Catching Up: Firefly- Our Mrs. Reynolds

Many TV shows live and die by their guest stars. Even those that have strong regular casts, like Firefly, the real test of the show's flexibility and the cast's talent is how they handle newcomers. While not all of the guests to appear on Firefly are all that memorable (the show, like many Joss Whedon outfits, has a propensity for generic thugs), there's a fairly impressive list of guest performers in the series' short run. Some worked so well that they showed up multiple times in the scant 14-episode order. TV's new favorite redhead, Christina Hendricks, is one such guest star.

Hendricks has made a name for herself by playing delightfully dubious characters. Her most famous role has been as Joan Holloway on our other (remaining) Catching Up show, Mad Men. Joan established herself early as perhaps the most savvy member of the Sterling-Cooper staff and Hendricks has handled the character's slow acquisition of complexity with grace. It's easy to see some of Christina Hendricks's background work for Joan's layers in brief parts like her turn as Saffron in Firefly and to a lesser extent as an unassuming black widow on an episode of Tru Calling. Hendricks has mastered this particular kind of inexplicably likable villain. In fact, likable villains are some of the best parts of Firefly. Whether it's a clever con artist like Saffron, a cockney criminal like Mark Sheppard's Badger or an elegant killer like Chiwetel Ejiofor's Operative, the Firefly universe is populated almost exclusively with bad guys who are only marginally less fun to be around than the central protagonists themselves.

What's really delightful about Saffron's first of two appearances on Firefly is that it happens early enough in the series to still be a little surprising. "Our Mrs. Reynolds" was the third episode of the show to originally air and it's the sixth episode in the production order, so viewers may still harbor a scrap of trust for any new person to step aboard Serenity. Of course the Firefly universe has a dearth of true innocents but Christina Hendricks does a good job of selling Saffron's false naivete. It also helps that Mal and the crew picked her up from a village of simple-minded puritans after saving them from a group of bandits. This allows the first half of the episode to be a fish out of water comedy with a sprinkling of cheeky sex jokes before the plot takes its inevitable turn for the dark and perilous.

"Our Mrs. Reynolds" is a nicely contained episode on its own but its real payoff comes much later in the series when Saffron returns in "Trash". Despite being canceled as early as it was, Firefly really was building a very rich world of characters and locations that would have served the series for several seasons.

Best Moment: Shepherd Book's warning to Mal about taking sexual advantage of Saffron. "The special Hell reserved for child molesters and folks who talk in the theater" may be one of Joss Whedon's greatest original lines.

Notes: An entire scene featuring River was cut from this episode for time, meaning that Summer Glau doesn't really appear in this episode at all. Here it is, in all its oddly-paced glory.

Episode Rating: 4.5/5- There's a lot of great stuff in this episode. Aside from Christina Hendricks, it has the introduction of Jayne's gun "Vera" and the first hints that Inara has feelings for Mal. Its only real snag is Joss Whedon's propensity for heroic speeches. When Mal gets on his high horse there's a good chance things are going to slow down a bit.