#joss whedon tw

[beyondthisdarkhouse]

Feeling really nostalgic about July 17-18, 2008, the last time I believed in Joss Whedon

It was just cool, you know? Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog dropped in three separate pieces over the course of the week. We'd get 15 minutes of story, and then two days to froth over the whys and wherefores in Livejournal comments before the next piece came out. And those days were so good.

Buffy fans are so fucking smart, y'all. They could combine academic rigor with unselfconscious fangirl squee. Squee was a hermeneutical method, a mode of interrogating the text--one we often dismiss and diminish, because if there's anything grosser than teenage girls getting goopy over a vampire they like, it's 30 or 50 or 70-year-old women getting goopy over a vampire they like. But it's similar to what I've seen called a "redemptive reading". You approach a piece of media specifically looking for its best parts, the pieces you love the best, and you allow yourself to fully embody the joy of liking something and caroling your joy to other people who like it too. In a perpetually burned-out time, squee can be like a desert oasis.

So the people who liked Buffy and Angel and Firefly watched Doctor Horrible in a manner both squeeful and intersectionally feminist, and saw all the amazing interesting things it was doing, showing how insecure geek masculinity fundamentally self-sabotages the main character, Billy, because the relationship he wants has been there in reach for months, and it's his own perception that he needs to be an alpha male warrior that has kept him from it. It interrogated the entire genre of costumed heroes, with two men thumping their chests and comparing their dick sizes, and none of them doing anything as direct and helpful for their society as Penny, the woman who stands on sidewalks collecting signatures to help a homeless shelter.

Part II came out on July 17, and the series would end with Part III on July 19. So on July 18, I spent most of the day reading Livejournal comments about it. There were all these theories: Maybe Penny was secretly Bad Horse, the archvillain whose approval Billy has craved since the beginning. Maybe she will collapse the love triangle with Billy's rival, Captain Hammer, by acting on her clearly-demonstrated discomfort and dumping him. Maybe Billy will learn that relationships are based on intimacy, not being The Best. Maybe Penny will become a superhero and replace Captain Hammer as Billy's nemesis. Maybe Billy will succeed and rule the world and give Penny Australia.

And then... none of those things happened. Joss Whedon ended the series in a way less progressive, less imaginative, less cool, than even the most half-baked fan theory out there. The story opened up possibilities to break out of an old, tired, toxic set of stories around men and women and sex and heroics, and then hid under a rock rather than change a single one of them.

July 19 was the day I concluded that while Joss Whedon might have his own baggage to work through about toxic masculinity, and artists have the right to make work meaningful to them, he wasn't making art that was meaningful to me. And I basically stopped expecting anything of him.

And then, for years, Buffy fans, educated and squeeful feminists and sharp pop culture critics, got told they were crazy histrionic SJWs for thinking Whedon didn't shit solid gold. For years. (I recently saw a video essay that included the line, "If you have the phrase 'mewling quim' branded onto your memory, you probably need some Metamucil" and, ouch, rude.)

There was so much excitement! A lot of us actually believed in the guy (although even then, there was enough evidence for many people to suspect what we now know to be 100% true about him.)

We wanted it to be good. We wanted to enjoy it.

I miss that feeling.

[yelenabelovarph]

SARAH MICHELLE GELLAR in BTVS 4.15 GIF PACK

In the source link you will find gifs of Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers & Faith Lehane in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It was released in the year of 2000. This gif pack includes some gifs with Alyson Hannigan, Alyson Hannigan, Marc Blucas, Anthony Head, Eliza Dushku, Kristine Sutherland and N.Br/nd/n. Make sure to follow my rules, it is linked on my tumblr. if you would like to support my work you can on ko-fi. If you have any questions, concerns or comments feel free to send an ask.

Please Note: the admin of this blog hates J*ss wh*d*n and N/ch/l/s Br/nd/n, but loves buffy. Do not use these gifs if you are pro those men or like Xander as a character.

[greensaplinggrace]

can this fandom stop acting biased as hell. almost every single one of your faves in the buffyverse has raped or attempted to rape another character on that show. the only two people exempt from this happening on screen are anya - who's an eleven thousand year old vengeance demon well versed in the art of exquisite torture - and giles (who has a fraught history of black magic and dancing on the wild side). buffy's pretty much the only person actually free of the blame here, probably because she was the victim in over half the scenarios.

[deviantplum]

Aliens Resurrection really feels like a Joss Whedon property and I mean that derogatorily.

First of all, the plot was incoherent.

"we cloned Ripley from the blood we got where she died"

Where she died? You mean, where she was incinerated?? And gee how much blood does incineration leave behind? Oh that's right, none.

