find your argument compelling.

Quote:
If Firefly had been shown on the perfect network, just the way Joss wanted, and gone for a few seasons, what would the first-season order have been? I'd be willing to bet that the episodes would have aired in the order they were numbered, and shot, because that's how the events unfolded in the 'Verse.

Again, other than numbers, there's nothing to indicate that Trash is supposed to take place after OiS (and much to indicate otherwise), so it would have aired before OiS in an ideal world. As for The Message? Who can say for sure? Oh, that's right! JOSS can! When he says that the DVD order is the order than he wanted the episodes to air!

I'd be willing to bet that on a perfect network, then, The Message would have preceded OiS.

Still, the issue does bring up an interesting little conundrum about the show, so the next time I sit down to watch the DVDs, I'll probably do it in "numeric" order for a little variety!

www.stillflying.net: "Here's how it might have been..."

CAUSAL

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 7:23 PM

Well, it's obvious we're not going to agree, so I'll just present my final rebuttals before I bow out.

Quote:
Originally posted by GWEK:
It seems to be that the evidence for The Message being last boils down to two specific pieces (each, admittedly, very compelling):

1-Jayne's line about River.

2-The script numbering.

That, and the fact that the episode was shot last.

Quote:
No matter how you slice it, SOMETHING doesn't make sense. Based on Jayne and River, The Message should come second. Based on Mal and Inara, The Message should preceded Heart of Gold (ie, DVD order=chronological order).

With all due respect, your analysis of Mal and Inara's behavior might be flawed. But the line is the line, and think that's the harder "inconsistency" to explain. More on this in a minute.

Quote:
Let's look at the two key pieces of evidence in favor of The Message-as-later:

1) Jayne's line about River.

The counter to this, as I say, is the dialogue between Inara and Mal and, to a lesser extent, between Kaylee and Simon. Simply focusing on Inara and Mal, where they are in The Message is the "wrong place" for them to be following the awkwardness of HoG AND OiS. ... Here, then, we have a contradiction that cannot be resolved.

Not to logic chop too much, but what you're describing isn't a contradiction per se. If I say, "That car is red," and you say, "That car is not red," we have a instance of contradiction: these statements directly oppose each other because the one is the denial of the other. On the other hand, if I say, "That car is red," and you say, "That car is black," we have an instance of contrariety. The two statements aren't in direct opposition--they're merely contrary--neither one denies the other. I believe that you'll find that there's no contradiction involved, because nothing in the case under consideration has been presented that is the denial of some other thing that was presented. If that were the case, there could be no resolution. But if they're contrary maybe we can resolve them.

Now, I'm not going to let you drag me into a discussion about the proper placement of Trash, because that's beyond the scope of the discussion. We're discussing the question of which is the last episode. As you've acknowledged, it seems that the best arguments have either TM or OiS last. Either way, there will be (in your mind, at least) the appearance of contradiction. If we put them in TM-OiS order, Jayne's line about River seems out of place. If we put them in OiS-TM order, Mal and Inara's interaction seems out of order. (For the sake of argument, I'm going to discount the Simon/Kaylee thing, as you admit that it counts "to a lesser degree"--and not at all, in my mind). So let's take them by turns.

If the order is TM-OiS, then we have to deal with Jayne's line about River being a mind-reading genius. As I mentioned in a previous post, Jayne doesn't seem to have the wits to come to this conclusion on his own. So how could he have possibly have known? As you say, the only real candidate seems to be River's line about being able to kill Jayne with her brain. But this line would only establish River as having telekinetic powers, not psychic ones, and at any rate, I think Jayne is just creeped out about the whole affair--I donubt very seriously that he put significant thought into River's comment, other than to be unsettled by it. No, the best explanation here seems to be that Jayne (who, even at his best, is about as sharp as a bag of hammers) drew this conclusion from hearing other people talk about it--so by inference to the best explanation that would put OiS before TM. There just doesn't seem to be a workable alternative.

How about the other supposed difficulty? Your contention seems to be that Mal and Inara's interaction in TM is too cordial to place it after her announcement in OiS that she's leaving. Now, in TM there is only one major interchange between Mal and Inara (their dialogue in the teaser) and two minor ones (In

ZEEK

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 7:51 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by GWEK:
ZEKE: I'm sorry to say that you're logic current logic is flawed.

Heart of Gold (in which Inara says she's leaving) MUST precede Objects in Space (in which Inara and Mal discuss her leaving).

That line was changed. Whether it was changed for the dvds or for tv we don't really know, but I don't count it one way or the other because there are two versions depending on the chronological order.

Which really begs the question "Did Joss know what order to put the episodes in when he was filming them?".

STARRBABY

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 8:06 PM

I'm surprised noone has brought up that Simon was shot in OiS. Wouldn't he be on crutches or something for HoG or The Message?

You can bring up that he's fine in the movie, but that was months later.

ASORTAFAIRYTALE

Tuesday, March 13, 2007 8:08 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Zeek:

That line was changed. Whether it was changed for the dvds or for tv we don't really know, but I don't count it one way or the other because there are two versions depending on the chronological order.

Which really begs the question "Did Joss know what order to put the episodes in when he was filming them?".

I'm fairly certain that the line was changed just for TV, because it was the last one they were going to air, and therefore they had to know that "Heart of Gold" was not going to be aired. But then that's also just my opinion. I think Joss probably had some idea of which order he wanted them in, because that's what the order on the dvd's is supposed to be.

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