Lee McKusick

It’s always bittersweet finishing a captivating story. It’s an close on an exciting and captivating chapter, but there are so many good memories.

Enough nostalgia, let’s move to the waxing philosophical.

(Again, there may be spoilers so you’ve been warned.)



So I just finished watching Serenity, the movie set after Firefly. At the very end, as Mal and River are flying Serenity up and out of the storm, we find another instance where we can catch a glimpse of God’s nature.

Mal: Ain’t all buttons and charts, little Albatross. You know what the first rule of flying is? Well, I suppose you do, since you already know what I’m ’bout to say.
River: I do. But I like to hear you say it.

People have grappled for centuries with the question that “if God knows our hearts and minds, why do we pray?”. Questions of predestination aside, if God knows what we think and what we are going to pray, why should we bother actually doing it?

The simple answer would be because God wants us to. He didn’t create us so that we could just go our own way and live on our own, apart from him. He did it so that we could experience his goodness, love, and community, and so that He could love us in return and take pleasure in our lives. It is God’s joy, and therefore our own, that we pray and talk with Him. He may know what we’re going to say. But He likes to hear us say it.

Mal: Love. You can know all the math in the ‘verse, but you take a boat in the air you don’t love, she’ll shake you up sure as the turn of the worlds. Love keeps her in the air when she ought to fall down. Tell you she’s hurting before she keens. Makes her a home.

I don’t know any biblical parallel to this off the top of my head, other than Paul’s description of love, but this is such a powerful quote.

Love is the fuel that a true home runs on. If your home isn’t built on a foundation of love, it’ll fall right out of the sky and crash to the ground in a fiery wreck. But a home built on love has the power to soar high above the clouds, lifting you and yours above anything that threatens to tear you apart.

Speaking of which, we might as well finish out the scene:

River: Storm’s getting worse.
Mal: We’ll pass through it soon enough.

Persist through the storms of life, and you will come out the other side. Like Serenity emerging from the clouds to journey back out among the stars.

Shiny!

Firefly is one of the most awesome shows ever made.

I’ve been watching the whole series over the past few days. Why Fox canceled it is beyond me. It’s funny and intelligent, dramatic and action-packed. Anyway, enough raving, if you haven’t seen it, go watch it. Or come watch it with me, it’s a great time.

Also if you haven’t seen it, and don’t like spoilers, you might want to stop reading now. If you don’t mind them, you might see one of the reasons I love this show so much.

To give some backstory first, they just rescued Jayne, and Simon and River (both wanted fugitives) from the Alliance after Jayne ratted them out for the reward money. Mal, being a man who looks after his own, has a little chat with Jayne.

This is probably the most moving (and chilling) scene in the whole series for me, because it directly parallels reality.

“He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’” - Matthew 25:45

The words and sentiments of Malcolm Reynolds directly parallel those of Jesus Christ. “You turn on any of my crew, you turn on me…You did it to me, Jayne.” I said it was chilling because it’s not a far stretch to put myself in that airlock, feeling the same fire of righteous fury directed my way. I imagine that that’s quite similar to how Jesus will respond to those who have sinned. I can’t think that the Creator of the ‘verse would take any more kindly to betrayal…

Another thing that made me shiver a bit was Mal’s response to Jayne’s question:

Jayne: What are you gonna tell the others?
Mal: About what?
Jayne: About why I’m dead.
Mal: I hadn’t thought about it.

Jayne’s betrayal caused a rift so great that Mal would simply abandon and forget him. Sound similar?

About the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi,[a] lama sabachthani?”—which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” - Matthew 27:46

But it’s what happens next that brings hope. Jayne accepts his impending doom, and genuinely repents. And because of that, Mal shows him mercy, and the rift is gone. Well, maybe not gone, as Jayne gets to ride in the makeshift brig for a while, but then again, he’s only human. Atherton Wing can attest to that:

Because of it’s spiritual parallels, and awesome humor, plot, and characters, I love Firefly. You should too. Dong-ma?

Have I mentioned I love Desktoptopia?

This is the image it just gave me:

I thought the HDR (High Dynamic Range, it’s what gives it the illustrated look) effect was really cool, so I decided to play my luck and see if they gave a link to the photographer. Sure enough, they did, and the guy, Trey Ratcliff, has a ton of beautiful HDR images.

His site, Stuck in Customs, has both his official portfolio, and a photoblog. It’s definitely worth a look.

Plus, most of his stuff is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike license. Props to him for that!

Tags: photography, hdr

So I’ve been watching the Showtime original series “Dexter”, with my roommates. It’s a show (based on the book Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay)  about a guy named Dexter, who is the top blood spatter analyst in the Miami PD. He’s also a serial killer.

In accordance with his “moral code”, all of Dexter’s victims are murderers themselves, and while there’s no justification for an eye for an eye, you really can’t help but root for him, mainly when he’s in danger of being caught, or if he’s in a similar sort of sticky situation.

I won’t give anything away, but Dexter is basically emotionless. He’s a very flat character by himself, but it’s the facade that he puts up that makes the show amazing, and the character of Dexter really likable. The mask he wears around other people is completely the opposite of his actual self, and Michael C. Hall does an excellent job of portraying those awkward, yet convincing interactions. Combined with the wacky interactions of Season 1 with the “Ice Truck Killer” (another serial killer in Miami), it all makes for a dynamic and interesting show.

As I mentioned, the show was made for Showtime, but season 1 is being shown Sunday nights on CBS at 10pm. ( I haven’t seen any on CBS, so I can’t say how well it survived the network TV editting process, but I will say that there’s really not much in terms of content that you wouldn’t find on, say, CSI (language notwithstanding).

So, if you’re looking for a great show that will grab your interest, and still make you laugh at times, I would recommend Dexter. But I warn you, it’s like a good novel, once you start watching it, the plot will suck you in…

Speakng of novels, I want to read Darkly Dreaming Dexter, so once I do, I’ll put up a review.