Firefly, a show-that-was, told the story of Earth-that-was getting used up and sprouting a crop of rocket ships that flew every which way in a new galaxy in an attempt to colonize it. Eventually, these disparate people formed into an Alliance, and a movement of Independents who tried and failed to fight their tyranny. The series featured an eclectic crew of characters, from the Han Solo-esque captain, Malcom Reynolds, to the pilot Wash and his wife Zoe, to even Shepherd Book, the preacher who flew with the crew of smugglers.
Having been off of regular television since the 80s after his run on Barney Miller ended, Ron Glass was a welcome addition to the crew as the warm, friendly, sometimes frightening Shepherd Book, a preacher with a mysterious past. Shepherd Book brought wisdom and heart to Firefly, and the show wouldn’t have been the same without him. However, though the show hinted at a past that ran far deeper than his life at the abbey, audiences never got a chance to learn his story in the show's single season.
Kind Man, Secret Heart
During Firefly’s short, but well-loved run, Shepherd Book pulled off a twofer. He was somehow both integral to the crew’s dynamic, and remained one of its most secretive members all at the same time. Even from the show's pilot episode he’s an enigma, only one-upped by Simon Tam and his sister-in-a-fridge, River. He buys his way aboard Serenity, passing any annoyingly close looks at his identity, and buying good favor with the ship’s mechanic, Kaylee, with strawberries, fresh fruit being a delicacy in the outer regions. It helps him sell the crew, despite Mal’s reservations, on Book being exactly what he says he is: the space-faring version of the Old West circuit preacher. And for much of the series, he fulfills that role, kind and open-hearted and devoted to the word of God — yet, he drops hints about a very different past.
In the second episode (of the actual story order, not the aired order), “The Train Job,” the crew of Serenity tries to lift some medicine for a crime lord named Adelai Niska. Book expresses his knowledge of Niska, something that wouldn’t be usual for an itinerant man of God in any other setting. When he’s shot in the episode “Safe,” an ID card grants Book access to the highest grade of Alliance medical facilities while keeping the crew and vessel free from the typical Alliance inspection, an even stranger turn than a working awareness of the galaxy’s underworld. “War Stories” sees him expressing not only his knowledge of high-powered guns, but participating in a shootout itself with Niska’s henchmen in order to rescue Mal and Wash, the ship's pilot, from the gangster’s clutches. Perhaps strangest turn of all is when sadistic Jubal Early, a bounty hunter with an almost eerily prescient knowledge of the crew, attacks Serenity and comes aboard, stating flatly that Book “ain’t no Shepherd,” after knocking the man out.
In all of these instances, it’s clear that Book was a man with much more to reveal than the short run of the series would allow. Book was clearly a man who, while not in favor of the crew's criminal undertakings, wasn’t unaware of them or incapable of helping out in a pinch if he was needed. He was important in the eyes of the Alliance and was someone bounty hunters instinctively feared, despite his mild-mannered personality. He was a character who never got the exploration he deserved, was unceremoniously moved off ship by the time of the feature film, Serenity, and met his death in that film before audiences got to understand who he really was.
A Closed Book
After the series was canceled, hope was not lost for fans, as various other media expanded on the lore of the series. Book's tale was among those told. The third volume of Dark Horse comic’s “Serenity” series saw Book’s entire story finally come to light, playing out in his mind moments before his death as shown in Serenity. The beloved Firefly character and kick-ass man of God was revealed to have grown up a poor kid on the street named Henry Evans. Having run away from an abusive home, he found himself up against a choice: an Alliance arrest warrant, or the flyer for the local chapter of the Independence movement he held in his hand. He chose the flyer, working his way up into becoming a spy for the Independents — outfitted with a camera eye — which is how he secured himself a place (and presumably earned his medical clearance) in the Alliance. He got his new name by killing a new Alliance recruit and taking his ID card, for one Derrial Book.
From there he rose through their ranks like a rocket ship, finally meeting his ignominious end after losing 4,000 Alliance crew members in a catastrophic loss for them during the ongoing conflict over the new galaxy. He was then kicked out so swiftly he was forced into an escape pod and jettisoned on a planet below. (How this matches up with his retaining such high-level ranking in the Alliance is never made clear; perhaps the details of his situation were confidential.) From there, Book became a rambling man, first coming to God through a rural church that took him in. Eventually, he found his way back out in the world, wanting to help out in a more spiritual way (since he’d already put his fists and gun skills to the test) and bring the Word to the newly colonized planets. Unlike Mal and Zoe, he’d put his past behind him, now only wanting to try to live out his remaining days doing peaceful, good work.
Preachers with pasts as ne’er-do-wells and warriors are nothing new, especially in the Western genre that Firefly so beautifully emulates. Clint Eastwood played a fighting preacher (named Preacher) in Pale Rider, the 1980s most successful Western. Shepherd Book, however, was different spin on the old trope, a man who was atoning for what he’d done by eschewing harm as much as he could. As the comic showed, Firefly’s mysterious preacher spent his entire early life in service to violence, yet the man who would become Book ended it in service to something greater.