Note: I accidentally deleted Dollhouse from my DVR after watching it only once this week; if I get some plot details wrong in the below please do leap in to correct me though I tried to check against some recaps.
I shall risk “you’re so hateful” comments again this week by being, well, not entirely enamoured of the second episode of Dollhouse, either. (For my views on the first, see here.) I know, I know. I love Joss too! But it’s starting to seem like the kind of relationship you have in your late twenties where the person you’re dating has such totally amazing qualities (you know, artsy, he totally likes Alan Parker movies too, etc.) that you totally gloss over any faults, until one day these things are brought into sharp relief in one bad evening. See, Joss and I are in this place right now where it’s like we’re out to dinner with friends and all of a sudden I realize he is opining on the categorical imperative while chewing on a huge wad of spaghetti and everyone at the table is either bored or grossed out…
Anyway, to summarize: this week we didn’t learn that much more about Echo’s background or how this whole personality erasure thing works or what Alpha is or anything, you know, actually plot-developing like that. Instead, we watched Echo be hired by a new client, ostensibly for a whitewater rafting trip (complete with a non-consensual sexual encounter, whee!), and then hunted through the woods in some kind of weird attempt to re-enact Deliverance. The client turns out to have been an impostor, and possibly connected with Alpha, although how and in what way are left entirely unclear.
Intercut with this present-day story were flashbacks explaining how Echo’s “handler,” Langdon, came to be, well… her handler. (The shocking and unexpected truth: he was hired for the job.) It appears, as well as having her mind erased, that Echo has been imprinted to blindly trust Langdon. He has only to tell her that “everything will be fine,” and she will follow him everywhere. In other words, he is the dad to her five-year-old mental capacity. So not only now do we have the denial of female agency as a central premise of the show, we also have father issues developing.
If it wasn’t clear already, all this is making me feel a bit suckered, readers, like the writers are going for disturbing for disturbing’s sake. I’m not sure they have greater things to say about any of the themes they play with but don’t per se address, if you know what I mean. I realize it’s early, but considering that that’s usually when you get all that pesky exposition out of the way, I’m wondering whether there is a there there, if you catch my drift. We asked some good questions last week – about what the Dollhouse is there for, and why anyone would want to hire a facsimile of the real thing – and so far we have been afforded nary a glimpse at potential answers to these questions.
I’m also worried that this show is going to fall victim to what I think of as “Lost Syndrome,” in which the writers take a fly-by-the-seat-of-their-pants approach to the narrative. No one knows where it’s going, and people often forget where it’s been. This works well in improv; it does not work so well in episodic storytelling. When you never know where you’re going, a show can commit its own suicide by way of continuity errors that can only be reconciled by tie-in internet websites.
For example, it says something that as I was watching the rafting trip morph into a hunt I was wondering to myself, “Is this intentional? Is this what he hired her for? Did the agency know that she would be at risk?” The writer, Steven S. DeKnight (an old Buffy hand), clearly wanted me to be unclear on this point – Adelle hints at the assignment’s “danger” by charging a last-minute additional fee. But then later, the ambiguity was retracted by a scene in which Adelle and some other Dollhouse minion exchange their unhappiness with this “psychopath” client. In which case, what is particularly dangerous about this whole scenario? Last week, Echo was sent off to negotiate with armed kidnappers, but no mention of additional fee was made.
It’s internal storyline confusion like that that suggests to me that the answers to these questions are not very clear to the writing staff either. In which case… we’re in for a hell of a (frustrating) ride.
Well, that’s enough of my view. Et tu, commenters?
P.S. Dorkalicious: Is it me or does the Dollhouse ape the layout of Wolfram and Hart from Season Five of Angel?
I haven’t watched Dollhouse yet, but I have less and less patience for geeky tv (well, western geeky tv – I’m currently downloading Japanese toku by the crapload) because of the a fore mentioned Lost Syndrome. I watched Alias all the way through, despite the drunken plot continuity fairy, but I quickly lost patience with Lost and Heroes – the plot continuity problems Alias had were just compounded.
