"THE MESSAGE." Firefly Episode.

Episode Number: 15 (last episode filmed for the series)

Aired: Unaired in the United States

23 July 2003 on FOX Latin America

28 July 2003 on SciFi UK

1 December 2003 on Canada’s Space Channel

Production Code: 1AGE11

Writers: Tim Minear and Joss Whedon

Director: Time Minear

Tracey: "When you can’t run, you crawl. And when you can’t crawl, you . . . When you can’t do that . . ."

Zoë: "You find someone to carry you."

Richard Burgi (Lt. Womack)

Tod Nakamura Fendris (Henchman)

Al Pugliese Amnon (Postal Worker)

Morgan Rusler Barker (Man in top hat at Space Station)

Craig Vincent Skunk (Henchman)

Joss Whedon Man at Funeral

Jonathan M. Woodward Tracey

First words: "We are not alone." Many extras were used to create a market full of peddlers and shoppers, some of which listen to the man in the top hat proclaiming to have the body of an alien in a large jar. Simon shows Kaylee that the ‘alien’ is actually a mutated cow fetus turned upside-down. Simon says the wrong thing and upsets Kaylee. Zoë and Mal meet with Amnon, the postal worker, to pick up some packages he’s been holding. The teaser ends with everyone looking in the box at a dead man.

Begins with the Battle of Du-Khang (Seven Years Earlier). Tracey (Jonathan M. Woodward) is the first soldier shown in the battle sequence. He looks tired and sleep-deprived. As he lays his gun down to eat a can of beans, Zoë slits the thought of an Alliance soldier stealthily sneaking up behind Tracey.

The battle scene cuts to Zoë and Mal looking into the box holding Tracey’s body. Denying help they carry the package out of the postal station. Once on the ship, they open the coffin again and look for clues. Zoë finds a recorder and the crew discovers that Tracey’s last request is to be carried home: "You two carried me through that war. Now I need you to carry me just a little bit further, if you can. Tell my folks that I'm at peace and all. When you can't run anymore, you crawl, and when you can't do that... well, you know the rest."

The act opens with Alliance Federal Police Officers walking into the postal station Mal and the rest of the crew just left. They threaten Amnon with jail and prison sex until he confesses that a crate large enough for a body had been picked up by Captain Malcolm Reynolds.

Kaylee listens to the recording with a sort of somber look while Simon watches her from the background. Book and Jayne talk about what people do in times of death and find consolation in various manners. River lies prone on top of the coffin saying "Very comfortable."

The Alliance Federals give Serenity a warning shot before engaging dialog. Mal assumes the police are after the stolen lassiter, but are quickly reminded that Tracey’s body should not have been mailed to them. After tearing apart the crate and coffin, they decide to search Tracey’s body. Simon prepares the body for an autopsy and, as he begins to cut, notices that Tracey’s chest has been opened before.

Mal tackles a naked and not quite dead Tracey to the floor of the clinic. Tracey explains to Mal, Zoë, Simon, and Jayne why he is being followed. He took genetically grown organs, transplanted with his own organs, from an Alliance clinic because he was offered more money than the original buyers.

The Alliance fires another shot at Serenity and wants to board the ship. Mal instructs Wash on where to land while they try to give the Alliance the slip.

In Kaylee’s quarters, she tells Tracey that Zoë is married and even smiles from time to time. He comments that it is good that people are making lives for themselves.

Serenity cuts through a jagged ravine while the Federal officers float above the rocks out of harms way. They park the ship under a large outcropping of snow-covered rock. Book turns to Mal and suggests an alternative.

Shepherd Book and Mal stare down until Mal says to call the cops and tell them they surrender. Tracey, listening at the door, picks up a pistol and threatens to shoot shep and Mal. Zoë shoots Tracey right before he limps out of the cockpit and grabs kaylee as a shield. Cornered, Tracey asks, "What are we now?" Jayne cocks his gun and, as Tracey turns, Mal shoots him in the heart.

The Alliance Feds come in the back dock and Shepherd points out that, despite the close proximity, they have yet to call the local station for backup. He also notices that Lt. Womack is far from his assigned sector, by about eight sectors, and probably doing this job on the side.

Mal tells the now mortally wounded Tracey the plan and he realizes he could have survived. He admits that he never could get his life working after the war. Requests that the fake message he recorded before, be followed now that he’s dying. Tracey’s last words were that "When you can’t run, you crawl, and when you can’t crawl…" Zoë finished the old saying for him: "You find someone to carry you."

Final scene: Mal and Zoë carry the coffin holding Tracey’s body onto St. Albus to Tracey’s family. The recording plays in the background as the crew of Serenity says goodbye to Tracey.

