Dollhouse: Epitaph One
Oct. 11th, 2009 06:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shapinglightOkay, I've watched Epitaph One now. Thoughts behind cut, and please don't spoiler me for season 2.
First of all, I'd better say that I don't know the history of the making of this episode so I could be wrong, but I think I know why Joss made it. It's the sort of Dollhouse equivalent of Serenity, the movie that Joss busted a gut to get made after Firefly had been cancelled (hey, I didn't like the show but far worse things go on for years and years without getting cancelled - Charmed? Ghost Whisperer? God, that show sucks). Joss knew that lightning doesn't strike twice and that, even if he had the energy to fight for it, no one in these post-credit crunch times was going to give him the money to make a feature film out of another failed TV show.
Which reminds me - all those people saying they hope Dollhouse will be cancelled so Joss can make something they like instead - don't they realise that when you have two failed TV shows under your belt, it becomes a lot less likely that you will ever be trusted to make another one?
Sorry, I digress. Anyway, I think Epitaph One was Joss's way of bookending Dollhouse for good in case it was cancelled, given that Omega was so much a season ender, not a show ender and left so many questions unanswered. For that reason, I'm glad he made it. I also hope that, now the show has been given a second season, he'll either ditch it as a show ender or, if season 2 is the last, give us an Epitaph Two that presents a completely different outcome to the world he's set up. I think this was your idea,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
quinara? I hope it happens.
That said, I didn't hate Epitaph One. There were some great scenes in it - notably Adelle and the revived Mr Dominic and Adelle and Crazy Topher. But all the scenes that looked like they'd dropped in from an episode of The Sarah Connor Chronicles with people floundering around in the dark and firing guns just got on my nerves, as did Echo and Ballard arriving to lead the dolls to the 'promised land'. I also wish people wouldn't mumble so much. I've no idea what was going on in the first five minutes because I couldn't make out a word anyone said, and I had to replay the ending four times to work out what 'Caroline's' final words were (that aside, that kid was pretty good, btw). I also think that things seem to fall apart a little whenever Joss's ideas go 'global' as it were. Yes, he was playing with some huge concepts here - loved the way people kept sneering at the 'give the people what they need, not what they want' line - but he's not so good at depicting the big picture stuff on screen, or wherever, as he is the intense intimate moments - and this is probably why Chosen isn't nearly as moving a finale as Becoming 2, and one of the reasons why the Buffy comic just doesn't work for me (too much big picture stuff, and guns, not enough character moments and not enough Buffy beating up vampires). In any case, the horror of what had happened to the world was far better realised in the intimate one-on-one scene between Adelle and Crazy Topher - the thing about answer the phone, don't answer the phone - and in every scene that Amy Acker was in, than it was in the scenes of death and destruction. Amy Acker was just brilliant.
But the shooting and quasi-military talk? I could have done without that.
So yes, some great moments, some grating moments. I can see why Joss made it. Equally, I hope it's just one possible future for the characters, not the only one.
First of all, I'd better say that I don't know the history of the making of this episode so I could be wrong, but I think I know why Joss made it. It's the sort of Dollhouse equivalent of Serenity, the movie that Joss busted a gut to get made after Firefly had been cancelled (hey, I didn't like the show but far worse things go on for years and years without getting cancelled - Charmed? Ghost Whisperer? God, that show sucks). Joss knew that lightning doesn't strike twice and that, even if he had the energy to fight for it, no one in these post-credit crunch times was going to give him the money to make a feature film out of another failed TV show.
Which reminds me - all those people saying they hope Dollhouse will be cancelled so Joss can make something they like instead - don't they realise that when you have two failed TV shows under your belt, it becomes a lot less likely that you will ever be trusted to make another one?
Sorry, I digress. Anyway, I think Epitaph One was Joss's way of bookending Dollhouse for good in case it was cancelled, given that Omega was so much a season ender, not a show ender and left so many questions unanswered. For that reason, I'm glad he made it. I also hope that, now the show has been given a second season, he'll either ditch it as a show ender or, if season 2 is the last, give us an Epitaph Two that presents a completely different outcome to the world he's set up. I think this was your idea,
quinara? I hope it happens. That said, I didn't hate Epitaph One. There were some great scenes in it - notably Adelle and the revived Mr Dominic and Adelle and Crazy Topher. But all the scenes that looked like they'd dropped in from an episode of The Sarah Connor Chronicles with people floundering around in the dark and firing guns just got on my nerves, as did Echo and Ballard arriving to lead the dolls to the 'promised land'. I also wish people wouldn't mumble so much. I've no idea what was going on in the first five minutes because I couldn't make out a word anyone said, and I had to replay the ending four times to work out what 'Caroline's' final words were (that aside, that kid was pretty good, btw). I also think that things seem to fall apart a little whenever Joss's ideas go 'global' as it were. Yes, he was playing with some huge concepts here - loved the way people kept sneering at the 'give the people what they need, not what they want' line - but he's not so good at depicting the big picture stuff on screen, or wherever, as he is the intense intimate moments - and this is probably why Chosen isn't nearly as moving a finale as Becoming 2, and one of the reasons why the Buffy comic just doesn't work for me (too much big picture stuff, and guns, not enough character moments and not enough Buffy beating up vampires). In any case, the horror of what had happened to the world was far better realised in the intimate one-on-one scene between Adelle and Crazy Topher - the thing about answer the phone, don't answer the phone - and in every scene that Amy Acker was in, than it was in the scenes of death and destruction. Amy Acker was just brilliant.
But the shooting and quasi-military talk? I could have done without that.
So yes, some great moments, some grating moments. I can see why Joss made it. Equally, I hope it's just one possible future for the characters, not the only one.
no subject
Date: 2009-10-12 03:16 pm (UTC)Probably. She appears to be one of Joss's pets, along with Amy, Alyson and Summer Glau (not dissing their acting chops by saying that, just saying). Can't say the character she played resonated with me much.
Considering how much I love post-apocalyptic global scenarios, I do forgive Joss for being a bit crap at them,
Well, there are scenarios and scenarios, aren't there?
(And I get rather gleeful that it seems like Echo, in all her super!special!goodness, shoots everyone apart from Dr. Saunders in cold blood. Or at least that's how it seemed to me.)
I suppose they cut away from that to leave us guessing, but yeah, it did look like she shot Adelle. Wonder what happened to Mr Dominic?
no subject
Date: 2009-10-12 05:03 pm (UTC)Oh, good point! Hmm... I suppose I'd say shot as well. (Echo probably enjoyed that one. :D)
no subject
Date: 2009-10-12 05:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-10-13 10:18 am (UTC)I would imagine so. Have to admit, I rather liked him.
no subject
Date: 2009-10-14 04:34 pm (UTC)Really? I always thought he was a bit of a git! Though it was interesting to compare him with DeWitt in a sort of father vs. mother thing, where he cared more about the concept of the people than the people themselves and she was sort of the other way round.
no subject
Date: 2009-10-15 09:35 am (UTC)