Companions 'Gilded Cage'

POSTED BY: Bytemite
UPDATED: Tuesday, December 21, 2010 08:47
VIEWED: 36140
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BYTEMITE

Thursday, March 4, 2010 2:41 AM

I think the war may have had some effect on her, but seeing the help that the Rim is BLATANTLY not getting that her precious Alliance promised probably is teaching her about her naivity. I think she may be regreting her support now, but she probably sees it more grey, that both sides really weren't good.

ANOTHERSKY

Thursday, March 4, 2010 9:02 AM

So I went back and watched the two scenes(the pilot w/the young man, and Jaynestown with Fess) to contrast them...voila:

Pilot

The most notable communication to the audience I think takes place with Joss' ever-important camerawork--he's obsessed with it in the pilot, and mentions it constantly in the commentary.

The number of jump cuts and fuzzes in this is crazy. Even the things young-Alliance-man (can we call him Greycoat? needs a handle!) says are all incomplete. He interrupts himself constantly and trails off. Inara gets to say complete, but generic sentences. Suggestion of a scene, rather than continuous dialogue.

Implications of dialogue we do hear:
1. Inara found Sihnon constricting (for whatever reason)
2. The client seems to have an "everyone's thinking it, I'm just saying it" attitude about the nature of a Companion's work. This is clearly shown to be a no-no.

Summary: This visit was a downer, for both of them. Quite awkward, because he apparently assumed he knew the rules and yet didn't play by them verbally. Meta-companioning. Oops. I would say her body language after he leaves is disappointed/cringing and trying to shake it off.

Jaynestown

1. Inara shows distaste(?) to Magistrate's "I only make the people I own use my title."

The idea of pompously owning people is kinda yucky to her?
She makes clear to Fess that she would come for him (because he's a good man and everything blah blah) but not for his father--we assume because Fess is not crude, domineering, meddlesome and arrogant.

2. the "Ritual"--"Our time together, it symbolizes something for your father". She also says it's important to her, but she emphasizes tea/ritual aspect to counteract his father's physical act emphasis?

I guess they "meet" in Fess, allowing for the plot device of not hanging the crew.

Summary: Stuff goes pretty well.
I'm thinking Inara is feeling like a pretty good mentorish person to Fess, and Fess is feeling very manly (I don't know whether to laugh or gag).

THEN Inara starts gushing to Fess about Mal. Whoa? Can anyone explain what happened there? Protocol? anybody? Lol.

__

Going for a ride.

ALIASSE

Thursday, March 4, 2010 1:03 PM

Wasn't she really young though? I mean, I'm not sure how someone at that age, living in the Core, could have been affected by the war. Unless it's something to do with the terrorist attacks.

BYTEMITE

Thursday, March 4, 2010 3:25 PM

According to Inara's DOB, she's 28 by the time of the series, assuming Joss doesn't have shenanigans going on with her age and Nandi and the guild cleverly playing cover-up. So she'd have been 21. I guess it depends on how badly officers from the war might come back messed up. She might have known people who were good friends who died. There was a draft, so it could have been a little like Vietnam here, where most everyone knew someone who went and who either died or came back changed. And who knows what "supporting unification" means for Inara? Maybe she actively found a way to help, like as a nurse or something, seeing that she does have some basic medical training.

Hmm, that could be a good basis of people who she might think she failed.

BYTEMITE

Thursday, March 4, 2010 3:39 PM

Good assessment, I pretty much agree, even about how kind of over-the-top Fess played his "I'm a man now!" thing.

Of course, by the same measure, in Jaynestown we don't have any Inara internal reaction cut-away shots like we do in the pilot. Maybe Fess didn't commit as big a faux-pas as first greycoat did (BTW, I think the greycoat was to suggest he was an Alliance naval cadet?), but it could be a number of things might have been wearisome for Inara that she never expressed.

And for someone she was supposed to care about, she sure was willing to use him for her own ends and get him in trouble. Sure, as far as we know it turned out okay, and she had a good reason for what she did, but considering her actions there I'm not sure she like him THAT much.

And a similar story with Sanda, the Alliance anti-terrorist special op, who she seems to like despite his worrisome mention of dustdevils, enough that she contacts him again. But during the engagement we know that Inara isn't thinking about him, enough that he notices and calls her on it, so she couldn't have liked him that much either.

MINCINGBEAST

Thursday, March 4, 2010 5:38 PM

i suspect that when inara says she supported unification, she means that she's had carnal relations with lots, and lots and lots, of alliance officers.

the more i think about it, the less inclined i am to frame inara in the war, or put her in the context of her own personal war. that's mal's gig.

ANOTHERSKY

Thursday, March 4, 2010 8:25 PM

originally by Bytemite:

Quote:
And a similar story with Sanda, the Alliance anti-terrorist special op, who she seems to like despite his worrisome mention of dustdevils, enough that she contacts him again. But during the engagement we know that Inara isn't thinking about him, enough that he notices and calls her on it, so she couldn't have liked him that much either.

The interesting thing is, he seems amused by it, or at least is fine with it. Professional distance? lol.

Originally by mincingbeast:

Quote:
i suspect that when inara says she supported unification, she means that she's had carnal relations with lots, and lots and lots, of alliance officers.

the more i think about it, the less inclined i am to frame inara in the war, or put her in the context of her own personal war. that's mal's gig.

Um, yes, agreed. I don't particularly see Inara going all Nightingale on the war effort. I think the only wars she's engaged in is one with herself and possibly some sneaky stuff in the Guild.
__

Going for a ride.

BYTEMITE

Thursday, March 4, 2010 9:46 PM

Well, but why would Joss Whedon SAY that there were terrorist attacks on Sihnon if they didn't somehow effect Inara?

The question is whether the impact for Inara was biological, chemical, or emotional, and whether it put any sort of hardship on her.

But not enough hardship that she really blames and hates the Independents. Or she's mature enough that she's let it go, mostly.

GILLIANROSE

Thursday, March 4, 2010 9:59 PM

There's just an awful lot we don't know about Inara. We don't know about the makeup of her family, her relationships with them, where they lived (I remember reading a story that treats her line about Sihnon, "I was born there," as highly symbolic), if they are still alive, what their socioeconomic/cultural status was - although Morena and Joss have referred to Companioning as a "family" business for Inara.

And we have only a bare outline about Training Houses, Companions-in-Training, and the Guild.

I keep thinking about all of these unknowns when I wonder about how the "devastating" War affected any of our characters, and I also think about one of the commonest descriptions of the American Civil War, that it pitted brother against brother.

And I always interpreted Inara having supported Independence as something much more prosaic than her client history - how well paid are military men, anyway? - something like her registered political affiliation and an absence of controversial remarks and behavior in her public life. I can imagine Inara chatting at a salon or other social function, acknowledging that the Independents bring up some valid points, but that a plan for Unification is most likely to bring the most good to the most people over the next several decades.

BYTEMITE

Thursday, March 4, 2010 10:23 PM

In the context that Inara talks about supporting Unification, that makes sense. The Alliance is authoritarian, after all, I bet you could be "black-listed" or something if you speak out against current policy when it's already been decided.

I think the Serenity Blue Ray might specifically list her birthplace, and I THINK it was Sihnon. I'll double check. Interesting point, though, Sihnon could be where Inara made her debut, and if she took a trade name then you could say she was born there. It's also interesting considering there she can move in seemingly any social circle, and there are inconsistencies in Inara fitting in among the upper class at times, which might suggest she's not from Sihnon or rich. That's one we've talked about before, but not the "off-Sihnon" possibility.

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