But, hey, what else is new for this show, huh? It’s still hanging on, if only just by a thread; after its seemingly miraculous renewal in the face of dismal ratings last spring, Dollhouse has returned to the Friday-night-graveyard of primetime where its return has been heralded once again by down-right depressing numbers. This post will cover the first three episodes of season two in one go, partly because I’ve been backlogged and haven’t gotten around to them until now, and partly because episode three rocked just a little bit more than the first two. So, yeah, I’m still enjoying this show because it’s grappling with some very heavy, far-out material (albeit often in an awkward, rough and ready kind of way.)
2.01 “Vows” In this episode, former agent Ballard (I think I’ll just call him Paul from now on) tests out his new, shaky alliance with Adelle & co. by arranging for Echo to be imprinted as an undercover agent programmed to help solve a case he himself never resolved with the FBI. So she goes undercover and actually marries this international arms dealer. Things start out well but soon go south, of course, and Paul is forced to improvise, actually using Ech
o’s rather unique “personality disorder” to solve the case in a rather unorthodox way. At the end of the day, when the bad guy’s all arrested and everything, Paul gets to be made Echo’s official handler, at which point the un-imprinted Echo asks him if he’ll help her find Caroline. Meanwhile, Dr Saunders struggles with the recent discovery that she herself was once an active, and that her entire personality and life as Saunders are just a construction of Topher’s, the guy she already hates (by design, it would seem.) She responds at first by finding cruel and petty ways to torment and freak him out, which culminates in this great confrontational scene between the two of them. I found it really interesting that she doesn’t seem to want to reclaim her original identity; she’s too afraid of relinquishing the reality she knows isn’t really real. To her, that would be like dying, and it scares her. Perhaps even more interesting is what Topher finally tells her: that he programmed her to question him, yes, because he thought it was necessary and prudent, but he never programmed her to hate him. She chose to. As much as I like the usual, smarmy Topher, it was really great to see this unnerved, vulnerable side of him.
2.02 “Instinct” Echo gets imprinted as the mother of a baby whose real mother died giving birth. (The father, too grief-stricken to love the baby himself, had turned to the Dollhouse to provide the infant with someone who could give it everything he needed.) When the father gets cold feet and tries to call off the engagement, we everybody learns the hard way that maternal instinct isn’t so easy for Topher to wipe away. Side note: a lot of people think that Eliza Dushku’s the weak link in the cast, and that she doesn’t have the versatility to play Echo. Well, I don’t know about that, but I must admit that she did a great job portraying the panic and terror of a mother losing her child. It was really quite affecting, I thought. Meanwhile, Madeline (the former active known as November) pays a visit to the Dollhouse for her post-release check-up, which is really just a way for Adelle to keep tabs on her. In the process, she runs into Paul, whom she of course doesn’t recognize, and also witnesses one of Echo’s more, er, colorful treatments. She remains blissfully unaware of the painful history she once shared with both of them, a seeming testament to the success of Dollhouse technology. Overall, this wasn’t a particularly strong episode, but it definitely had its moments. Even in her new incarnation of Madeline, Miracle Laurie is still a joy to watch.
2.01 “Vows” In this episode, former agent Ballard (I think I’ll just call him Paul from now on) tests out his new, shaky alliance with Adelle & co. by arranging for Echo to be imprinted as an undercover agent programmed to help solve a case he himself never resolved with the FBI. So she goes undercover and actually marries this international arms dealer. Things start out well but soon go south, of course, and Paul is forced to improvise, actually using Ech
o’s rather unique “personality disorder” to solve the case in a rather unorthodox way. At the end of the day, when the bad guy’s all arrested and everything, Paul gets to be made Echo’s official handler, at which point the un-imprinted Echo asks him if he’ll help her find Caroline. Meanwhile, Dr Saunders struggles with the recent discovery that she herself was once an active, and that her entire personality and life as Saunders are just a construction of Topher’s, the guy she already hates (by design, it would seem.) She responds at first by finding cruel and petty ways to torment and freak him out, which culminates in this great confrontational scene between the two of them. I found it really interesting that she doesn’t seem to want to reclaim her original identity; she’s too afraid of relinquishing the reality she knows isn’t really real. To her, that would be like dying, and it scares her. Perhaps even more interesting is what Topher finally tells her: that he programmed her to question him, yes, because he thought it was necessary and prudent, but he never programmed her to hate him. She chose to. As much as I like the usual, smarmy Topher, it was really great to see this unnerved, vulnerable side of him.