But ok, ok let's pretend they meant the EEV and maybe there was some of her blood in there from the crash that was miraculously separate from Hicks' blood, who got fully impaled in there.

But sure, whatever, you got her blood. Then you cloned her, which for some fucking reason meant the alien queen embryo was also cloned. Because of Alien Genetics™ I guess.

Terrible premise, but we press on. Then they tell us that she's the 8th attempt. Ok, not a lot of tries to get that right, but they make a whole thing about "should we let the host live" which implied that they did not do that for the failures.

But then we get to meet the failures and we're supposed to believe they went from "not even functionally human" to "100% perfect clone of Ripley complete with memories of her life."

But also, why were the failed attempts even still alive?? One was literally begging for death, what possible reason did they have for keeping them, given how lukewarm they were about even letting the perfect Ripley live??

That reason is, of course, is: Body Horror makes Whedon's dick hard and he has no shame. So he just dedicated an entire scene to body horror.

Which brings me to my next complaint: lacing the fetish stuff into horror movies is supposed to be a subtle art. It shouldn't be obvious to the uninitiated. Resurrection went a different direction. Whedon asked "what if Ripley writhed sensually in a pit of tentacles?" "What if Ripley and the Alien sensually nuzzled each other in the darkness for five entire minutes?"

None of that was ever addressed btw. It just happens and then we move on with no explanation for the softcore monster porn.

Not to mention the Aliens have been established as a highly intelligent, but animalistic species.

Whedon had them having full on conversations with each other. He had to make them pass the Harkness Test so no one would complain about the ethics of his softcore monster porn.

Also "what if a pretty robot girl got shot in the chest and Ripley suggestively fingered the bullet hole?" is just a thing that happened.

So while Resurrection lacks a reasonable plot or compelling dialogue, the one thing it definitely has in spades is unveiled fringe erotica.

[gloriousburden]

Hey, you don't have to apologize at all! <3 We all have our lives. Also, it is up to you to decide when you wish to answer or if you wish to answer some asks at all! This is supposed to be your space, so def take all the time you need!

I'm happy that I helped you put some thoughts into words, too! And like always, I agree w all you say!! Also, for the Sylvie shapeshifting part — there's a post on it (if I find it I'll send it to you), and sadly, it is true. I didn't connect the dots before, but now it makes further sense with how they use her character, too. It is stated multiple times in the series by Mobius, and in general they kept highlighting the fact that she's a female counterpart. I shouldn't be surprised, but I always am in the end 😔

And another point you made — for Ragnarok, I saw your rb and. Man. When I tell you my jaw DROPPED at that scene — like ... It's awful. I hope that we won't have that one day, even if that feels far away. None of you deserve this. Putting such lines is very harmful, because (other than the fact that it's just straight up disrespectful, racist and ignorant) while the film itself is fictional, it still has influence in real life and people could take that and think it would be fine, to belittle and mock others. I've learned about your culture and am still learning, and with everything that has transpired, things like this make everything worse. It's so widespread, too, the misinformation. Of course, the best weapon to this is to be respectful, open, informed, and curious about everything, but still, such lines should not be accepted at all. You have already stated it very well. Thank you for that.

Sorry you had to see that, Thor would never. Bruce either, that cannot be Bruce, I revoke him ... Oh, and I'm definitely up for listening to your points on this. I'm very curious about it. I'd also love to learn more about your culture!

(Including your other ask here as well)

Hey! I checked out a few of her posts about it. Is this it? [Link]

In all honesty, I’m not too sure about the shape-shifting thing. But… I assume her being able to shape-shift as well as the enchanting stuff would’ve made her too “OP” (not that they really care about that) and not “distinctive” enough from Loki lol. As for her being strictly female and not fluid… man, I don’t know. I guess they wanted to focus on female rep (which they’re not really good at either) instead. They already see Loki as male, so they treated both of them as only being female/male with the ‘Sex:Fluid’ thing being an afterthought to “please” fans. Basically:

‘OKAY SHUT UP YOU’VE GOT IT! WE THREW IN A FILE SAYING HIS SEX IS FLUID DURING THE CREDITS, BUT HE IS SHOCKED WHEN A FEMALE VARIATION OF HIM SHOWS UP! Uh… it totally wasn’t an afterthought or anything, haha…”

🤦🏻‍♀️ so stupid.

