Hoban "Wash" Washburne was a regular character in the sci-fi TV series Firefly. He served aboard Serenity under Captain Malcolm Reynolds as the ship's pilot and was happily married to her first mate, Zoe Alleyne Washburne. He was portrayed by Alan Tudyk.
Biography[]
Early life[]
Wash grew up on a planet that was so heavily polluted that the stars weren't visible. As a child, he travelled around the 'verse with his father, which instilled in him a desire to fly and see the stars. When he attended flight school, he was second in his class, though he would have been first had his childhood friend Mr. Universe not hacked the school records. In order to buy Wash's silence, Mr. Universe promised to offer his services to Wash free of charge whenever needed.
Aboard Serenity[]
After the war between the Alliance and the Independents, Wash travelled far and wide throughout the 'verse. His skills as a pilot caught the attention of multiple ship captains who wanted to recruit him, though Wash would ultimately choose to fly Serenity, due mainly to having fallen in love with her first mate, Zoe Alleyne. While Zoe initially disliked Wash, she eventually became charmed by his quirky personality as well as his loyalty to both her and Malcolm Reynolds. The two would later marry and continue to live and work together aboard Serenity.
A laid-back guy with a dry and occasionally laconic sense of humour, Wash tended to represent the pragmatic, cut-and-run opinion in any shipboard debate, and often served as the calming influence in heated arguments. His actions sometimes appeared cowardly (or at least less-than-heroic), but Wash had proven his resolve and willingness to both put himself in harm's way and do violence on behalf of his friends on many occasions. His loyalty to his fellow crew was unshakable, as was shown when he insisted on rescuing Mal from the clutches of the crime lord Adelai Niska, despite clashing with Mal over Zoe earlier and having been severely tortured by Niska to the point of barely being able to stand.
As a pilot, Wash's flying style oscillated between near panic and a Zen-like calm. The attitude he conveyed seemed to be in inverse proportion to the degree of danger he believed he and the ship were in at any particular moment, acting the most calm when facing the greatest danger. His mantra, which he quietly recited during a highly stressful situation, was "I am a leaf on the wind; watch how I soar," although Wash apparently did not know what it meant.
Wash kept a collection of toy dinosaurs in the ship's cockpit and played with them during lulls in the action. They were a gift from his father, who Wash traveled with as a boy. The elder Washburne gave him the toys after Wash was intrigued by a dinosaur exhibit on one of their stops. Wash also kept a dinosaur plushie in his and Zoe's room.
Death[]
During the events of the film Serenity, the Serenity crew discovered the planet Miranda and learned that the Alliance was unintentionally responsible for creating the Reavers, a group of psychotic, cannibalistic marauders that had been wreaking havoc across the 'verse for years. A recording left behind by an Alliance scientist revealed that they created a chemical agent intended to rid the planet of violence, but it worked too well and made the population unmotivated and apathetic to the point where they stopped going to work, stopped talking with each other and even stopped trying to sustain themselves. However, a fraction of the population reacted to the chemical in the completely opposite way, becoming savage, violent maniacs willing to commit the most horrifying acts of barbarism one could imagine.
Mal and his crew took the recording and headed for the moon where Mr. Universe operated his pirate broadwave station. Knowing the Alliance were hunting them and were probably going to blockade the moon, Mal used a cannon salvaged from a downed ship to open fire on a Reaver vessel. This caught the attention of the rest of the Reavers surrounding Miranda and Serenity soon had an entire fleet chasing after it. Mal's plan was to lure the Reavers into the ionic gas cloud surrounding Mr. Universe's moon where the Alliance fleet was lying in wait, pitting both fleets against each other and keeping them distracted while Serenity made its landing.
As Mal had planned, the Alliance and Reavers started fighting each other, but Serenity still had to navigate its way through the crossfire and land on the moon. Thanks to Wash's impeccable piloting skills, Serenity avoided total destruction despite being tailed by a Reaver ship, though it was struck by an EMP blast. Though the ship made a rough landing and suffered significant damage, it ultimately came to a stop with everyone aboard still alive. However, just as Wash and the others took a brief moment to enjoy their successful landing, a Reaver harpoon suddenly smashed through the cockpit canopy, impaling Wash and killing him instantly.