2.02 “Instinct” Echo gets imprinted as the mother of a baby whose real mother died giving birth. (The father, too grief-stricken to love the baby himself, had turned to the Dollhouse to provide the infant with someone who could give it everything he needed.) When the father gets cold feet and tries to call off the engagement, we everybody learns the hard way that maternal instinct isn’t so easy for Topher to wipe away. Side note: a lot of people think that Eliza Dushku’s the weak link in the cast, and that she doesn’t have the versatility to play Echo. Well, I don’t know about that, but I must admit that she did a great job portraying the panic and terror of a mother losing her child. It was really quite affecting, I thought. Meanwhile, Madeline (the former active known as November) pays a visit to the Dollhouse for her post-release check-up, which is really just a way for Adelle to keep tabs on her. In the process, she runs into Paul, whom she of course doesn’t recognize, and also witnesses one of Echo’s more, er, colorful treatments. She remains blissfully unaware of the painful history she once shared with both of them, a seeming testament to the success of Dollhouse technology. Overall, this wasn’t a particularly strong episode, but it definitely had its moments. Even in her new incarnation of Madeline, Miracle Laurie is still a joy to watch.
2.03 “Belle Chose” Now, I really liked this episode a lot. It featured two separate, seemingly unrelated engagements that ended up converging in a hideous and hilarious way. The first is your basic fantasy fulfillment engagement, with Echo being turned into a bimb-tastic sorority girl named Kiki at the request of a creepy old lit professor. The second one involves a Rossum bigwig calling in a favor with Adelle, and she imprints Victor with the guy’s serial-killer nephew in an effort to locate his victims. When Boyd pulls Paul off of Echo’s engagement to use his FBI profiling on serial-killer-Victor, his reaction is hilarious; completely unnerved by “Kiki”, he says in a dazed kind of voice, “A serial killer? Thank god!” Unfortunately, the real killer’s uncle springs the killer-imprinted Victor from the DH and inadvertently lets him loose on society. Desperate to control the situation, Adelle forces Topher to attempt a tricky remote wipe of Victor that ends up short-circuiting the entire active grid. In all the confusion, Echo’s and Victor’s imprints get crossed: she becomes the insane killer hell-bent on finishing what he started and poor Victor becomes the flighty party-girl, shaking his thang all over an LA club. The results are both frightening (in Echo’s case) and hilarious (in Victor’s). This episode really showcased Enver Gjokaj’s many talents as an actor. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, but I really like this guy. I think he’s the best of all the dolls at
really embodying each new character he’s given in a totally believable way, even when it’s something as ridiculous as Kiki, or intense as the serial killer. Plus, he’s totally adorable! I hope we get to see much more of him in the future.Overall, I think this show’s greatest strength is also its greatest weakness: it’s complex to the point of being unwieldy. It’ll never be mainstream or popular, because it’s really not for the casual viewer. Its greatest hope for survival is to garner enough of a fringe, cult following to buoy it up. Well, here’s hoping!
Oh, and I also thought I'd post the link to this video recap of season one, which is a little long but does an excellent job of bringing together the most compelling elements of the first season and setting us up for furutre developments.
This is the first TV show that my husband and I sat down to watch together weekly. We saw all of season one and were keeping our fingers crossed for season two. So far this season we haven't had a Friday night to plug in, but with the episode summaries above, I think we'll have to go to Hulu and get started. I can't wait to see episode 3. :)
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