Firefly Reconsidered: Why Firefly Isn't "Hall of Fame" Great

[Thomas Shey]

Look, please stop. I've been being super nice about this. I keep saying that I don't like it. But please stop trotting out this whole, "What? How can anyone possible not like this?"

You're going to like or not what you want. But I've seen a bit too much claims that its "obvious" Lost Cause apologism to just let that go. If its too close for you, it is, but that doesn't make your perceptions self-evident.

Whedon based it on a CIVIL WAR book. He has stated, on the record and before it became controversial, that Killer Angers was the inspiration*. None of this is remotely in dispute. It's not just Western Tropes ... it's specific to the Civil War in America.

He has also repeatedly stated that he envisioned Firefly as having been modeled after the RECONSTRUCTION era during the Civil War.

"I was taken with the idea of a civil war and rebuilding from the point of view of people who had lost the war." -Whedon.

I mean- Browncoats. C'mon, man. Like what you like, but don't pee on my leg and tell me it's raining. If I don't like something, then I don't like it, and telling me to ignore what I see with my eyes isn't going to change that.

And ignoring the things that clearly point that, inspiration or not, that's not what he's doing doesn't make those go away.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Whedon said he based Firefly after The Killer Angels, which is a fictionalized account of Lee at Gettysburg.

Still not seeing how that makes what he ended up with Lost Cause apologism.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

You're going to like or not what you want. But I've seen a bit too much claims that its "obvious" Lost Cause apologism to just let that go. If its too close for you, it is, but that doesn't make your perceptions self-evident.

Author: I based this on the American Civil War. I specifically wanted to explore Reconstruction. From the losing side. The Confederates. Funny thing- I even named the main character's ancestor after a Confederate General. Funny, right! Oh, that's just the tip of the iceberg..... There's a lot to say about Reconstruction, and the nobility of the losing side of the Civil War, and the Gray Coats ....

Thomas Shey: WUT? I CAN"T HEAR YOU!!!!! SHUT UP!

 

[Thomas Shey]

Author: I based this on the American Civil War. I specifically wanted to explore Reconstruction. From the losing side. The Confederates. Funny thing- I even named the main character's ancestor after a Confederate General. Funny, right! Oh, that's just the tip of the iceberg..... There's a lot to say about Reconstruction, and the nobility of the losing side of the Civil War, and the Gray Coats ....

Thomas Shey: WUT? I CAN"T HEAR YOU!!!!! SHUT UP!

What part of "this was inspired by a novel about the Civil War but changed up for my purposes" is not comprehensible? Like I said, did the color of the other browncoat, the story's reaction to slavery, and the episode with the Southern style elite vanish while I wasn't looking? Or do the things that look like the Confederacy count while the things that don't look that way somehow not matter?

Let's not even get into how little the other side of the war looks nothing much like the North, because that might make this all less tidy.

Like I said, if its still too close for some people, it is; the Confederacy casts a long dark shadow. But I've seen Confderate apologism, and this doesn't look much like it at all once you zoom in in the least.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Like I said, if its still too close for some people, it is; the Confederacy casts a long dark shadow. But I've seen Confderate apologism, and this doesn't look much like it at all once you zoom in in the least.

What part of Whedon saying that this wasn't just modeled after the Civil War, but RECONSTRUCTION did you miss?

I started this by avoiding getting into the topic, given that (for those who care about it) it is fairly well-known. It was considered an issue when the show aired, and it's become more of an issue since then.

So I'm going to say this one more time- if it doesn't bother you, great. But you are either a) denying it's a show that is modeling American reconstruction, and glorifying the losing side; or b) admitting that, and saying that it isn't "Lost Cause" apologism because you just know it when you see it, and you're denying it. Of course, the majority of Lost Cause symbolism focused on ... Reconstruction, and on how it wasn't about slavery (it was just good ol' boys, protecting their freedom against the big bad gummint) and how the South was always doomed against the technologically superior North but the South had the better minds and the more gallant and dashing heroes. Chivalry- the gallant and dashing soldier? Yeah, that. Is this sounding familiar? At all?

Maybe you missed it. Maybe this doesn't bother you. Maybe you're like, "I have no idea how anyone can mistake the Unification War with the purple bellies to bring in the Independent Faction with the War to Preserve the Union fought by the blue bellies to bring in the Confederacy."

Good. For. You.

But please stop with the whole, "This has nothing to do ... NOTHING AT ALL TO DO with the iconography of the Lost Cause." If you don't see it, or don't care, then enjoy.

 

[payn]

It aint lost cause apologist; its lost cause romanticist.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

It aint lost cause apologist; its lost cause romanticist.

Eh, fair enough.

 

[payn]

Eh, fair enough.

Im not saying that makes it ok.

 

[Thomas Shey]

But please stop with the whole, "This has nothing to do ... NOTHING AT ALL TO DO with the iconography of the Lost Cause." If you don't see it, or don't care, then enjoy.

I never said it had nothing to do with it. What I said is you can evoke some of it without being an apologist. If you don't get the difference, I don't know what to tell you.

 

[Rabulias]

Firefly seemed to intentionally invert or make mirror images of a number of traditional western (the genre) tropes. Look back at some western films or TV shows and while they don't present the Lost Cause narrative, former Confederate soldiers show up as sympathetic individuals from time to time (even as protagonists). The ideas of the Confederacy are not presented as sympathetic, of course. Many of these soldiers are shown to be troubled or conflicted about their service, and are often shown to have noble heroism within them. I believe this is paralleled in Firefly with Book's backstory - an Alliance agent/operative who regrets his service and feels he must atone for what he did during the war.

Firefly's setting is based on this inversion. In Civil War terms, what if it was the Confederacy that had the economic and military power, and the free states tried to secede from the south -- and lost? Yes, there is a Lost Cause parallel, but IMO, it's not whether you win or lose that makes you the good guy or the bad guy, it's what you stand for. Firefly makes it pretty clear that Mal and Zoe do not support anything akin to the Confederacy's abhorrent ideas.

Aside: My favorite inverted trope is Inara. In many westerns, the "soiled dove" prostitute is not the most respected person in town. In Firefly, she has the highest prestige and social standing of the crew!