The Shepherd’s Tale | Firefly

Shepherd Book’s past has long been shrouded in mystery. What happens when we untangle the threads of his memories?

Find out on this week's In the 'Verse podcast #2.5. FireflyDrinkingSongs.com

SHOW TIMES

- Upcoming Shows, Marc and Mikey News

- 5-Minute Plot Synopsis / Show Discussion

- This Week’s Songs

SHOW NOTES

MARC: Welcome to In The Verse, the podcast that makes music inspired by popular media.  I am Marc Gunn, the creator of the Firefly Drinking Songs show and host of the Irish & Celtic Music Podcast.

MIKEY: And I’m Mikey Mason, creator of the Beer Powered Time Machine Podcast and currently the MIKEYtalks podcast.

MARC: This is episode FIVE of our new 10 episode season of the In The Verse Podcast.

Mikey: Since we ran out of episodes of Firefly to discuss and write about, we’ll be finding inspiration in episodes of other media; TV shows, Comic Books, Cartoons, but probably not video games.

MARC: As always, you can support us in this and other creative endeavors by supporting Mikey athttp://patreon.com/mikeymason/

MIKEY: And by supporting Marc at http://patreon.com/celtfather

UPCOMING SHOWS & NEWS

MARC GUNN

• OCT 14-16: MultiVerse, Atlanta, GA
• NOV 4-6: Conjuration, Atlanta, GA
• NOV 19: Three Taverns Brewery, Decatur, GA
• EVERY WEDS, Coffee with The Celtfather @ 11 AM ET.

MIKEY MASON

• TsunamiCon (thought it likely will have happened before this airs) Oct 21-23 in Wichita, KS.
• Monthly online shows. October’s monthly online show is set for Saturday, October 29th at 8pm EST at Twitch dot tv slash comedyrockgeek.
• I joined a band - the Meanies. Our first gig in the new form is the Halloween Party at the Fickle Peach, October 28, 2022 from 8-11 pm.

BAND NEWS

• Marc: Kickstarter reached. Planning Celtic Christmas Podcast. Irish & Celtic Music Pdocast won 4th Podcast Award. Celtic Invasion Vacation for 2023 launched. New Brobdingnagian Bards song. Album Pin successes. Updated Pub Songs & Stories podcast format. Back from ALEP.
• Mikey: My Patreon patrons are still getting a new song EVERY Monday - that’s 52 songs a year for as little as $1/month (though you’re perfectly welcome to pledge more, if you can afford it and want to!) & MIKEYtalks podcast. Also The Passage: New Album. Dark, pagan-influences faerie tale album. Also Actual play podcasts and RPG worldbuilding content.

PLOT SYNOPSIS & DISCUSSION

MIKEY - The book opens at Haven Mining Colony moment’s before Shepherd Book’s death, then flashes back 2 years to tin interior of the Serenity, where Book has a conversation with Jayne about whether or not he’ll go to hell, and then walk in on Mal and Zoe roughing up an arms dealer during a deal gone bad, whereupon he returns to his quarters to pray.

MARC - Then the story flashes back 2 more years, to Southdown Abbey, where we witness Book’s discussion with the Abbess about his decision to leave the Abbey and return to the world. As he exits the Abbey, he walks right past Kaylee who says, “You’re coming with us.”

MIKEY - Another ten years earlier, and we watch him get into a drunken brawl with an alliance soldier who recognized him. They fight, and the officer kicks him unconscious in the street. When he wakes, Book is in a shelter and has a spiritual moment over a bowl of chicken soup. He eats the soup and walks the streets, stopping under the neon glow of a cross, presumably over the door to the Abbey.

MARC - Then, six years earlier, we witness Book as an Alliance officer, being harshly reprimanded for organizing an action that cost 4000 lives–the very action mentioned by the Alliance officer ten years later in the street fight. Book asks for investigation powers, to uncover the moles, but is stripped of rank and kicked off the Alliance vessel, an attempt to cover up their embarrassment. He is forced into an escape pod and jettisoned. It crashes on a nearby planet, and he stumbles across the sand, alone.

