Synopsis

Simon uses his med-kit for a quick run-down on black-market pharmaceutics. His plan -- break into the Alliance hospital in Ariel City, and empty their medvault, using Simon's knowledge of hospitals. In the process, Simon gets access to a 3-D neuroimager in the diagnostic ward. The government facility will be immediately restocked, the drugs go out to the Rim, Serenity's crew makes a ton of cash, and Simon might get the information he needs to diagnose and treat River. The gang swings into action in a plan designed to get around the substation of Federals based in the hospital. The problem is only getting in -- once inside, they can move around freely. As Simon details the plan, Kaylee and Wash hit the hospital's contract junkyard to rebuild an ambulance; Jayne buys the paramedic uniforms, ID badges and key cards, as Simon drills Mal, Zoe and Jayne in their unaccustomed roles as paramedics. Everything's finally ready, but Simon has to talk River into the hard part -- they'll both be put into medical comas, playing dead to enter the hospital. River gets extremely upset at the idea; Simon manages to reassure her into going along, so he'll be able to help her, but she's crying when he does the injection.

The ambulance lands as planned, Wash staying behind to fly the getaway. Jayne promises to hold up his end of Simon's plan; as long as he gets paid, he's happy. The trio debarks with their 'bodybags' and the entrance doesn't even require the use of their well-rehearsed lines (although Jayne delivers his anyway); the nurse sends them straight to he morgue. Mal injects the stimulants, and Jayne waits there for Simon and River to wake while Mal and Zoe head for the med vault. But as soon as they're out of sight, Jayne leaves the morgue to find a communications terminal -- to contact the Fed he's been talking to, and tell him where Simon and River will be waiting. The Fed assures him his reward is waiting.

Jayne returns to the morgue in time to see River and Simon wake up. They're both in bad shape from the drugs, but functional. Mal and Zoe get cut off on their trip by an officious doctor who has too many questions, as Jayne and Simon (in doctor scrubs) wheel River in a wheelchair through the recovery ward. They run into their own problems when River points out a man who's going to die; he goes into cardiac arrest a moment later. River insists that his doctor is killing him and Simon has to help him; after a brutal moment of indecision, Simon leaves them to race to the patient. He manages to resuscitate and stabilize the patient, and berates the young doctor who carelessly gave him the wrong medication before hauling ass out of the ward as Jayne watches, open-mouthed. The officious doctor asks too many questions and Zoe stuns him from behind as Simon gets River to the diagnostic ward. The access badges don't work, but Zoe and Mal steal the one from the doctor they zapped, and get into the med vault anyway. While Simon begins running the tests, they clear the place out.

As the computer records the readings, the neuroimager shows that River has been operated on several times, the surgeons cutting into the part of her brain that regulates emotional control -- it's not there anymore. Jayne tells Simon to get moving; he says the plan changed and they have to be at the back entrance in five minutes. Simon balks, but goes along -- as River's brain scan flares up, all areas suddenly going active. She starts screaming and freaking about "they come when you call"; Simon gets her calm enough to move, but Jayne is getting really uneasy about what River's yelling. They head directly for the back entrance, River telling Simon that she doesn't want to go back; as they walk through the door, Federal marshals appear from all sides, placing them under arrest.

Everyone gets cuffed, including Jayne; the marshal he was talking to, McGinnis, informs him that he plans on getting a nice reward for bringing in the fugitives and their accomplice. Jayne tries to fight his way free, but gets knocked out by a sun blast from one of the guns. Mal and Zoe arrive back on time with their hauls to find the other three still missing. They're in the Fed substation being processed, and Jayne's guilt trip begins as Simon thanks him for fighting back. River babbles about them taking Christmas, and Jayne is freaked enough to tell her to shut up. Mal gets serious about finding the strays, and Kaylee picks up chatter from the Feds. Mal and Zoe head back inside. McGinnis starts to move his prisoners, and Simon faces him down until McGinnis tells him they're being taken to a holding center for someone else to retrieve.

