I know a lot of people have busied themselves haterizing on Dollhouse, but I’m here to take a stand.
I really dug that show.
And with the news that it’s been canceled, I find myself disappointed, for once again the world has been deprived of what could have been.
I say could have, because I think we can all agree that Dollhouse never really rose to the apex of Joss Whedon’s talent for storytelling.
But the potential was definitely there. Dollhouse is the Jerry Maguire to my Renee Zellwegger — I love it for the show it wants to be and I love it for the show it almost is. And I even made my face all scrunchy and squinty when I said it!
But like Firefly before it, Dollhouse has been given the axe too soon. (Of course, the difference is that Firefly was instantly a clearly great show, but I digress.)
It seems that the two most common criticisms of the show were the following: Eliza Dushku wasn’t a good enough actress to pull off the part of Echo, and the show took far too long to establish the greater story arc, instead focusing on too many “one-shot” episodes. I’d like to take this time, before the corpse is even cold, to offer my rebuttal.
Sure, Eliza Dushku is no Meryl Streep, but few are, and I think people had made up their minds about her not having what it takes long before they saw a single episode. In fact, there were a few times she really impressed me. (And personally, I have a theory that indifference to this show stemmed from a lot of Buffy fans’ resentment of the fact that Dushku and Whedon were working together but NOT in a Buffyverse-related project. That, however, is a topic for a whole other article.)
Focusing on her also conveniently allows haters to overlook the solid talent of some of the other players, particularly Amy Acker, Fran Kranz, Olivia Williams, and the impressively chameleonic Enver Gjokaj, who in the part of Victor really did seem to be a different person with each new assignment.
As for the season-long story arc that we’ve come to expect from Whedon (a tactic he used on both Buffy and Angel), I believe he was trying something different. With Dollhouse there was no season-long storyline, but rather a series-long storyline. Each season didn’t contain a Big Bad — the corporation responsible for the Dollhouses was the nemesis, and the vanquishing of that foe meant the end of the series.
Therefore, Whedon allowed us a great deal of time to live in this world, to soak up every little detail of it, so that when the plot changed significantly there would be no confusion. But while crafting this sort of slow-drip exposition, he gave us fun little adventures each week, and with his true flair for storytelling, they bounced liberally between drama, comedy, action, and horror.
The individual episodes weren’t setting us up for the ride. They were the ride. But many Whedonites, too busy looking for the Big Bad and the overarching story, failed to see that, and grew frustrated.
Of course, this is all just my opinion. What one likes is entirely subjective, and I can understand how for many people, Dollhouse just wasn’t their cup of tea. But I enjoyed it. I genuinely liked the characters, and wanted them to eventually find their way out of the Dollhouse. But now, sadly, I’ll never see that happen.
Sorry it didn’t work out, Joss and Eliza. I was with you guys.
Um…if you’re looking for something else to do, though, there’s always that Faith show! Just throwin’ it out there…
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This is not fair…I really liked DollHouse! It definitely was not given a chance!! The only real problem I had with the show were the dolls in the background always seemed to move faster than they should have. Oh…and that sneizure comment because I myself have epilepsy. But I will still miss it.
I, too, will miss Dollhouse. It had it’s moments and truly shone on occasion. I do think that Joss was still finding his way, though.
As for Eliza, I agree that most of the time she did not seem to convince me that she was someone else (half the time–especially when she was a ‘tough girl active’ I kept waiting for her to say “Five by Five”!), but she did it at least a couple of times. I don’t remember the name of the episode where she was the dead woman who loved horses but Eliza was quite convincing in that one, IMO.
The supporting cast though, was even better than she was (the best being Enver, who was a true revelation) and episodes based on those supporting characters were the best.
The one thing I keep hearing, though, is that this was just not as funny as many of Joss’s other shows. I realize this show was meant to be darker and all but even Angel seemed to have more laughs than this show (and most of the comedy seemed to fall to poor Fran as Topher–a character almost no one seemed to like and so the comedy fell flat).
In short, this show had potential and glimmers of greatness but I guess we’ll never get to see it fully developed. But hey, silver lining–now Joss can get to work on the Dr. Horrible sequel! :-)
Could not agree with you more! I will definitely miss my weekly dose of a Whedon show (sigh…i really miss Buffy and Angel). Eliza was good but not great in the role and Enver Gjokaj was a revelation. I do,However, feel a bit angry and confused with Joss Whedon’s decision to allow another one of his shows to be murdered by Fox. Yes, Fox gave the show an unexpected second season but the friday night time slot clearly wasn’t working from the onset and it would have been nice if the network tried the show on a different night. Also, I seem to recall that Joss once stated that he would never work with Fox again…am i wrong? In the end, i just think that in order for a Joss show to come into its own and fulfill its potential, or simply have a REAL shot at longevity it should be on a channel like Syfy or even HBO, SHOWTIME, STARZ(?).