The thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by eric3579.

He totally screwed up the part were River gained or had her "powers" naturally (she was only naturally/gifted mentally, that is, she was a genius or prodigy). That came from the experimenting FROM the Alliance... Same with her fighting abilities, that was also an Alliance "gift" (to use her as a "psychic weapon"). But I think Joss already made the point IN the show that Mal was indeed a very shady person, if you didn't get that you are an idiot!

You were supposed to know that the Alliance brought a lot of great things with them, but they also stole your freedom...essentially (in exchange for a world with lots of rules).

But, what the Alliance was up to "behind the scenes" is what was really everyone's main concern--which they covered in Serenity a bit... In Serenity we found out that they had been up to a LOT more terrible things than just taking individuals like River--they were in the business of thinking they knew how to make all people "better" people...and one day they would try to institute it in force, en masse...

It seemed like the show was more a story about the civil war had the wrong side won--to some degree; I think you could make an argument for both. But it was obvious from watching that "Mal's side" was the "Confederacy", but they didn't stand for the same things, it was just that the history of things were playing out the same in many ways...and that was the point.

If The Union had been lying about a huge amount of things and started to institute policies that you went into action then they'd seem so very much like the Alliance in the show (BUT, some actions are exactly like what The Union did to Confederate "states" after the war; which DID leave them in states of welfare were citizens were left to fend for the most basic of necessities on their own--the Wild Wild West didn't just appear from comic books... Even the citizens had to fight off Indian attacks here and there and most of these attacks were born from the legacy of military campaigns and other actions via The Union (or before the States went to war--but, it's easy to see what the "Reavers" were based on, at least I assume that is what he had in mind).

Ironically, right now in our government it's doing the things that Mal was so concerned over that many that HAD lived in the Alliance regions hadn't been as worried about: slowly eroding our civil liberties, our regular freedoms are being taken away or one-by-one being hamstrung, and regulation is being destroyed allowing the corrupt to make this circle all that much worse (of course one day this cycle will just feedback on itself and create a revolution--as it always has). That is what The Alliance was doing, especially to the planets that didn't join immediately...so it does have a lot in common with our history. As The Union did do some pretty annoying and considering all of the people that needed help and were not getting anything, they actually directly killed a large amount of completely innocent people...just to punish some wealthy land owners and other people that had something to do with the Civil War. They should have taken the matter directly into their hands, but there is a lot on that as well (just like the show...why the Alliance never intervenes in the outer planets...).

God how I miss that show. I can only imagine what Joss could have accomplished in 7 or 8 seasons (maybe more). He could have made a show that could easily be written about in a college setting, about the civil war and the topics related to it. How grand the adventure could have been, except for one dickhead producer at Fox...

(*I take no responsibility for the parts of my comment I messed up on...* )


*nerd rant*

Clue: The main character's name means "bad".

Yep, my immediate reaction too. I was never confused that I was rooting for anything other than the Loveable Bad Guys.

Nothing new.

And the soldiers of the Confederacy weren't necessarily the bad guys. They were people loyal to their states. Robert E. Lee sided with the Confederacy because of his loyalty to his state. Loyalty is inspiring.

Losers of wars are underdogs. We root for the underdog. Usually. It's a unique position to observe the human spirit.

They are like Ronin, emotionally fraught PTSD survivors living a waking nightmare, with no satisfying role in society left to fill. What can they do?

They will fight.

*controversy

Adding video to channels (Controversy) - requested by MrFisk.