Warning: Spoilers

This post contains spoilers for the sci-fi movie, Serenity. Do not read if you don't want to be given the worst part of the movie.








Wash (A Painful Firefly Memory)

I'm not sure why Joss did what he did. Maybe it was a cheap trick to put the audience on the edge of their seats for the finale, although I'd expect better treatment of a character from Joss.
As a writer myself, I have an unholy respect for my characters -- a love that some authors might find ludicrous. I don't believe they exist solely to advance the plot, anymore than human beings exist just to move along the action in everyday life. People are more than what they do or say. I throw challenges at my people, and they respond as best they can. It is their reaction to the challenges that moves the plot. As a result of overcoming the challenges, they learn and grow, and then I throw harder challenges at them so they can learn and grow more.

If you kill a character, it should be for something more than just for effect.

I didn't want Wash dead, ever. I certainly didn't want him killed to create a mood, or raise the level of dramatic tension. Part of Joss's skill is his ability to create characters that transcend their existence as characters, and become people you feel you know. He facilitates an extension of the viewer's suspension of disbelief to the point where you'd love to sit down in Serenity's kitchen and spend time chowing down with this crew.

Wash was family, his fictitious status notwithstanding. To have him killed so precipitously, torn away without warning -- well, it's like watching an old friend step off the curb into the path of an oncoming semi. If Joss used him as a tool for establishing dramatic tension, it's even worse. Instead, it's like watching someone you trust SHOVE your old friend in front of the semi just to make you worry that someone else you love might be next. Yes, Wash belonged to Joss.

But he belonged to all of us Browncoats too, because we gave him life by believing in him and the whole crew.

This being said, he's gone. Any attempt for Joss to bring him back to life would be no better than Spock's return from death in the Trek movie franchise (which was really weird and stupid in my opinion). I can think of a neat way to bring him back that would be funny and touching and right for Wash -- as a ghost only River (and the audience) could see and hear, delivering ongoing commentary about the action without being able to take part. Even so, the empty seat at Serenity's table would stay empty. And his wry counterpoint to the "wacky fun" would go unheard, and unanswered, by the crew.

I guess the bottom line for me is this. Joss can do what he wants with his characters. But Wash was ours as much as he was Joss's, because we gave him life and believed in him. And even though Wash wasn't real, I will mourn his loss. The franchise isn't dead, and it promises to take some interesting twists and turns in the future (if there is one). I don’t think Joss had the right to take away Wash so violently and suddenly.

But the dinosaurs are silent, the Hawaiian shirts are packed away, and Zoe sleeps alone. Rest in peace, old friend. You will be missed.