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thebratqueenWARNING! WARNING! THIS IS THE EXTREMELY SPOILER-FILLED VERSION OF WHAT HAPPENS IN SERENITY! IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE SPOILED FOR THE MOVIE IN ANY WAY, SHAPE, OR FORM DO NOT CLICK ON THE LINK!!!
If you're looking for my spoiler-free review it is here.
There, think that warning was clear enough? =)
Okay, on the odd chance we've got some spoiler whores who have yet to read somebody else's recap of the movie, here's the sixpense summary as best as I can remember it:
The Alliance is after River because she psychically picked up on secret information from high-ranking people that the Alliance would very much like not to become public. They send an assassin to track River and Simon down. In the meanwhile, there's tension on Serenity thanks to a darker Mal and a Simon and River who aren't as integrated with the crew as you might remember them as being. Mal uses River to help out on a hiest which is good because she alerts them to incoming Reavers and thus helps save the others, but the danger she was in pisses Simon off (who didn't want her going in the first place) and he decides he and River are going to leave the ship. There is no sign of either Book or Inara, but we do find out that Mal pushed Inara away (according to Kaylee, who accuses him of doing the same to Simon and River) and that's why she's not there anymore.
While on a planet where Simon's ostensibly finding a place for him and River to go and Mal's taking care of some business, River gets triggered by a subliminal message on a TV screen in the bar, says the word Miranda, and starts kicking ass (this is the scene of her fighting in the trailer). She beats the ever-living crap out of anyone who comes near her, including Jayne, and is ready to go to town on Mal when Simon comes in and uses a safe word that puts her to sleep.
Mal takes River and Simon back onto the ship (River is handcuffed, which leads to the many shots of her you see in the trailer of her sitting on the floor and looking lost and helpless) for reasons nobody else can understand and Mal doesn't clarify (possibly because he himself doesn't even know). There's various arguing about the wisdom of this (with Jayne kicking it promo-style about the danger River presents to everyone on the ship) but Mal stands firm (this being one of many scenes when he comes off as more of a right bastard captain than the nice man Kaylee says that he is).
Deciding they need some help they, under Wash's suggestion, contact a character named Mr. Universe who is played by Charlie on Numb3rs aka David Krumholtz. You may have read early reviews of Serenity that said the Mr. Universe concept was very cheesy and stupid. These reviewers are wrong. I'm not saying this plot point was generated by Mensa, just that clearly the people who watched those scenes had something wrong with their brains being missing, because they gave the scenes meaning and weight in the film that they clearly were never meant to have. Mr. Universe is also the one who drops the line about "Can't stop the signal." The idea being that once transmissions get out there you can't control them, and it's always possible for somebody to pick them up.
Mr. Universe's schtick is that he's connected to [insert impressive Firefly number here] transmissions and keeps tabs on everything via multiple TV banks all over the bedroom he shares with his robot wife (this detail leading to an amusing reveal as up until then you think she's a real woman - also apparently Mr. Universe is Jewish, as detailed by the events of their wedding). Mal and Wash get Mr. Universe to go over the security camera recording of what happened to River in the bar and that's when we find out about the subliminal trigger. This is also when everybody else finds out that River whispered "Miranda" before going bat-shit.
Various forms of trying to find out what Miranda is ensue, including a sweetly amusing one of Simon talking to River and asking "Am I talking to Miranda now?" to which she gives him a perfect "My older brother is clearly a dork." kind of look.
I forget the order of events but somewhere in here Mal and the gang go to visit Book (who got a HUGE reaction of joy out of the audience when he finally showed up onscreen) who's living on a planet with this group of people who clearly know the Firefly gang and like them and vice versa, but none of those details are expositioned and I don't remember enough of the show to be able to tell you if these are new people or if we're supposed to know who they are. Regardless, Mal and Book have a nice conversation about belief with Book saying that Mal needs to believe in something, and that something doesn't have to be God.
