'I'd rather not die at all.'
POSTED BY: chrisisall
UPDATED: Friday, July 16, 2010 10:46
VIEWED: 7364
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Does Inara's fatal disease trouble you?
Would a cure have been found before the end of the series?
"I don't know..."
Will Inara star with Mal after Serenity? Has she realized that in the time she has left, Malcolm is her best choice of "companionship?"
I find that this new dimension to the Firefly 'Verse makes it all the more compelling, and sad, and happy...
Like life.
The laughing Chrisisall
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the show ends with mal sitting next to inara on her deathbed after winning the second unification war.
just a hunch.
"I really am ruggedly handsome, aren't I?"
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Hell yeah it does.
First of all, which fatal disease allows one to carry on as if nothing's wrong ?
Clearly, it's not communicable. And if she isn't up to the health requirements to companion ( verb ), then word would have to get back to the Guild, and her secret would be known in due time.
So, I'm guessing it's some sort of congenital condition, not so much a disease. ( Or have we been told already ? ) I admit to being a bit fuzzy on the details, mainly as I don't WANT to know.
Even more so after losing 2 crew already.
dammit.
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Quote:It is a bit distressing...
Originally posted by AURaptor:
Even more so after losing 2 crew already.
The laughing Chrisisall
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Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:Quote:It is a bit distressing...
Originally posted by AURaptor:
Even more so after losing 2 crew already.
The laughing Chrisisall
So, everyone dies, but River ? That'd be poetic. They put their lives on the line to save her life, and do. In exchange for theirs.
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Quote:Huntington's Disease meets all your criteria for Inara's disease. It is an incurable neurological disease, which, in early stages, is suitable for television. It is fatal. You can hide the symptoms. You can carry on with your life before symptoms are obvious. It is hereditary, so you can't give it to any but your children, which cuts out motherhood for Inara. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huntington's_disease
Originally posted by AURaptor:
First of all, which fatal disease allows one to carry on as if nothing's wrong ?
Clearly, it's not communicable. And if she isn't up to the health requirements to companion ( verb ), then word would have to get back to the Guild, and her secret would be known in due time.
So, I'm guessing it's some sort of congenital condition, not so much a disease. ( Or have we been told already ? ) I admit to being a bit fuzzy on the details, mainly as I don't WANT to know.
Even more so after losing 2 crew already.
dammit.
And best of all, the name Huntington's is easy to pronounce for TV audiences. A name like trinucleotide repeat disorder is too complicated for TV. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinucleotide_repeat_disorder And there may be a miracle cure that is discovered 500 years in the future.
The Joss Whedon script for "Serenity", where Wash lives, is
Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/two
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Yeah, it's most likely a hereditary degenerative neurological disorder. Like Huntington's. Cancer been known since the ancient greeks, and there's still not cure, though we're getting closer every day. But there could be poorly understood diseases nowadays we might still not know how to fix 500 years from now, so that's not unreasonable.
I've always liked the idea that someone from the guild/alliance hospitals/ Blue Sun has been telling lies, though. It might be the medicine she's taking that's killing her, rather than the actual disease, which is probably an easier fix. :D
If she dies, it's going to trash Mal. He's almost as overprotective of her as he is Kaylee. And based on his story in Still Flying, he appears to daydream about having a normal life with her planetside somewhere, so he consciously or unconsciously has a lot of his hopes for a future pinned on her.
Mal's the main character, I think (I know people would disagree and say River, but I still think she's a MacGuffin). So if something ends his story, it ends Firefly. How much angst can one guy take? Lost his war, lost his family, lost his homeworld, soldiers he knew, members of his crew... Honestly, if Inara dies, Firefly really becomes sort of a sadist show to see how much Joss can torture Mal.
There's a chance he might not. Inara is only "dying," not "going to die," and everyone kind of expects him to go the cruelest direction possible.
Select to view spoiler:
Well, Joss was willing to give Zoe a happy ending, and Kaylee is also confirmed to have one.
So finger's crossed.
