"Bushwacked" Analysis

POSTED BY: Sydni64
UPDATED: Thursday, June 24, 2004 16:36
VIEWED: 4331
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SYDNI64

Thursday, June 24, 2004 12:37 PM

Hello, fellow browncoats,

I hope I'm doing this ok (I'm a new poster). I've just posted some longish analysis of Bushwacked over on my livejournal, in case anyone is interested in checking it out: http://www.livejournal.com/users/sydni_64/29283.html

SYDNI64

Thursday, June 24, 2004 3:57 PM

It might be easier if I just post the content here, even though it's long. These are my thoughts on the idea of "nothingness" in this ep:

Firefly 103: Bushwacked

The theme of this ep is the thin line between humanity and nothingness, civilization and nothingness, life and nothingness, or simply, something and nothingness*. Simon remarks that it's unsettling that a very thin piece of glass in a helmet could be all that separates a person from "nothing." When a floating corpse hits Serenity, Jayne's explanation is that he must have gone stir-crazy and gone out for a "walk in space," and was then killed by the "nothing,” the vacuum. We never learn for certain why that man was outside of the ship (was he killed by the Reavers? was it a mad attempt to escape? was it entirely unrelated?), but it is likely that in a roundabout way, Jayne was right: the man was killed by "nothing," as we learn that the Reavers are men who moved too far away from civilization and were changed by the "nothing" they found. Jayne insists that the Reavers are not men at all, Book says that they are, and Mal gets the last word when he says that the Reavers aren't men on account of they forgot how to be men, and now they are "nothing."

The three men's differing takes on the Reavers are telling. Jayne's view is perhaps predictably simple: "Reavers ain't men." If he has any capacity to appreciate subtle degrees of difference between "man" and "not-man," he does not show it. His description makes no reference to what the Reavers were, how they’ve come to be what they are, or what is in their minds or hearts. The truth of their being is for him a brute fact: Reavers ain't men, they're things to be feared and avoided, and that is all he needs or, it seems, wants to know about them. Book's view is perhaps equally simplistic: of course the Reavers are men, he says, only they've lost their way. Book's description is hopeful--if one has only lost his way, then he need only be led back to the right path. Perhaps this is exactly the view we should expect from one who is called a "Shepherd." It is Mal who provides the most subtle and nuanced view of the Reavers, and the one that rings most true: the Reavers became so intimately involved with "nothing" that they forgot how to be men, and now that they aren't men, they are nothing. This, then, is the danger of nothing--when you face it, it changes you and claims you. It is underscored later when Mal informs the crew and later the Alliance that the derelict’s survivor (Mal would reject the term "survivor") has no choice but to emulate the Reavers. He came too close to "nothing," was forced to stare upon it, and now must become it. This all brings to mind a certain famous saying of Nietzsche's. Further, Mal tells us that the Reavers "gnaw at your insides." They will literally render their victims hollow, merely shells with nothing inside.

Simon, who in this ep reveals himself to be more than a little phobic about the nothingness that is the vacuum of space, has a brush with the danger of nothing when, tricked by Jayne into thinking he needs to suit up before boarding the derelict, is told by Kaylee that he has put his helmet on incorrectly. In a real situation, his naïveté would have prevented even that thin glass from protecting him from "nothing." In a more metaphorical sense, this might suggest that Simon lacks the resources to adequately protect himself (and River) from the dangerous influence of "nothing." (This recalls Simon's actions when faced by a certain moral problem in Firefly's pilot ep: he threatens to allow Kaylee to die if the crew of Serenity will not bend to his will. One can't imagine this is the sort of thing he would have done before being thrust into his new situation, having lost nearly everything and now having only his sister standing between his having something to live for and his having literally nothing.)

Early in the ep, Simon is joined by Inara and the two stand together, observing the other crewmembers playing with a ball and a suspended hoop. (River observes them, too,

PIERSNICA

Thursday, June 24, 2004 4:36 PM

That's a very astute analysis. I'd say something more significant, but I think you pretty much summed it up.