I agree with the “disturbing for disturbing’s sake” characterization. I know that people think Whedon is building up to an overall feminist POV, but it’s just too much torture titillation for me (I’m the kind of person who can’t stomach horror/slasher films). I would like to give Whedon the benefit of the doubt, but I think each individual episode needs to express the vision of its creator. As a stand-alone episode, Dollhouse seems to me like any other “dead hooker/stripper/adulturous housewife/little girl” storyline on CSI. The message cannot help but be clouded when violence/misogyny is entertainment.
I think Dollhouse has both a vision problem (trying to be feminist and fails) and a storytelling problem.
In the sense that it is a massive corporate office feel, yes, it apes it. In the sense of layout and how the building works, no not at all.
As for the rest of the show, it seems to be a long game. At least last week’s episode was enjoyable for the complete absurdity of ‘massive plot twist encompassed in a shot’ before the commercial break. I was laughing through the first commercial. So that’s something. Then again, I have an odd sense of humour.
>>See, Joss and I are in this place right now where it’s like we’re out to dinner with friends and all of a sudden I realize he is opining on the categorical imperative while chewing on a huge wad of spaghetti and everyone at the table is either bored or grossed out…>>
heh. I haven’t watched Dollhouse yet, but I feel ya, and that’s nicely put. although I do still enjoy the Buffy comics a lot, yeah, there are…faults. always have been. they become clearer as time goes on, yes. and yeah, something about the sensibility seems a little dated as well.
Is it me or does the Dollhouse ape the layout of Wolfram and Hart from Season Five of Angel?
i said the exact same thing to my roomie last week!
great posts, by the way.
She was imprinted to blindly trust Langdon, and in this episode she does trust him, but she doesn’t accept it when he says that everything will be fine. She also retains the “shoulder to the wheel” gesture after she has had her brain wiped – like Alpha, she seems to be retaining things. So it does seem like she’s slowly gaining tiny bits of agency and personality, though I admit her blank behavior inside the Dollhouse post-brain wipe freaks me out.
The line “I have 4 brothers, and none are Democrats” (or something like that) when asked if she knew how to use a gun cracked me up.
As for the “risk fee” – maybe they decided to add that after the previous engagement got out of hand? My bet is that it is something added when there’s potential for an active to have – rafting and climbing could easily lead to scrapes and bruises, making her less appealing to future customers. (Ugh, that was horrible to type, but if you’re viewing her strictly as a commodity, which the Dollhouse does, that sort of logic makes sense.) The only reason it was mentioned in the episode was to create doubt about how far the Dollhouse bosses are willing to go to cater to a client’s fantasy.
I think what bothers me most is the way the minion guy talked to her at the end – mentioning how people end up dead around her, how he’d like to see her gone. She of course has no idea what he’s talking about and can’t respond in any informed way. She’s completely vulnerable to his abuse. (Also, it seems stupid on the part of the minion. Why would he talk to Echo like that, present her with any non-engagement/non-daily life information? Seems risky, especially after Alpha.)
Also, evidently Alan Tudyk is playing Alpha. This pleases me, because Alan Tudyk is awesome. And it is completely unsurprising, because yeah, Joss likes to reuse actors.
Well, I’m keeping the faith. I saw plenty of clues that the show is heading towards Echo proving that it is a big mistake to try to control and manipulate people the way the Dollhouse does.
I enjoyed the weird exchange with the minion dude and Echo when he was angry with her and she blankly responded. I felt it underscored who the screwed up one was and, also, what does he have to be so mad about? I found it funny.
At any rate, I find everything Joss does to have many layers, but then, I’m a big fan. And btw, when I mentioned in my comment on your last Dollhouse post that Willow was the one speaking, I wasn’t implying you said anything wrong or attacking your post; I was merely showing what a Buffy geek I was too because I knew who you were quoting. Sorry you thought I was attacking or correcting you.
Vicarious: didn’t mean you, your comment got published, this is how you can be sure you were not among the “why are you feminists so ANGRY” set.