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Most of the dialog of the television series Firefly was written by Joss Whedon and Tim Minear.

Warning: Plot details follow.

Serenity[]

Mal: We've done the impossible, and that makes us mighty.

Mal: Did something just fly off my gorram ship?

Mal: We're not gonna die. We can't die, Bendis. You know why? Because we are so very pretty. We are just too pretty for God to let us die.

[Deleted scene, soldiers in Serenity valley, seeing med ships.]
Zoë: Whose colors are they flying? [...] Are we really getting out?
Mal: We are.
Zoë: [almost crying] Thank God.
Mal: God? Whose color is he flying?

[Wash, playing with plastic dinosaurs.]
Wash's Stegosaurus: Yes. Yes, this is a fertile land, and we will thrive. We will rule over all this land, and we will call it... "This Land.".
Wash's Allosaurus: I think we should call it "your grave!".
Stegosaurus: Ah, curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!
Allosaurus: Har har har! Mine is an evil laugh! Now die!
[The Allosaurus attacks the Stegosaurus.]
Stegosaurus: Oh, no, God! Oh, dear God in heaven!

Jayne: Any one you walk away from, right? Long as we got the goods, I call this a win.
Mal: Right. [sad look] We win.

Jayne:  Can you stop her from bein' so cheerful?
Mal: I don't believe there is a power in the verse that can stop Kaylee from being cheerful.

Wash: Sweetie, we're crooks. If everything were right, we'd be in jail.

Zoë: We still gotta drop the goods.
Wash: And when we do, we fly off to Boros rich and prosperous. Well, less poor.

Badger: Crime and politics, little girl: the situation is always... fluid.
Jayne: The only fluid I see here is the puddle of piss refusin' to pay us our wage.

Jayne: Ten percent of nothing is, let me do the math here, nothing into nothing, carry the nothin'...
Mal: Jayne, your mouth is talking. You might wanna look to that.

Mal: Been a long time since Patience shot me and that was due to a perfectly legitimate conflict of interest. I got no grudge.

Zoë: Now we have a boatful of citizens right on top of our... stolen cargo. That's a fun mix.
Mal: Ain't no way in the verse they could find that compartment, even [stops talking as a passenger walks past] Even if they were lookin' for it.
Zoë: Why not?
Mal: 'Cause... ?
Zoë: Oh yeah, this is gonna go great.
Mal: If anyone gets nosy, just, you know... shoot 'em.
Zoë: Shoot 'em?
Mal: Politely.

Book: Captain, you mind if I say grace?
Mal: Only if you say it out loud.

Book: The important thing is the spices. A man can live on packaged food from here ’til Judgment Day if he’s got enough rosemary.

Inara: So. Would you like to lecture me on the wickedness of my ways?
Book: No, I brought you supper. Although if you'd prefer a lecture, I've a few very catchy ones prepped. Sin and hellfire... one has lepers.
Inara: [smiling] I think I'll pass.

[Mal lowers his hands after realizing the lawman wants to arrest Simon, not him.]
Mal: Hey! Is there, is there a reward?

Wash: Can we maybe vote on the whole murdering people issue?

Mal: I've given Jayne here the job of finding out.
Jayne: [to Dobson, with a knife] He was non-specific as to how.
Mal: [softly to Jayne] Now you only gotta scare him.
Jayne: Pain is scary...!

Simon: What happens if they [Reavers] board us?
Zoë: If they take the ship they will rape us to death, eat our flesh, and sew our skins into their clothing, and if we're very, very lucky, they’ll do it in that order.

Jayne: Testing. Testing, Captain, can you hear me?
Mal: I'm standing right here.
Jayne: You're coming through good and loud.
Mal: 'Cause I'm standing right here.

Zoë: Don't think it's a good spot, sir. She still has the advantage over us.
Mal: Everyone always does. That's what makes us special.

Mal: Well, we may not have parted on the best of terms. I realize certain words were exchanged. Also, certain... bullets.

Mal: Well, you were right about this being a bad idea.
Zoë: Thanks for sayin', sir.

Mal: Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.

Wash [speaking about incoming Reaver ship] I guess they got hungry again...

Dobson: I'm not playing anymore. Anybody makes so much as a [Mal, entering the ship, shoots him in the head.]

[Wash, very calmly, is trying to evade a ship of brutal reavers.]
Wash: If everybody could just be quiet a moment...

Wash: I don't mean to alarm anybody, but I think we're being followed.

[After her husband Wash executes a brilliant escape from the reavers, Zoë turns to Mal.]
Zoë: Sir? I like you to take the helm, please. I need this man to tear all my clothes off.
Wash: Work, work, work...

Book: I've been out of the abbey two days, I've beaten a lawman senseless, I've fallen in with criminals. I watched the captain shoot the man I swore to protect. And I'm not even sure if I think he was wrong.

Mal: How come you didn't turn on me, Jayne?
Jayne: Money wasn't good enough.
Mal: What happens when it is?
Jayne: [smiling] Well... that'll be an interesting day.


Simon: Um, I’m trying to put this as delicately as I can… how do I know you won’t kill me in my sleep?
Mal: Listen, you don’t know me, son, so I’m gonna say this once: if I ever kill you, you’ll be awake, you’ll be facing me, and you’ll be armed.
Simon: Are you always this sentimental?
Mal: I had a good day.

Simon: You had the Alliance on you, criminals and savages… half the people on this ship have been shot or wounded, including yourself, and you’re harboring known fugitives.
Mal: We’re still flying.
Simon: That’s not much.
Mal: It’s enough.

Mal: I did a job and had nothing but trouble since I got it, not to mention more than a few unkind words with regard to my character. So let me make this abundantly clear: I do the job and then I get paid. Go run your little world.

