Reaver culture and American football by gohm

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Reaver culture and American football

POSTED BY: GOHM
UPDATED: Monday, November 20, 2006 21:27
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Monday, November 20, 2006 6:25 AM

I was thinking about the Reavers...

The only time we actually see the Reavers is in the BDM, and then they're utterly bonkers. Not only are they not the prettiest of boys (all we see are males), not only do we not hear them speak (we hear growling and screaming), but they're also more than a little thick. The Reavers eagerly run into gunfire, and later fight River hand-to-hand (plus, sword-to-head) tactics instead of just shooting her. In short, they seem like armed, rabid dogs.

However, we've seen them operate spaceship, navigate between planets, use ingenious weaponry, etc. In 'Bushwacked', the Reavers set up a very clever trap that no doubt required some creative engineering. And, of course, they need to have some social structure to co-exist on spaceships between raids.

So, how we reconcile our Reaver dichotomy? Perhaps they can operate like a really angry American football team (brutal, hyper macho, yet organized) most of the time. Like a football team, perhaps Reaver culture glorifies strength, cunning and disregard for pain. To those unfamilar with the sport, it'll appear brutal and barbaric at first viewing. For those well versed in the sport's strategies, it's extraordinarily complex.

I've read interviews with football players in which they speak of the practices and training before a game as something to be tolerated to reach the violent release of the game on Sunday. Maybe the Reavers spend their week cutting themselves, sharpening their teeth and patching together their ships just enough so they can have the opportunity for their barbarism on the weekend.

I shudder to think of Reaver cheerleaders.

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Monday, November 20, 2006 6:41 AM

DONCOAT

Interesting analogy.

Various fans have offered explanations of the Reaver paradox. Perhaps the vampire model is appropriate. We don't see vampires sucking each others' blood, do we?

Maybe the Pax causes some biological need for non-Reaver flesh that must be satisfied from time to time, and that leads to a feeding frenzy. Between smorgasbords, the Reavers can deal with each other in a relatively sane fashion.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I'm pointin' right at it!

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Monday, November 20, 2006 7:29 AM

PIRATECAT

Don't bad mouth American Football Frenchie. It is called the NFL. Its a privilage to grow up here part of our culture is boy scouts and football a way life. Then we grow up to join Patton's Third Army to knock the snot out of hitler youth. We are 10 and 1 in the history polls. Reavers and muslims you might have a dog gone point. Why don't you go put gravy on your fries uhhh. On the day of Monday Night Football are ya ready.

I like smacken em.

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Monday, November 20, 2006 7:32 AM

CRUITHNE3753

Quote:
Originally posted by gohm:I shudder to think of Reaver cheerleaders.

...gyrating about to the strains of "Living Dead Girl" by Rob Zombie...

...Actually, "The (insert town/city name here) Reavers" would make a good name for an American football team... just trying to imagine the looks on the opposing teams faces as they go out onto the field...

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Monday, November 20, 2006 7:50 AM

DESKTOPHIPPIE

Reaver cheerleaders...

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Monday, November 20, 2006 8:50 AM

RABBIT2

For some time now I`ve had the suspicion that there was a huge untold story about Reaver background.
The Pax and Miranda were I think, probably a simplification Joss came up with for the BDM rather than something that was around from the beginning, at least in the form they appear in the screenplay.
What little we learned about them from Firefly was most likely intended to be of the `what everybody knows` variety rather than accurate information. Laying the groundwork for more elaborate Reaver plotlines later.
Sadly, I doubt we will ever find out for sure.

--------------------------------------------------

Flight Instructor: Son, know what the first rule of flying is?
Me: Don`t crash?

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Monday, November 20, 2006 9:13 AM

PIRATECAT

Ever heard of chem trails.

I mean anyone we can't spare.

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Monday, November 20, 2006 9:46 AM

CRUITHNE3753

Quote:
Originally posted by Rabbit2:
The Pax and Miranda were I think, probably a simplification Joss came up with for the BDM rather than something that was around from the beginning, at least in the form they appear in the screenplay.

One thing that bugs me... Why did they test the Pax on the whole population? Surely you'd want to test it in the laboratory first...

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Monday, November 20, 2006 9:56 AM

PIRATECAT

Miranda was the lab. Furthest planet on the rim. Had a void of space between it and other rim planets. Way away from the border and core. Perfect, kinda like New Mexico. Why go there. Elitist run the alliance absolute power corrupts ablsolutely. Sorta like Mickey Dees and Coke. Pizza Hut and Pepsi. They all crushed Burger Chef awesome 70's chain.

Jayne were robbing the place not occupying it.

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Monday, November 20, 2006 11:06 AM

CAVALIER

Quote:
Originally posted by Cruithne3753:

One thing that bugs me... Why did they test the Pax on the whole population? Surely you'd want to test it in the laboratory first...

Good question. Maybe they did and had no problems. It's just when they scaled things up and had 20 million pax-dosed people interacting with each other that problems showed up.

Not sure how that would work, but it's the best explaination I could think of.

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Monday, November 20, 2006 11:16 AM

REDLAVA

I kind of look at the Reavers as being, if you forgive me for the Star Trek reference, kind of like Klingons. Just more crazy. They are seen as violent, warlike and lacking in many social skills.

Or perhaps like a pack of wild dogs. They won't turn on each other while there is an abundance of food and supplies from the raiding parties they send out. I am sure their are cases of packs turning on each other or on other packs aspecially if their terriroty is tresspassed on or food and supplies are low.

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Monday, November 20, 2006 11:22 AM

DESKTOPHIPPIE

Plus serial killers capable of the most obscene violence are still often clever enough to mask their trails. At least for a while. And they can certainly drive or operate machienery while cruising for victims. I guess Reavers could have the excessively violent / serial killer part of their brain in overdrive. After all, they seem to go for sadistic pleasure (eating people alive, torture, that kind of stuff) rather than just random violence.

That's a scary thought... were the Reavers potential serial killers that reacted to the Pax? Would that be about a tenth of a percent of a population?

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Monday, November 20, 2006 11:40 AM

GOHM

That's a scary thought... were the Reavers potential serial killers that reacted to the Pax? Would that be about a tenth of a percent of a population?

[/
B]

That's an interesting take on the Pax...that it just brought the absolute worst in one out of every thousand people.

One of the many, many bad things about the Firefly being cancelled so early is that Joss didn't have the opportunity to more fully delve into the Reavers.

I thought it could have been a fun twist if the Alliance had purposefully created the Reavers, so that they could fight the Independents.

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Monday, November 20, 2006 11:43 AM

DESKTOPHIPPIE

I don't know about making the Reavers on purpose, but I've often wondered if they used the same technology (in a more controlled way) to create River.

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Monday, November 20, 2006 9:27 PM

RABBIT2

Quote:
After all, they seem to go for sadistic pleasure (eating people alive, torture, that kind of stuff) rather than just random violence.

One idea I`ve not seen mentioned before is the possibility that the Reavers deliberately leave evidence that they do this to itimidate people and cover up what they actually do in their raids.

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Flight Instructor: Son, know what the first rule of flying is?
Me: Don`t crash?

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