#SQUADGOALS (21)
By:
May 24, 2017
One in a series of enthusiastic posts, contributed by HILOBROW friends and regulars during 2017, on the subject of our favorite squads.
The short-lived, much-beloved TV series Firefly was billed as ‘a Western in space.’ Like most Joss Whedon vehicles, it features an ensemble cast of characters and sparkling dialogue. But what really makes the Firefly crew unique to me is what they’re doing when they’re not fighting, or planning, or getting rescued, or just hanging out.
At the end of Whedon’s The Avengers, the team famously goes out for shawarma and then, presumably, everyone goes home. But at the end of adventures in Firefly, the home they go back to is the eponymous ship.
The crew lives on Serenity, a Firefly-class spacecraft. That means it’s completely self-contained — warmth, food, water, sanitation, even air. But all of that results from carefully maintained systems, and the team has to count on each other to keep their home safe, even in the absence of direct threats.
This deep interdependence of people aboard Serenity with each other and with their home is underlined in the episode “Out of Gas”, in which a critical engine part fails, leaving the ship adrift in space and running out of heat and oxygen. The episode consists of three timelines, one in the present, one in the near past, and an origin story: a timeline that shows how Mal, the captain, recruited his crew. It’s telling that the story of how the team came together is narrated in parallel with their failure to keep their home functional and secure (and, of course, how their deep bonds as a team allowed them to save it and each other).
From the A-Team to the X-Men, squadmates rely on each other to watch each other’s backs and to stand together in a fight. But few teams have to depend on each other, day after day, for the most basic of human needs. There’s team. There’s family. And then, on Firefly, there’s infrastructure.
#SQUADGOALS: Annie Nocenti on THE WILD BUNCH | Alice Boone on PRETTY LITTLE LIARS | Gordon Dahlquist on BOWIE’S BAND | Rob Wringham on THE HOME GUARD | Jennifer Krasinski on WATERSHIP DOWN RABBITS | Annalee Newitz on ROBIN HOOD’S MERRY PALS | Adrienne Crew on THE BLOOMSBURY GROUP | Mark Kingwell on THE HONG KONG CAVALIERS | Adam McGovern on KAMANDI’S FAMILY | John Overholt on THE CLUB | Greg Rowland on THE VULTURE SQUADRON | Sara Ryan on BETSY, TACY & TIB | Chelsey Johnson on VI ÄR BÄST! | Brian Berger on THE JOHN FORD STOCK COMPANY | Sherri Wasserman on THE WARRIORS | Jessamyn West on FAREYNIKTE PARTIZANER ORGANIZATSYE | Josh Glenn on DADA | Matthew De Abaitua on THE TIME | Mandy Keifetz on THE FOUNDING FATHERS | William Nericcio on ZOOT SUIT PACHUCOS | Deb Chachra on FIREFLY CREW | Matthew Battles on THE ANIMAL FAMILY | Ingrid Schorr on THE HARLEM GLOBETROTTERS | Joe Alterio on THE USUAL GANG OF IDIOTS | Dan Reines on THE BREAKFAST CLUB | Rob Walker on LES TROIS INSÉPARABLES | Devin McKinney on 1975 RED SOX | Steph Burt on DAMAGE CONTROL | Elina Shatkin on THE HOLOGRAMS | Chris Spurgeon on THE ALKALI METALS | Carl Wilson on NEW YORK SCHOOL POETS | Barbara Bogaev on THE MOD SQUAD | Franklin Bruno on THE AACM | Judith Zissman on THE FUTURIANS | Mimi Zeiger on ARCHIGRAM | Jacob Mikanowski on THE RATBASTARDS | Lynn Peril on THE DALY SISTERS | Anindita Basu Sempere on MEG MURRY’S FAMILY | Libi Rose on THE ENIAC TEAM | Gary Panter on THE TRIBE OF HIPPIES | Peter Doyle on CORNEL WILDE BOYS | Ken Layne on THE MONKEY WRENCH GANG | Molly Wright Steenson on BAUHAUS | Katie Hennessey on BEAT POETS | Mimi Lipson on THE RUNAWAYS | Jordan Ellenberg on BOURBAKI | Michael Campochiaro on THE SUICIDE SQUAD | Deborah Wassertzug on THE BLOODHOUND GANG | Colin Dickey on ACÉPHALE | Douglas Wolk on SEVEN SOLDIERS OF VICTORY | David Smay on THE MYSTIC KNIGHTS OF THE OINGO BOINGO | Karinne Keithley Syers on BLACKLIPS PERFORMANCE CULT.
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