Dollhouse Review and a bit on Demons...
Jan. 18th, 2010 09:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatWatching the Demons from BBC America...it makes me miss Buffy, although the demons remind me from something out of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere - which is a nice twist. The writing of Buffy is better, and more innovative - since we have a bouncy female heroine as opposed to the oh so original rebellious/angsty/brooding teenage boy hero, who, gasp, is related to Van Helsing. (*eyeroll*) BBC has done better...with innovative shows such as Being Human - although I'd have found it more interesting if it had been two girls and one guy. Apparently Whedon's the only one who felt the need to do horror/fantasy with a mostly female cast. US - isn't much better, *cough*Supernatural*cough*. That said, I'm wondering if the reason the gal is the ghost on Being Human - may not be a reference/commentary on the invisible girl/minority in society?
Demons is basically the old school, teenage boy demon hunter, teenage girl side-kick/girl friend damsel, blind seer, and a mentor/godfather - Professor Rupert Galvern. (Yes, I kid you not - Rupert G. I like the actor - he's the same one who played Gene on Ashes to Ashes and Life on Mars. But I prefer Anthony Stewart Head, who had more edge.) And yes, you've probably seen this set up before. I know I have.
Also saw the last two Dollhouse episodes. Which were okay. Felt a bit rushed and cramped with story - but that's to be expected.
The most interesting thing to me about the last two episodes of Dollhouse was the reveal on who was behind the Rossume Corporation. And if you only watched Epitaph One? You don't know who is behind Rossum. There are no clues in S1. Well there are clues, loads of clues, actually, but it is a bit like S1 Buffy and S2 Buffy...you don't know who the baddie is because "you", the audience, are so emotionally invested in the baddie being a goodie (those guys actually make the best villians in dramas, not to mention the most realistic ones - because the story turns out to be more multi-layered and not just about the villian, but about the betrayal of trust or the relationship between the heroine and the villain - which is more interesting to me. Because in real life - the people who hurt us the most are often those we love the most. That's why my favorite villains in Buffy were Willow and Angelus. Always more interesting when it is someone you'd die to save.) I discussed this at length in 2maggie2's journal because it is rather spoilerly and she already knew all the spoilers.
I actually found Dollhouse more interesting in how it relates to what Whedon is doing in Buffy S8. Saw a lot of parrallels. But on it's own? Eh. Okay. I enjoyed it but it's nothing to squee about. There were better episodes this season. This is hard for me to talk about without talking about Buffy S8 spoilers - because Dollhouse more or less clued me into where Whedon was going - it narrowed down who Twilight had to be, I guessed wrong but that's only because I was convinced one of the characters had an iron-clad albi, which, ahem, turns out, he/she/it really really doesn't have, while the character I thought was Twilight, actually does have an iron-clad albi. The writer did something I didn't think he'd do in a million years for a lot of reasons. Turns out, I was wrong. The nifty thing about Whedon and what makes his stories so unpredictable - is this writer is willing to break the rules and piss off his established fansbase. And I mean really piss them off - he doesn't go half-way. Gotta to give him credit for that, if nothing else. That takes guts. In Dollhouse, he takes a similar risk - because I'm willing to bet I wasn't the only one who loved the character that became the insane head of Rossum. You were supposed to love him, to care for him, the story does not work if you don't. Since it is about identity, about false illusions, and false trust. Whedon apparently is fascinated with these things at the moment. Specifically how we project our fantasy and desires on to someone else.
Echo's need for a father figure, a caretaker, a protector, someone she can trust no matter what, who won't molest her, won't force her to love him physically, and will protect her from others. She aches for this person. Which gives Rossum it's opening. Boyd imprints upon her - trust. She loves him. She trusts him with her life. She projects onto him all her desires and needs. It is an emotional bond. But it is not real. Or not in the way it is inside Echo's head. Boyd does love Echo, he does protect her, but in the way a scientist protects his creation. From his pov - she is his daughter, his project, his to do with what he wishes.
Father knows best. She is his Galatea. Much like Henry Higgins sees Eliza Doolittle, Boyd views Echo. And sees Paul Ballard as a Freddie...a nincompoop, someone he can easily do away with - with but a quick phrase.