Again I'm getting the order of events confused (I'm just trying to follow the major plot points here, not do a scene for scene recap) but somewhere in here as well we find out that Inara is teaching companions off on some planet somewhere and the guy who's trying to track down River shows up. Inara then contacts Mal (who is shirtless as he just got out of bed) and the two of them have a conversation (with Zoe, Wash, Kaylee, and Jayne eavesdropping) about how Inara could use a hand with something if Mal wants to help but, you know, only if it's no trouble. Mal says sure, goes to the others in the bridge and goes "So... trap?" "Trap". Kaylee: "How do you know? Maybe she just wanted to see you and talk!" Mal: "Were you eavesdropping?" Them: "Yes." Mal: "Did you hear us fighting?" "No.' "Then trap."
Mal goes to see Inara who is at the time alone in a little shrine. Inara chastizes him for being so stupid as to actually come. Mal/Inara flirty banter ensues and the guy tracking down River shows up. Things again kick it promo-style as the guy expositions about how dangerous River is ("It's worse than you think." "It usually is.") Various bits of posturing (with extremely good Mal lines) ensue leading up to the whole "I'm unarmed" "Good." exchange you see in the trailer. The guy was wearing protection though so this then leads to a huge fight between him and Mal where Mal gets his ass kicked (he puts up a good fight though) and they only escape because Inara had the presense of mind to activate a small bomb under the guise of lighting some incense when the guy first came into the room.
They escape to the ship. More debates/fighting about the wisdom of helping Simon and River. River figures out that Miranda refers to a planet. The gang figures out that the planet technically doesn't exist, but they do find it - waaaay across Reaver territory. The gang's really not into the concept of going there and are less so when they go back to Book's planet and find out that everyone there is dead thanks to an attack by the guy tracking down River. Book himself is on death's door and has a touching, less cliched and cheesy than it sounds final conversation with Mal before he dies. The gang figures out the assassin is simply killing off anyone who would give them safe haven, so they try to contact their other friends only to find them dead too.
Inspired by a taunting conversation with the assassin, Mal decides that they're going to imitate Reavers to get through to Miranda. The gang seriously does not want to do this as it involves desecrating the bodies of their dead friends (though not Book's) and Mal basically tells them to do it his way or shut the fuck up. It's one of Mal's darkest moments and if you're looking for a comparision to something you know think of Angel back when Connor was taken ("I would never hurt anyone I care about.")
They manage to get through Reaver territory to Miranda (tracking down a faint beacon that lead them to the planet in the first place). They discover a town devoid of anything but dead bodies. River is especially freaked out by this (this is when you see her do the gasp/head spin shot from the promo) though it's not like anybody else in the gang is overly thrilled.
They eventually discover a place that has a recording that River instinctively knows how to activate. On it they see a woman who I want to say was played by Sarah Paulson aka Miss Isringhausen on Deadwood, but when I check the imdb entry for both her and Serenity there's nothing. Anyway, the woman in the recording explains that the Alliance tried to make a perfect society by doping everyone so that they would be peaceful. Only problem was that they were so peaceful that they stopped caring about anything at all and basically allowed themselves to peacefully lie down and die because they couldn't even raise up enough concern to care about pesky things like keeping themselves alive.
If that wasn't bad enough, 1% of the population had the exact opposite reaction, which was to go totally sadistically insane. In other words, to become Reavers. The recording of the woman records (which we hear but do not see the visual - though the Firefly gang can) her death at Reaver hands. The gang is obviously upset by this and decides to do something. This is what leads to Mal's "I aim to misbehave" speech which is basically the speech he gives to the gang to gear them up for the horrible fight to come, and stands out in a marked contrast to his earlier "Do as I say or go fuck yourself" type speeches (I'm paraphrasing those, btw, obviously he says those in a much more Malesque manner.)
The plan is to get the recording to Mr. Universe who can broadcast the information across the 'verse. In their way however are both Reavers and the guy coming after River who has plenty of ships and firepower to back him up.
