jedibuttercup

Perhaps you should read further until the Muse has channeled and written Inara.

Bushwacked is about the only ep that somehow got skipped over in our latest watching of Firefly on Sci Fi and DVD, would really like to see it again.

As for the Mal darkness. I've done a little research on the Civi War, for another fandom I was in which has turned into a historical novel idea I may never write. But as Firefly and the Unification war is clearly based on the Civil War and the West it makes sense that that's what I think of in reference to Mal, Zoe and the war. More so than WW II or other modern wars, the Civil War was largely fought by common people with little training or previous experience in dealing with the horrors of war, and this lead to them doing rather gruesome things. Add to that the fact that the technology to kill had greatly increased without the medical technology to heal made it a very heavy casuality war.

As for why Mal (and Zoe for that fact) have been able to look at the horror of war and come out sane and generally balanced... In Mal's case I like to think it's because of the good and unbreakable qualities he has, and that they shine through enough for him to have compartmentalized the horror he's seen, or done. What exactly he'd have been right after the war though is a damned good question. Although, from "Message" and the pilot, I see Mal as one who really truly believed in the indepence cause and even in their victory, perhaps up until Serenity Valley and his surrender. That I think, having that faith that may have kept him sane and somewhat human during the war, crushed, would have been the harder wound to heal from. Why he's so against God and such faith.