|
|
| Saturday, September 26, 2009 11:54 PM |
| On the Viewer - Dollhouse (Season 2, Episode 1 - "Vows") |
 by Fëanor |
My usual live-blog style review, with many spoilers included. Enjoy!
—
Saunders sent Topher a clip from Bride of Frankenstein? I suppose to protest Echo's latest mission, wherein (I happen to know from the ads) she is being turned into a bride for a client.
Victor's scars from Alpha's attack are healing up. When checking these scars, DeWitt lets her hands linger a bit too long on his face. Still harboring some feelings for him, are we?
Langton is talking about weird client demands. A news anchor wanted to be rolled in eggs and flour and dipped... "Ah, Tempura Joe," says DeWitt. "Such a lonely soul." Oh my. But the latest engagement is even sicker than that! Echo's getting married! But hey, why is she walking up to the altar alone? They couldn't manufacture a Dad to give her away?
So Topher sleeps on a little cot in the server room? And he doesn't shower? That's sad. And nasty.
Apparently Sierra's latest engagement was as a stuck-up, racist British noble with kinky tendencies. Hoo boy.
Topher: "How many more today?"
Ivy: "Well, the Jonas Brothers are back in town."
Topher: "Say no more. Voracious little nippers."
HA!
Saunders pulls another prank on Topher: mice in the cabinets! She's still a little ticked off about this whole "you're really just another active and you've been designed to be broken" thing.
Interesting. DeWitt paid for a series of expensive surgeries to fix Victor's face - but didn't do the same for Whiskey.
Saunders: "What if she went over your head?"
Langton: "I'm very tall."
Okay, that's funny.
Langton: "You seem to be having a hard time."
Saunders: "My entire existence was constructed by a sociopath in a sweater-vest. What do you suggest I do?"
Langton: "Have dinner with me."
This is an interesting exchange!!
Langton: "Every person I know is pretty poorly constructed. Everyone has an excuse for not dealing. But eventually that's all they are: excuses."
Saunders: "What's yours?"
Ah! Jamie Bamber has a weird British accent! Why are you talking like that, Apollo??
Ha! We cut from Echo's love talk with her husband to Ballard's bitter, angry face.
(An aside: watching this show from the perspective of Joss' recent comments on what it was always meant to be about is making me notice all the sexual content a lot more. It's very much about sex and desire, isn't it?)
Ah, now I see what this mission is really about! Echo is not just playing a wife - she's playing an undercover agent playing a wife, so she can nail a drug dealer! Oh, the levels of artifice!
Ballard has to check his notes to stay in character. D'oh! Also: Ballard is the client. Woah.
Echo starts getting those memories she's not supposed to have again, and she and Saunders have a pretty mind-blowing conversation. As Saunders talks to Echo about the incident with Alpha and why it happened, her hand hovers over the scalpel for a second! Then she grabs a lollipop instead and tells Echo to go be her best. Echo: "No one is their best in here."
Alexis Denisof of Angel fame arrives as Senator Daniel Perrin. He's making the Rossum Corporation a target of a crusade. Did Ballard feed him information?
Woah! DeWitt wants Ballard to consider becoming Echo's handler?? Sounds like a dream come true for him.
DeWitt: "You work for the betterment of mankind, fighting crime by listening to Echo have sex. It's terribly noble."
Then she says she thought Ballard really cared about November, but now she thinks he was just done with her - but he's not done with Echo. Ouch! She sure knows how to push people's buttons.
Oh, c'mon. Ballard let the drug dealer's men take pictures of him talking to Echo? Rookie mistake!
Saunders crawled into bed with Topher!! Every time I think this show can't get any more creepy and twisted, it does!
Topher: "That is the minority vote. And you tricked it!"
This is a seriously disturbing scene. Saunders thinks she's found out Topher's real plan for her: to create a being that hated him so that if she did come to love him, he would know it was real.
Topher: "You don't know me! That's the contract. You don't know me, and I don't know you. Not fully. Not ever. I made you question. I made you fight for your beliefs. I didn't make you hate me. You chose to."
Topher asks why she doesn't try to get her old identity reimprinted. Saunders: "Because I don't want to die.... I'm in someone else's body and I'm afraid to give it up." Wow.
Saunders: "I'm not better than you. I'm just a series of excuses."
Topher: "You're human."
Saunders: "Don't flatter yourself."
Echo is in serious trouble of being found out by her husband, then does a very good job of turning it all around on him - until suddenly her Echo memories pop out and take over again. Not good! Yep, she's having a serious composite-type event now. And Ballard is beating her up, but only in order to deliberately dial up the personality that beat him up in the Chinese restaurant way back when. Crazy plan, dude! I like it!
For a minute there I thought for sure Saunders had killed herself. But I only thought that because Whedon wanted me to think that. In fact, he wants to leave his options open in case the actress becomes available again (I'm guessing). So Saunders just left. But, uh, the only thing is, I thought you couldn't leave the Dollhouse? Maybe Topher helped her?
Echo remembers everything. For good and for real now. That's kind of a game changer.
Echo: "Will you help me?"
Ballard: "I swear, I'm with you. No matter what. Everything's going to be all right."
Echo: "...now that you're here."
Ballard: "Do you trust me?"
Echo: "With my life."
"Vows" indeed. This episode began with one marriage, and ended with another one. Very neat.
A strong start to the second season of Dollhouse! Extremely twisted and thought-provoking, and a number of rather large changes to the status quo. Exciting! |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Jim Genzano's books on Goodreads
