Ironic Deaths for Firefly Crew

POSTED BY: zoid
UPDATED: Wednesday, December 29, 2004 22:28
VIEWED: 13607
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ZOID

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 3:37 AM

Greetings, fellow Browncoats:

Over on the 'How do you see yourself on Serenity' thread, I joined previous commentators from this site in comparing Joss Whedon to William Shakespeare. Specifically, I pointed out that Shakespeare had a decided tendency to kill off his main characters at the precise moment when their lives appeared to be satisfactorily resolving themselves. Id est, just about the time Romeo and Juliet appear to be on the verge of getting a richly deserved life together, a capricious error in timing -- what? 5 minutes or so? Less in some productions? -- makes their story a double-suicide tragedy. Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, Titus Andronicus... My understanding is that JW has pulled similar shenanigans on his series in the past.

So, since JW seems bent on Shakespearean tragedy, here's my complete list of ironic, yet inescapable endings for our BDH's. Some of mine are purely whimsical. The problem with whimsy is that it so closely resembles irony; you, my fellow fans, must decide which of the two I'm being.

Please feel free to add or amend to your liking...

Malcolm Reynolds:
As I said in my 'Future Quotes' series, posted right here on FFFn some time back, Mal lays down his life on a suicide mission at the decisive battle of the Second War of Independence. The ironical bit: He rediscovers his faith in God and his joie de vivre in the face of impossible odds, as he exhibited at the first Battle of Serenity Valley. In the penultimate episode of the 7-year series, he dies in battle, as he should have in the first War.

Zoe:
Dies in childbirth, leaving Wash a single parent of a child he resisted having in the first place. If he'd won that battle with Zoe, she'd never have died in childbirth.

Inara:
Post mortem reveals cause of death is Toxic Shock Syndrome (of type S. aureus).

Wash:
Using the same 'dead-stick' maneuver he exhibited in "War Stories", Wash flies a shuttle into the bridge section of an Alliance cruiser, allowing Serenity and her crew to escape.

Kaylee:
Develops sudden allergic reaction to strawberries and dies of asphyxiation due to swelling in her throat, face and fingers. Recollecting her introduction in OoG, I was going to have her choke to death on something else, but it's a family show...

Jayne:
How else? Playing with his gun. Dies of apparent heart attack while in his bunk. ("This is my rifle, this is my gun. This is for fighting, this is for fun." Animal Mother, "Full Metal Jacket")

Book:
Stricken by a sudden grand mal seizure, he is unable to speak, except with his eyes, by which means he attempts to convey to Mal his secret past of remorse and personal redemption, as he lays dying. As a result, JW keeps his fans from ever knowing the full extent of the Shepherd's mysterious past.

Simon:
While treating seriously wounded patients in battlefield triage, shuns the use of surgical gloves (because the only ones available are blue). A slip of the scalpel slices his skin as he is working on a patient who is afflicted with 'Rapid Onset Latent Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome', a bioweapon unleashed on Browncoat positions by the Alliance/BlueSun. He closes his eyes for a much-deserved rest in the makeshift doctors' lounge after his 20-hour shift in the MASH OR, and never reawakens.

River:
Voluntarily plugs her mind into the cybernetic interface of the strategic supercomputer that the Alliance/BlueSun had designed to defeat all opposition to their hegemony. She uses this system to defeat the Alliance/BlueSun's superior forces; but, her human body is forfeit.

Serenity:
Decommissioned after the Second War of Independence (WoI 2), her engines removed, she is on permanent display in a latter-day version of the Smithsonian.

Okay, that was deeply depressing...

Morbidly,

zoid

P.S.
I'm surprised no one ever asked me what became of River at the end of 'Future Quotes'; why she was so important that Book would make her the central figure of his historical account of WoI 2; or why I

DARKJESTER

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 3:44 AM

Quote:
'Rapid Onset Latent Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome'

OK, let me see if I have this right... Simon dies from ROLAIdS?

MAL "You only gotta scare him."
JAYNE "Pain is scary..."

