PTSD and Mal. Really?

POSTED BY: Bytemite
UPDATED: Monday, January 27, 2020 20:08
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BYTEMITE

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 1:58 PM

Agreed, and also, in Better Days, it says that it was Zoe who became a terrorist for a little while after the war. Not Mal. Maybe Mal had just become defeatist and too depressed to fight by then, but it seems to me like Zoe had more trouble letting go of the war than Mal did.

Zoe's military soldier, not volunteer. She was born and raised vesselside, according to various canon sources. When her side lost and she was no longer a soldier, I suspect she had no idea how to function outside military life. I'd even go as far as to say she thought her life was over, because what else did she have? So she looked to join back up with some version of her old life, and ran with the Dust Devils for a little while.

RALLEM

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 3:21 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by AgentRouka:
Quote:
Originally posted by rallem:
I don’t think Zoe is suffering from PTSD, and that she was able to reconcile any losses she may have experienced during the war. Wasn’t it posted above somewhere that Zoe said all she ever lost was the war?

Well.. unlike Mal, Zoe is probably really in denial about her PTSD.

In no way is she completely fine. She seems fairly unable to truly open up to Wash. She has completely unnecessary conflicts with im, like in War Stories, denial of th reality around her (Babies on Serenity? Hello?), the same compulsive apple cutting that Mal does. her entire life revolves around the job she had in the war. Mal made his own path, Zoe just follows him.

I don't blamne her, but she is definitely damaged.

I think Zoe is less damaged than you think. She wanted to have a baby with Wash even if it were going to be difficult and with the possiblity of losing it.

http://www.swyzzlestyx.com/index.html

BYTEMITE

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 3:58 PM

Zoe's definitely improved. It's hard to tell how much.

As of just before Miranda, I think she was more stable than Mal in a PTSD sense. After, with Wash gone, who knows?

AGENTROUKA

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 4:12 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by rallem:

I think Zoe is less damaged than you think. She wanted to have a baby with Wash even if it were going to be difficult and with the possiblity of losing it.

Well, that's the choice all prospective parents make, but there's having a baby under whatever are the "normal" circumstances of your time, and then there's having a baby in decidedly more dangerous circumstances. It's not like Zoe doesn't have a choice here, she just values sticking with Mal is their unstable, violent rebel life over a safer life, the way Wash would prefer - which would be the much more responsible choice.

I think she's trying to stick to her military roots at all cost, as has been said here. Not the mark of an undamaged person.

MAL4PREZ

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 5:03 PM

My take on Zoe is that her upbringing prepared her for the end of the war. When you grow up a soldier, you know that you might die in an ugly way, or you might lose in a uglier way. I'm not saying she didn't get hurt - it would appear that she lost her family along the way, and that must have sucked quite a lot - but she would have always known that a life of peaceful retirement wasn't in the cards for her. She was prepared for loss, even trained for it.

Mal, on the other hand, grew up loving a certain kind of life, then volunteered for the military because his way of life was in danger (one assumes). He had a cause he believed in and he thought God was on his side. He probably believed his side would win, even if he didn't make it through, because the Independents were *right*. Losing, and losing the way he did, was a complete betrayal by God and all that should have been structured and orderly in the `verse. He was in no way prepared for that.

So while losing damaged them both, I think it was much more profound for Mal. Zoe knew how to take a beating and move on in her usual soldierly way, but Mal was completely destroyed.

ETA: I also don't see Zoe's hard-assed attitude as purely a consequence of losing the war. I think she was always was a tough soldier, and she'd be the same no matter what. Really, I see no PTSD-type symptoms in her, other than the apple thing, which I don't find unreasonable.

The only real oddness I see in Zoe is the strength of her attachment to Mal, that her partnership with him overrides even her marriage. But I wouldn't call that war damage. Not sure what I would call it.

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BYTEMITE

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 5:45 PM

Hmm. I could see that. Zoe joining up with the Dust Devils and continuing to follow Mal could have been just that, trying to hold on to her "usual soldiery way." Just because the Dust Devils were terrorists doesn't mean she was an angry terrorist trying to keep the fight going at any cost. Could be it's just all she knows.

Their relationship is definitely more than JUST a war buddy thing, even though I hear war buddies can be really close too, best friends. Mal and Zoe are beyond best friends. I think of them as brother and sister in arms, blood mixed by battle, and for a good while they were the only family they each had left. There's no one they can rely on more, and therefore no one they're more loyal to. Their roles as sergeant and corporal are force of habit and surface only, underneath, they're pretty equal, and Zoe questions Mal's orders and actions more than Wash gives her credit for. Like about leaving that man behind in the movie, or whenever his plans veer slightly too close to reckless.

In fact, even back during the war, I suspect Mal wasn't a hardass about people bringing up practical objections to his orders. His style back then seems to have been very fluid, taking ideas from his men as needed and applying them to whatever crazy greater goal he had in mind.

AGENTROUKA

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 6:00 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by mal4prez:
ETA: I also don't see Zoe's hard-assed attitude as purely a consequence of losing the war. I think she was always was a tough soldier, and she'd be the same no matter what. Really, I see no PTSD-type symptoms in her, other than the apple thing, which I don't find unreasonable.

The only real oddness I see in Zoe is the strength of her attachment to Mal, that her partnership with him overrides even her marriage. But I wouldn't call that war damage. Not sure what I would call it.