The Train Job[]

Mal: Say that to my face.
Lund: I said, you're a coward, and a pisspot. Now what are you gonna do about it?
Mal: Nothin'. I just wanted you to face me so she could get behind ya.
[Zoë hits Lund with the butt of her rifle.]
Mal: Drunks are so cute.

Mal: This is why we lost, you know. Superior numbers.
Zoë: Thanks for the re-enactment, sir.

Zoë: Funny, sir, how you always seem to find yourself in an Alliance-friendly bar come U-Day, looking for a "quiet drink".
Mal: See, this is another sign of your tragic space dementia, all paranoid and crotchety.

Mal: It's nothin'.
Simon: I expect there's someone's face feels differently.
Mal: Well, they tell ya, never hit a man with a closed fist, but it is on occasion hilarious.

Mal: Well, what about you, Shepherd? How come you're flying about with us brigands? I mean, shouldn't you be off bringing religiosity to the Fuzzie-Wuzzies or some such?
Book: Oh, I got heathens aplenty right here.
Mal: If I'm your mission, Shepherd, best give it up. You're welcome on my boat. God ain't.

Inara: What did I say to you about barging into my shuttle?
Mal: That it was manly and impulsive?
Inara: Yes, precisely. Only the exact phrase I used was "don't".

Mal: Kaylee, what the hell's goin' on in the engine room? Were there monkeys? Some terrifying space monkeys maybe got loose?
Kaylee: I had to rewire the grav thrust because somebody won't replace that crappy compression coil.

Niska: You have reputation! Malcom Reynolds gets it done, is the talk.
Mal: Well, I'm glad to hear that.
Niska: You know what is reputation? Is people talking, is gossip. I also have reputation; not so pleasant, I think you know. Crow!
(Crow opens the door to show a tortured man hanging upside-down from the ceiling)
Niska: Now for you, my reputation is not from gossip. You see this man? Ehh, he does not do the job. I show you what I do with him, and now for you my reputation is fact. Is solid. You do the train job for me, then you are solid.

Mal: He's not the first psycho to hire us, nor the last. You think that's a commentary on us?

Zoë: Sir, is there some information we might maybe be lacking as to why there's an entire fedsquad sitting on this train?
Mal: Doesn't concern us.
Zoë: It kinda concerns me.

Zoë: Sir? I think you have a problem with your brain being missing.

Jayne: Time for some thrilling heroics.

Jayne: You know what the chain of command is? It's the chain I go get and beat you with until you understand who's in ruttin' command here.

Jayne: You've got the light.. from the console.. keep you, lift you up. They shine like... [he tries to catch the light in his hands] ...little angels... [the drugged Jayne falls down]
Wash: Did he just go crazy and fall asleep?

[Jayne is lying on the landing of the stairway.]
Kaylee: We tried to get him into the infirmary, he's just heavy.

Mal: Now this is all the money Niska gave us in advance. You bring it back to him, tell him the job didn't work out. [Crow spits.] We're not thieves — well, we are thieves. Point is we're not takin' what's his. Now we'll stay out of his way the best we can from here on in. You explain that that's best for everyone, okay?
Crow: Keep the money. Use it to buy a funeral. It doesn't matter where you go, or how far you fly. I will hunt you down, and the last thing you see will be my blade.
Mal: Darn. [Mal kills Crow by kicking him into the engine intakes. A second henchman of Niska is brought forward.] Now this is all the money Niska gave us in advance...
Henchman: Oh, I'm good. Best thing for everyone. I'm right there with you.

Bushwhacked[]

Zoë: Proximity alert. Must be coming up on something.
Wash: [alarmed] Oh my god. What can it be? We're all doomed! Who's flying this thing!? [deadpan] Oh right, that would be me. Back to work.

Jayne: Looked bigger when I couldn't see him.

Kaylee: [about bypassing a boobytrap] Sure. Yeah. I think so. 'Sides, if I mess up, not like you'll be able to yell at me.

Harken: And you love him? Zoë: I don't see how that's relevant. Harken: He is your husband. Zoë: Yes.

Harken: You fought with Captain Reynolds in the war?
Zoë: Fought with a lot of people in the war.
Harken: And your husband?
Zoë: Fight with him sometimes, too.
Harken: Is there any particular reason you don't wish to discuss your marriage?
Zoë: Don't see that it's any of your business, is all. We're very private people.
-- cut to:
Wash: [Zoë's husband] The legs. Oh yeah, definitely have to say it was her legs. You can put that down. Her legs, and where her legs meet her back. Actually, that whole area. That, and above it. [...] Have you seen what she wears? Forget about it. Have you ever been with a warrior woman?

Harken: Seems odd you'd name your ship after a battle you were on the wrong side of.
Mal: May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one.

Mal: That poor bastard you took off my ship. He looked right into the face of it. Was made to stare.
Harken: "It"?
Mal: The darkness. Kind of darkness you can't even imagine. Blacker than the space it moves through.
Harken: Very poetic.
Mal: They made him watch. He probably tried to turn away, and they wouldn't let him. You call him a survivor? He's not. A man comes up against that kind of will, the only way to deal with it, I suspect, is to become it.

Jayne: You saved his gorram life, he still takes the cargo.
Mal: He had to.... couldn't let us profit. Wouldn't be civilized.

Shindig[]

Mal: Persephone is not home. Too many people we need to avoid. Resupply, look for work, move along. We sniff the air, we don't kiss the dirt.
Zoë: Wasn't planning on the dirt-kissing, sir.
Wash: I wouldn't stand for it anyway, Captain, jealous man like me.

Zoë: Planet's coming up a mite fast.
Wash: That's just cause, I'm going down too quick. Likely crash and kill us all.
Mal: When that happens, let me know.

