Dollhouse

Dollhouse

– Hello Echo, how are you feeling?
– Did I fall asleep?
– For a little while.

Routine conversation when Echo, an ‘active’ in the Dollhouse (IMDb, Wikpedia), just got her memory wiped out. In her Dollhouse state, Echo and the other ‘actives’ are like ‘dolls’, vulnerable, helpless and without any idea what the real word is. But sooner or later someone with lots of money rents a ‘doll’. Then the ‘doll’ is imprinted with the character and skills the client wants, a killer, a lover, a thief, a anti-blackmail-expert, a caring mother or even a karate-master. The ‘dolls’ are programmable people. They do whatever they programmed for and have no real will. But, something isn’t quite right, some ‘dolls’ seam to build some kind of self awareness.
From the outside, Paul Ballard investigates the disappearance of Caroline. He picks up that there exist a Dollhouse. But the more he investigates, the more he finds himself in trouble. His boss fires him, but Paul doesn’t stop. He’s obsessed to find the truth.

Joss Whedons (Buffy, Firefly) new TV-show is a solid sci-fi drama/thriller. A slowly progressing background story and different operations for the ‘dolls’  in each episodes give the show some variety. The quality of the episodes varies from some average episode to hilarious and thrilling ones.
Well, Dollhouse doesn’t do anything obviously wrong. But I’m still not really convinced. I think it’s partly because there aren’t any likeable characters in it. The ‘dolls’ are reset for each episodes, the other characters don’t have much screen time or are cold as stone. It’s not that the actors are bad, they just play roles of people I don’t want to meet in real life.

The first season is nearly finished. Fox won’t air the last episode, it will be released only on DVD. Well, maybe another Fox series which will be cancelled.

Star-O-Meter: (3.5/5)

Trailer:

• ← Lang.NET Symposium 2009
• Mocks for internal interfaces →