Serenity #1

Timeline

Approximately six months after the events in “Objects in Space”

The Sitch

Well, here we are.

When the last tale (notwithstanding the grossly of out sequence Serenity, Parts 1 & 2, a week later) of Firefly aired on December 13, 2002, it appeared that the crew of Serenity forever faded into the black. But, you know what, we did it and she’s flying again. The fans stood up, bought the DVDs, had the shindigs, talked about the show to our friends, and finally, finally, convinced Universal with our coin.

In just a few months (from the time this article is written), once again, we’ll be singing the theme and watching our nine big darn heroes fighting again. And now, we get our first tale, and things ain’t changed too much. We open to Shepherd Book, itinerant preaching on the planet Constance. The topic of his sermon is about giving and taking in this world.

And taking is exactly what Mal, Zoë and Jayne are doing, or at least they’re trying. Whedon and Matthews give us immediate action before we leave the first page as our BDH are facing down another crew, led by a character named Ott, who wants the same bank vault. The big problem with Ott is that he has superior firepower, and Mal knows that the coin isn’t worth the fight. The coin isn’t, but Ott makes the mistake of wanting one more item.

Mal’s gun from the war.

Surprisingly, Mal gives it to him. Not surprisingly, he kicks it into Ott’s face. Ott’s crew reprises with the afore-mentioned firepower to which Jayne responds with a grenade. In a vault. Zoe manages to toss the grenade into a security box and shoot it shut before the concussion kills them all.

The resulting explosion IS enough however to bring Book’s sermon to an end and empty the church of everyone except for an old lady shaking her fist (my favorite visual in the whole book). Back in the vault, Zoe and Jayne point out to Mal that Ott and company are getting away with the money. Mal makes a daring dive to shoot Ott through the elevator door and manages to…miss. The humiliation of losing the money is compounded by having to crawl the sewers to escape (they finally figured out a good way to get sewers into Firefly!)

With the ruckus at the bank and Ott’s quiet departure, Mal realizes that his crew needs to quickly depart from the planet lest they are blamed for the money they didn’t manage to take. Their first transport arrives in the form of Book driving what appears a hybrid SUV-ATV. By the time that Wash is contacted for their second transport – Serenity – Book’s assessment of the villager’s gun-toting is fully proven out.

After sussing out the situation a bit, Wash calls Kaylee away from taking pictures of Simon. Simon straps Kaylee into a harness (a la the Train Job), and she hooks up the belly of Serenity to the local water tower. As Book drives underneath, Wash pulls the whole tower down on the village people, washing (forgive me) them away.

Back on Serenity, Kaylee is cheerfully assessing that their heroics, though not easy, meant getting paid. Her spirit is dampened by the realization that they didn’t. As Mal sits down at the table in the kitchen, he has one last spill to take – his drink – as he unexpectedly discovers River under the table, speculating on balls of yarn. She has gotten away from Inara, who, good to her decision in Heart of Gold, is packing to leave. She and Mal apparently have been arguing this point for months. As Mal storms out, River tells Inara to let the ball of yarn go.

Postlogue on Whitefall – A grizzled guard is approached by two figures, who are looking for the man inside the shack he is guarding. They are here for a common purpose – finding Malcolm Reynolds. He tells the two men that “the man” don’t see anyone. Even as he speaks, the blue-gloved men remove a small cylinder from their jackets. The guard’s insides explode. The men, two by two, hands of blue, have decided to tell “the man” themselves.

End of Issue 1

Thoughts

Well, my first thought on this issue is “man, I’m glad this story didn’t end.” For those few months between the end of Firefly and the announcement of Serenity, I was fundamentally disappointed that we would never see where this story went. What form would the great stories of Firefly, like Buffy’s “Once More with Feeling” or Angel’s “Smile Time” (just to name a couple), take? It’s probably the biggest thing that I admire about Whedon’s work – the continuity that builds both characters and plotlines.

So, to say it again, here we are. Serenity. My second thought on this book was that it went pretty good. I wasn’t dazzled by the story on my first few reads, but then we are just getting reintroduced again. It’s kind of like that weird mix of feelings I got when I went to see the first Star Trek movie or when Family Guy came back on the air. They were gone, and the fans brought it back. So, what was good?

The tone of the book was Firefly through and through. The pacing, humor and unexpected turns that we got for those 14 episodes was all mixed in. And it keeps that space western feel. The artwork is great in this title. Conrad and Martin do an excellent job in representing most of the characters on the comic page. And the dialogue is classic Whedonverse.

My main issues with this first issue is that it doesn’t do a lot with the six months in between Objects in Space and the current time. The only major advancement of characters center around Mal and Inara’s degrading relationship and Shepherd Book. Kaylee and Simon are still playing at the edges of romance. Wash, Jayne, Zoe and River stay fairly static in this book. And maybe that’s OK. I know as a person there are month’s when things just go along, though not as exciting as a caper like this one.

The most intriguing piece to this story is Book’s sliding towards even more ambiguity. Is he helping the crew by preaching to distract or using their thievery to honestly try to help people in the midst of a situation? Was he the escape driver or was he trying to save his friends’ lives?

Before we can start leaning too far towards the idea that Book is giving in to the crew around him, he rebuffs Mal’s comments about the church member’s killing them being against a commandment. Book retorts that it’s before the one about stealing. And his face is torn about the water tower incident, and the damage it will cause the townspeople that he was preaching to minutes before.

Book is one of my favorite characters in Firefly. I was fascinated by the mystery of who he is when he is taken in by Alliance and Jubel’s comments about him not being a shepherd. Being a preacher among the crew members presents a unique situation. I want to see what it brings out.

Finally, the men in blue are back. I would ask what they want, but we know that already. The bigger mystery is who “the man” is and how he relates to Mal.

They couldn’t take the story from us. We supported the show, and this comic makes us fans mighty (yeah, because we did the impossible). The movie that it’s leading to will be even more shiny.

Cover Art

Three separate covers will be available for each issue of Serenity (total of nine – one for each character). Yeah, I’m buying them all.

Inara (JG Jones) – Honestly, this is my least favorite cover of the entire series (I’ve seen all the covers). I love the use of color and the great work on her clothing, but Inara’s face doesn’t quite capture Morena Baccarin’s beauty.

Jayne (Brian Hitch) – I enjoyed this cover. There’s an excellent level of detail given to Jayne and it captures him exactly as he should be – covered in weaponry. Jayne is my favorite of this issue’s covers.

Mal (John Cassady) – Whedon brings over his artist from Astonishing X-Men, John Cassady, for the Mal cover. I particulary liked the depth of the artwork for this one. You feel like you’re looking down the barrel in Mal’s extended arm. Much like AXM, Cassady uses amazing colors to achieve a look that brings a sense of realism without fully realizing. You know you’re in a world that isn’t your own when you see his drawings and yet it feels slightly familiar.

What's My Line?

Sir, it disturbs me that I’m inclined to agree with Jayne.
That makes two of us.

The War is over, Mal.
Yeah. People keep saying that.

Wash. Wash, you hearing me? WASH.
MOTHER!
Wash, I am decidely NOT your mother.

Let the ball of yarn go.

Rating:
3 of 5 (A right cunning tale…)

Main Credits (as listed in the issue)

Writer - Joss Whedon & Brett Matthews
Script - Brett Matthews
Artist - Will Conrad
Colors - Laura Martin
Letterer - Michael Heisler
Editor - Scott Allie

Published July, 2005