They see their relationship with one another differently. Oh it is the same relationship in theory, it's just they don't see it the same way. So Boyd isn't really betraying Echo in his head - he is doing what he promised, he is protecting her, but not from Rossum but from everyone else. That's the important thing - Whedon seems to be getting across - how we think, how we see is different. To us, we are the good guy. Caroline sees herself as the hero, but Boyd points out that to the world she's a terrorist taking down a pharamceutical corporation that saves millions of lives. She's the bad guy. Boyd sees himself as the good guy, finding a cure for the imprinting, moving humanity to the next evolutionary stage, with fire is reknewal, he is saving the world and she is his means to do it. What he is doing is for the betterment of society. See, he has proof on paper. Why won't she cooperate? She will save lives. Her refusal will destroy the human race. Two opposing points of view.
As Whedon states - in our heads we are the heroes of the piece, the leading lady or leading man - the other guy is the villain, the other guy the supporting player.
It's not a new theme. In Firefly/Serenity - the union or corporate governing body believed it was the hero and the Firefly crew terrorists. Mal had killed people in the war in terrorist actions. There was peace and prosperity under the Union. And their experiments to end aggression while ending badly in one place were not intentionally harmful. They wanted peace, right. From Mal's point of view - they are removing free choice, automony, personal power.
Same deal with Jasmine in Angel - Jasmine who promises peace, prosperity. But Angel states without choice, why does it matter? No one can choose, they are under your spell, happy like on a drug. Would you prefer chaos, she states? And he does or so it appears.
Twilight in Buffy sees the slayer army as an imbalance. Causing disorder. We need to do away with the slayers, away with magic, go back to the status quo. Shouldn't these women be allowed to have power? To use their potential? To choose what to do with it? Shouldn't I be able to share it - instead of have it harnassed by men? Buffy asks. Uncertain. If I hadn't done the spell - would Twilight exist? Would we exist? Does undoing it resolve things? Not so far as we have seen. Nor is there any evidence that Twilight is necessarily correct and that the slayers have unbalanced things - it could very well be someone else's actions that disrupted the balance for all we know. There's no clear evidence it was Buffy. Just as it is Boyd's actions that cause the apocalypse not Caroline's - she attempts to stop him, but she is too late - it has already gotten out. Boyd pushed the button that destroyed the world, although he had the best of intentions at the time...the road to hell blah, blah blah.
Does individual choice matter over order? Are Caroline's actions justified?
Are Boyd's? Clearly Caroline is in the right...but Boyd does have a point, Rossum for all it's ills is saving lives...even if they are destroying the world in the process.
But isn't Caroline also aiding in destroying the world through her own actions? If she'd never attacked Rossum - would they have been able to get as far as they did?
Anyhow some interesting themes and parrallels here, even if the execution was a bit on the flimsy side and hap-hazard. I give them a pass - because I know they had to push these out quickly and under the gun. With little prep time. And had to wrap up what they clearly hoped was a an year long arc. That said, I wish Whedon would find a good plotter, a la David Greenwalt to team up with. Minear is not a good plotter. He needs someone who is good at plot points, and can reign him in as Gail Berman, David Greenwalt, and others had. Buffy S8 has the same problem that Dollhouse did - plotwise it is a mess. They've wandered all over the place, literally. Both stories went off on unnecessary tangents, which informed the plot, but also lost the audience...in the meandering. What they both lacked was good editors. Making me realize how important an editor is to a story, particularly when writer's get carried away and lose their line of thought.
Sigh. Back to work tomorrow. Short three day MLK holiday is over. MLK would have been 81 today.
Demons is basically the old school, teenage boy demon hunter, teenage girl side-kick/girl friend damsel, blind seer, and a mentor/godfather - Professor Rupert Galvern. (Yes, I kid you not - Rupert G. I like the actor - he's the same one who played Gene on Ashes to Ashes and Life on Mars. But I prefer Anthony Stewart Head, who had more edge.) And yes, you've probably seen this set up before. I know I have.
Also saw the last two Dollhouse episodes. Which were okay. Felt a bit rushed and cramped with story - but that's to be expected.
The most interesting thing to me about the last two episodes of Dollhouse was the reveal on who was behind the Rossume Corporation. And if you only watched Epitaph One? You don't know who is behind Rossum. There are no clues in S1. Well there are clues, loads of clues, actually, but it is a bit like S1 Buffy and S2 Buffy...you don't know who the baddie is because "you", the audience, are so emotionally invested in the baddie being a goodie (those guys actually make the best villians in dramas, not to mention the most realistic ones - because the story turns out to be more multi-layered and not just about the villian, but about the betrayal of trust or the relationship between the heroine and the villain - which is more interesting to me. Because in real life - the people who hurt us the most are often those we love the most. That's why my favorite villains in Buffy were Willow and Angelus. Always more interesting when it is someone you'd die to save.) I discussed this at length in 2maggie2's journal because it is rather spoilerly and she already knew all the spoilers.