Female counterpart… the writing and handling of Sylvie being female felt misogynistic to me. Okay so Loki cannot call her out on her own flaws (because how dare a female character have flaws), but also she’s automatically stronger and is so “badass”, but also she has no depth and there was little thought put into her backstory. I can straight up say that as a female that I do not want to see robotic female characters with absolutely no depth, and no flaws! Instead of them correcting the misogynistic mistakes they’ve made in the past with making a strong female character, they make her robot like because I guess that’s easier than giving a female character depth.

I feel like a good example of a well written female character is Mikasa from Attack on Titan. She is strong, but also has depth. She loves Eren, but has a personality and motives outside of that. She has weaknesses, and is not immune to struggling. She’s one of my favorite female characters, and I think more should be written like her. Anime/Manga are notoriously BAD at handling female characters, but in Attack on Titan (though there are still flaws of course), they feel real. They aren’t just there for fan service, or just to shut up female audiences with no actual care put into any part of it.

Lol sorry I deleted the RB Because I felt no one saw it, but thank you so much for reading it!

[Link] for context.

I really do appreciate you taking the time to learn about my people, and our culture. Thank you for seeing us for who we are, outside of all the hatred. It truly does mean a lot, as I’ve been discriminated against throughout my life.

I also want to point out that the joke isn’t JUST beyond disrespectful to my OWN culture, but it is disrespectful to any other culture that’s cultural clothing includes headscarves. So many people who proudly wear their headscarves (and any other cultural clothing for that matter) are targeted in hate crimes and It’s just really gross to me that they chose to mock them. It fuels hatred and ignorance. It alienates people.

A lot of people when talking about anti Roma racism mainly talk about the G word (Gypsy), but there are more important things to me than that. Like the fact that Roma children are ethnically targeted in hate crimes by non Roma ADULTS and AUTHORITY FIGURES throughout Europe, but primarily in the Balkans where a lot of us reside/have ties to.

Politicians openly spew hatred against us, with little to no repercussions. They want my people to assimilate, but when they attempt to, they are mocked and just overall treated like garbage. There’s no winning. They want them to strip themselves of our culture. Of our traditions.

I will not get into it on here a whole lot as it is absolutely vile, but my people were targeted during the Holocaust and experimented on in horrific ways. How were they targeted? Nazi scientists studied our features, and how we dressed.

That’s why jokes about how we look or how we present ourselves really are not funny. It reflects real life.

I believe I said this in so many words on the OG post, but the weirdest part to me of all of it is how little sense it makes for Bruce to make that joke to Thor. Like it was just Mark Ruffalo going out of his way to be hateful towards us once again. Thor doesn’t pay much mind to the joke if you watch the scene.

It’s funny because Thor (after his banishment), has almost always been respectful towards other groups of people from what I can remember at the top of my head.

He was respectful towards humans when he was casted out to Midgard, and he CLEARLY tolerates them to a certain extent if he’s willingly in a relationship with one, as well as willingly associate with them (The Avengers.)

‘You can’t kill an entire race..’

‘You think yourself above them?’

Thor is supposed to be open minded for an Asgardian, so.. this really was just Mark Ruffalo and his racism again. And I know he portrays himself as being aware of and deeply caring about social issues, but I guess that awareness and care excludes Roma. That’s what makes it worse. What also makes it worse is the MCU’s history of racism against us. A lot of people have talked about this on here, but the white washing of MCU Wanda/Pietro. As well as Joss Whedon’s racism towards us.

Thank you for the ask! Once again, feel more than welcome to send another any time 😁

[rensplotdumps]

Stupid Idea:

Angel themed? #29 ? I give up with numbers, I'm far too inconsistent to organize this way.

Anyways, my document literally says: "What if joss wheadon wasn’t a little bitch and had angel get affected by billy "

Which basically translates to when the charecter Billy whose blood makes men misogynistic to the max (ex. Murder for breathing) it effects Wesley and Gunn but not Angel because... he lost the "primordial misogyny" when he became an evil demon because Angelus killed for pleasure not hatred (this is me paraphrasing the wiki thank you wiki for not making me dig through a transcript at midnight <3)

So how about that reasoning isn't valid as a fic idea and Angel isn't exempt from having his already present implicit bias amplified?

[shewhotellsstories]

Oh that Vareity article? Reylos still crying over that really shows their obsession with John. Not only was it taken out of context because John very much supports his costar, but the same interviewer has a history of setting up his Black guests like this

I was so annoyed I totally skipped over the writer of that article being Adam B. Vary. I remember hearing about him because a similar thing happened with Anthony Mackie and he did that disgrace of a rehabilitation tour story for Joss Whedon where he called Ray Fisher a bad actor and spewed a bunch of fake nice-guy rhetoric about how he couldn't help but sleep with his subordinates because he couldn't get date in high school. (Gee I wonder why.) It honestly felt sketchy as hell because in addition to Whedon being allowed to call his victims either liars or just bad at English Vary was whining on Twitter about how Ray Fisher wouldn't do an interview with him about the Whedon of it all. Honestly, if I were a PR person in Hollywood I would advise any client of mine with melanin to decline any interview with Vary, he seems to have a nasty habit of running with quotes that could get the most rage clicks. But yeah, thanks for pointing that out to me.