Mal: It's sounds like the finest party I can imagine getting paid to go to.
Inara: I don't suppose you'd find it up to standards of your outings. More conversation and somewhat less petty theft and getting hit with pool cues.

Wash: You want a slinky dress? I can buy you a slinky dress. Captain, can I have money for a slinky dress?
Jayne: I'll chip in.
Zoë: (to Jayne, smiling) I can hurt you.

Mal: [to Badger] You backed out of a deal last time. Left us hanging.
Jayne: Hurt our feelings.

Badger: The man's taken an irrational dislike to me.
Jayne: What happened? He see your face?

Badger: You think you're better than other people.
Mal: Just the ones I'm better than.

Badger: [talking about the party] 'Course you couldn't buy an invite with a diamond size of a testicle. But I got my hands on a couple.
[Mal and Jayne try to contain their laughter]
Badger: ...of invites! You want the meeting or not?

Mal: He wears a red sash crossways.
Kaylee: Why does he do that?
Mal: Maybe he won the Miss Persephone Pageant. Just help me look.
Kaylee: Is that him?
Mal: That's the buffet table...
Kaylee: Well how can we be sure, unless we question it?

Kaylee: Yessir, Captain Tight Pants.

Wash: Sleepiness is weakness of character. Ask anyone.

Wash: Here lies my beloved Zoë, my autumn flower, somewhat less attractive now she's all corpsified and gross...

Distinguished Old Man: Why, Banning Miller! What a vision you are in your fine dress. It must have taken a dozen slaves a dozen days to get you into that getup. 'Course, your daddy tells me it takes the space of a schoolboy's wink to get you out of it again.

Sir Warwick Harrow: I know him. And I think he's a psychotic low-life.
Mal: And I think calling him that is an insult to the psychotic low-life community.

Mal: My work's illegal, but at least it's honest.

Mal: And I never back down from a fight.
Inara: Yes, you do! You do all the time!

Simon: [talking about River] She's just a passenger.
Badger: Yeah? Why ain't she talking? She got a secret?
Simon: No, I'm sure not--
River: [mimicking Badger's accent perfectly] Sure, I got a secret. More'n one. Don't seem likely I'd tell 'em to you, do it? Anyone off Dyton Colony know's better'n to talk to strangers. You're talking loud enough for the both of us, though, ain't you? I've known a dozen like you. Skipped off home early, minor graft jobs here and there. Spent some time in the lock-down, I warrant, but less than you claim. Now you're what, petty thief with delusions standing? Sad little king of a sad little hill.
Badger: [smiling nervously] Nice to see someone from the old homestead.
River: Not really. [walks away, looks over her shoulder at Simon] Call me f'anyone interesting shows up.
Badger: I like her.

Mal: Mercy is the mark of a great man. [stabs Atherton] Guess I'm just a good man. [stabs Atherton again] Well, I'm all right. [throws sword to the side]

Mal: Mighty fine shindig.

Inara: Are you in pain?
Mal: Absolutely. I got stabbed, you know, right here. [lifting shirt]
Inara: [squeamish] I saw.
Mal: Don't care much for fancy parties. Too rough.
Inara: It wasn't entirely a disaster.
Mal: I got stabbed! Right here!

Safe[]

Young River: [playing behind a couch] We got outflanked by the independent squad, and we're never gonna make it back to our platoon. We need to resort to cannibalism.
Young Simon: That was fast. Don't we have rations or anything?

Young River: [About Simon's homework] That's wrong.
Young Simon: It's from the book, River.
Young River: No, the book is wrong. This whole conclusion is fallacious.

Gabriel Tam: I will not have it in my house. But since your mother's already ordered you one, I guess I should give up the fantasy that this is my house.

Mal: So, she's added cussing and hurling about of things to her repertoire. She really is a prodigy.
Simon: It's just a bad day.
Mal: No, a bad day is when someone's yellin' spooks the cattle. Understand? You ever see cattle stampede when they got no place to run? It's kind of like a... a meat grinder. And it'll lose us half the herd.
Simon: She hasn't gone anywhere near the cattle.
Mal: No, but in case you hadn't noticed, her voice kinda carries. We're two miles above ground and they can probably hear her down there. Soon as we unload, she can holler until our ears bleed. Although I would take it as a kindness if she didn't.
River: The human body can be drained of blood in 8.6 seconds given adequate vacuuming systems.
Mal: See, morbid and creepifying, I got no problem with, long as she does it quiet-like.

Jayne: [to Simon stepping in a cow pie] 'Bout time you broke in them pretty shoes.

Mal: [about cattle] You know... they walk just as fast if you lead 'em.
Jayne: I just like smackin' 'em.

Zoë: Next time we smuggle stock, let's make it something smaller.
Wash: Yeah, we should start dealing in those black-market beagles.

River: They weren't cows inside. They were waiting to be, but they forgot. Now they see the sky and they remember what they are.
Mal: Is it bad that what she said made perfect sense to me?

Simon: I'm very sorry if she tipped off anyone about your cunningly concealed herd of cows.

Inara: Does it seem every supply store on every border planet has the same five rag dolls and the same wood carvings of... what is this? A duck?
Kaylee: It's a swan. I like it.
Inara: You do?
Kaylee: [stroking swan] Looks like it was made with, you know, longing. Made by a person really longed to see a swan.
Inara: Perhaps they'd only heard of them by rough description.

Simon: It's fun, being forced to the ass-end of the galaxy. To get to live on a piece of lèsè [garbage] wreck. And to eat molded protein. And to be bullied around by our pien juh duh jiou chiao ren [stubborn disciplinarian] of a captain. It's fun.
Kaylee: [offended] Lèsè?