I actually found Dollhouse more interesting in how it relates to what Whedon is doing in Buffy S8. Saw a lot of parrallels. But on it's own? Eh. Okay. I enjoyed it but it's nothing to squee about. There were better episodes this season. This is hard for me to talk about without talking about Buffy S8 spoilers - because Dollhouse more or less clued me into where Whedon was going - it narrowed down who Twilight had to be, I guessed wrong but that's only because I was convinced one of the characters had an iron-clad albi, which, ahem, turns out, he/she/it really really doesn't have, while the character I thought was Twilight, actually does have an iron-clad albi. The writer did something I didn't think he'd do in a million years for a lot of reasons. Turns out, I was wrong. The nifty thing about Whedon and what makes his stories so unpredictable - is this writer is willing to break the rules and piss off his established fansbase. And I mean really piss them off - he doesn't go half-way. Gotta to give him credit for that, if nothing else. That takes guts. In Dollhouse, he takes a similar risk - because I'm willing to bet I wasn't the only one who loved the character that became the insane head of Rossum. You were supposed to love him, to care for him, the story does not work if you don't. Since it is about identity, about false illusions, and false trust. Whedon apparently is fascinated with these things at the moment. Specifically how we project our fantasy and desires on to someone else.
Echo's need for a father figure, a caretaker, a protector, someone she can trust no matter what, who won't molest her, won't force her to love him physically, and will protect her from others. She aches for this person. Which gives Rossum it's opening. Boyd imprints upon her - trust. She loves him. She trusts him with her life. She projects onto him all her desires and needs. It is an emotional bond. But it is not real. Or not in the way it is inside Echo's head. Boyd does love Echo, he does protect her, but in the way a scientist protects his creation. From his pov - she is his daughter, his project, his to do with what he wishes.
Father knows best. She is his Galatea. Much like Henry Higgins sees Eliza Doolittle, Boyd views Echo. And sees Paul Ballard as a Freddie...a nincompoop, someone he can easily do away with - with but a quick phrase.
They see their relationship with one another differently. Oh it is the same relationship in theory, it's just they don't see it the same way. So Boyd isn't really betraying Echo in his head - he is doing what he promised, he is protecting her, but not from Rossum but from everyone else. That's the important thing - Whedon seems to be getting across - how we think, how we see is different. To us, we are the good guy. Caroline sees herself as the hero, but Boyd points out that to the world she's a terrorist taking down a pharamceutical corporation that saves millions of lives. She's the bad guy. Boyd sees himself as the good guy, finding a cure for the imprinting, moving humanity to the next evolutionary stage, with fire is reknewal, he is saving the world and she is his means to do it. What he is doing is for the betterment of society. See, he has proof on paper. Why won't she cooperate? She will save lives. Her refusal will destroy the human race. Two opposing points of view.
As Whedon states - in our heads we are the heroes of the piece, the leading lady or leading man - the other guy is the villain, the other guy the supporting player.
It's not a new theme. In Firefly/Serenity - the union or corporate governing body believed it was the hero and the Firefly crew terrorists. Mal had killed people in the war in terrorist actions. There was peace and prosperity under the Union. And their experiments to end aggression while ending badly in one place were not intentionally harmful. They wanted peace, right. From Mal's point of view - they are removing free choice, automony, personal power.
Same deal with Jasmine in Angel - Jasmine who promises peace, prosperity. But Angel states without choice, why does it matter? No one can choose, they are under your spell, happy like on a drug. Would you prefer chaos, she states? And he does or so it appears.
Twilight in Buffy sees the slayer army as an imbalance. Causing disorder. We need to do away with the slayers, away with magic, go back to the status quo. Shouldn't these women be allowed to have power? To use their potential? To choose what to do with it? Shouldn't I be able to share it - instead of have it harnassed by men? Buffy asks. Uncertain. If I hadn't done the spell - would Twilight exist? Would we exist? Does undoing it resolve things? Not so far as we have seen. Nor is there any evidence that Twilight is necessarily correct and that the slayers have unbalanced things - it could very well be someone else's actions that disrupted the balance for all we know. There's no clear evidence it was Buffy. Just as it is Boyd's actions that cause the apocalypse not Caroline's - she attempts to stop him, but she is too late - it has already gotten out. Boyd pushed the button that destroyed the world, although he had the best of intentions at the time...the road to hell blah, blah blah.