Fun story, once in college I was interviewing an administrator about mental health policies. He was from the South and very brusque and blunt. He said, "if you want to kill yourself, that's fine, we can't kick you out of school for it," because I was asking him about students being forced to take time off indefinitely after mental health crises. Now, if you read that quote on its own you might think that he was saying that suicide is fine, but when I asked a follow-up question he explained that he meant that if someone is in crisis they should be encouraged to seek help, but it was against the ADA to force someone to move out of student housing due or withdraw from classes indefinitely to self-harm or suicidal ideation because being mentally ill doesn't necessarily make you unfit to be a student. I feel like Adam Vary would've just run with "if you want to kill yourself, that's fine."

[alexthepleb]

Oh no. Oh dear God no. I'm on a re-watch of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I'm watching Season Six. Getting near the end. The next episode is...Oh No. I'm about to be watching THAT PARTICULAR episode. The worst one.

Fuck Joss Whedon for many things. But Good Grief...the episode I'm about to watch. Why, God. Why?

[yelenabelovarph]

SARAH MICHELLE GELLAR in BTVS 4.16

In the source link you will find gifs of Sarah Michelle Gellar as Faith Lehane & Buffy Summers in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, season four episode sixteen. It was released in the year of 2000. This gif pack includes some gifs with Alyson Hannigan, Marc Blucas, Anthony Head, Emma Caulfield Ford, Amber Benson, Kristine Sutherland, and N.Br/nd/n . Make sure to follow my rules, it is linked on my tumblr. if you would like to support my work you can donate on ko-fi. If you have any questions, concerns or comments feel free to send an ask.

Please Note: the admin of this blog hates J*ss wh*d*n and N/ch/l/s Br/nd/n, but loves buffy. Do not use these gifs if you are pro those men or love Xander as a character.

Support banner by @cafekitsune

[katiemcwrath]

Rewatched all of Buffy and on season 5 of my rewatch of Angel and wow Whedon really hated women.

[raisedbythetv89]

Yeah famously he shoved James Marsters and held him against a wall and shouted in his face “THIS ISN’T THE SPIKE SHOW” because Spike became so popular that whedon’s original plan for him to be killed off in season 2 had to be changed and because he’s an insane narcissist with severe control issues, having a character on his show be super popular that he didn’t intend to aka didn’t “approve of” for women especially at the time, but also just in general, to love made him B I G mad

Hence why I think we got two seasons of Riley, he feels like a giant finger wag at all of us and Buffy like “this is who you’re supposed to want and love you sick freaks what’s wrong with you!!!” as was really driven home by xander’s horrific speech to Buffy before he flies off in his stupid helicopter

Because of his narcissism and emotional immaturity whedon always tries to force the world to exist in black and white, it’s where his “vampires should always only be evil and ugly” came from he literally wanted all of his villains to be one dimensional and he didn’t want them to be sexy or desirable because they were evil and in his world no one is allowed to like or enjoy evil things. But notice how much he failed to follow his own rules bc darla is SO hot and was the first vamp we see which is another thing that happens a lot with narcissists they don’t follow their own rules and then they blame everyone else for the circumstances that creates - him punishing James and all of us for liking spike when he was “still evil” aka soulless

It was only after he had finally regained control of the audience’s reactions to Spike after filming the most traumatic scene in the whole show in seeing red, despite several other instances of actual SA existing that were completely glossed over, that he switches and suddenly he’s claiming to be a spuffy fan “even if it’s not popular, that can be just for me” and allowing them to be tender and sweet to each other and claim now that Spike is one of his favorite characters. The switch up after he felt back in control of Spike and people’s perceptions of him was CRAZYYYYYY

All of his behavior is incredibly contradictory and makes no sense if you don’t know how narcissists operate but he’s literally so textbook he could be studied

Day 1,600 of wondering how the FUCK anyone was shocked or even dumber - ANGRY we all are so desperately and obsessively in love with this fine ass man????? You’re shocked?? HOW. Do you know anything about women and queer people??? (rhetorical question we of course know joss whedon in fact doesn’t) but like hello?? WHERE IS YOUR BRAIN OF COURSE WE ARE COMPLETELY OBSESSED LOOK AT HIM!!!!!!!

