A Very British Serenity

[ffutures]

OK - one of the adventures I want to run in a few weeks will be a story of pioneering Americans heading off to the stars aboard their trusty spaceship, which may or may not be called Serenity. Their aim is to found a new American Republic in another solar system.

However, for game purposes America has been part of the Anglo-Saxon Empire and largely Anglicised for the last 150 years or so, and the gallant crew get most of their ideas of the romance of the Old West and America filtered through a very British lens.

So... I think that the Firefly crew would work for this, if suitably modified. E.g.
The Reverend Book (strict C of E)
Miss Inara Serra (of the Bombay Serras), a gentlewoman and adventuress
and so forth.

Anyone want to give me versions of River, Mal, Jayne, etc.?

Comments

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Thanks - Kayleigh is obviously a tomboy of some sort, really can't see Zoe as a soldier though, not in this setting. Maybe a famous eccentric and big-game hunter?

[w00hoo.livejournal.com]

Actually, keeping with the British/Western theme it might work to make Zoe a native american scout for Mal as the tracker/big game hunter. Would give them a reason to have that 'forged in combat' bond between them which gives the interest in the Wash/Zoe/Mal relationship, presuming Wash isn't a character you drop. It'd be possible that the job they've been doing is suitably on the edge that it creates that 'need to pioneer and be free' among the crew.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

That could work - and the Empire seems to be slightly less worried by race than you might expect, if I'm interpreting things correctly.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

(a) Why shouldn't the Anglo-Saxon Empire have established some combat units made up of women? There was already a demand for equal rights and opening up of more occupations to women in the 19th century. You wouldn't need to have full integration to have some sort of women auxiliary troops.

(b) Alternatively, if you want them to have met on the battlefield, women served as nurses in war zones from the Crimean War on. It would give a different set of occupational skills to Zoe, but she and Mal could have been through a war together.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately there's nothing in the source material (a 1900 novel) to support the idea - women are presented throughout as decorative but pretty useless.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

If you've got source material that specific, and on that point, I'm perplexed at your trying to adapt Serenity. You could just barely fit in Inara, maybe, but Zoe, Kaylee, and River are all capable in a nontraditional mode. Unless you want to just turn at least Zoe and Kaylee into men.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I think it's a challenge to do it, but I want to see if it's possible without straining the setting too badly.

[cobrabay.livejournal.com]

I assume Mal would look a bit like this http://thephobia.com/post/1300475634

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Yep, something like that.