Mal: This is the last time. Last time with cows. Hear there was an idea regarding beagles? They have smallish droppings?
Zoë: I believe so, sir. Also, your disreputable men are here.
Mal: Better go take their money.

Book: That's... that's quite a lot of blood, isn't it?
Mal: Just means you ain't dead.
Book [a preacher]: Afraid I might be needing a preacher.
Mal: That's good. You lie there and be ironical.

River: We're lost... lost in the woods.

Zoë: Knew a man who had a hole clean through his whole shoulder, once. Used to keep a spare hankie in there.

Jayne: [faux-reading Simon's journal] "Dear Diary, Today I was pompous and my sister was crazy. [flips page] Today we were kidnapped by hill folk never to be seen again. It was the best day ever."

Zoë: Captain will come up with a plan.
Kaylee: That's good. Right?
Zoë: Possibly you're not recalling some of his previous plans.

Zoë: You sanguine about the kind of reception we're up to receive on an Alliance ship, Cap?
Mal: Absolutely. What's "sanguine" mean?
Zoë: "Sanguine." Hopeful. Plus, point of interest, it also means "bloody."
Mal: Well, that pretty much covers all the options, don't it?

Alliance commander: We aren't an emergency facility, Captain. Our services aren't available simply to anyone.
Book: Com... mander... my... ident card.
Alliance commander: [seeing who Book is] Get this man to the infirmary at once.

Doralee: A place like this might be good for your sister. Quiet. Safe. A place where folks take care of each other.
Simon: Mmm, yes, seems like a lovely little community of kidnappers.

Jayne: [in the Tohoku-class cruiser Magellan] This place gives me an uncomfortableness.

River: I get confused. I remember everything. I remember too much, and... some of its made up, and... some of it can't be quantified, and... there's secrets.

River: You gave up everything you had to find me. And you found me broken.

River: We won't be here long. Daddy will come and take us home. And I'll get better. I'll get better.

Simon: It's been a big day, what with the abduction and all.

Doralee: "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live!"

Simon: I'm sorry, Dad. You know I would never have tried to save River's life if I had known there was a dinner party at risk.

Book: I am a Shepherd. Folks like a man of God.
Mal: No, they don't. Men of God make everyone feel guilty and judged.

Simon: [standing on River's pyre]: Light it.

Mal: Appears we got here just in the nick of time. What does that make us?
Zoë: Big damn heroes, sir.
Mal: Ain't we just.

Patron: This is a holy cleansing. You cannot think to thwart God's will.
Mal: Y'all see the man hanging out of the spaceship with the really big gun? Now I'm not saying you weren't easy to find. It was kinda out of our way, and he didn't want to come in the first place. Man's lookin' to kill some folk. So really it's his will y'all should worry about thwarting. [to Simon] Gotta say, doctor, your talent for alienatin' folk is near miraculous.
Simon: Yes, I'm very proud.
Mal: [about River] Cut her down.
Patron: That girl is a witch.
Mal: Yeah, but she's our witch. [cocks gun] So cut her the hell down.

Mal: Well, you were busy trying to get yourself lit on fire. It happens.

Mal: So then the Shepherd says to the Companion, "Well, a good goat would do that."

Our Mrs. Reynolds[]

Jayne: I married me a powerful ugly creature.
Mal: [dressed as Jayne's wife to lure bandits] How can you say that? How can you shame me in front of new people?

Mal: You been bird-doggin' this township awhile now... folks 'round here wouldn't mind a corpse of you.

Mal: I swear by my pretty floral bonnet, I will end you.

Mal: Like woman, I am a mystery.

Jayne: All I got was that dumb stick that sounds like it is raining. How come you got a wife?

Mal: Someone ever tries to kill you, you try to kill 'em right back!

Book: If you take sexual advantage of her, you're going to burn in a very special level of hell. A level they reserve for child molesters and people who talk at the theater.

Zoë: Remember that sex we were planning to have, ever again?

Wash: Quaint!

Jayne: Six men came to kill me one time and the best of them carried this. It's a Callahan fullbore autolock, customized trigger and double cartridge thorough-gauge. (he holds it out to Mal) It's my very favorite gun.
Mal: She has a name.
Jayne: So does this! I call it Vera.

Mal: Well my days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle.

Mal: Whoa! Hey! Flesh...

Mal: (After "Saffron" quotes a passage about sex from her Bible) Whoa, good Bible.

Mal: It's been a while—a long damn while—since anybody but me took hold of my plow.

Mal: Oh, I'm going to the special hell.

Book: (pointedly to Mal) Well, isn't that special?

Wash: Some people juggle geese!

Wash: Oh do I wish I was somebody else right now. Somebody not... married, not... *madly* in love with a beautiful woman who can kill me with her pinkie!

Jayne: That's why I never kiss 'em on the mouth.

Mal: But she was naked! And all... articulate!

Wash: Okay! Everybody NOT talking about sex, in here. Everyone else, elsewhere!

Jayne: See, Vera? You dress yourself up, then you get taken out somewhere fun.

Saffron: Everybody plays each other that's all anybody ever does. We play parts.

Mal: ...That's 'cause I got people with me, people who trust each other, who do for each other and ain't always looking for the advantage.

Saffron: Promise me you're gonna kill me soon.

Jaynestown[]

Kaylee: Bye now. Have good sex.

Simon: All right. Fine. I'll go. Just... stop describing me.

Wash: (watching Simon play his role... poorly): Who is this diabolical master of disguise?

Simon: (After seeing a giant statue of Jayne in the middle of town) This must be what going mad feels like.

Mal: Jayne? Why is there a statue of you in the middle of this town square?

Jayne: Don't rightly know myself.