Does individual choice matter over order? Are Caroline's actions justified?
Are Boyd's? Clearly Caroline is in the right...but Boyd does have a point, Rossum for all it's ills is saving lives...even if they are destroying the world in the process.
But isn't Caroline also aiding in destroying the world through her own actions? If she'd never attacked Rossum - would they have been able to get as far as they did?
Anyhow some interesting themes and parrallels here, even if the execution was a bit on the flimsy side and hap-hazard. I give them a pass - because I know they had to push these out quickly and under the gun. With little prep time. And had to wrap up what they clearly hoped was a an year long arc. That said, I wish Whedon would find a good plotter, a la David Greenwalt to team up with. Minear is not a good plotter. He needs someone who is good at plot points, and can reign him in as Gail Berman, David Greenwalt, and others had. Buffy S8 has the same problem that Dollhouse did - plotwise it is a mess. They've wandered all over the place, literally. Both stories went off on unnecessary tangents, which informed the plot, but also lost the audience...in the meandering. What they both lacked was good editors. Making me realize how important an editor is to a story, particularly when writer's get carried away and lose their line of thought.
Sigh. Back to work tomorrow. Short three day MLK holiday is over. MLK would have been 81 today.
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no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 08:02 am (UTC)I agree about Whedon needing a good plotter. The emotional side of his plots usually works great, but the setting is to him just the stage the drama takes place on and he doesn't seem to know what great things you can do with it.
If he had a plotter like JMS or George R.R. Martin, Stephen Moffat someone who an make your jaw drop with the sheer geniality of the plot that would help a lot.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 08:19 pm (UTC)Agreed. He's very very good at emotional and psychological arcs, and emotional relationships - depicting the horrific underbelly of them. Reminds me of a soap writer with a horror fetish and a cynism streak. Hee.
If he had a plotter like JMS or George R.R. Martin, Stephen Moffat someone who an make your jaw drop with the sheer geniality of the plot that would help a lot.
Agreed - he lacks the attention to detail that those three plotters have. He needs someone who is equally patient with fine details...Greenwalt was possibly the closest. I don't believe Brad Meltzer is...and since he was allegedly Whedon's co-plotter on this arc, I'd say that's been more or less proven. He had better editors on X-men, actually.
Oh, I sent you Last Angel in Hell this weekend. Let me know if and when you receive it.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-20 07:51 am (UTC)Hee, that's what makes him so unique :)
He needs someone who is equally patient with fine details...Greenwalt was possibly the closest. I don't believe Brad Meltzer is...and since he was allegedly Whedon's co-plotter on this arc, I'd say that's been more or less proven. He had better editors on X-men, actually.
I know Meltzer too little to make a qualified comment and X-men I'm afraid is the only thing not even Whedon gets me to read. I liked his run on Runaways though (but there he could also go for personal realationships).
Oh, I sent you Last Angel in Hell this weekend. Let me know if and when you receive it.
*Squeees* Thank you so much!
no subject
Date: 2010-01-20 05:16 pm (UTC)I know Meltzer too little to make a qualified comment
I'm hardly an expert, but I have read two of his things, one a forgettable legal thriller that makes John Grisham feel like Shakespeare in comparison ( although that may not be fair) and the other Identity Crisis - which was about Justice League covering up a murder by one of their own, which Batman unravels. And causes a major rift between Batman, Superman and Wonderwoman. Basically Batman feels as if they betrayed his and humanity's trust by their actions. That was the gist of it. Been a while since I read the thing and I did it in the comic book story in the space of an hour. Didn't buy it.
The Buffy comics in some ways echo Identity Crisis - the whole betrayal of trust theme is huge in both. With the three main characters being people known for their trust issues.
and X-men I'm afraid is the only thing not even Whedon gets me to read. I liked his run on Runaways though (but there he could also go for personal realationships).
I guess you don't want my X-men comics then? ;-)
Ah, I was the opposite, I picked up Runaways, but it didn't interest me, while X-men I'd been reading since the 1980s, finally stopped in 2001, until Whedon's arc - where I dipped into it again but only for his arc.
By the way...that arc also delved heavily into trust issues regarding relationships. There's one character that everyone believes has betrayed them, Emma Frost, when she's actually been trying to protect them from a greater threat and empowered her lover and the only one who trusted her absolutely, and felt most betrayed, Scott "Summers" to help her out of it.