Mal comes up with the brilliant idea of pissing the Reavers off by shooting at them, then leading the Reavers directly towards the assassin and his ships, because obviously the Reavers aren't so fussy about who they're killing, raping, and skinning. The fight and chaos that ensues allows Serenity to get past the assassin's ships, but not without heavy damage. They more or less fall out of the sky and only land/crash with any amount of success thanks to Wash's l33t flying skills.
All is not well, however, because something comes plunging through the front of the ship (this was either from the Reavers or due to the crash landing) and goes directly through Wash's chest, both impaling and killing him. Zoe and Mal are obviously upset, but they've got Reavers and everybody else on their tail and can't linger to mourn.
The gang picks a strategic place inside of Mr. Universe's home to fight the Reavers and Mal goes on to take the recording to Mr. Universe. Mr. Universe is dead, however, having been killed by the assassin who then had his men destroy Mr. Universe's equipment. But before he died, Mr. Universe recorded a message into his robot wife, alerting Mal to a backup set of broadcasting equipment in a "hard to get to" place near the generator. Mal then gets to battle the assassin while the gang battles the Reavers.
The gang does not do well in the fight against the Reavers (the main players are Zoe and Jayne. Simon and Kaylee aren't as skilled with weaponry - though Kaylee is more determined to survive now that she's only just found out from Simon that yes, he would like to have sex with her - and River is too busy freaking out and being lost in her mind to lend a hand). The Reavers get the upper hand and the gang has to pull back even further. Zoe gets seriously hurt as does Kaylee. Simon realizes he forgot his medical kit in the room they just vacated and when he gets up to get it he gets shot in the gut.
River freaks out at the idea of Simon being hurt. Simon tries to comfort her even as he lies there bleeding his guts out onto the ground, but River finally has an epiphany about how Simon's dedicated his entire life to taking care of her and now for the first time ever she can take care of him. She stands up, determined, and runs out to kick. Reaver. ASS.
Mal in the meanwhile is fighting with the assassin. The two of them battle their way to the backup broadcasting station (having to leap across chains and avoid falling into spinny fan blades of death and all the usual stuff you'd expect in a scene like this). The assassin thinks he has the upper hand on Mal, especially after stabbing Mal in the gut with a sword, but clearly the assassin has never seen Out of Gas to find out just how determined Mal can be once he sets his mind on something. Mal eventually gets the upper hand and has the chance to kill the assassin, but instead he doesn't. Instead he pins him in place using the sword and forces the guy to watch the broadcast about Miranda, and about the "sinless" society that the Alliance tried to create (the idea of living without sin being a strong one for the assassin, even if he realized he was creating a society that he himself couldn't live in).
River defeats the Reavers only to find herself (and the others) confronted by the men that the assassin brought with him. The men have the Firefly gang (including Mal) cornered and radio the assassin for the order to kill. The assassin is watching the recording of the woman die at Reaver hands, however, and tells the troops to stand down and let the Firefly gang go.
There's a small funeral (we only see the silent tail end) for Mr. Universe, Book, and Wash. Serenity gets repaired (Mal wears civvies!), Simon and Kaylee have sex (Simon is shirtless!!). Mal and the assassin talk. The assassin says he's going to advice the Alliance to give up on chasing River since hey, everybody now knows the secret she had, so what's the point? But the Alliance is the Alliance so there's no guarantee that they'll let up. Mal and the assassin part ways.
The movie ends with Mal and River in the bridge, and Mal saying a few words (prompted by River) about his keep on flying life philosophy. There's also an implication that River will be pilot, or at least help out in that area, now that Wash is gone. The ship flies off into the outer space version of flying off into the sunset, with a cute funny end line from Mal just before the credits roll.
And I think that covers all the major stuff. Feel free to ask questions as I can guarantee I forgot something.
ETA random details that people might care about if they haven't seen the movie yet:
There's heavy Mal/Inara vibes and scenes but no kissage.
