The Mal-Functional Crew From "Firefly" Quiz

Answer: Malcolm Reynolds

In the pilot episode "Serenity", we are introduced to Malcolm Reynolds, fighting for the Independents at the Battle of Serenity Valley. He is shown at the height of his powers, his faith and his idealism. The actions that follow in the battle shatter that facade and he loses faith in his religion, his government and, to a degree, humanity itself. We are then introduced to him some six years later, having acquired the Serenity, and looking to find a new identity. In many respects the crew that he's selected mirror a different facet of him. This leads to the creation of a deliciously complex character.

Reynolds, at times, shows that he's an intellectual... he quotes Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Xiang Yu, but he hasn't a clue as to who or what Mona Lisa is. He is fiercely loyal and stands by his crew. When it comes to their safety he will seek the positions that offer the best defense, yet, when it comes to his own safety he can become reckless. In the episode "The Message" (#12), Zoe recalls the Battle of Serenity Valley where she is explaining the rule of never letting the enemy know where you are... at which point Mal breaks cover and starts yelling "Whoo hooo! I'm right here! I'm right here! Come and get me".

It is in the episode "Out of Gas" (#8), in a flashback scene, we are shown Mal stumbling across the Firefly class ship that he will christen Serenity and how he falls in love with the craft. He convinces Zoe to join him on his enterprise, selling the idea that this ship represented the opportunity to live the life they had wanted before the war took it away from them.

Answer: Hoban Washburne

In the episode "Heart of Gold" (#13) Wash is asked what he does on board the ship to which he puts forth that he is the funny one. Jayne will provide the audience with amusement with his flawed, (almost) dim-witted logic, Kaylee does so with her cheerful optimism, but it is Wash who delivers the comic relief with his "I laugh in the face of danger" style bravado. This is probably best illustrated in the movie "Serenity" (2005) when the ship is in dire danger:
Wash: "This is gonna get pretty interesting."
Mal Reynolds: "Define interesting."
Wash: (Deadpan) "Oh, God, oh, God, we're all gonna die."

Wash is the master pilot and his ability to navigate the Serenity through disasters is second to none. His humour becomes his defense mechanism when confronted with a crisis. Ironically, he comes to represent that sense of humour that was stripped from Mal by the outcome at the Battle of Serenity Valley. We are given a glimpse of this side of the Captain, one of the more poignant ones, during the episode "The Message" (#12). It is during the Battle of Du Khang where Mal tries to lighten the mood with a soldier by declaring "they don't like when you shoot at them. I picked that up myself".

Finally, like most comedians, Wash is a worrier (not a warrior) and the person he worries about the most is his wife Zoe. She's the warrior and every time she is on a mission it's a cause for concern for Wash. This is something that he admits to Simon Tam during "War Stories" (#10). It is also an indication as to how deep his love is for his wife.

Answer: Kaylee Frye

Kaylee Frye may not be the soul of the Serenity, but she certainly is its heart, its cheerful heart at that. She takes on board the "Monty Python" adage and "always looks on the bright side of life". Her optimism is so intoxicating that in the first episode ("Serenity") Mal declares "I don't believe there's a power in the 'verse can stop Kaylee from bein' cheerful. Sometimes you just wanna duct-tape her mouth and dump her in the hold for a month."

To Mal, Kaylee represents the type of life he wants have. Whilst the rest of the crew is family to him, Kaylee seems more... almost blood, for want of a better word. Kaylee is the only crew member that he hugs in the series, the one whose hair he will playfully rub... she is almost like a daughter to him.

Along with her positivism, there is an openness about Kaylee, especially when it comes to sex. She may look innocent but there is a joyous hunger about her when it comes to copulation. We first identify this in a flashback scene in the episode "Out of Gas" (#8). Mal storms into the engine room ready to tear strips off his mechanic, Bester, played by Dax Griffin, as to why his ship was not operational, only to find him in a compromising position with Kaylee. Even though a stranger has walked in on her intimacy Kaylee is very matter of fact about it all and indicates that she identified the problem while she was lying on her back. That's when Bester got fired. Even though the following arose in the movie "Serenity" (2005), this comment from Kaylee illustrates her demeanor perfectly and, it is too good to pass: "Goin' on a year now I ain't had nothin' twixt my nethers weren't run on batteries!"

Answer: Simon Tam

US author Shanna Swedson, best known for her "Katie Chandler" series of novels, wrote an essay called "A Tale of Two Heroes", which can be found in the anthology "Serenity Found", a collection by Jane Espenson, published in 2007. In here she compares Simon, with his education and privileged background, as a twin to Malcolm Reynolds, despite he, Malcolm, being raised on a small farm and with a limited education.