As soon as they're through the doors, Jayne makes his move; even with hands restrained, he and Simon manage to disable/kill both of their guards. Mal and Zoe race through the hospital, and Wash tells them to hurry -- reinforcements just arrived. Jayne frees Simon and River; armed with the guards weapons, they start out. Jayne wants to go they way they came, but River is freaking again. "They're here," she sobs, as McGinnis greets his visitors -- two men in suits with blue gloves whom we've met before. McGinnis makes the mistake of admitting he and his men spoke to the prisoners; the Gentlemen (to steal Lizbet's moniker) withdraw an odd cylindrical device, which starts humming loudly. A minute later, bleeding from the nose, mouth and eyes, McGinnis and everyone else in the room collapse in pools of red.

The three fugitives can hear the screams of the dying Feds, as the Gentlemen step over their bodies. River is completely gone, and takes off running in the opposite direction. Jayne and Simon follow, the Gentlemen close on their backs -- stopping to kill the guard Simon left alive. His screams spur them faster after River, who seems to know where she's going. She leads them to a back door, but Jayne's gun misfires and he can't break through the lock. The Gentlemen get closer and closer as Jayne battles the door -- and a shotgun blast comes from the other side. The door blows open to reveal Mal and Zoe; the Gentlemen arrive to find their prisoners gone. Inara arrives back on Serenity just ahead of the others, who got away clean. Mal is in high spirits from the successful mission (they got away with the goods and Simon got his information), and Simon is full of praise for Jayne's 'daring rescue', thanking him profusely for his efforts. Mal sends everyone out, keeping Jayne to help with the cargo. But as Jayne starts unloading, Mal swings a wrench square into his jaw.

As Serenity lifts, Jayne wakes in an airlock, a radio next to his hand. Seems Mal figured out what really happened on the planet -- a traitor was the only way the Feds would have been waiting at the back exit. He opens the airlock door partially; they're still in atmosphere, but not for much longer. Jayne tries denial, then justification -- it's not like he did it to Mal. Mal informs him that he betrayed Mal's crew, which is the same thing as betraying Mal. Mal starts to walk away, but Jayne asks him not to tell the others what really happened -- what he did. Mal thinks -- then slowly walks back and closes the outer hatch. "Next time you decide to stab me in the back, have the guts to do it to my face," Mal warns, and leaves Jayne in the airlock to contemplate his sins. In her quarters, River draws an intricate series of Russian dolls as Simon comes in. He's got another injection, and River is resigned to going to sleep again. "No, mei mei," Simon tells her gently. "It's time to wake up." He carefully injects her with his cure.

Perri's Review

Continuity:
The experimentations done on River at the Academy included multiple brain surgery's, cutting away the part of her brain that allows her to consciously regulate her emotions. Simon believes he can come up with a chemical cure.

The blue-gloved Alliance goons (from now on referred to as the Gentlemen) continue to pursue River (and, evidently, Simon) with dogged determination -- and are equally determined to kill anyone who's had contact with them, which doesn't bode well for Serenity's crew.

River's psychic powers are becoming more and more obvious (even showing up on her brain scans), yet no one is commenting. Wow.

Companions have to have an annual physical exam on a Core world.

Jayne turned Simon and River in to the Feds, but helped them escape when his double-cross turned into a triple-cross. Only Mal (and possibly River) know.

Relationships:
Simon is certainly feeling a lot more charitable towards Jayne than he was before the 'daring escape'. That'll last until he finds out what Jayne tried.

Characters:
I was mildly spoiled on this ep by TV Guide, which mentioned a traitor on Serenity's crew. Sadly, there wasn't a single doubt in my mind who that traitor would turn out to be, and I was right. For the first five minutes after he called the Feds, I was all in favor of spacing him; I would have cheered when the Fed cuffed him, except I was too busy rolling my eyes so hard they almost fell out. But Jayne himself admits what happened -- the money, combined with frustration at River's presence, made him extremely stupid. Now, I don't blame him for being pissed at River; getting slashed in the chest will ruin your whole day (not wild about the way he backhanded her, though....) -- but I still wanted him spaced.

