Day 06 – Favorite episode of your favorite TV show:

As we established on Day 4, my favourite TV show is Firefly, though I can never decide between “Out of Gas” and “Objects in Space.”

I seem to like “Objects in Space” a lot more than my friends, and I wonder what’s wrong with them. You’ve got your existentialist-philosophizing bounty hunter, River’s craziness being a force for AWESOME, and Simon being snarky and shirtless. Plus some really amazing facial expressions from Nathan Fillion. What more could you want?

I have a great fondness for characters who are a little whimsical in the brainpan–Dru in Buffy, Auri in The Name of the Wind, Delirium in Sandman, and above all, River. The insight into the way she sees the world was just neat. It was fascinating to see her take center stage, then to see her acceptance of sorts by the rest of the crew.

“Out of Gas” is simply a revelation. It juggles three separate timelines–one present, one recent past, and one more distant past–with grace and wit. We’re given a hefty dose of backstory for a number of characters, but at no point does it feel gimmicky. It changes the way we see the crew, and it makes us love them even more. And Alan Tudyk’s story about stealing the shuttle recall button and giving it to Joss has been known to make me sniffle.