page_title: Nathan Fillion
section_title: In contemporary culture
hierarchical_section_title: Nathan Fillion / In contemporary culture
caption_attribution_description: English: Screen capture from metascifi, a digital work of public art by Martin Firrell featuring life lessons from American television science fiction; Nathan Fillion on the wider significance of his character Capt Mal Raynolds from Joss Whedon's Firefly
context_page_description: Nathan Fillion is a Canadian-American actor, best known for the leading roles of Captain Malcolm "Mal" Reynolds on Firefly and its film continuation Serenity, Richard Castle on Castle, and is currently starring as John Nolan on The Rookie.
  Fillion has acted in traditionally distributed films like Slither and Trucker, Internet-distributed films like Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, television soap operas, sitcoms and theater. His voice is also featured in video games, such as the Bungie titles Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST, Halo: Reach, Destiny and Destiny 2, along with the 343 Industries video game Halo 5: Guardians.
  Fillion first gained recognition for his work on One Life to Live in the contract role of Joey Buchanan, for which he was nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Actor in a Drama Series as well as for his supporting role as Johnny Donnelly in the sitcom Two Guys and a Girl.
context_section_description: Fillion has been associated with the public artist Martin Firrell since 2009. He is the subject of two works of contemporary public art by Firrell: Complete Hero (digital projections of text and video portraiture to the West and North elevations of the Guards Chapel, Wellington Barracks, London, 2009) and Metascifi (a digital app investigating American television science fiction series for ideas and strategies for living well).
  Fillion was the 'face' of Complete Hero. The artist explained the choice of Fillion as follows: "I wanted to make a piece of work that looked at all kinds of heroism, not just the usual derring-do of white square-jawed men. But I thought it would be interesting to start with a white, square-jawed man and Nathan Fillion agreed to take part."
  In Metascifi, Fillion discusses the deeper significance of his Firefly character Captain Mal Reynolds, reflecting on some of the universal preoccupations of any human life: death, love, evil, intimacy, power, vulnerability, violence and freedom.
caption: Nathan Fillion in Metascifi, artist's impression 2014
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