MIKEY  - Four years earlier, we watch Book as an Alliance cadet, physically beating a prisoner during an interrogation while two officers discuss how driven he is, how tactically brilliant, and how arrogant.

MARC - Four years before that, we see Book in street clothes, a long brown coat, fighting three alliance soldiers. He beats two of them easily, and tells the other to run. He then shows up at a resistance meeting where they’re discussing getting an operative, a mole, into the Alliance to rise through the ranks and feed them information.

MIKEY - Book volunteers, and they replace his left eye with a biomechanical robotic one, that secretly transmits everything he sees to them. He’ll need a new background, though. His is too connected to the resistance, too traceable. He stalks and kills a young traveler and assumes his identity, the identity of Derrial Book.

MARC - Six years prior, we watch a couple of young street thieves robbing a couple at gunpoint and then running from the police. One of them is named Henry, and he uses his skill and daring to escape, abandoning his accomplice. Later, in a diner, he is recognized by a police officer who receives his picture on a communication device while sitting next to henry at the counter.He reaches for his gun, but Henry has already drawn and cocked his own. “Don’t,” he says.

MIKEY - The exchange was observed by another diner, and afterwards, that man has a conversation with Henry in the streets outside, and hands him a flyer, trying to convince him to join the Independence movement. Henry declines, and returns to his apartment. From the stairwell, however, he sees a police team battering down his door to arrest him. He looks at the flyer for the Independence movement and slips out of the building, unnoticed.

MARC - And finally, Ten years earlier, we witness young Henry returning home to a shabby, rundown apartment, expressing relief that his abusive father is asleep. He slips into a curtained off room and listens to music on headphones, finding escape. His father wakes and beats him, and then, when his father passes back out, Henry packs his things and leaves, determined to make a life for himself beyond his abusive father and poverty.

THANK YOU PATRONS

Mikey: Marc and I make our living as full-time musicians. We love creating this podcast and sharing our music for you. But it would be near impossible to release as much great music and podcasts if it wasn’t for the generosity of people just like you.

Marc: So if you enjoyed this show, please support what you love. Your generosity pays for the production and promotion of our music and this podcast.

Mikey: Thank you so very much to the amazing Patreon patrons who help keep the music being made, my incredible Misfits, especially Ora M., Rev Chris Adotta Smith, Drk Unicorn, Amy Stuart, Michael Khandelwal, Josh Logan, Ame Morris, Les Howard, Brian Jackey, Jon Haight, John R Woollard. Scot Mealy, Scott & Melanie Wienhusen, Jeremy D Jackson and Jennifer Lewis

Marc: I am extremely grateful to everyone who supports my Gunn Runners Club on Patreon. You are all so generous with your support. Thanks to my newest Patron: Ivan MacKillop, Don Rice, Antonya Pickard

I also want to thank each of these top-tiered incredible patrons: Cecilia Fairley, Not Higgins, C.J. Taylor, Les Howard, Sarah Crockett, Bill Mandeville , Brian Morin, Carol Baril, Kurt Goodyear, Miranda Nelson, Luke Miller, Josh Brown, LauraMay Sorkin, James ODell, Eric Ray, Tim M. O'Brien, Troy Rodgers

WHAT’S NEXT?

• The Doctor’s Wife S6 E4

CLOSING NOTES

Marc: Thanks so much for listening. You can download many of our songs when you sign up on our Patreon pages. Find out more about Marc Gunn and Mikey Mason and how to support our music on Patreon.

Mikey: We would love your comments, suggestions, songs and lyrics or links to videos to share in the next show. Use the hashtag #InTheVerse. You can post them on the Blue Sun Tour Facebook page or email [email protected]

Marc: In the ‘Verse was produced by Marc Gunn and Mikey Mason. Sign up on our website and find out more about us and the show at http://fireflydrinkingsongs.com