River's first appearance in the pilot episode, "Serenity"
I've been thinking some more about the existentialist ideas presented in Firefly, and my mind is still recovering from the Firefly episode "Objects in Space," Zynda's article, and today's class discussion!
In my last post, I talked about the female characters in the show. I speculated that River's character is objectified since she is presented as an contained object (as shown in the image above) and she travels in storage like a product; also, she's valuable like a commodity (to the Alliance) and personally valuable (to her brother, Simon).
I'm not completely sure what to make out of this yet, but I've been thinking about River's character from the pilot episode to the final episode and the idea of objects from our existentialism discussion. (At this point, I've only seen the two episodes we watched in class, so they're all that's comprising my knowledge of the show). I've argued that River is an object of sorts as she is first presented--she's completely out of it, not just in the sense of being a little bit odd, but unconscious. However, the final episode opens with a more active River, walking around the ship and exploring (in crazy ways, too--I'm thinking about her standing up on the railing, very ballerina-like). Overall, she is much of the episode's focus. Even when we just hear her voice, she has great presence.
Notably, River enters the ship (and the show) as an object, but by the end, she is something much more. River has gained power and influence on Serenity. Furthermore, she finds a way to get under Early's skin (when nobody else can seem to defeat him) by becoming the ship, an all-encompassing voice. Even though it's a clever trick of technology on River's part, I couldn't help but think of River saying "I am the ship" as a huge leap from her character's introduction as a vulnerable, naked, and mentally/physically weak girl to something much, much bigger. I look at an image like the one above of her in the small container to the image of her in a huge ship as an example of River's growth/power.
6 comments:
Love. This. Post.
From the moment River said, she has become the ship her character blew up for me in such a way that I fell and love with her, and consequently became FURIOUS that the show was canceled because I wanted to see and hear more about her.
I don't necessarily agree with her being an object. I can see how it can be perceived but River is something more powerful and even dangerous, which I think takes her out of the realm of being an object. She's a danger now towards the Alliance.
I don't necessarily agree with her being an object. I can see how it can be perceived but River is something more powerful and even dangerous, which I think takes her out of the realm of being an object. She's a danger now towards the Alliance.
I agree with both of you. I'm with Cait about being upset that River's character (along with the rest of the Firefly crew) didn't get the chance to properly develop, as it takes seasons to do.
I also agree with Adam because I didn't really see River as being an object. However, I can understand the analogy from the River we see in the pilot. She does seem to be like an interesting object that everyone doesn't know what to do with, but she pulls herself out of that state to become more of a danger to the enemy.
@Adam and Ashley: I definitely agree that she is dangerous and *more* than just an object even from the very beginning; I guess I should've made that more clear in my post. I think the crew perhaps she were more object-like in the pilot so they could handle the situation, but they (especially Simon) have to take into consideration that she's very much human and cannot simply be stored away .
I love this post, too. The image of River that Hannah's included does a fantastic job of supporting her idea that River is, in many ways, initially more an "object" than anything else. (And an object can be dangerous.) It seems to me that (perhaps?) she realizes the existentialist message about objects and then uses that to gain the upper hand in her confrontation with Early.
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