[mrtankhun-sebastian-elizabeth]

A Mothers Love

I have recently started to re-watch Buffy The Vampire Slayer again for like the 100th time and i am up to season 5 where we are introduced to Dawn (Buffy’s sister/ the key) and are going through that whole Glory phase. Oh also where Spike starts to realize how much in love he is with Buffy. 

But most importantly the storyline where Joyce (Buffy’s mother) is sick and will pass away in the coming episodes. 

While watching this season i have come to realize that the saddest death in Buffy isn't her own sacrifice, Spikes sacrifice, Tara’s death, Jenny calendars slaying nor Anya's death in battle (although all very heartbreaking and soul destroying deaths) but the death of Buffy’s own mother, Joyce.

However, the ultimate heartbreak doesn't flood in because Joyce is the mother of Buffy or one half of the parental figure for most of the scooby gang, but because her death was natural, unavoidable.  

Let me explain;

In a world of supernatural, of vampires and demons, of witches' and robots, their comes a reality that certain deaths are inevitable, not necessarily avoidable but kinda anticipated. However when the so called ‘anticipated’ death comes in the form of natural in a world of unnatural, the death itself feels unrealistic, not real. Especially when that death comes for a whole heartedly, pure and innocent character like Joyce. 

Joyce died of an aneurysm suddenly and painlessly while lying on her couch. The realization of the slayer to come to understand that the death of her mother is something so opposite to supernatural is unheard of. For someone, Buffy, who is given this responsibility at a young age to protect the natural world for the bad supernatural and to get stabbed in the back by this supposed ‘natural/innocent’ world by killing her mother is soul destroying. 

That's why i think Joyce's death is the saddest death in the series, because the fact is she is the only character that died a natural death, a death buffy and her gang can't blame anyone or anything for, a death that is at no ones fault besides the world Buffy is trying to protect. A death that the magical or the supernatural can’t reverse. 

Joyce’s death shows us that even in a world filled with the unrealistic, the unimaginable, the crazy - the only real thing and continues thing is death. Death doesn't care who you are, where you come form, what color your skin is, who your family is, what you do or have done, who you love or hate - once death has you in its sight, it will engulf you until you are no more. 

[naamahdarling]

Y'all, if you like offbeat indie horror with a comedic tone, and you have Shudder, or can see it some other way, I really recommend A Ghost Waits.

Handyman Jack is sent to investigate why tenants keep abandoning a rental house, which turns out to be haunted by ghost Muriel, who is, herself, struggling with the same identity/purpose issues as Jack. It could have done so many things wrong, and it did them right. No big action sequences, this is all character and dialog.

It isn't for everyone. Not because it's gruesome or distressing or any of that. It's actually pretty light. It's just...weird and quirky, relatable, briefly a storm of wildly mixed feelings including brief intense sadness, then so fulfilling. And utterly not something that would go over in theaters.

The writing is sharp and funny without being too Joss-Whedon/MCU forced clever. The acting is middling but really sincere and saved by the unpretentiousness of the whole thing. The male lead is convincing and funny in just the right believable way - a lovable mess. The female lead is a bit stiff in her delivery but the emotion of her acting is spot on. She carried the part with her expressions.

It isn't a downer, but I have to issue a pretty strong suicide TW though. Not gory, but...yeah. If the movie worked for you to that point, you'll feel a lot.

[chilewithcarnage]

Discussions of fictional and real life SA and incest TW /

I was going to respond to that Utena ask you responded to a couple of days ago but I got distracted. Basically, the manga was created by a woman but she definitely had a bigger problem with exoticising south-Asian people and the manga is less critical of the bad shit happening.

The anime itself also (as discussed before) has the issue of depicting its only brown characters as either constant victims and perpetrators and it also has what fans call the ‘curry episode’, which is its own can of worms. The director gets a lot of praise from female shoujo fans for ‘not being exploitive’ in his depictions of incest and SA as it’s never really super explicit. He’s often seen as a male feminist by them but he’s fairly well-known amongst con staff to harass young female fans (I can send sources for this if you’d like), that’s hardly known in the fandom but I see him as the anime industry version of Joss Whedon.

So yeah, I do struggle with discussing the show in good-faith at this point and a lot of white fans are huge elitists with a problem of dismissing discussions of racism in the show especially.

-

[liminalmemories21]

F and U for the fandom asks!

F - What’s the longest you’ve ever been in a fandom?

