Malcolm Reynolds' history of injuries...
POSTED BY: Goldbrick
UPDATED: Wednesday, April 14, 2010 20:38
VIEWED: 13995
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I was so impressed by Malcolm Reynolds’ ability to bounce back from injury that I compiled a short history of his many, many injuries. We might consider his regenerative powers to be his special skill, on par with Wash's excellence at the wheel, Kaylee's affinity with engines, etc. Perhaps you'll agree after this review:
1) Mal was hit in the side by shrapnel during the war and had a nerve cluster relocated. (According to Serenity the Movie).
2) Mal was wounded by Patience in an undisclosed location of his person, presumably while concluding business on Whitefall. This injury took place prior to the events of the pilot episode. (Ref: Serenity, the pilot episode)
3) Mal was grazed in the arm by a bullet during the second shootout with Patience on Whitefall. (Ref: Serenity, the pilot episode)
4) Mal starts a barfight on U-Day, and once again he's on the losing side. (And Mal has a history of barfights on U-Day.) (Ref: The Train Job)
5) Mal suffers a stab wound in upper chest from Niska henchman Crow’s thrown hooked dagger. (Ref: The Train Job). By the way, Mal remarks to Simon while being sewn up that he’s had “many worse” wounds.
6) Mal is thrown about with accompanying fist blows by Crow. (Ref: The Train Job)
7) Mal picks another barfight by picking the pocket of a slave-trader. (Ref: Shindig)
8) Mal suffers sword wounds, one rather severe, while dueling with Hamilton Wing. (Ref: Shindig)
9) Mal is rendered unconscious by Saffron’s “goodnight kiss” with subsequent hard crash to floor. (Ref: Our Mrs. Reynolds)
10) Mal is shot in the lower left side of his abdomen by the captain of a salvage ship. (Ref: Out of Gas)
11) Mal is tortured to death by Adelai Niska. (Ref: War Stories)
12) Mal brawls with “Yo-Saf-Bridge” resulting in a bleeding, possibly broken nose. (Ref: Trash)
13) Mal is knocked unconscious by Jubal Early. (Ref: Objects in Space)
14) Mal is beaten up by the Operative at first meeting. (Ref: Serenity the Movie)
15) Mal is shot in the back by the Operative near Mr. Universe’s backup transmitter. (Ref: Serenity the Movie)
16) Mal suffers numerous injuries in his final brawl with the Operative, including an abdominal sword wound. (Ref: Serenity the Movie)
As a followup, here are the six episodes in which Mal took no physical damage (but others did):
Bushwhacked (Jayne is jumped by the survivor of the reaver attack).
Safe (Shepherd Book is severely wounded in a shootout).
Jaynestown (Simon Tam is beaten and slashed on the arm by Stitch Hessian).
Ariel (Jayne is slashed across the chest by River, brawls with a guard during the getaway, and finally gets slammed in the head with a wrench by Mal).
The Message (Wash is grazed on the side of his head by a bullet).
Heart of Gold (the single episode in which no one on the crew suffers physical harm).
There were, of course, many other wounds suffered by the crew, such as Kaylee’s bullet wound in the pilot episode, Jayne’s bullet wound while rescuing Mal from Niska, Simon’s bullet wounds (by Jubal Early and the reavers), and of course Book and Wash were killed in Serenity the Movie.
Even if the far future has phenomenally great health care compared to the early 21st Century, it might be for the best that the series was only 14 episodes and one movie long.
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Pretty comprehensive, Goldbrick.
You might want to add Jayne's leg being impaled by a Reaver harpoon during the pilot mule chase.
We did a thread way back when which catalogued Mal's scars.
Mal's head has taken quite a bit -- how long until he is punch-drunk?
bun
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I for one suspect that his shrapneled nerve cluster doesn't remotely represent the entirety of the injuries he may have taken in the war.
Interestingly, I read the script to Objects in Space recently, and the nerve cluster thing is actually first revealed there, when Jubal Early hits him, fails to incapacitate him, then knocks him out another way. I always thought Joss pulled that one out of no where for Serenity, turns out he'd been planning it for a while.
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Quote:As Spock would say, fascinating.
Originally posted by Bytemite:
I read the script to Objects in Space recently, and the nerve cluster thing is actually first revealed there, when Jubal Early hits him, fails to incapacitate him, then knocks him out another way. I always thought Joss pulled that one out of no where for Serenity, turns out he'd been planning it for a while.
The laughing Chrisisall
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Quote:
Mal's head has taken quite a bit -- how long until he is punch-drunk?
Zoe(deadpan):"You mean he's not ?"
-F
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Adding to the list because this is the most interesting post I’ve read this month:)
Mal takes a beating in the "Better Days" comic from Inara's client. He's all cut up and bandaged at the end.
In Heart of Gold, no crew member gets physically harmed, yes, but Mal takes an emotional lashing from Inara, when she says she needs to leave. He doesn't seem to bounce back by the time of Serenity, though. Physical wounds heal, emotional wounds, not so much.
Joss and Nathan have both said their favorite thing to do was beat up on Mal, like a spanking boy, so it is quite likely if the series would have continued we would have seen more of the same miraculous physical recovery coupled with emotional devastation, especially for Mal.
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Lets not forget he survived as U S paratrooper private Ryan during WW2 in “Saving Private Ryan”. At least he was still alive when Tom Hanks left him and also…….. countless pink slips from F*><.
The captain is resilient. Castle should write a book about him.
Z
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Also, Nathan himself was hurt in the BDM, because he kept actually falling on his face for the shot when he's on the platform with the Operative. Joss says on the commentary he noticed Nathan's cheek was getting bruised and swollen and they had to break from filming.
*
People before profits
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Falls from a roof in Outing Riley.
Almost gets absorbed by an alien and suffers another abdominal wound in Slither.
And Nathan actually gets killed in....
White Noise: The Light. And it was a marvelous open eyed death scene. And he still saves the day.
http://fireflyfaninnc.livejournal.com/
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