The Chinese and distinctive Firefly patois is dialed down, but still there.
There is a moment of sound in space and then silence, I suspect this will be heavily debated between Joss and the studio until the movie airs.
If you're looking for my spoiler-free review it is here.
There, think that warning was clear enough? =)
Okay, on the odd chance we've got some spoiler whores who have yet to read somebody else's recap of the movie, here's the sixpense summary as best as I can remember it:
The Alliance is after River because she psychically picked up on secret information from high-ranking people that the Alliance would very much like not to become public. They send an assassin to track River and Simon down. In the meanwhile, there's tension on Serenity thanks to a darker Mal and a Simon and River who aren't as integrated with the crew as you might remember them as being. Mal uses River to help out on a hiest which is good because she alerts them to incoming Reavers and thus helps save the others, but the danger she was in pisses Simon off (who didn't want her going in the first place) and he decides he and River are going to leave the ship. There is no sign of either Book or Inara, but we do find out that Mal pushed Inara away (according to Kaylee, who accuses him of doing the same to Simon and River) and that's why she's not there anymore.
While on a planet where Simon's ostensibly finding a place for him and River to go and Mal's taking care of some business, River gets triggered by a subliminal message on a TV screen in the bar, says the word Miranda, and starts kicking ass (this is the scene of her fighting in the trailer). She beats the ever-living crap out of anyone who comes near her, including Jayne, and is ready to go to town on Mal when Simon comes in and uses a safe word that puts her to sleep.
Mal takes River and Simon back onto the ship (River is handcuffed, which leads to the many shots of her you see in the trailer of her sitting on the floor and looking lost and helpless) for reasons nobody else can understand and Mal doesn't clarify (possibly because he himself doesn't even know). There's various arguing about the wisdom of this (with Jayne kicking it promo-style about the danger River presents to everyone on the ship) but Mal stands firm (this being one of many scenes when he comes off as more of a right bastard captain than the nice man Kaylee says that he is).
Deciding they need some help they, under Wash's suggestion, contact a character named Mr. Universe who is played by Charlie on Numb3rs aka David Krumholtz. You may have read early reviews of Serenity that said the Mr. Universe concept was very cheesy and stupid. These reviewers are wrong. I'm not saying this plot point was generated by Mensa, just that clearly the people who watched those scenes had something wrong with their brains being missing, because they gave the scenes meaning and weight in the film that they clearly were never meant to have. Mr. Universe is also the one who drops the line about "Can't stop the signal." The idea being that once transmissions get out there you can't control them, and it's always possible for somebody to pick them up.
Mr. Universe's schtick is that he's connected to [insert impressive Firefly number here] transmissions and keeps tabs on everything via multiple TV banks all over the bedroom he shares with his robot wife (this detail leading to an amusing reveal as up until then you think she's a real woman - also apparently Mr. Universe is Jewish, as detailed by the events of their wedding). Mal and Wash get Mr. Universe to go over the security camera recording of what happened to River in the bar and that's when we find out about the subliminal trigger. This is also when everybody else finds out that River whispered "Miranda" before going bat-shit.
Various forms of trying to find out what Miranda is ensue, including a sweetly amusing one of Simon talking to River and asking "Am I talking to Miranda now?" to which she gives him a perfect "My older brother is clearly a dork." kind of look.
I forget the order of events but somewhere in here Mal and the gang go to visit Book (who got a HUGE reaction of joy out of the audience when he finally showed up onscreen) who's living on a planet with this group of people who clearly know the Firefly gang and like them and vice versa, but none of those details are expositioned and I don't remember enough of the show to be able to tell you if these are new people or if we're supposed to know who they are. Regardless, Mal and Book have a nice conversation about belief with Book saying that Mal needs to believe in something, and that something doesn't have to be God.