Lola asked this - answered here (tldr - a really long time)

U - Three favorite characters from three different fandoms, and why they’re your favorites.

Okay, having revealed exactly how long I've been reading fic, let's go oldschool.

1 - Fraser from Due South. Due South is on the surface a deeply unhinged police procedural about a Mountie from Canada's far north who is a liaison for the Canadian Consulate in Chicago for reasons that don't need exploring at this juncture (*tm) partnered with a Chicago cop. And, on another level it is a show about a deeply kind man, but a man who is also deeply stubborn and set in his ways, who is out of place and unhappy, but has the mind set of we make the best of it and don't complain too ingrained to ever admit that he's unhappy. I love him so much. Also doesn't hurt that the actor is Paul Gross, just saying.

2 - Stiles Stilinski. Okay, confession, I read my way through all of TW fandom without having seen the show. I ended up watching the first couple of seasons sometime during the pandemic and kept going - okay, wait, that shit was actually canon? This show was wild. That said, I love that Stiles's superpower is research, and being smart. He's surrounded by werewolves (and other assorted mythical creatures), and he's way too curious for his own good, but he's smart.

3 - Giles, my beloved. Look, I know that Buffy has its issues (and Joss Whedon turns out is a tool), but Giles has the best lines, and the older I get the more I sympathize with his long suffering love for the Scooby Gang.

[allwithagrainofsalt]

So I'm watching Princess Weekes' video about confederate vampires (watch it fr) and I wanna expand upon smth they mention about the explicitly White American Confederate storytelling in,

Drumroll please...

Firefly.

Now first: I LOVE Firefly. It's an incredible show and in fact I think it's a beautiful and inspirational piece of political art in many ways, and I'm gonna talk about that part a little bit at the end. But mainly, why did I hear the comparison and immediately start to have 50 puzzle pieces click? Well. This essay got long, and to be honest idk how much I might be repeating others cuz PW mentioned it due to others talking about it too, but I just kinda took a journey of my own off-the-dome observations based on things I've already read about/know. I hope it's an interesting journey for you too.

TW below the Readmore: discussion of colonial / military violence; discussion of Sexual Assault

We are looking at a world of cowboys in the stars, in which there was a recent Civil War. In fact, we're set in a "real life future," where the majority remaining galactic race stems from the great American Empire. We do get influences of Chinese culture with language and clothing, but remember that Spaghetti Westerns of the 1960s - which themselves romanticized the values of independent, libertarian southerners (who massacred Indians and no-good loiterers - we'll talk about that later) - heavily utilized "Oriental" aesthetics and caricatures while dehumanizing the Asian people they were ostensibly in relationship with. After all, Asian Americans were a growing population in the landscape of the Western frontier, often working alongside your storybook railroad workers, gold seekers and, even further east than Pacific coastal industries, working & living alongside cowboys. However, the language of Western-genre films (because of the way it mirrors the language of Confederates) does not respect Asian culture as it is, but rather as a collection of "wisdoms" and aesthetics to pick apart and use the "good parts" of - for use by white people in their white expansion. This idea fits a bit uncomfortably well with Firefly's multiple white characters who are "orientalized" by the camera. Kaylee, Inara, and the Tam siblings fulfill various stereotypes and tropes of Chinese- and other Asian-American diaspora people groups. The show, in this way, offers the "diverse" presence of a Chinese influence... using actors of Italian, Irish, German, and possibly Latine background to fill the roles. This makes the Firefly universe look less of a pacifist future between Western and Asian cultures, and more like a colonized universe where the (white) Western colonialists maintain some practices of those forward-thinking Asians who came before them.

But! You may say! Firefly isn't quite so white as that. What about the POC in the show!? Beyond its treatment of the de/re-Orientalization of a decidedly American/Western future, what about Firefly's real interracial representation, like Zoe Washburne and Shepherd Book? I would argue the inclusion of these unapologetic and kind black activist ideas is part of what begins to bring this show towards something more agreeable, but I also think they are at risk of becoming a bit of an obfuscation of a deeper anti-black racist remnant that remains entrenched in the show's Confederate story influences...

We need to talk about Reavers.