Whedon likes to tread the same ground, just in slightly different ways. And no, I don't think he's doing the same thing with Buffy that he did on X-men.
I actually think Buffy will be closer to Dollhouse.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-20 06:34 pm (UTC)Thing is, I'm a ginormous comic book fan, but the mainstream US superhero series do nothing for me. I'd say only about 10% of all my comics have superheroes and even those are more of the not so standard variety (Watchmen, Rising Stars, Kabuki, Runaways, Aria (could anyone tell the author that that's a stupid title to market in germany)). Maybe a Batman book or two but that's it. So the X-men are not really my thing (though I saw one of the movies).
But you're right the story on X-men sounds amazingly like where Buffy could lead, though I really hope he's not going to try to sell me "but Angel meant well" too hard.
How do you think it will be closer to Dollhouse? In that one of her own will betray her and claims to be an uberpatronizing Jasmin like pseudo peace bringer?
no subject
Date: 2010-01-21 03:14 am (UTC)Depending on how you look at it... that's already happened, one of her own has betrayed her and become an uberpatronizing Jasmin or rather Caleb like psesuo peace bringer. (Haven't you been reading Twilight's speeches?) ;-)
Twilight reminds me a lot of Boyd. His organization and his words echo Boyd's. Also like Boyd, he comes from a corporation or formerly ran a corporation. He has a vast organization much like Boyd does. And he is manipulative like Boyd. Also like Boyd, he had a close and trusting relationship with the heroine.
Boyd's death reminds me a lot of...well Angel's in Season 2. Where he is wiped clean of Angelus and she tells him to close his eyes and drives a sword through his chest. Here, she hands Boyd a grenade, fits him with a bomb, and tells him to pull the plug when she leaves. In both cases - she is justified for he is the one who brought this about, it is his own bed. And in both cases it is an innocent, someone wiped clean of it, that is killed or sent to hell - they don't choose to sacrifice themselves - she chooses for them. They trust her and she sends them to hell.
At the heart of all of Buffy's problems is trust. She was told at the beginning by Giles and her Watchers - not to trust anyone, especially her parents. We learn later in Normal Again, when she did trust her parents they put her in a psychiatric hospital. Later, she gains power by trusting Xander and Willow, but by doing so, she constantly puts them in danger. Giles...who she trusts more than anyone, betrays her horribly in S3, but redeems himself, barely.
Then he does it again in S6 - by leaving just as her father left her and her sister and her Mom, to fend completely on her own. He redeems himself, again, barely by returning at the end of the season. But in S7 - after she's indicated how important Spike is to her fight, after she's trusted Giles with the reasons behind her choice to remove Spike's chip, and her relationship with him - Giles goes behind her back and plots Spike's murder with Robin Wood, the child of one of Spike's victims - without alerting Buffy to Wood's agenda. He says it is for her own good. After that the betrayals stack up and there is an odd rift between them, that never quite heals..even in the comics. Giles does not trust Buffy, and she senses it. The same thing happens with Xander and Dawn, who confide in each other but shut Buffy out, they don't tell her they are seeing each other or have feelings - she finds out. Willow knows more about Xander and Dawn than Buffy, and hides even more. No wonder Buffy feels so alone.
Echo in Dollhouse - has all these people in her head but can trust no one. Not Adelle. Not Topher. Not even herself. She trusts Paul, until he is taken from her...and the person she did trust over everyone else, Boyd, turns out, ironically, to be the person she's been against all along.
Like Echo lost Paul, Buffy in a way lost Spike in S7...the one person she trusted was taken from her, by a device provided by Angel. Echo similarily lost Paul due to a device and operation in part orchestrated by Boyd, Paul's rival. It was to save Paul's life. And Paul is a hero. Dollhouse feels like a tragic take on the same themes.
What hits me as interesting in the comic is the three people taken prisoner.
Giles = trust (broken trust)
Faith = guilt (if Buffy hadn't died, Faith wouldn't have the power, if Buffy had stayed dead, Faith would be the slayer, Buffy much like Faith did in No Future, feels guilty for what happened to Faith - Faith represents her guilt. Also notably Faith has big time father issues, either an abusive or absent, can't remember which - but it was what got her involved with the Mayor)
Andrew = those Buffy has saved. The killers, and people who have done bad things, but she's redeemed and helped. Such as Spike, Anya, etc. The good she's done. Hence the double joke - Your name WILL come to me. The forgettable name. Or the fact that I don't wish to focus on the good she's doing and continues to do?