Jayne: Shake your head, boy. Your eyes are stuck.

Jayne: Instead of us hanging around playing art critic till I get pinched by the Man, how's about we move away from this eerie-ass piece of work and get on with our increasingly eerie-ass day?

River: Bible's broken.

Wash: We gotta go to the crappy town where I'm the hero!

Simon: I reattached a girl's leg. Her whole leg. She named her hamster after me. I got a hamster. He drops a box of money, he gets a town.

Kaylee: (Drunk) Hamsters is nice.

Simon: To Jayne! The box-dropping, man-ape-gone-wrong-thing.

River: Can't....Too much...Hair.
Zoe: River, honey? He's putting the hair away now.
River: It doesn't matter... it'll still be there... waiting.

River: They say the snow on the roof was too heavy. They say the ceiling will cave in. His brains are in terrible danger.

Jayne: The living legend needs eggs.

Mal: Let's go get our wayward babes.

Jayne: You think there's someone just going to drop money on you?! Money they could use?! Well there ain't people like that... There's just people like me.

River: Just keep walking, preacher-man.

Mal: It's my estimation that every man ever got a statue made of him was one kind of sumbitch or another.


Out of Gas[]

Mal: You are very much lacking in imagination.
Zoë: I imagine that's so, sir.

Mal: Try to see past what she is, on to what she can be.
Zoë: What's that, sir?
Mal: Freedom, is what.
Zoë: [pointing] No, I meant — what's that?
Mal: Oh. Just step around it. I think something must've been living in here.

Zoë: Get her running again?
Mal: Yeah.
Zoë: So not running now?
Mal: Not so much. But she will.

Wash: Monastic humor. I miss out on all the fun.

Jayne: Yeah, 'cos sick people are hi-larious.

River: [about Simon's birthday] "Day" is a vestigial mode of time measurement based on solar cycles. It's not applicable. [beat] I didn't get you anything.

Kaylee: [regarding Simon's cake] Come on, Doc. Give a good blow.

Bester: No can do, Cap. Secondary grav boot's shot.
Kaylee: No it ain't. [getting dressed] Ain't nothing wrong with your Grav boot. Grav boot's just fine. [turns around and waves] Hello!
Bester: [to Mal] She doesn't... and that's not what it... [to Kaylee:] No it ain't!
Kaylee: Sure it is. Grav boot ain't your trouble. I seen the trouble plain as day when I was down there on my back before. Your right Couple's bad.

Mal: I need that in Captain Dummy Talk.

Simon: Suffocation's not exactly the most dignified way to go. The human body will involuntarily --
Inara: [interrupting him] Please, I don't really require a clinical description right now.
Simon: I'm sorry. I just... [beat] It was my birthday.

Wash: I guess the news that we're all gonna be purple and bloated and fetal in a few hours has made me little snippy.

Wash: Right. Because teenage pranks are fun when you're about to die.

Mal: I'm not leaving Serenity.
Inara: Mal — you don't have to die alone.
Mal: Everybody dies alone.

Mal: Well. Looks can be deceiving.
Jayne: Not as deceiving as a low down dirty... deceiver.
Mal: Well said. Wasn't that well said, Zoë?
Zoë: Had a kind poetry to it, sir.

Jayne: You want I should shoot 'em now, Marco?
Marco: Wait until they tell us where they put the stuff.
Jayne: That's a good idea. A good idea. Tell us where the stuff's at so I can shoot ya.
Mal: Point of interest? Offering to shoot us, don't work so well as an incentive as you might imagine.

Mal: I mean, let's say you did kill us. Or didn't. There could be torture. Whatever.

Mal: Zoë, I'm paying you too much.

Mal: You all gonna be here when I wake up?

Ariel[]

Wash: Can I use companion as a verb?

Simon: (Concerning Jayne's eating habits) Could you not do that while we're... ever?

River: (after slashing Jayne with a kitchen knife) He looks better in red.

Mal: The patients were cynical and not responding and we couldn't bring them back.
Simon: Cyanotic.
Mal: Pupils were fixed and dilapidated —
Simon: Dilated.


Jayne: If I had wanted schooling, I'da gone to school.

Simon: For this to work, River and I will have to be dead.
Jayne: Huh. I'm starting to like this plan.

Mal: Look, you got a little stabbed the other day. That's bound to make anyone a mite ornery.

Jayne: (reffering to a currently comatose Simon) Maybe I'll give him a tattoo while he's out.

River: Your toes are in the sand.

Zoë: Can we fly somewhere with a beach?
Wash: Maybe a naked beach?
Zoë: Ooh.

Zoë: Sorry, sir. Didn't mean to enjoy the moment.

Jayne: You stop flapping that pretty mouth at me.

River: They took Christmas away. Came downstairs for the shiny presents, They took the tree, the stockings... nothing left but coal.
Jayne: (to Simon) would you shut her up?
River: (smiling at Jayne) Don't look in the closet, either! It's greedy, it's not in the spirit of the holiday.

Mal: Just once I'd like things to go according to the gorram plan.

River: Two by two. Hands of blue. Two by two.

