Simon Tam
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| Character | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Simon Tam |
| Occupation: | Trauma surgeon |
| Relationships: | sister River Tam, parents Gabriel and Regan Tam, love-interest Kaylee Frye |
| Fandom: | Firefly/Serenity |
| Other: | played by actor Sean Maher One of the nine principal characters in Firefly and Serenity and related comics and games. |
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Simon Tam is a character from the TV series Firefly and the movie Serenity.
Canon Overview
Simon left the practice of medicine and employed all of his personal fortune to recover his sister, who was the victim of experiments in brain surgery, to enhance psychic and physical abilities for purposes that remained murky in Firefly/Serenity canon. He smuggled her in stasis from the facility where she was being held. Both he and she became fugitives from the Alliance government as a result of his rescue.
An Alliance agent, Lawrence Dobson, followed Simon and the stasis capsule in which he had River hidden, onboard the disreputable Firefly class ship Serenity, captained by Malcolm Reynolds. Dobson's suspicions led to his accidentally shooting Kaylee Frye, the ship's mechanic, and Simon performs the surgery that saves her life, cementing his place on Serenity as the ship's medic.
As an upper class, highly educated professional, Simon's character arc is that of the "outsider" in the rough-edged and largely illegal world of Malcolm Reynolds and his crew, evincing good table manners, never swearing, unskilled in fighting or defending himself; but, as Mal tells him, "You ain't weak," and by the time the series has ended and the movie Serenity takes over the story, Simon has become an accepted part of the crew.
During the action of Serenity, Simon is shot by Reavers and given a gut-wound almost identical to the one he repaired in Kaylee in the pilot episode of Firefly. He survives this wound and, in the movie's coda, is seen shirtless in Kaylee's arms.
Shipping
| Person | Ship | Expo |
|---|---|---|
| Kaylee Frye | Kaylee/Simon | In canon, their relationship developed throughout the series, and was (presumably) consummated near the end of Serenity. This is a fairly popular pairing among fans, although perhaps not as common as other prominent Simon pairings. |
| Malcolm Reynolds | Mal/Simon | The most popular slash pairing involving Simon is between him and Mal. Simon's discomfort with Kaylee's overtures, and his bolder relationship with Mal, led slash-oriented fans to see Simon and Mal in a homoerotic light. |
| Jayne Cobb | Jayne/Simon | Simon Maher has said that Simon did have a crush on Jayne. |
| River Tam | Simon/River | Canonically, Simon's most important, central, and all-consuming relationship is with his sister River. |
| Inara Serra | Inara/Simon | Based around the idea of them both being city people in the wild wild. |
Example Simon-centric Fanworks
| Examples Wanted: Editors are encouraged to add more examples or a wider variety of examples. |
Fanfiction
Fanart
Meta
- DR. SIMON TAM: The Dork Knight Returns, Archived version by executrix, a character essay at idol_reflection (2007)
- The Pretty Fits by sparky77, a Simon/Mal ship manifesto (2004)
Archives & Links
- Simon Tam works on Ao3
- Simon Tam (Firefly) works on ff.net
- Simon Tam (Serenity) works on ff.net
- Simon Tam character page on The Firefly and Serenity Database
- Simon Tam character section on Wikipedia