She argues that both of them consider themselves to be better than anyone around them and that they are both driven by a strong moral code. Yet, despite this code, both of them are criminals who have an unshakeable belief in the validity (or rightness) of their actions. Mal is a smuggler and a thief but he justifies this by saying that he only robs from the rich and that his ultimate end is the welfare of his crew. Simon became a fugitive when he broke his sister out of a government training facility.

This devotion to their own causes (Mal to his crew and Simon to his sister) is never spelled out better than in the series' first episode "Serenity". Kaylee (their mechanic) has been shot and life is slipping away from her. Mal orders Simon to use his medical skills to save her. At the same time an Alliance ship has arrived and has demanded that Mal hand over Simon and his sister. Simon insists that the Serenity does a runner. Mal refuses, demanding that Simon tends to Kaylee before he does anything at all. A stalemate arises and neither is prepared to budge. It is at this point that Kaylee screams out in pain and Mal, considering the safety of the rest of his crew, is the first one to blink.

Answer: Zoe Washburne

Zoe and Mal (Reynolds) stood side by side at a number of battles, most notably the Battle of Serenity Valley, which solidified in Zoe's mind what kind of man Mal is. As a consequence, she remains fiercely loyal to him.

In this group, she is Mal's soldier, she is his hard edge. She is as ruthless as she is efficient and she does not let emotion get in the way of her task. In this way, she is a far more dangerous proposition than Mal. In Jane Espenson's "Serenity Found: More Unauthorized Essays on Joss Whedon's Firefly Universe" (2007), there is a story by Maggie Burns ("Mars Needs Women: How a Dress, a Cake and a Goofy Hat Will Save Science Fiction") where she asks the question; who would you rather have hold a gun to your head, Mal or Zoe? She indicates that it would be Mal. Why? Because Mal would blink... and then he'd hit you over the head so that you could recover and come back to haunt him another time. Zoe, on the other hand, would shoot you without thinking twice.

Despite this level of dispassion, Zoe still manages to (comfortably) step across the chasm to passion and enjoys a loyal love life with her husband "Wash" played by Alan Tudyk.

Answer: Saffron

OK, so, there are only nine crew members onboard the Serenity and ten questions that need to be filled. There needed to be a ring-in. The choice had to be Saffron because, for a brief moment in time, she was a member of the team.

We first meet Saffron in "Our Mrs. Reynolds" (#6) where the crew have just completed a successful mission and are celebrating with the locals. Malcolm Reynolds gets quite inebriated and does not realize that he is also participating in a wedding ceremony. When he wakes up the next morning he has a new wife to contend with.

Whilst Saffron is diligent and she cooks and cleans for him, Mal refuses to accept the fact that she is his wife. Even the confirmation by Shepherd Book that the ceremony was a valid one does not sway our wayward captain. Saffron resorts to sex, Mal caves in and that proves to be his undoing. That's when we discover that all of this had been a ruse by Saffron to get her on board the ship so that she could hijack it. She then redirects it toward a pirate trap where the Serenity was to be captured and salvaged.

The second encounter with Saffron is in the episode "Trash" (#11), where Saffron, now known as Bridgett, then Yolanda, ropes Mal and the crew in on the heist of an extremely valuable antique gun. While, in this episode, Saffron/Bridgett/Yolanda winds up leaving Mal naked and alone in the desert, Mal shows that he's learned his lessons and has already set a trap in motion for his pretend wife.

Saffron proved to be a wonderful Joss Whedon creation, who is both devious and resourceful. When backed into a corner she resorts to her feminine wiles to get herself out of trouble. Inara identifies that Saffron has had some Companion Guild training, which would make her a formidable seductress (sorry Mal, you had no chance). Her motto is "everybody plays everyone else" and she wants to make sure that she is always the player.

Finally, we identify that hers is a lonely life and this is never better illustrated than at the end of "Our Mrs. Reynolds" when Mal tracks her down to a little cabin, overpowers her and demands to know her real name. Saffron doesn't tell him because she doesn't know. As a frustrated Mal walks away he spits out that it probably would have been a lie anyhow. In the wonderful one-off comic "Firefly: Bad Company" (2019), Josh Lee Gordon writes a back story on Saffron, but we still don't get to find out her real name.

Answer: Jayne Cobb

Jayne provides two things on Serenity; an amusement factor and the muscle. He is also Malcolm Reynold's morality litmus test. Like Mal, Jayne has a code that he lives by but, that code is so different to Mal's that if Jayne readily agrees to a mission, it usually means that Mal needs to chill, step back and re-think the situation.

The things that drive Jayne can be neatly bundled up into three little boxes labelled money, sex and guns. Beyond those, he doesn't see the point in life. A good example of this is in the episode "Heart of Gold" (#13), where Mal volunteers the team to help out a friend of Inara's. Jayne refuses to help out because there is no pay in the deal. He only starts to get enthusiastic about the mission when Mal informs him that Inara's friend runs a brothel. Even his first words when he walks into the place are "when am I going to get sexed already?"