Mal: Job is done. Figured it was time for a little chat. Seems to me we had a solid plan. "Smooth", you might say. But what I cant figure out is what you were doing around the back exit... you called the Feds.
Jayne: What?! I got pinched!
Mal: Which is what happens when you call the Feds.
Jayne: No! I would never do that! My hand to God! May he strike me down as I'm standing here!
Mal: Well, you won't be standing there long. The minute we break atmo, you'll be a lot thinner once you get sucked out that hole.
Jayne:Aw, come on, Mal! That ain't no way for a man to die. You wanna kill me, shoot me! Just let me in!
Mal: You know, I hear tell they used to keelhaul traitors back in the day. I don't have a keel to haul you on, so...
Jayne: O-Okay! I'm sorry, all right?
Mal: Sorry for what, Jayne? I thought you'd never do such a thing.
Jayne: The money was too good. I got stupid. I'm sorry, okay? Be reasonable. What are you taking it so personal for? It ain't like I ratted you out to the Feds.
Mal: Oh, but you did! You turn on any of my crew, you turn on me! But since that's a concept you can't seem to wrap your head around, then you got no place here. You did it to me, Jayne, and that's a fact.
Jayne: What are you going to tell the others?
Mal: About what?
Jayne: About why I'm dead?
Mal: I hadn't thought about it
Jayne: Make something up. Don't tell 'em what I did.
(Mal shuts the door.)
Mal: The next time you stab me in the back, have the guts to do it to my face.

River: Time to go to sleep.
Simon: No, mei-mei... it's time to wake up.

War Stories[]

Book: Yes, I'd forgotten you're moonlighting as a criminal mastermind now. Got your next heist planned?
Simon: No. But I'm thinking about growing a big black mustache. I'm a traditionalist.

Mal: Ah, the pitter-patter of tiny feet, in huge combat boots. SHUT UP!

[Kaylee triumphantly holds up the apple she wrested from a playful River.]
Kaylee: No power in the 'verse can stop me.

'[Zoë is telling the crew about a close trench conflict with the Alliance during the war.]
Zoë: We mentioned that we were out of rations, and 10 minutes later, a bunch of apples rained into the trench.
Wash: And they grew into a big tree, and they all climbed up the tree into a magical land with unicorns and a harp.

Wash: But these apples are healthsome, good.
Jayne: Grenades cost extra.

Zoë: Is there any way I'm gonna get out of this with honor and dignity?
Wash: You're pretty much down to ritual suicide, lambie-toes.

Wash: I am a large, semi-muscular man. I can take it.

[Simon asks River how she's doing.]
River: [smiles] Played with Kaylee. The sun came out, and… I walked on my feet, and… heard with my ears. [more raggedly] I ate the bits. The bits did stay down. And I work. I… function like I'm a girl. [sobbing] I hate it because I know it'll go away. The sun goes dark, and chaos is come again. It's fluids! What am I?!
Simon: You are my beautiful sister.
River: I-I threw up on your bed.
Simon: Yep. Definitely my sister.

[Repeated line, when Jayne spots Inara with her female client.]
Jayne: I'll be in my bunk.

Wash: I can't stand the thought of something happening that might cause you two to come back with another thrilling tale of bonding and adventure.

Wash: Hey, I've been in a firefight before! Well, I was in a fire. Actually, I was fired from a fry-cook opportunity.

Wash: Now I'm learning about scary.

Wash: I don't want you to spare me, Mal. If you think you know what's happening, then you tell me. You wouldn't spare Zoë if she were in this situation with you, would you? You would be planning, and plotting and... possibly scheming. So whatever Zoë would do in this instance is what I wanna do. Do you know why? No matter how ugly it gets, you two always come back with the stories. So... I'm Zoë. Now, what do I do?
Mal: Probably not talk quite so much.
Wash: Terse? I can be terse. Once in flight school, I was laconic.

Wash: I mean, I'm the one she swore to love, honor and obey.
Mal: Listen... She swore to obey?
Wash: No, but that's the point! You she obeys! She obeys you! There's obeying going on right under my nose!

Jayne: Could be he's harboring some resentment at us for putting his man through our engine.

Niska: I think this is not enough [money]... not enough for two, but sufficient perhaps for one? Ahhh, you now have...
Zoë: Him. (points to Wash)
(pause)
Zoë: ...I'm sorry, you were going to ask me to choose, right? Do you want to finish?

Niska: This money, it is too much. You should have some small refund.

Zoë: He'll make it last. For days, if he can.
Wash: Bastard's not gonna get days.

Zoë: We're gettin' him back.

Jayne: What'r we gonna do? Clone 'em? (Jayne looking at Mal's severed ear)

[regarding Mal's severed ear]
Simon: Well, it's a clean cut. With the right equipment, I should be able to reattach it. That's assuming there's a head.

Niska: Do you know the writings of Shan Yu?
Mal: We're starting a book club?

Wash: Grenades?
Zoë: Oh, yes. Thank you, dear.

Zoë: Preacher, don't the Bible have some pretty specific things to say about killing?
Book: Quite specific. It is, however, somewhat fuzzier on the subject of kneecaps.

Niska: You died, Mr. Reynolds.
Mal: Seemed like the thing to do.

Jayne: Smellin' a lot of "if" comin' off this plan.

Zoë: Okay, people... If it moves, shoot it.
Kaylee: Unless it's the Captain!
Zoë: Unless it's the Captain.

Mal: You want to meet the real me now?

[After River, facing away from her targets, plugs three men with three shots, she turns to Kaylee.]
River: No power in the verse can stop me.

Mal: Haven't you killed me enough for one day?

[The rescue team comes upon Mal struggling with his torturer; Zoë stops the others from interfering]
Zoë: This is something the Captain has to do for himself.
Mal: No! No, it's not!
Zoë: Oh.
[Zoë, Jayne and Wash shoot the torturer.]

Wash: Mmm. Wife soup. I must have done good.

[Mal tells Zoë about his and Wash's in-torture discussion about getting past Zoë's supposed unrequited passion for the Captain.]
Mal: I know it's a difficult mission, but you and I... have to get it on.
Zoë: I understand. We have no choice.
[Jayne arrives.]
Zoë: [deadpan] Take me, sir. Take me hard.
Jayne: Now something about that is just downright unsettlin'.
[As Zoë and Mal awkwardly move to kiss, Wash gets up and drags Zoë off.]
Wash: We'll be in our bunk.
Jayne: [slapping Mal on his recently injured chest].... Hey! Free soup!

