FIREFLY: BIG DAMN HERO

Reviewed by Steven H Silver

The last time an official novel based on Joss Whedon's Firefly came out, was in 2005, when Keith R.A. DeCandido published the novelization of Whedon's film Serenity. Although three short stories and several comics have been published since then, Big Damn Hero, a novel by James Lovegrove based on an original idea by Nancy Holder, is the first official original Firefly novel to be published. The novel is set immediately after the events of the Firefly episode "The Message," in which Mal and Zoe are reunited with Tracey, one of their comrades in arms from the Unification War. This timeline allows Lovegrove to play with all nine characters from the series.

The novel opens with Mal Reynolds agreeing to carry a highly explosive cargo for Badger. In order to make the trip more profitable, Mal, Zoe, and Jayne meet with Hunter Covington, a meeting that goes awry when Mal is kidnapped while Jayne and Zoe are in a bar fight. Lovegrove follows the crew's attempts to find and rescue Mal as well as Mal's captivity. It quickly becomes apparent that Mal has been targeted by a group of Browncoats who are trying to punish those who they deem traitors to the Independents' cause. Everything the shown of Mal so far in the official canon has shown him to be a model Browncoat, so it is clear that there is a mistake, a personal vendetta, or something about Mal has not previously been revealed.

Although the novel's plot is totally in line with the types of shenanigan's Serenity's crew got involved with in the television episodes, film, and comics, the characters themselves don't seem to be quite as well on-target. Lovegrove focuses primarily on Mal, Zoe, Book, and Jayne, with smaller roles played by the remaining five crew members. Unfortunately, the dialogue generally does not feel entirely right. There are only a few places where it sounds like lines the various actors would say.

The novel includes a balanced mix of old and new characters and reveals much more of Mal's early life than was peviously known. While Whedon had revealed that Mal grew up on the farming moon Shadow with his mother, Lovegrove has introduced the Four Amigos, the tight-knit group of friends Mal hung out with as a teenager before theyh all volunteered with the Independents. He slowly reveals the secrets that were kept in the group as they fought against the local authority, represented by Sheriff Bundy, and give some clue as to the forces that continue to drive Mal.

Lovegrove include a little too much fanservice in the book, with frequent references to the adventures show on the television show. While the references to the episode "The Message" are appropriate, since Lovegrove establishes that Big Damn Hero takes place immediately after that episode, and before "Heart of Gold," references to events in earlier episodes seem gratuitous, especially since he doesn't refer to incidents which haven't been televised in the same way, thereby highlighting that he is making connections to events that don't necessarily deserve them within the context of the story. Setting Big Damn Hero immediately after the events of "The Message," however, spotlights another weakness. The events of the novel seem slightly redundant since, like "The Message" they focus on a not entirely pleasant reunion between Mal Reynolds and a former compatriot, although Toby Flynn was one of Reynolds's friends on Shadow before the Unification War and allows Lovegrove to explore a much younger and less sure of himself Reynolds.

At least two more novels in the Firefly universe are scheduled, The Magnificent Nine, also written by Lovegrove, and Generations, written by Tim Lebbon. With luck, most of the fan service hs been dealt with in this novel and future books won't make such consistent call-backs to the television show. Whether or not Lovegrove will capture the characters' voices better in The Magnificent Nine remains to be seen and Lebbon, of course, will chart his own course. The current novel manages to scratch the Firefly plot itch with characters who act like Whedon's creations even if they don't quite sound like them.

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