ZOID

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 3:58 AM

DarkJester wrote:

Quote:
... Simon dies from ROLAIdS?

I'm a sick bastard.

v/r,
zed

EBONEZER

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 4:29 AM

At least Wash dies valiently. But their poor kid, now everyone's dead but him/her.

Anyhoo, I see Inara's death more akin to aging 50 years in 30 seconds when she see's the painting of herself in the attic...

And even if Book dies without telling the crew what he's big secret really is...they can still go through his stuff and look at the ID card.

-----------------------------------

Four out of five dentists reccomend calling Ebo a girl.

ZOID

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 4:36 AM

ebonezer wrote:

Quote:
At least Wash dies valiently. But their poor kid, now everyone's dead but him/her.

How did you know the kid was a him/her?! (Actually, a her/him, but everything's relative according to frame of reference)

You must be some kind of psychic (assassin)...

v/r,
zed

EBONEZER

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 4:48 AM

Yes. I'm a telepathic assasin. I've had congress with the devil, and work for a secret, undergroud diivsion of Blue Sun. Waste Management is the polite term.

-----------------------------------

Four out of five dentists reccomend calling Ebo a girl.

THEREALME

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 7:51 AM

Heh, heh, heh.

That Ebo! Always joking.

< EBO! That was all supposed to be secret! >

The Real Me

MAUGWAI

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 12:28 PM

At the risk of sounding like a complete jackass, I have to protest that none of those deaths is truly ironic. They're all very creative and interesting, but not quite in line with the definition of irony.

Every year middle school teachers around the country play the Alanis Morrisette song "Ironic" as a lesson in irony, but none of the things that happen in that song are actually ironic, which is in intself kind of ironic. That tells me that our society does not truly understand the cocept. I can see that, since it a very complicated idea.

The definition I always give my students is this: "When something happens that is the opposite of what is expected." But even that doesn't entirely cover it.

In order to be fully ironic, for instance, Jayne would give his live to save Simon and River from the Blue Hands. Mal would die destroying his ship in a mission to protect the Alliance from rebels.

This lesson brought to you by a bored English teacher during her planning period.

"Dear diary, today I was pompous and my sister was crazy."

BROWNCOAT1

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 12:49 PM

You know this thread is mrobid and downright unsettlin'.

Oh, Zoid started it. That explains everything.

__________________________________________

"May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one."

Richmond, VA & surrounding area Firefly Meet Up:
http://firefly.meetup.com/9/boards/

ZOID

Tuesday, October 26, 2004 2:51 PM

maugwai:

For me, the oft-abused term 'irony' may be defined as the best-laid plans gang aft agley, and in such a way as to point out the foolishness of the planner. For instance, back in 2000 anno Domini, when the gasoline prices in my area rose to $2.00 per gallon, I got my motorcycle out of mothballs and drove the 112 miles roundtrip to my place of work, in order to save money. This worked for five weeks, until one predawn morning I was t-boned by a driver who was running a little late for work and never saw me. $90,000 later ($30K of which was unpaid by insurance), I will walk with a limp for the rest of my life (left knee shattered with no surviving ligaments), and my dominant right hand sits on my wrist at an odd and painful angle. You see, it was a Friday, and by the time they got around to operating on me that afternoon, there was no hand specialist available; instead, a foot surgeon repaired my wrist. By the time the cast came off and they reckoned their mistake, the soft tissue regrowth made a complete and correct repair impossible.

So, not only did I not save any money, I went bankrupt and was left physically the worse for wear. I'd call that ironic, at least by my definition.

I may not be an English teacher, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night...

Respectfully,

zoid

P.S.
I'm fine now; but, I do miss the lost opportunity to play ball with my boy. ...And of course my fantasy career as a violin-playing action hero.

P.P.S.
B's 'neez: You were in Congress?
_________________________________________________

"Burn the land and boil the sea, you can't take the sky from me." The Ballad of Serenity

Only 177 days, 14 hours, 21 minutes, and 25 seconds left until The BDM!

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