But then we got to watch the ramifications sink in, got to watch him realize just what exactly River and Simon were running from. I won't say he felt sympathy, or even understanding -- I honestly don't think Jayne's got even a drop of empathy in him. But something registered on a 'that's just wrong' level, enough for him to take the other two with him when he escaped (which I didn't think he was going to do for a second). Part of him knows what he did was wrong, or he wouldn't have asked Mal not to tell the others. Guilty? Some, I think -- he was massively uncomfortable with Simon's effusive thanks. But definitely aware of wrongdoing, and that awareness just might keep him from doing it again. I don't know if Mal actually believes that, or just couldn't bring himself to kill a member of his crew when that crew member showed any remorse, but I can bet he'll be keeping a close eye on Jayne. Personally, I'm waiting to see how Jayne himself is going to react to this? Will he just go back to normal? Smart money bets that way, although there's a fair chance -- depending on the actual level of guilt and remorse, plus the latent respect he seemed to be developing for Simon over the course of the caper -- that he'll turn into one of the Tam siblings' most obsessive protectors. I don't actually expect that, but it'd be interesting.

Mal's determination to take care of his crew is moving out of the range of loyalty/responsibility and into the range of Massive Issue. Not hard to figure out where it's coming from, given everything we know about the Battle of Serenity (Valley? Hill? Can't remember...) -- all of his soldiers, everyone he was responsible for, wiped out. So he's obsessive about the people he has responsibility for now. He's more intense about it with some (Zoe, Inara, Kaylee) than others, but they are his crew. Period. Even when River is a proven threat, he doesn't kick her off-ship; that's some serious dedication to an ideal. And woe betide anyone who messes with his crew... I've admired Mal's rather ruthless pragmatism since Bushwacked, when he threw the guy in the engine -- good to see it's still there. He really was three seconds away from spacing Jayne -- one of his crew. Never piss this man off.

So, now we know what the foundation of River's problem is -- well, one of them. But what was the Academy trying to accomplish? Some kind of open psychic receiver with no ability to shut itself off is my personal theory, but I try not to think too much like sociopathic surgeons if I can help it. I do wonder what Simon thought when he was studying those records -- the machine certainly seems like it should have caught the way her brain lit up when Jayne started lying. And, question: when River went after Jayne with the knife -- was she just insane, or was she going after him for something he hadn't done yet. Short-range precognition has been established, along with some kind of telepathy and/or clairvoyance, judging by how well she was finding her way when they booked it out of the hospital. Just how far into the future can she see? I really hope Simon's cure works; I'd love for River to be able to actually talk about what's happening inside her head. In ways people other than River can understand.

Simon continues to prove that he's a doctor at some bone-deep level; in the middle of a massive caper, he stops to save someone's life. That's going to get him into trouble someday.... But he certainly learned a lot when he was breaking River out of the Academy, didn't he? Planning a break-in, acquiring black-market uniforms, breaking through security -- Mal's right, there's a great criminal mind in there. Serenity's crew has been a bad influence on him, obviously, but there also seems to be some native talent. But the doctor and the big brother will probably choke most of it off, which could be all that's saving the universe. < snerk >

Not a great episode for the chicks (other than River); Kaylee continues to be far too cheerful about criminal activities, but it's fun. Zoe really needs to have more to do than swapping the straight-man role back and forth with Mal. She's always wonderful whatever she's doing, but she never gets to do much of anything (although zapping the doctor was great). :( Massive waste of a fabulous actress. Wash gets his usual couple of great lines, but also continues to be underused. And practically no Inara. :(

Best Moments:
The planet-side landing had some seriously cool visuals -- I loved our first real look at a Core world. And I loved Inara's planet-side wardrobe; she continues to have the best clothes.

The horseshoes in the cargo bay were fun; I love seeing how the crew passes time when they're not robbing people or getting shot at.

The entire sequence of explaining the job at the same time they're doing the prep work was wonderfully done -- it condensed a lot of action and exposition into one tight, funny, fast-moving act, leaving lots of time for the caper itself.

Simon drilling Mal, Zoe and Jayne on their parts was just hysterical; they were all so intent and focused and utterly out of their depth. Kaylee in the junkyard was fun, too, but I kept having the most insane "Junkyard Wars" flashes.

Simon talking River into the injections. Sean Maher got another really good episode here and he ran with it; the interactions between him and Summer Glau continue to be sweet and heartbreaking.