Again I'm getting the order of events confused (I'm just trying to follow the major plot points here, not do a scene for scene recap) but somewhere in here as well we find out that Inara is teaching companions off on some planet somewhere and the guy who's trying to track down River shows up. Inara then contacts Mal (who is shirtless as he just got out of bed) and the two of them have a conversation (with Zoe, Wash, Kaylee, and Jayne eavesdropping) about how Inara could use a hand with something if Mal wants to help but, you know, only if it's no trouble. Mal says sure, goes to the others in the bridge and goes "So... trap?" "Trap". Kaylee: "How do you know? Maybe she just wanted to see you and talk!" Mal: "Were you eavesdropping?" Them: "Yes." Mal: "Did you hear us fighting?" "No.' "Then trap."
Mal goes to see Inara who is at the time alone in a little shrine. Inara chastizes him for being so stupid as to actually come. Mal/Inara flirty banter ensues and the guy tracking down River shows up. Things again kick it promo-style as the guy expositions about how dangerous River is ("It's worse than you think." "It usually is.") Various bits of posturing (with extremely good Mal lines) ensue leading up to the whole "I'm unarmed" "Good." exchange you see in the trailer. The guy was wearing protection though so this then leads to a huge fight between him and Mal where Mal gets his ass kicked (he puts up a good fight though) and they only escape because Inara had the presense of mind to activate a small bomb under the guise of lighting some incense when the guy first came into the room.
They escape to the ship. More debates/fighting about the wisdom of helping Simon and River. River figures out that Miranda refers to a planet. The gang figures out that the planet technically doesn't exist, but they do find it - waaaay across Reaver territory. The gang's really not into the concept of going there and are less so when they go back to Book's planet and find out that everyone there is dead thanks to an attack by the guy tracking down River. Book himself is on death's door and has a touching, less cliched and cheesy than it sounds final conversation with Mal before he dies. The gang figures out the assassin is simply killing off anyone who would give them safe haven, so they try to contact their other friends only to find them dead too.
Inspired by a taunting conversation with the assassin, Mal decides that they're going to imitate Reavers to get through to Miranda. The gang seriously does not want to do this as it involves desecrating the bodies of their dead friends (though not Book's) and Mal basically tells them to do it his way or shut the fuck up. It's one of Mal's darkest moments and if you're looking for a comparision to something you know think of Angel back when Connor was taken ("I would never hurt anyone I care about.")
They manage to get through Reaver territory to Miranda (tracking down a faint beacon that lead them to the planet in the first place). They discover a town devoid of anything but dead bodies. River is especially freaked out by this (this is when you see her do the gasp/head spin shot from the promo) though it's not like anybody else in the gang is overly thrilled.
They eventually discover a place that has a recording that River instinctively knows how to activate. On it they see a woman who I want to say was played by Sarah Paulson aka Miss Isringhausen on Deadwood, but when I check the imdb entry for both her and Serenity there's nothing. Anyway, the woman in the recording explains that the Alliance tried to make a perfect society by doping everyone so that they would be peaceful. Only problem was that they were so peaceful that they stopped caring about anything at all and basically allowed themselves to peacefully lie down and die because they couldn't even raise up enough concern to care about pesky things like keeping themselves alive.
If that wasn't bad enough, 1% of the population had the exact opposite reaction, which was to go totally sadistically insane. In other words, to become Reavers. The recording of the woman records (which we hear but do not see the visual - though the Firefly gang can) her death at Reaver hands. The gang is obviously upset by this and decides to do something. This is what leads to Mal's "I aim to misbehave" speech which is basically the speech he gives to the gang to gear them up for the horrible fight to come, and stands out in a marked contrast to his earlier "Do as I say or go fuck yourself" type speeches (I'm paraphrasing those, btw, obviously he says those in a much more Malesque manner.)
The plan is to get the recording to Mr. Universe who can broadcast the information across the 'verse. In their way however are both Reavers and the guy coming after River who has plenty of ships and firepower to back him up.