Trash[]

Monty: Damn you, Bridgette! Damn you to Hades! You broke my heart in a million pieces! You made me love you, and then you... I SHAVED OFF MY BEARD FOR YOU, DEVIL-WOMAN!

Wash: I'm confused.
Saffron: You're asking yourself: "if I've got the security codes, why don't I go in and grab it for myself?".
Wash: No, actually, I was wondering... What's she doing on the ship?! Didn't she try to kill us?!
Saffron: Please, nobody died last time.
Wash: We're in space, how'd she get here?
Mal: She hitched.
Wash: I don't recall pulling over!
Mal: Point is, this ain't no wobbly-headed doll caper. This here's history.
Jayne: Okay, I've got a question. If she's got the security codes, why don't she just walk in and grab it herself?
Saffron:(Sarcastic) Good point.

Saffron: He's my husband.
Mal: Well, who in the damn galaxy ain't?!

River: Also, I can kill you with my brain.

The Message[]

Tracey: When you can't run anymore, you crawl... and when you can't do that --
Zoë: You find someone to carry you.

Simon: Yup, it's a cow fetus.
Kaylee: I guess so. It does seem to have an awful lot of limbs.
Simon: It's mutated.
Kaylee: But cow? How do you figure?
Simon: It's upside down.
Kaylee [turning head to view]: Oh yeah. Cow.

Wash: Oh my god, it's grotesque! Oh, and there's something in a jar.
Zoë: Scared her away again, did you?
Simon: This may come as a shock, but I'm actually not very good at talking to girls.
Zoë: Why, is there someone you are good at talking to?
Wash: [to jar with cow fetus, mock-serious] Do not fear me. Ours is a peaceful race, and we must live in harmony...

River: [trying to eat an 'Ice Planet' frozen treat] My food is problematic.
Jayne: Girl's a mind-readin' genius, can't even figure out how to eat an Ice Planet.

Jayne: I got post?
Book: Might we all want to step a few paces back before he opens that?
Jayne: Ha ha. It's from my mother.

Inara: So, do aliens live among us?
Kaylee: Yeah. One of them's a doctor.

Jayne: [wearing ugly homemade hat] How's it sit? Pretty cunning, don't you think?
Kaylee: I think it's the sweetest hat ever.
Wash: A man walks down the street in that hat, people know he's not afraid of anything.
Jayne: Damn straight.

Jayne: What'd y'all order a dead guy for?

Tracey: Thanks. Didn't know you were out there.
Zoë: That's sort of the point. Stealth, you may have heard of it.
Tracey: I don't think they covered that in basic.
Zoë: Well, at least they covered 'Dropping your weapon so you can eat beans and get yourself shot'.
Tracey: Yeah, I got a badge in that. [seriously] Won't happen again.
Zoë: It does, I'm just gonna watch.

Mal: Oh! That was bracing. They don't like it when you shoot at them. I worked that out myself.

Mal: Vitelli's out of it. That bumblebee laid down arms at the first sign of inevitable crushing defeat, can you imagine such a cowardly creature?

Jayne: We're taking him on board?
Mal: We are.
Jayne: Don't know if I see the percentage in that.
Mal: Don't strain your brain trying. You might break something.

Tracey: [recorded message] Uh, okay. Uh, recording. Hi, I guess. This is a message for Zoë, and for Malcolm Reynolds. And I really hope you all are the ones listening to it. I'll spare you the boring details. I've fallen in with untrustworthy folk. Makin' a bunch of bad calls. All that matters is I expect to be shuffled off. And you two are the only people I trust to get me where I'm going, which is home. I'd like my body to be with my folks on St. Albans. We got the family plot there, and my Mom and Dad, well, they deserve to know I died. You know, it's funny. We went to the war never lookin' to come back, but it's the real world I couldn't survive. You two carried me through that war. Now I need you to carry me just a little bit further, if you can. Tell my folks I wanted to do right by them and that I'm at peace, and all. When you can't run anymore, you crawl, and when you can't do that, well—Yeah, you know the rest. Thanks, both of you. Oh, yeah, and make sure my eyes is closed, will ya?

[gathered around the table, laughing]
Mal: I thought I was gonna die.
Inara: How could he possibly--
Mal: Oh, the colonel was dead drunk. Three hours pissin' on about the enlisted men, 'they're scum, they're not fighters', and then he passed right out. Boom.
Zoë: We couldn't even move him. So Tracey just snipped it right off his face.
Mal: And you've never seen a man more proud of his moustache than Colonel Obrin. I mean, in all my life I will never love a woman the way this officer loved that lip ferret.
Zoë: Big walrus-y thing—all waxed up!
Inara: Did he find out?
Mal: Oh! Next mornin', he wakes up, it's gone and he is furious! But he can't just say, you know, 'someone stole my moustache!' So he calls us together, all the platoons...
Zoë: We thought he was gonna shoot us!
Mal: ...and, oh he's eye-ballin' all the men somethin' fierce. Not a word. And he comes up to Tracey, and Tracey's wearing the gorram thing on his face!
Zoë: He had glued it on!
Mal: He's starin' the old man down wearing his own damn moustache!

Jayne: Spry for a dead fella!

Mal: All right. You wanna explain to me why you got yourself all corpsified and mailed to me?

Mal: So, your innards ain't your innards?

Bad Guy: That hat makes you look like an idiot.

Heart of Gold[]

Inara: Hi.
Mal: BWAA!
Inara: Sorry. I didn't mean to startle.
Mal: You didn't. I was just, uh — BWAAA! That's more like a... It's a warrior like... Strikes fear into the hearts of...