Jayne delivering his line even when he didn't need to. He's worked so hard for it, he was gonna do it! < snicker >

Simon saving the patient in the hospital. He's so cool.

Mal consulting the list of meds inked on his wrist. < snicker > Utterly classic.

The neuroimager was an intensely cool effect, especially the way Simon made the manual adjustments. Gorgeous CGI, and Sean Maher really sold it.

The Gentlemen killing everyone. Very, very disturbing, and the ensuing chase scene was even more so. Lizbet's right -- you just can't help having flashbacks to the Buffy episode "Hush," which makes it all that much worse. Can't kill these guys by screaming, I don't think.

The return to the ship was a fun scene, with Kaylee's cheerful recap to Inara, and Mal hugging her, and everyone being happy to be home. And then, suddenly, Mal's hitting Jayne with a wrench and the shock is incredible. Very nice writing and directing job.

The airlock scene. I repeat, never piss Mal off. But even I was feeling sympathy for Jayne by the time he asked Mal not to tell anyone. Lovely performance throughout by Adam Baldwin.

Questions and Comments:
Mostly asked and discussed during the review, although I remain curious as to when the hell someone's going to bring up River's weird abilities.

Rating:
4 stars out of 5. An absolutely solid caper, with a solid character arc for Jayne, and terrific writing and directing throughout.

SunSpeak

"I adore [Simon], he's so cool. Best big brother in the world." -- Chris

Anyone else have their ears perk up on Inara's "same as last year" report on her medical examination? I found that extremely intriguing. Why did she decide to travel the outskirts?"
"See, I've been wondering that for a while; she isn't hiding from the Alliance, but I do wonder if some client is stalking her. *Or*, I like this thing you've come up with - is she trying to put something over on the doctors? Such that she has to visit a different one every time, so they don't pick up on whateveritis? Interesting story idea, if nothing else...." -- Dawn and Chris

"Really enjoyed River losing it this week; I wonder if she knifed Jayne because of something he was going to do - or something he'd already done? Where's the cause, where's the effect?" -- Chris

"Mal handled Jayne perfectly, I think. Still semi-redeemable, the jerk. Between guilt from Simon calling him a hero, and River *definitely* know what was up, and Mal riding his case, I don't think it'll happen again soon. Although I still want to dopesmack him for both his treachery and his stupidity. Never, ever believe the Alliance is gonna pay up, dummy." -- Chris

"The Hands of Blue are the chilliest pieces of work I've come across in quite some time."
"I just call them The Gentlemen. Seems appropriate. "
And why didn't *their* brains explode when they used their Dr. Who Special Sonic Screwdriver? I'd like to believe it was just earplugs, but I doubt it. Relentless bastards, aren't they? And did they finishe what they meant to do to River at the Academy - meaning is the finished product *supposed* to be that broken - or did Simon interrupt and rescue her before it could be finished?" -- Chris and Lizbet

"Loved, loved, loved the caper. Especially Zoe zapping that guy, and them loading him up on the stretcher nice as you please.... What else... um, the bits where they put together the shuttlecraft, and practiced their jargon for breaking in? Way too fun. I was irresistibly reminded of "the rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain" while watching Jayne try to remember the cortical stimulator stuff. Heh." -- Chris

"I keep wincing for poor River, though. Pobrecita. I really hope that Simon has come up with whatever's necessary to help her, now. "
"I'm just *waiting* for someone to twig to the fact that [River] knows things... things she *can't* know. C'mon, guys, how much of a big, bright, shiny, FLASHING clue do you need? I thought Simon at least would get it when River knew stuff about the mute girl in the last episode. Do you think he's blocking "knowing", because he doesn't want to admit to himself there's more wrong with his sister than he can explain, or fix? I'm really thinking the stuff scrolling on the screen behind Simon when he was distracted in the imaging chamber (ooh, QL flashbacks! ) will turn out to be the freaky stuff he can't explain when it comes time for him to evaluate the data. She was having a precog moment right then, wasn't she? I haven't had time to re-watch the episode to check on that, but I think so, which makes Simon's data -- if not Simon himself -- at least *one* of the reasons why the "two by two, hands of blue" guys want him." -- Chris and Maureen