Mal comes up with the brilliant idea of pissing the Reavers off by shooting at them, then leading the Reavers directly towards the assassin and his ships, because obviously the Reavers aren't so fussy about who they're killing, raping, and skinning. The fight and chaos that ensues allows Serenity to get past the assassin's ships, but not without heavy damage. They more or less fall out of the sky and only land/crash with any amount of success thanks to Wash's l33t flying skills.
All is not well, however, because something comes plunging through the front of the ship (this was either from the Reavers or due to the crash landing) and goes directly through Wash's chest, both impaling and killing him. Zoe and Mal are obviously upset, but they've got Reavers and everybody else on their tail and can't linger to mourn.
The gang picks a strategic place inside of Mr. Universe's home to fight the Reavers and Mal goes on to take the recording to Mr. Universe. Mr. Universe is dead, however, having been killed by the assassin who then had his men destroy Mr. Universe's equipment. But before he died, Mr. Universe recorded a message into his robot wife, alerting Mal to a backup set of broadcasting equipment in a "hard to get to" place near the generator. Mal then gets to battle the assassin while the gang battles the Reavers.
The gang does not do well in the fight against the Reavers (the main players are Zoe and Jayne. Simon and Kaylee aren't as skilled with weaponry - though Kaylee is more determined to survive now that she's only just found out from Simon that yes, he would like to have sex with her - and River is too busy freaking out and being lost in her mind to lend a hand). The Reavers get the upper hand and the gang has to pull back even further. Zoe gets seriously hurt as does Kaylee. Simon realizes he forgot his medical kit in the room they just vacated and when he gets up to get it he gets shot in the gut.
River freaks out at the idea of Simon being hurt. Simon tries to comfort her even as he lies there bleeding his guts out onto the ground, but River finally has an epiphany about how Simon's dedicated his entire life to taking care of her and now for the first time ever she can take care of him. She stands up, determined, and runs out to kick. Reaver. ASS.
Mal in the meanwhile is fighting with the assassin. The two of them battle their way to the backup broadcasting station (having to leap across chains and avoid falling into spinny fan blades of death and all the usual stuff you'd expect in a scene like this). The assassin thinks he has the upper hand on Mal, especially after stabbing Mal in the gut with a sword, but clearly the assassin has never seen Out of Gas to find out just how determined Mal can be once he sets his mind on something. Mal eventually gets the upper hand and has the chance to kill the assassin, but instead he doesn't. Instead he pins him in place using the sword and forces the guy to watch the broadcast about Miranda, and about the "sinless" society that the Alliance tried to create (the idea of living without sin being a strong one for the assassin, even if he realized he was creating a society that he himself couldn't live in).
River defeats the Reavers only to find herself (and the others) confronted by the men that the assassin brought with him. The men have the Firefly gang (including Mal) cornered and radio the assassin for the order to kill. The assassin is watching the recording of the woman die at Reaver hands, however, and tells the troops to stand down and let the Firefly gang go.
There's a small funeral (we only see the silent tail end) for Mr. Universe, Book, and Wash. Serenity gets repaired (Mal wears civvies!), Simon and Kaylee have sex (Simon is shirtless!!). Mal and the assassin talk. The assassin says he's going to advice the Alliance to give up on chasing River since hey, everybody now knows the secret she had, so what's the point? But the Alliance is the Alliance so there's no guarantee that they'll let up. Mal and the assassin part ways.
The movie ends with Mal and River in the bridge, and Mal saying a few words (prompted by River) about his keep on flying life philosophy. There's also an implication that River will be pilot, or at least help out in that area, now that Wash is gone. The ship flies off into the outer space version of flying off into the sunset, with a cute funny end line from Mal just before the credits roll.
And I think that covers all the major stuff. Feel free to ask questions as I can guarantee I forgot something.
ETA random details that people might care about if they haven't seen the movie yet:
There's heavy Mal/Inara vibes and scenes but no kissage.
The Chinese and distinctive Firefly patois is dialed down, but still there.
There is a moment of sound in space and then silence, I suspect this will be heavily debated between Joss and the studio until the movie airs.
