And episode three:
Stage Fright. Echo becomes a backup singer to watch out for a female singing sensation with a very overzealous fan. Agent Ballard's investigation takes a turn for the worse.
I have to say that the description of episode five alone will keep me hanging in until then. But let's hope for less girl running and screaming this week.
I’m actually tweeting this (is that what the kids are calling it?). This episode is a little…goofy.
Man. That was simultaneously really frustrating (i.e. “Bad”) and yet gave me hope for this series eventually finding its feet.
First of all, everything to do with the music was awful. Just excruciating. I wish they hadn’t gone anywhere near it.
And all the male gaze-y stuff that they keep invoking, what is it supposed to be signifying? “Hey, this is a bad thing. Look at the bad thing. Ahem, hey, bad things are happening! Take note!” And then, in the end, the gazers/users/whatever get their asses beat down. Except for the viewer, who is left feeling guilty for having eyes.
That said, the fact that Echo is displaying unexpected/independent behavior makes me think this could get interesting. Particularly that last head shake at Sierra. Oh, and the Russian mafia doll was a bit of a mindfuck, too.
I like the Russian guy, who has actually been giving me hope in each episode, mostly because his voice was the most Whedonesque. Plus, I thought he was cute, in a weasely sort of way. I had sort of guessed he was an active, but still liked it. Is it wrong that I find both Victor and Sierra more interesting than Echo?
The main plot was goofy, especially the whole suicidal popstar thing. That said, I sort of appreciated when Echo knocked her out with a folding chair.
The folding chair was a nice surprise and kind of the highlight of the episode for me!
This episode felt far less squick-happy than the others so far. I wished it had a bit more mythos-building stuff (and less actual music numbers), but I didn’t mind it. Nothing here particularly infuriated or troubled me, and I also dug the folding chair moment.
Oh, and Russian doll was a nice reveal too. I keep thinking that the plan has to be to take this to a place we can’t quite see yet, because I actually can’t imagine Joss Whedon or anyone writing the show not getting bored with repeating the same structure over and over, week after week.
Eliza was better this week, I thought, perhaps because she got to a) use a version of her Faith accent and b) didn’t have to stay totally blank in the Dollhouse (no “Did I fall asleep?” this week, right? Or am I forgetting it?).
Dollhouse seems to be finding its pace, and I like the subtlety of that little conspiratorial headshake at the end. Agree that letting Eliza play to her strengths this week was a good thing. I don’t know where all of this going, exactly, or rather: I don’t know how well it’s going to do in getting there. But I’m finding resonance in this woman discovering her own agency and sense of self independent of the roles and people-pleasing identities projected onto her. I think the show is done intelligently, in that they aren’t beating us about the head with that Message, but allowing it to come through as embodied by Dushku.
I think this episode was actually my favorite so far. The singing and dancing reminded me that YES! I am watching a Joss Whedon production. I thought it was quite amusing, actually. I totally enjoyed the Faith accent, the folding chair, and the conspiratorial head shaking at the end. I am very much looking forward to the upcoming episodes. When I saw the first episode of Dollhouse I wasn’t sure at all about it, but I’m starting to buy in.