MONDO EXTRAS

There are two scenes (hereabouts I think, at least basically) that were deleted, and for good reason, but they're interesting. In the first, this scene continues, and River protests that "he has to see what he doesn't want to see," has to force himself through the veil. Simon asks what that is, and it is death. Whose? "Everybody's!" she screams. In the second, which actually falls a bit later but chronologically now goes here, Inara and a woman at the Companion's Training House where she lives talk about how much her students love her, and how stories of her "torrid affair with a pirate" have made the rounds. Inara protests a bit too much, but is stricken down when the woman, Sheydra, suggests that Mal may already be dead. Now, if you're like me, and basically come to this show vis-à-vis the Inara and Mal relationship, the continuing interrogation of how a personally designed system of belief doesn't do shit for you if love or some other disaster comes knocking cruelly on your door, then do what my mother suggested last week, and get the DVD immediately, because as she said, "The movie you wanted was deleted." And so it was. It was. And still...once a Browncoat. My mistake was watching Battlestar all day before we saw it, big jump to make in your head, and anyway, that was work-related.

Short scene to get us from Mr. Universe to Haven, where Shepherd Book has been living for six months or so: Inara greets the Operative at the door, smiling for about one millisecond before her Companion training alerts her to any one of a number of troubling facts about the Operative.

Down on Haven, Book comes to greet Serenity with hugs, Kaylee sweeping a child into her arms, the planet name even more on the nose than usual. It says what it is, for both Book and the crew. It feels like they come back here a lot. I hope that they do. Book's got cornrows, and I can't help but wonder if he put those in because he knew River was coming -- or because he knew she was now a ninja and will stop at nothing to destroy them. They are welcomed home as heroes, and later, as Book prays over the lot of them, Jayne plays the guitar for them by the fire. Book and Mal stand a ways away, gorgeously lit by warm firelight in the darkness. "You got a plan?" And Mal's response: "Hiding ain't a plan?" Book tells him it'll do "for a spell," and "the folks here'll be glad of the extra coin," because Robin Hood is alive and living in the Outer Rim, "but the Alliance will be coming." Mal agrees: "They're after this girl with a powerful will. I look to hear the tromp of their boots any moment." I'm sorry there's so much verbatim transcription, but the language! "You won't. This isn't a palms-up military run, Mal. No reports broadwaved, no warrants. Much as they want her, they want her hid. That means closed file. Means an Operative. Which is trouble you've not known." Just so you know, this isn't the usual "people are looking for River" thing -- Book wants to tell you this is totally different. It's a Big Damn Movie, son! The stakes are... Oh. Yeah. Not funny right now.