Mal: You know, not altogether wise, sneaking up on a fella when he's handling his weapon.
Inara: I'm sure I've heard that said.

Inara: Any well-bred petty crook knows that the small, concealable weapons go to the far left of the place setting.

Mal: [to Inara] This distress wouldn't happen to be happening in someone's pants, would it?

Inara: It sounds like something this crew can handle. I can't guarantee they'll handle it particularly well, but --
Nandi: If they got guns, and brains at all --
Inara: They've got guns.

Inara: I suppose you heard most of that?
Mal: Only because I was eavesdropping.

Jayne: Don't much see the benefit in getting involved in strangers' troubles without an upfront price negotiated.
Book: These people need assistance. The benefit wouldn't necessarily be for you.
Jayne: S'what I'm sayin'

Jayne: 'Cause I don't know these folks. Don't much care to.
Mal: They're whores.
Jayne: I'm in.

Mal: Well, any friend of Inara's is a strictly businesslike relationship of mine.

Mal: I'll introduce you to the rest later. They're good folk.
Jayne: Can I start getting sexed already?
Mal: Well, that one's kind of horrific.

Wash: You'd really lie with someone being paid for it?
Kaylee: Well, it's not like anyone else is lining up to, you know, examine me...

Jayne: Oh, my John Thomas is gonna pop off and fly around the room, there's so much tasty here.
Wash: Would be you get your most poetical about your pecker.

Kaylee: Wash, tell me I'm pretty...
Wash: Were I unwed, I would take you in a manly fashion.
Kaylee: 'Cause I'm pretty?
Wash: 'Cause you're pretty.

Mal: Inara, think you could stoop to being on my arm?
Inara: Will you wash it first?

Mal: Nothing worse than a monster who thinks he's right with God.

Nandi: It's who I am. And it's my home. I'm not going anywhere.

Mal: Well, lady, I must say — You're my kinda stupid.

Zoë: I don't give a good gorram about relevant, Wash. Or objective. And I ain't so afraid of losing something that I ain't gonna try to have it. You and I would make one beautiful baby. And I want to meet that child one day. Period.

Mal: Well, we're an odd conglomeration. Got a preacher, a married fellah, and the doctor... well he'd have to relax for thirty seconds to get his play, and that'd be more or less a miracle.

Inara: How many babies have you actually delivered?
Simon: As the primary? This would be the first. You?
Inara: My first too.
River: Mine too.

Mal: Miss Nandi, I have a confession to make.
Nandi: Maybe I should get the Shepherd.
Mal: Well, I ain't sinned yet, and I'd feel a little more than awkward having him here when I did.

Nandi: Malcolm, I been waiting for you to kiss me since I showed you my guns.

Nandi: You okay with this?
Mal: [after kissing her] I'm just waiting to see if I pass out. Long story.

Inara: So you took to bed with Nandi. I'm glad.
Mal: Glad?
Inara: Yes! She's a dear friend, and probably in need of some comfort about now.
Mal: So you're okay. Well, yeah. Why wouldn't you be?
Inara: I wouldn't say I'm entirely okay. I'm a little appalled at her taste. (A moment later Inara is seen curled up and crying in her room.)

Kaylee: Captain seem a little funny to you at breakfast this morning?
Wash: Come on, Kaylee. We all know I'm the funny one.

Jayne: Whoa now, girl, that's just plain dirty...
Mal: Jayne, you aware your radio's transmittin'? Cause I ain't feelin' particular girlish or dirty at the moment.

Jayne: Mal! Looks like we got some imminent violence!

Petaline: Rance... this is Jonah. Jonah, say hi to your daddy. [Petaline shoots Rance] Say goodbye to your daddy, Jonah.

Objects in Space[]

River: Just an object. It doesn't mean what you think...

Mal: Fully loaded, safety off. This here is a recipe for unpleasantness, does she understand that?
River: She understands, she doesn't comprehend.
Mal: Well I'm glad we've made that distinction. No touching guns!

Jayne: Well, I don't like the idea of someone hearing what I'm thinking.
Inara: [rolls her eyes] No one likes the idea of hearing what you're thinking.

Jayne: Are you saying she's a witch?
Wash: Yes Jayne, she's a witch. She has had congress with the beast.
Jayne: She's in congress?
Wash: How'd your brain even learn human speech. [smiling] I'm just so curious.
[While Jayne shoves a tin box to Wash]

Jayne: Yeah, and if wishes were horses we'd all be eatin' steak!

Simon: Are you Alliance?
Jubal Early: Am I a lion?
Simon: What?
Early: I don't think of myself as a lion. You might as well though, I have a mighty roar.
Simon: I said "Alliance."
Early: Oh, I thought...
Simon: No, I was...
Early: That's weird.

Simon: So you're a bounty hunter.
Early: No, that ain't it at all.
Simon: Then what are you?
Early: I'm a bounty hunter.

Simon: My sister's a ship...We had a complicated childhood.

Jubal Early: You oughta be shot, or stabbed, lose a leg... to be a surgeon. You know? Know the kind of pain you're dealing with. They make Psychiatrists get psychoanalyzed before they can get certified, but they don't make surgeons get cut on. That seem right to you?

Jubal Early: You aren't in my gorram mind, you're in my gorram ship! [After realizing that River was in his ship.]

River: Permission to come aboard?
Mal: You know, you ain't quite right.
River: [Laughing] That's a popular theory.
Mal: [Smiling] Go on get in there. Give your brother a trashing for ruining your plan.
River: [Sighing] He takes so much looking after.

Jubal Early: Well, here I am... [while floating in space]


This page uses material from the Wikiquote page Firefly.
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