Dollhouse: Reviewed!
Sep. 7th, 2009 10:37 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seriousficSo I finally got around to watching Epitaph 1 and, uh… it was kinda lame?
IDK, but here we have a character in a post-apocalyptic future stopping to take a shower alone in a haunted house. That’s the kind of thing Whedon would’ve written Xander and Willow mocking ten years ago. Seriously now, if there are zombies running around (or shambling around), everyone gets to watch me shower, as long as they’re watching for zombies too. C’mon in, California Supreme Court, I need someone to wash my back anyway.
But anyway, plot!Stephen King Joss Whedon writes the story of a phone call that turns everyone who hears it into a zombie. These Reavers Butchers kill everyone who hasn’t heard the phone call. And… that’s the big apocalypse. The whole business about rich people transferring their consciousnesses into poor people, giving them functional immortality, is a red herring. The real problem with Dollhouse tech is that it can turn people into zombies. Imagine that, a technology that turns people into zombies leads to the apocalypse. Cheap.
In flashbacks, we get to see all the interesting stuff that we won’t see because Fox will can the show before it comes up. Echo and Paul are working together to bring down the Dollhouse from the inside (oh, thank fucking god). Dominic comes back, all scruffy and bitter and in need of a room with Adelle. Victor and Sierra got together and then broke apart, because no relationship can last in the Jossverse. Ever. Not a one. AndSpike Topher has gone insane because he has a soul and remembers all the lives he’s taken might have a soul and remembers all the lives he’s taken.
But hey, at least there’s that trademark zingy Whedon dialogue, huh?
Gazing out at post-apocalyptic wasteland: “They really thought they were helping, huh? Giving people what they needed? Is this what we needed?”
“No. Kids playing with matches. And they burned the house down.”
I get the feeling that what Whedon was going for was one of those Babylon 5 episodes where they give you a taste of the end-game. Of course, that was so brilliantly done that what you got was to see the end of people’s arcs, then as you went forward you saw those arcs start up and it all wove together. It was like giving you a letter in Jeopardy.
Here, Whedon gives you basically the entire puzzle and wants you to stick around to see what the last letter is. Pat, I don’t need that letter, I can solve the puzzle! The apocalypse comes up because people start using the Dollhouse’s technology as a weapon. Sure, we don’t know the fates of the individual characters, but I’m betting it’ll be bittersweet.Angel Investigations the Dollhouse will save the world (with a few token deaths, especially anyone in a happy relationship because Joss Whedon didn’t dance at the prom) or die trying. What’s the point of watching everyone march slowly to their appointed fates?
And letting us know their fates up to 2019 just means that Whedon can’t do his “anyone can die!” schtick. On the one hand, that could force him to be a sharper writer since he can’t rely on the crutch of shock value deaths. On the other hand, as hackneyed as it becomes, Whedon can work the shock value death.
P.S. If Ballard just joined the Dollhouse to bring it down, shouldn’t Adelle have seen that coming (considering what a HBIC she’s been shown as up to now)? Really now, just kill the guy. He’s disgraced, he’s discredited, no one’s going to notice if he turns up in a river somewhere.
Season one review: I kinda hate it when any media depicts a rape just to do a PSA on how rape is bad, so do we really need an entire TV SHOW dedicated to that premise? I get that the Dollhouse represents the Patriarchy, but really now. White Liberal Guilt: The Series? That’s not something you can hang a show off of, since basically every other show (with varying degrees of success) does episodes about how misogyny is bad but is also about other stuff. Usually, entertaining stuff. Do we really need a rape revenge TV show where the entire first season is dedicated to showing the rape and the very last episode, which isn't even aired, says "oh, BTW, it’s totes gonna get vengeful up in here!"
IDK, but here we have a character in a post-apocalyptic future stopping to take a shower alone in a haunted house. That’s the kind of thing Whedon would’ve written Xander and Willow mocking ten years ago. Seriously now, if there are zombies running around (or shambling around), everyone gets to watch me shower, as long as they’re watching for zombies too. C’mon in, California Supreme Court, I need someone to wash my back anyway.
But anyway, plot!
In flashbacks, we get to see all the interesting stuff that we won’t see because Fox will can the show before it comes up. Echo and Paul are working together to bring down the Dollhouse from the inside (oh, thank fucking god). Dominic comes back, all scruffy and bitter and in need of a room with Adelle. Victor and Sierra got together and then broke apart, because no relationship can last in the Jossverse. Ever. Not a one. And
But hey, at least there’s that trademark zingy Whedon dialogue, huh?
Gazing out at post-apocalyptic wasteland: “They really thought they were helping, huh? Giving people what they needed? Is this what we needed?”
“No. Kids playing with matches. And they burned the house down.”
I get the feeling that what Whedon was going for was one of those Babylon 5 episodes where they give you a taste of the end-game. Of course, that was so brilliantly done that what you got was to see the end of people’s arcs, then as you went forward you saw those arcs start up and it all wove together. It was like giving you a letter in Jeopardy.
Here, Whedon gives you basically the entire puzzle and wants you to stick around to see what the last letter is. Pat, I don’t need that letter, I can solve the puzzle! The apocalypse comes up because people start using the Dollhouse’s technology as a weapon. Sure, we don’t know the fates of the individual characters, but I’m betting it’ll be bittersweet.
And letting us know their fates up to 2019 just means that Whedon can’t do his “anyone can die!” schtick. On the one hand, that could force him to be a sharper writer since he can’t rely on the crutch of shock value deaths. On the other hand, as hackneyed as it becomes, Whedon can work the shock value death.
P.S. If Ballard just joined the Dollhouse to bring it down, shouldn’t Adelle have seen that coming (considering what a HBIC she’s been shown as up to now)? Really now, just kill the guy. He’s disgraced, he’s discredited, no one’s going to notice if he turns up in a river somewhere.
Season one review: I kinda hate it when any media depicts a rape just to do a PSA on how rape is bad, so do we really need an entire TV SHOW dedicated to that premise? I get that the Dollhouse represents the Patriarchy, but really now. White Liberal Guilt: The Series? That’s not something you can hang a show off of, since basically every other show (with varying degrees of success) does episodes about how misogyny is bad but is also about other stuff. Usually, entertaining stuff. Do we really need a rape revenge TV show where the entire first season is dedicated to showing the rape and the very last episode, which isn't even aired, says "oh, BTW, it’s totes gonna get vengeful up in here!"
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 04:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 11:52 pm (UTC)The_Lurker
Date: 2009-09-08 07:03 am (UTC)The_Lurker
Date: 2009-09-08 09:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-09-09 02:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-09-09 02:13 am (UTC)