I agree that Zoe isn't damaged in the same way Mal is, partly through her upbringing. But at the same time she has a much easier time hiding her "damage" behind Mal. She doesn't bear the responsibility of making choices, she follows Mal. She doesn't have to justify anything, she just points at Mal's often-expressed anger. She doesn't have to become friends with anyone because she has to be there for Mal 24/7. She doesn't have to confront herself because she has Wash to focus on, this baby-containing future to fantasize about. Marrying Wash, in that regard, isn't THE step toward healing or all that brave, because it provided her with a great distraction from herself.

In a way, Zoe has moved on even less than Mal has. Mal is the one who made himself a home, Mal is the one with close bonds within the crew, Mal is the one making all the choices (only rarely questioned by Zoe). In her own way, Zoe is incredibly passive, as if afraid to take a step on her own.

Hell, I think when Mal and Inara get together, their relationship will be healthier than Wash and Zoe's because I think Mal would actually want to open up to Inara, or at least be able to communicate why and when he doesn't. Which Zoe is really really bad at with Wash.

I find it fascinating that this doesn't jump out at others like it does at me, because it occured to me fairly early on about Zoe. :)

BYTEMITE

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 6:11 PM

I guess I just have a different perspective of Zoe, although mine's kind of fuzzy around the edges. I see her questioning Mal a lot, and I don't see her hiding behind his command. If he does something she doesn't like, she confronts him about it.

I agree with you that she was damaged and probably still is, and that getting onboard Serenity helped her a lot, but just how much is hard for me to tell.

For me it comes back to the Dust Devils. Did Zoe join them out of habit, out of a desire to maintain her habits, or because she was affected by the war? I could see it all three ways, and two of those suggest PTSD.

And if she has PTSD, just how much is she healed? How much of Zoe's stoic behaviour is her military upbringing, and how much is a defensive mechanism?

Something I do agree with you is that she really latched on to Wash, to the point where she didn't really interact with the rest of the crew apart from Wash and Mal.

RALLEM

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 6:27 PM

I have no doubt that Mal was an eclectic leader in combat, and I think Zoe might have been his heavy hand when it came to doling out punishment, unless it was a situation which required the Sarge's touch. I think to Zoe and Mal Serenity is their idea of home and heaven, where they can get a good crew and take jobs as they need them. That probably was the reason Zoe mellowed out on the idea of Serenity not being operational, when Mal brought up the subject of them being able to stay out of the ALliance's reach.

http://www.swyzzlestyx.com/index.html

MAL4PREZ

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 7:37 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by AgentRouka:
I agree that Zoe isn't damaged in the same way Mal is, partly through her upbringing. But at the same time she has a much easier time hiding her "damage" behind Mal. She doesn't bear the responsibility of making choices, she follows Mal.

I just don't agree - she decided to follow Mal, didn't she? OK, maybe that's my own fanon, but a career military Amazon woman ended up second in command to a volunteer, and that seems odd to me. You think a person like Zoe let herself get into that situation unwillingly?

She does have an easier time hiding her damage than Mal, but I don't think it's "hiding behind" Mal. I guess it's a difference in how we see what she truly is. You seem to be saying she is not truly her self when she's with Mal. I think she is, and she's chosen her place intentionally.

She does have a tendency to go along with Mal when he's walking a fine edge, I think that's because he earned her respect in the war, and she has chosen to make him lead dog. Face it - Zoe is not a natural leader. She's not a people person (witness the interview in Bushwhacked.) She has no ambition to run things herself, but feels more comfortable with some semblance of military rank-and-file to guide her along. Now, I'd hate that with a passion, but I'm not of the military mentality. It makes sense to me that someone with her upbringing would be comfortable living in the shadow of a leader she respects. Doesn't mean something's wrong with her.

Quote:
In a way, Zoe has moved on even less than Mal has. Mal is the one who made himself a home, Mal is the one with close bonds within the crew, Mal is the one making all the choices (only rarely questioned by Zoe). In her own way, Zoe is incredibly passive, as if afraid to take a step on her own.

Or maybe she simply chooses not to. Because she did at least once take a step on her own - the Dust Devil thing. She must not have liked it out there on her own, because she didn't stay with it.

Another point where we see different: I don't have the problem with a child on the ship. (Other than that I find baby-rearing fics boring as hell LOL!) These characters are not living in our world. No where is 100% safe. They have to take what they can get.

In the Killer Angels analogy, Zoe lost the Civil War and now she's out in the Wild West, trying to eke out a living. Sure, a lot of folks would say: "if you're gonna have a baby, leave this crew of miscreants and go back East to raise it proper!" But she simply can't live in the East (return to the Bushwhacked interview). She knows what she wants in life, what's important to her, and she's not giving it up. She wants to have her thing with Mal and her thing with Wash too. She's demanding that she have both, on her own terms.

I think it's brave of her, and I admire it. But then, I've never believed that child rearing must take place under rigidly defined conditions. I think "safe" can be more dangerous for a child than letting him or her experience life as it is. Personally, I would never raise my kid in suburbia. But that's me.

Not to say something that everyone knows: aren't these characters the shit? So many different interesting ways to see them, and so many relatable issues.

Bytemite: I see it more like you do. Mal and Zoe have a strange and deep relationship, certainly something outside the norm. But that doesn't automatically make it unhealthy. After what they lived through, I think they should live life on their own terms.

As for the Dust Devils: I wonder if we'll ever learn of the circumstances of that? Maybe another comic series years down the road? It takes so long!

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