Serenity: A Question

[butterfly]

Okay, how is the Operative like Jubal Early? I do not get it. To me, they seemed like completely, utterly different characters.

Jubal was a bounty hunter who was clearly nuts and who liked causing pain and threatening people, the Operative was an assassin who was very rational and straight-forward. And Jubal didn't Believe in much of anything (is it still River's room if River isn't in it?), much less a better world. And the Operative was exceedingly polite and open-minded, even while killing people (Young miss?). I can't picture the Operative threatening to rape Kaylee. And Jubal tried to deny to himself that he was a monster, tried to claim that it was just his job, whereas the Operative was just doing his job and was aware that that choice did make him a monster.

Seriously, I just really want someone to explain to me how they're alike.

Comments

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Yeah, part of the reason that I posted this was because I really can't see any other similarity.

And, upon getting comments, still think that the differences so very much outweigh the similarities, mostly because Fucking Nuts and Not Nuts is a fairly important line for me, and the Operative never struck me as crazy, just strong in how far he was willing to go for a belief that I (and Mal) considered flawed. But he clearly wasn't crazy, because he was able to access new information and change his mind when he realised that his previous outlook had serious flaws (a sinless world might be possible, but certainly not at the hands of the Alliance).