Joss Whedon admitted that Reavers were influenced by the role Native Americans played in traditional Westerns. "Every story needs a monster," he said in an interview. "In the stories of the old west it was the Apaches." It's pretty clear how the Reavers, who rape, murder, skin and cannibalize those of the "civilized world" are constructed from the specific racism against Black and Indigenous groups in America. Depictions of cannibals and savages in media have always been constructed to dehumanize those on the outskirts - whether it's the Apache threat Whedon mentions from the Wild West, or indigenous tribes of Africa or South America in any media, or the "terrifying" blackfaced "black" characters in Birth of a Nation, the horror trope of "uncivilized bands of roving lunatics who self-mutilate and can't communicate with their words" is pretty inseparable from its own racist origins. For centuries Europeans have been making "demons" out of pagans and indigenous people for their battle tactics or necropolitics, while simultaneously working hard to entrench our own atrocities in "necessities of the time." For one example, think of the fear associated with "headhunter" displays versus the still-controversial but more civilized-presenting "harsh peacekeeping" of public hangings. What is the difference between these practices besides a different eagernesses to contextualize the practice? I don't argue in favor of punitive violence for cultural purposes here, but it's important not to lose the contextualization of these tropes' origins in the social messaging of popular media. And in fact, the Reavers show an interesting way that the criminalization of Black and Indigenous Americans ties closely to the way we talk about the incarcerated and the mentally ill. I'm frankly not much more satisfied by the Reavers being an embodiment of "space madness" than I would be if they were straight up just Native Americans, or runaways from enslavement. American culture is great at coming up with "madnesses" which are really just the pushback to dehumanizing and unjust regimes. I'm not saying that the logic of the show would allow Reavers to receive constructive community-based mental health support involving free medicine and good therapy. But in a show that claims to be in favor of the marginalized and their voice for power, it's weird that this doesn't come up, right? Do the monsters in our media need to be irredeemable to work as narrative tropes? I would argue, once again, the inclusion of this Western and frankly genocidal trope (and if you think the Reavers are NOT a genocidal story trope, let me know what paths the narrative offers as a solution besides killing them immediately and indiscriminately when given the chance.) works to build a world-feel that's less "for the people" and more "for the justified, downtrodden warriors who know right from wrong," which is a very confederate line of thought.

Although Firefly highlights some literal black voices in their main cast, the plotline of the show is much the same as a confederate apologist story. Some people are more worthy of life than others in this tale - others who are too animistic and uncivilized; or who are simply left behind by the inevitable march of the white, righteous underdog ideologies. And these bold, brave rebels from the Civil War which recently happened are still around, just waiting to reassert their power and their independent desires from the empire. The Confederacy of the US was a white, ethno-nationalist and fascist state, admittedly so by their own politicians. It provided ideological groundwork for Nazi Germany and preceded much of the pseudoscience of phrenology. The Confederate position was based on white supremacy nearly entirely, and argued for the most racist version of a "globalist" idea possible. As evidence, here's some of the Cornerstone Address presented by Alexander Stephens, the "vice president" of the Confederacy: "Many governments have been founded upon the principle of subordination and serfdom of certain classes of the same race; such were and are in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of nature's laws. With us, all of the white race, however high or low, rich or poor, are equal in the eye of the law. Not so with the negro. Subordination is his place. He, by nature, or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system." But confederate stories and ideas have maintained a long-standing and unyielding influence, as after they lost the Civil War, the ideology of the Confederacy underwent a serious PR rebranding. Rather than "anti-American" racists, they became the noble fighters of a lost cause. They became the "defenders of heritage," and they became the mythologized ancestor of any white people who wanted to claim them. The Civil War "rebels" were painted as noble Southern men and women who, in a political landscape of the South becoming red states and the bible belt, were mythologized as Southern Belles and nobly humble plantation owners who loved Good Black people... just not the "mentally ill" ones who did things like run away or fight bondage.

(By the way, Alexander Stephens had some things to say about mental illness too (same link again)- I'm tying this back to my point about "mentally ill Reavers" being less of a far-cry than you might think from Confederate thinking: "Our new government [the Confederacy] is founded upon [this] idea; its corner-stone rests upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition. ... Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. ... Those at the North, who still cling to these errors [of racial equality], with a zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate [call them] fanatics. All fanaticism springs from an aberration of the mind from a defect in reasoning. It is a species of insanity. One of the most striking characteristics of insanity, in many instances, is forming correct conclusions from fancied or erroneous premises; so with the antislavery fanatics. Their conclusions are right if their premises were. They assume that the negro is equal, and hence conclude that he is entitled to equal privileges and rights with the white man. ... [I] told [a gentleman from one of the northern states in the House of Representatives] that it was he, and those acting with him, who were warring against a principle. They were attempting to make things equal which the Creator had made unequal." It's worth wondering what makes us, as viewers, accept that Reavers are inherently incurable of the mental illness which makes them monsters. Of course this trope could be used in a critical way - but we can see the real-language example here which should make us question what kind of reading to take from media which only addresses the single solution of wiping a True Evil demographic from existence.)

