"I'm keeping my sexy business woman shoes."

[andraste]

I haven't posted about it here, but I've really been enjoying Doll House. It takes half a dozen episodes to really start cooking, but I think it's well worth a look. (It's not as though it will eat up much of your time, since it's almost certain to be cancelled after the end of its thirteen-episode season.)

And you know what I love about it most? It's infinite levels of skeeviness. Obviously many people find these elements off-putting, but it's not every show that can find brand new ways to squick me every episode.



Obviously the show is one big dubious consent issue, but for some reason I found the revelation that Adelle DeWitt has been using Victor like that especially icky. In some ways, it's even more disturbing than what Hearn was doing to Sierra - and yet, I still felt bad for her. (I also loved the way references to Victor's 'Lonely Hearts' assignments had been carefully dropped into previous episodes.)

Into the bargain, we have Ballard continuing his relationship with Mellie after he finds out she's not a real girl, which is definitely morally dubious. On the other hand, it's not like he knew what she was before he started sleeping with her, and breaking things off in the middle of a make-out session could tip off his targets.

My favourite part of the whole show, though, is Boyd Langton's multi-layered, incredibly screwed up and bizarrely sweet relationship with Echo. It's like the partnership between Dixon and Sydney Bristow from Alias would be if Syndey got mind-wiped after every mission and Dixon was her pimp. From the moment in The Target when she failed to respond to her cue and accept his assurance that everything was OK, he's started to see her as a person. He's still one of her oppressors, even though his affection for her is real, which in some ways makes him the worst handler of all. It remains to be seen if his attachment for Echo will trump his pragmatic loyalty to his employers before the end of the season - one way or another I'd really like to see that thread play out. (I live in hope that Boyd will get to punch a few more people in the face before the curtain closes. I <3 that.)

Comments

[jmtorres.livejournal.com]

My new favorite thing about Boyd and Echo is how when they gave her a new handler, she didn't take the prompt until she was looking at *Boyd.* Imprint fail, dudes! I wonder how long it's gonna take anyone to notice that. Honestly I started to wonder if Echo was reciting the lines to their little scripts pro forma since... around episode 5.

[lilacsigil.livejournal.com]

I'm also enjoying Dollhouse, for exactly the reasons you list here - from Episode 6 on, they really have been using all the skeevy ideas present in the prompt, and using them in interesting and sometimes powerful ways. I'm very interested in the Paul/Mellie relationship, as he has been the one character entirely unambiguous about the fact that having sex with dolls is rape.

What really disturbed me, and hasn't been brought up again (though now I have faith that if they have time, they will) is Sierra's situation - that someone may have put her in the Dollhouse against her will. I understand that the consent that Echo and November gave is highly dubious anyway, but it's in a form where the handlers can persuade themselves that it's okay. If there's any truth to Sierra's backstory of being forced into the Dollhouse - and from the handlers' comments there may well be - that's a very different story indeed.

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

You know, Dollhouse is kind of frustrating for me, and I really blame Fox. According to Whedon, the story the show is telling now is what he wanted to start out with, but the network insisted on half a dozen standalone action-adventure type episodes first. And those have left a taste in my mouth that's really, really hard to get past now.

The thing is, I can completely get behind a show that's about deeply skeevy things, if they're acknowledged to be skeevy and their wrongness is the entire point. Which does seem to be the case here. But, man, even though they also tried to be pretty clear about the Wrongness in those first few episodes, there's just something about using this particular deeply skeevy idea as the basis for Yet Another Episodic Action/Crime/Drama that's sort of nauseatingly wrong, and while I could handle it at first, the more I watched, the harder it got. If I was enjoying an episode, I felt uncomfortably skeevy, myself. And if I wasn't -- which was often the case -- it left me with lots of time to think about how much I'd like to see all these skeevy characters die in a fire. It's hard for me to get past that, which is really unfortunate, because if they'd started where Joss wanted, I think my reaction would probably have been very different.

but for some reason I found the revelation that Adelle DeWitt has been using Victor like that especially icky.

So did I, and I'm not sure why, because objectively it's no worse than anything else they've done, and not as damaging as some things. Still.

I get the impression, by the way, that we're supposed to find DeWitt more sympathetic after that episode, but I'm afraid I still want her to die in a fire. Possibly more than I did before. This despite a performance that certainly would have wrung some sympathy for the character out of me if there were any to be had.

Which is interesting, because I can't help comparing it with my recent obsession, The Pretender (a show to which Dollhouse bears some interesting similarities), where I find myself saying things like, "Well, yes, OK, he may have been complicit in kidnapping small children and holding them in captivity for decades and running unethical experiments on them, but, oh, he's such a sweetie!" Which just underscores my initial impression that what Dollhouse really needs is Patrick Bauchau.

Anyway. I will keep watching it. As you say, it probably won't last much longer, so I might as well stick around and see what happens until they cancel it.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

I get the impression, by the way, that we're supposed to find DeWitt more sympathetic after that episode, but I'm afraid I still want her to die in a fire. Possibly more than I did before. This despite a performance that certainly would have wrung some sympathy for the character out of me if there were any to be had.

I don't think we're supposed to find her more sympathetic as such, but more fleshed out as a character; even when high, she has been on top of things all the time, so to speak, and you have to wonder why a smart and charismatic woman like that couldn't find other ways to gain money and power, and who was she kidding with the ongoing "we're just doing this to help people" line? This episode, however, showed some of the ways she's screwed up herself (beyond the obvious, i.e. she has to be if she took this job), and that one of the reasons she's so hung up on said line is that this is her self justification re: Victor/Roger. The way they present Adelle DeWitt reminds me very much of Lilah Morgan in Angel. The show has always been clear on Lilah's evilness, but she was a compelling character, and things like her affair with Wesley (in which she was arguably the more vulnerable party) contributed to this without excusing what Lilah did for a living.

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

I don't think we're supposed to find her more sympathetic as such, but more fleshed out as a character;

Well, it does succeed at that. What I'm not sure about is how well is succeeds at making me care. I recall Lilah as being rather more interesting.

[st-aurafina.livejournal.com]

Dollhouse switched on like a light-globe from episode six - I've been enjoying it so much better. Though, I've loved Boyd from the moment they reversed the trust exchange, in that skeevy, skeevy hunter episode with the Middleman.

I was also creeped out by the Victor/Adelle thing, but I'm prepared to give Joss the benefit of the doubt, and assume that there will be consequences for her actions. (I just rewatched the episode with the drug, and Adelle so nearly tells Topher about her relationship. I love how those little details have been tucked into each episode - Joss is king of foreshadowing.)