• Zoë’s Du-Khang war experience illustrates how hard and stoic she once was. Tracey’s conversation with Kaylee reveals how much Zoë has changed since the war, especially the astonished look at hearing that she is married to Wash.

• Capt. Mal Reynolds’ past war experience reveals how playfully fearless he once was. It also reveals his respect for emotional stress and occurrences. In the teaser, we also learn that Mal is very ‘street smart’ when he grabs the kid who tried to pick his pocket.

• Jayne receives a package from his mother and immediately dons the ‘funny hat.’ This shows that even a criminal-for-hire loves his mother.

Mal is trying to fence the lassiter and failing when Inara suggests they use her connections. The lassiter was stolen from Saffron’s first husband on Bellerophon in the unaired "Trash."

In the beginning of act two, Lt. Womack talks, in a sort of round about way, about prison sex. He makes references to ‘being blue enough,’ ‘pitching,’ and ‘grappling,’ while calling him a ‘little woman.’

At the beginning of act three Mal tackles the newly awakened Tracey to the floor. In a wide shot, the viewer sees a fully clothed Mal straddling a seemingly naked Tracey.

• When speaking into the video phone/communicator, Mal covers a camera positioned several inches above the viewing screen to ‘mute’ his conversation, but he speaks directly to the monitor. In theory, the person on the other end of the communication is seeing the top of Mal’s head and not his face, but the view of the other person is correct on the monitor.

• Jayne’s hat alternates several times from having packing straw stuck to it and not.

• Shepherd Book and Jayne: Jayne offers to spot Book if he wants to take a turn at the weight bench. He then confides that when he sees a body, one he hasn’t murdered, he feels like he has to do something. Book translates this experience into his need to feel alive and Jayne agrees.

• Kaylee and Simon: During the teaser Kaylee and Simon go into the booth to see the ‘alien’ body. Simon proves once again that he does not know how to talk to women. By the end of the episode, Kaylee takes Simon’s hand at the funeral. (Note: Kaylee and Simon were supposed to have their first kiss during this episode, but the take did not make the cut.)

• Mal and Inara: Inara offers to fence the lassiter for Mal but he refuses to let her become a criminal. Despite how much he pesters Inara, he respects and admires her uncriminal-like success.

• Memorable Quotes:

• "Oh my god its grotesque! Oh and there’s something in a jar." --Wash proclaims upon entering the booth with the ‘alien’ body. (Classic example of a Whedon line.)

• "This food is problematic." --River states as she tries to eat an ice planet during the teaser.

• "What’d ya’ll order a dead guy for?" --Jayne says at the end of the first act.

• "You are such a boob." --River informs her brother, Simon, of his condition as she struts by eating her ice planet.

• "You know, it's funny... we went to the war not looking to come back, but it... it's the real world I couldn't survive." --Tracey tells Zoë and Mal on the recording he makes before faking his death.

• "Everybody dies, Tracey. Somebody's carrying a bullet for you right now and doesn't even know it. The trick is to die of old age before it finds you." --Mal tells Tracey during the battle sequence of the first act.

• Whedon Signatures:

• Ice Planets (white balls hanging from a string tied to a stick): Shepherd Book and River are eating these creations during the teaser when River pronounces them "problematic."

• In recognition of the death of Firefly, Whedon plays an extra as one of Tracey’s of family members during the funeral scene.

• "Hat Trick": using one character for characters in BtVS, Angel, and Firefly. Jonathan M. Woodward appeared as vampire Holden Webster in BtVS Season Seven’s "Conversations with Dead People" and as Knox, Fred’s assistant, in Angel seasons four and five. The only other ‘hat trick’ in Whedon’s vault is Jeff Ricketts.

• Battle Sequence: Several extras were used and the set designer managed to construct a large, ruinous Bhuda that Zoë leans against as she speaks to Tracey. The overall tone is very dark and grey.

• Space Station: Many extras were used on this set. The viewer watches a variety of storefronts and peddlers with carts float by during handheld tracking shots, including open views of the station from the postal area. Again, the mixture of Western and Eastern influences is heavily imbedded into the set, costumes, and music.

• Booth with ‘Alien’: The booth is a simple black room with an illuminated, cylindrical jar holding some sort of mutated fetus.

• St. Albans Funeral Scene: There are tall, snow-covered trees in the background in addition to some sort of illuminated structure to the left of the funeral party. Family members ranging in age from about 10 to 60 stand waiting for Tracey’s body to be carried off Serenity. A light snowfall in a twilight setting completes the scene.

--Erica Marsh