So I hope you see the influences now, how Firefly follows Confederate and White Supremacist storylines. It's of course worth talking about though, the ways it can be read as a radical story as well. The cast includes an empowered revolutionary black woman, a black spiritual elder who advocates for pacifism in resistence, a sex worker who consistently values and stands up for herself and her line of work explicitly, a working woman who struggles with misogyny, and a rich man disgracing himself from society to save his mentally ill younger sister who was facing violent abuse at the hands of the state. These are people who orient themselves for one reason or another in at least some form of opposition to the oppressive and violent power of the government, which once again, is an analogous state to the United States. Of course, the difficulty of the anti-governmental Confederate narrative is that anti-governmental sentiment can have incredibly valid origins. If you are facing discrimination you should indeed oppose the oppressive force that monitors and abuses all its citizens in one way or another. But for God's sake, that opposition should come from a perspective of eliminating discrimination for all. Not a perspective like Jayne Cobb's - the explicitly violent and self-serving voice which, through the show and movie, metaphorically pulls our disaffected protagonist, Malcolm Reynolds, toward the direction of his more cynical, militaristic and even fascist internalized values. Firefly wants to simultaneously make a diverse revolutionary text, but also misses the opportunities it presents itself to say something more meaningful through its own medium. We could've addressed the harm of Jayne's willingness to grant "humanity" ONLY to the people he deems as something like family - or who he feels have properly convinced him that they're worth saving. He is the perfect embodiment of the right-wing, misogynist, white-supremacist ideology at the center of Confederate thinking. He's a Nazi who has been pulled into collaborating with real marginalized people through his relationship with Mal. And there's some level of that which could be an interesting story about deradicalization. In fact in some ways I believe the show could be open to some kind of that interpretation, given the almost-betrayal that Jayne goes back against due to his dedication to Mal. But unfortunatly I'd also say that in the execution of the show I got a different perception, which is back to the whole Confederate thesis...

Instead of a fascist who we could watch be deradicalized by his fellow crew, Jayne ends up doing marginal good only ever out of respect for Mal. I would argue in this way, their relationship mirrors the romanticized mythology of the Civil War being a "war between brothers" due to split households in border states. This narrative clearly holds more respect for the Confederacy than continuing to rightfully call the ideology the abhorrent thing that it is, and it is clear that the same ideology rears its head deep into our legal systems through the treatment of oppressed groups to this day. In ways, the influence of pro-Confederate radicals AFTER the war worked to legitimize bigotry of all kinds in a truly unprecedented way in America. If we have to respect the opinions of the Confederates because they were our "brothers" and not our ideological enemies, then who will we feel more and more comfortable throwing by the wayside - them or the people we work together to shamefully dehumanize? Through this contextual lens, with a vision of Mal as a "decent cowboy" compared to Jayne's more blatantly intolerant cowboy persona, it seems glaring that Jayne's bigoted views are just more intense outward versions of similar prejudices to those Mal feels, but by comparing the two characters to one another Mal would of course begin to look more forgivable despite his relative centrism and lack of care for the marginalized beyond his immediate group. Neither Mal nor anyone, for the narrative's sake, ever really, constructively pulls Jayne aside to actually lay down meaningful expectations of respect. And our rebel storylines of outgroup justice in the future should not accept this lack of accountability! By doing so, we leave no room for the revolutionary need for the Paradox of Tolerance...

The one thing we must not tolerate is intolerance.

Oh and P.S., one last thing: Upon an internet search about the paradox of tolerance I learned that Bill Maher has a famous quote about it, and idk the specifics but seeing that dang centrist asshole liberal made me want to clarify that the argument itself could tie very well into stuff like Islamophobic talking points, since the US defends a lot of its military landgrabs as "defending liberal ideals" due to conflating all Muslims with extremist groups. So I just felt the need to add that being "intolerant of intolerance" is NOT equivalent to dehumanizing groups based on stereotypes of them being "more prone to violence" or other dogwhistles like that. I would imagine that comes through, but it's also just worth making explicit. Even me, in this essay, seeing a character who falls into many of the plot points of a Confederate heroism storyline and is a white man - I'm not intolerant OF those things. In the episodes where Mal successfully subverts those ideologies he's mirroring on screen, by interacting with the world differently because he has learned to humanize an increasingly large group of people, I cheer for him! However, I remain intolerant of the intolerance Mal continues to show by virtue of his failure to hold others and himself accountable to the paradox of tolerance, and lets abuse goes unchecked for longer than he, as a man with power and a growing communal mindset, COULD put to rest.