It's a fun thing to do, to put yourself in the service of something if you think you can add an interpretation. It's no different than any other storytelling.

That girl will rain destruction down on you and your ship. She is an albatross, Captain. Way I remember it, albatross was a ship's good luck, 'til some idiot killed it. [to Inara] Yes, I've read a poem. Try not to faint.

I wanted to drag Shakespeare from obscurity. I've been a fan my whole life.

When it comes to the iconic moments, you sort of have to take all of those things and distill them the same way the costumers do and everybod Distill them and then find your own. The most iconic moment in the movie is, assuming they do, when they assemble.

Identity is something that you are constantly earning.

When people say to me, 'Why are you so good at writing at women?' I say, 'Why isn't everybody?' Obviously there are differences between men and women - that's what makes it all fun. But we're all people. There's a lot of good writers who are very humanist, but still manage to kind of skip fifty-five per cent of the race. And I just don't get that. Not to be able to write an entire gender? To me, the question isn't how do you do it? It's how can you possibly avoid doing it?

Bottom line is, even if you see 'em coming, you're not ready for the big moments. No one asks for their life to change, not really. But it does. So what are we, helpless? Puppets? No. The big moments are gonna come. You can't help that. It's what you do afterwards that counts. That's when you find out who you are.