Select to view spoiler:
In Crystal, my interpretation is that there might be one more foreshadowed death, however. It's a toss up between Mal, Inara, or River. And I'm actually leaning towards River, because it's the least obvious, and because River actually collapses in the story, and is carried like a corpse past Mal's quarters. A writer doesn't establish that kind of imagery without a reason. And River says nothing about her own future, the only member of the crew she says NOTHING about, suggesting she just flat out might not have one. That, and her "running out of time" comments. There's just a lot of stuff there...
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I think she would ultimately die of whatever is killing her, especially if there was ever an actual relationship between her and Mal. It's Joss; couples aren't allowed to be happily ever after.
And on a nitpicky note, the quote is "I don't want to die at all." in response to Simon's "I just don't want to die on it." (in reference to the ship, with its slightly funereal name.)
HRWATPWRTCITG
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No offense, but those of you who are thinking that Mal would end up holding Inara's hand at the end of Season Seven of FIREFLY clearly didn't watch BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER or at least didn't notice all the relationship changes that happened throughout.
Joss originally told the cast that he planned for FIREFLY to run for seven years, although he has admitted that he didn't have more than a vague plan for some of the direction. Based on his track record, I seriously doubt that he intended for Kaylee/Simon or Mal/Inara to live happily ever after.
My thinking, personally, is that it would have been SIMON at Inara's bedside. Sure, Mal might've been there, but he'd be holding hands with Kaylee, possibly knocked up with the first of a future passel of rugrats.
Mal and Kaylee, you see, are the two who will NEVER willingly leave the ship, and I suspect that over the long-term, that would draw them together.
The way I sorta see the show ending is that, long before Season Seven, Zoe has drifted away to protect her daughter. A second war has been fought and won (sort of) and social change is in the air.
But Blue Sun, the ultimate Big Bad, is still hiding in the shadows, and there has to be a final reckoning, during which BS's end game becomes apparent (searching for other human colonies, possibly to invade), Jayne dies protecting River, and Zoe returns to help save the day.
In the wind-down, Inara, pushed beyond limits due to recent events, finally succumbs to her illness/toxin/whatever, with Simon by her side. We are left with the implication that her final words will ignite Simon to rise up and become a force for social change in the 'Verse.
Meantime, Mal and Kaylee, knowing how Inara's story will end, head off on Serenity into the Great New Black that exists between their 'Verse and the next colony over. There's a great big universe out there for Firefly and the Reynolds clan to explore... not to mention the stowaway who reveals herself once their in the air--River Tam.
But I digress...
www.stillflying.net: "Here's how it might have been..."
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Shipper warfare commence!
We're talking 19th century and Victorian influence, and the staying within the social circles. You think Joss is gonna uphold classism? That like characters are going to end up with like characters? I ain't seein' it, sorry. It has unfortunate implications, and is completely counter to the show's premise about subverting the establishment.
And while I've never watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I'm pretty sure that Buffy/Angel was fairly official, seeing how Buffy/Spike from what I hear didn't work out at all, and there were real issues with Angel/Cordelia of the "unholy abomination of nature Angelus demon unlocked" variety.
Dollhouse also very strongly officially ships Echo/Ballard and Victor/Sierra the whole way through.
So in Joss' show, while supporting characters often do the relationship Do-si-do, and while main characters sometimes stray from the main pairings, There are some real official couples that stay consistent throughout each series.
IMO, Mal is more likely to end up with River than he is to end up with Kaylee. Depending on how you tilt your head, you could easily argue either River or Mal are the main character, and shipping the two main opposite gender characters is an established trend in Joss' shows.
Looking at Dollhouse, Echo is a combination of both River and Inara, in that both represent female exploitation, and Ballard is clearly also a flatter version of Mal. Also if you squint at Buffy, River is a crazy tragic version of the supernaturally ass-kicking Buffy, and Inara is the Cordelia. This basic three character love-triangle arrangement is something Joss likes to write, and he comes back to it repeatedly. As such, I could imagine Mal ending up with either River or Inara. Though I don't really like storylines where an emotionally and physically traumatized wreck is "fixed" by the love of a good man (gack), I'm not blind to the possibility of eventual Mal/River.
I also think that Inara's illness kinda bends the whole thing strongly towards Mal/Inara, because otherwise he ends up looking very unsympathetic if he ditches her when she's dying.
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