We are provided an instant snapshot of the right and the wrong that is in Jayne's make-up, in the pilot episode "Serenity", when he questions the existence of the cannibalistic Reavers "Eating people, where does that get fun?" On the other side of the coin, he doesn't have an issue with killing a man so long as it's "in a fair fight, or if he starts a fight, or if I think he's gonna start a fight, or if there's a woman, or if I'm getting paid, but mostly only if I'm getting paid".

Answer: Derrial Book

In the opening episode of the series, "Serenity" there is a flashback scene that highlights Malcom Reynolds' faith in God. It is during the Battle of Serenity Valley and Zoe asks Mal if their mission will be successful. Mal replies "Do you really need to ask" and then kisses the crucifix around his neck. After their betrayal in that battle Mal loses faith in both his God and in humanity. His resolve now is that he would fight only for himself and for his crew.

If Hoban Washburne, the ship's pilot and funny man, represents the sense of humour that has faded from Malcolm Reynolds' life then Shepherd Book becomes that link to Mal's former faith. Whilst Book provides a calming influence to Mal and the crew, he and the captain would often come into conflict as a result of their beliefs. This is beautifully illustrated in the episode "Bushwhacked" (#3) where Book argues that Reavers are humans doing atrocities to other humans and will be judged by a higher power. Mal rebukes this by claiming they're not men, they won't be judged and that Book should contemplate that while "they're gnawing on his insides".

Book's past is also a mystery to the crew on Serenity but there are small hints dropped along the way to indicate that the preacher was, at one time, not a peaceful man. It appears he may also have been a senior figure within the Alliance. This is hinted at in the episode "Safe" (#5) when Book is shot and requires urgent medical treatment. The crew take him to an Alliance ship who initially reject him but, upon seeing his credentials, they assist him without any further questioning. Sadly, the series does not get a chance to explore this.

Answer: Irana Serra

Irana operates as a companion. There is an ember that smoulders between her and Captain Malcom Reynolds that threatens to, but never does, burst into flame. In what is a hand that may have been dealt by the devil, both are drawn to each other but both of them know that neither would take the next step. Mal will not commit to Inara while she continues to work as a companion. Inara, for her part, will not deviate from her path because her role is the core of her purpose in life and it is a badge she wears with pride.

This can create friction between the pair with the potential to explode when that desire becomes frustration or jealousy. In the episode "Shindig" (#4), Inara is escorting a client at a gala gathering when a clearly jealous Mal, hurtfully asks "Is this the hardest part, would you say, or does that come later?"

Inara's position or standing as a companion provides Mal and his crew with a level of respectability. They have been able to use this as an asset to get themselves out of a couple of tight corners during the series. However, there is also a depth to Inara that we are denied the opportunity to explore and that is that Inara has something in her past that is only ever hinted at and never revealed. In "Heart of Gold" (#13), Inara's friend Nandi tells Mal that she cannot understand why Inara left the Training House, where she was destined for higher honours. And, in "Bushwhacked" (#3), she tells an Alliance officer "we're all running away from something".

Answer: River Tam

River is an individual that has been blessed with extraordinary gifts but those same gifts, unfortunately, have bought her to the attention of the Alliance. After being taken away as a child and subjected to a series of tests and experiments she is now "damaged goods".

Her value to the crew on the Serenity is, initially, difficult to fathom; she's a stow-away, is moody, says nothing and does little, takes a knife to Jayne because she doesn't like the tee-shirt he's wearing, attacks the ship and provides the temptation to Jayne to sell her out.

They key question to be levelled at Captain Mal Reynolds then is "why do you keep her on board"? The answer may well be that Mal sees River as someone that has been damaged as badly by the Alliance as he has and, in this, there is a form of kinship. The other aspect is that it could be another way that Mal is sticking it to the Alliance.

There may also be a psychic link at play between the two. In the episode "Out of Gas" (#8), it is revealed that River is a "reader" (of thoughts) and this link between her and Mal is hinted in the episode "Safe" (#5) (acknowledge that it is numbered earlier, but the Fox studios played these out of order... "Out of Order" was aired October 25, 2002, while "Safe" went to air on November 8). River joins in dance at a town fair, is in step and smiling. On the other side of town Mal, Jayne and Book are in a gunfight. Book is shot but no one notices. Switch to the dance and River is still in step and laughing. Switch to the gunfight and Mal finally sees that Book is down. In that moment River knows too and her step falters.

River remains a dilemma for Mal but this is one of those loose ends that writer Joss Whedon appears to tie off at the end of the film "Serenity" (2005). River is being groomed by Mal to be the pilot of the ship:
Mal Reynolds: "But it ain't all buttons and charts, little albatross. You know what the first rule of flying is? Well, I suppose you do, since you already know what I'm about to say."
River Tam: "I do. But I like to hear you say it."