Six: We’re the children of humanity. That makes them our parents in a sense.

Five: True, but parents have to die. It’s the only way children can come into their own.

–Battlestar Galactica, “Bastille Day”

When first I wrote about Caprica, I said it was “the story of two grieving fathers.”

I was wrong.

Oh, it’s an easy mistake to make. Daniel Greystone and Joseph Adama are two grieving fathers, both trying to find a way to hang on to their daughters — or perhaps, in Adama’s case, to free his daughter. Their initial contact, sealed by their mutual grief at the loss of their daughters and Adama’s wife in a terrorist attack, sets the stage for what is to come.

But Caprica is not about Daniel Greystone and Joseph Adama. Not really. No, Daniel and Joseph are merely players in a story being written by Zoe Greystone, with tremendous help from Lacey Rand, and with assistance from Clarice Willow, Amanda Greystone, and Tamara Adama. Two of those people — Zoe and Tamara — are dead. Three of them — Zoe, Lacey, and Tamara — are not yet adults.

And all of them are women.

It took some time for this to develop. Daniel did indeed try to save his daughter’s life by uploading her own creation — an avatar of herself, based on everything from brain scans to school records to internet logs — into a robot, a prototype Cylon, the only one he’s gotten to work. Daniel did indeed seek help from Joseph Adama, and his friends in the Ha’la’tha, the Tauron mafia, to steal technology from the Vergis Corporation, in order to try to get his daughter’s robot self working.

But Daniel wasn’t the prime mover in this drama. That was Zoe. She created her avatar, one that survived her death. Moreover, she created the program that allowed her to create the avatar. When the program was destroyed during Daniel’s attempt to upload her into a robot body, he was unable to duplicate her work. She was smarter than he was. She was the one who started the process that saved a part of her.

And when she realized that the transfer did work? That she was uploaded into a Cylon body? Well, she didn’t bother to mention it to the father of her creator — her sister, herself. Daniel had no claim on Zoe. Zoe was her own person. And throughout the series, she has hidden in plain sight, not so much as hinting that she exists, manipulating things behind the scenes — even luring a young technician working on her robot body into some cyber dates, not just because she thinks he’s cute — though she does — but in order to try to manipulate him into setting her robot self free, so she can escape Caprica and make it to Gemenon, where her human twin was heading before her human twin’s boyfriend blew up a train. The line she ultimately uses to snare the technician? It’s all about how trees should be coded in the virtual world.

Both Zoes’ friend, Lacey, is the only other person who knows Zoe’s avatar survives. And Lacey herself is not above manipulating the world to her whim. She is just a teenager, just a girl in a school, one with a headmaster who she mistrusts. But she knows the terrorist organization that Zoe orbited, and she’s slowly seducing a fellow teen, one deeper into the S.T.O. that she, into helping her to ship the Zoe robot to Gemenon. Is she attracted to him? Perhaps — but like Avatar Zoe, she’s using him, first and foremost.

Zoe and Lacey are the prime movers, but they are not the only ones. Amanda Greystone — Zoe’s mom, Daniel’s wife — is dancing on the razor’s edge between reality and unreality. Just like the rest of the Twelve Colonies, I suppose, only Amanda’s scars run deeper than just a love of virtual reality. It is Amanda’s sudden declaration at a memorial service that her daughter, Zoe, was a terrorist sympathizer — and perhaps, a terrorist — that causes a public uproar against her husband’s organization, and pushes him down a path where manufacturing more Cylons seems the only way to save his company.

Sister Clarice Willow, the headmaster of Zoe and Lacey’s school, is marvelously broken, possibly drug addicted, married into a group family that mistrusts her (save for two husbands) — and fanatically, hopelessly faithful that The One True God has a Plan. She is willing to manipulate Amanda to get the program Zoe was working on, because she believes that program is the key to eternal life for all people — the key to the very gates of heaven.

And Tamara Adama — she is lost in the virtual world, an imperfect copy of Joseph Adama’s daughter, created using the same program that created Zoe’s duplicate. She has ended up living her life in a videogame that resembles a cross between Grand Theft Auto and Worlds of Warcraft– only she’s the only character in the game who can’t die. And though she first entered the virtual world blindly, unsure of what she was or where she was, now she has become something more — something able to bend the rules of the game.

These are the leading characters of Caprica — these five women. Oh, the show does not condescend to men. Daniel is allowed his battle for his company and his search to figure out what makes the one working Cylon prototype work, when none of the others will. Joseph is allowed to try to salvage his relationship with his son, William, and to search for his daughter in the virtual world, where she is said to be. Sam Adama — Joseph’s brother — is allowed to be a Ha’la’tha enforcer who’s quietly showing his nephew the business, and coming home to a husband who worries about him. And these stories are real and deep and important.

But Daniel and Joseph are reacting to the world around them. Zoe, Lacey, Amanda, Clarice, Tamara? They’re acting. They’re the one calling the tune. Daniel and Joseph are dancing.

It’s rather bracing to see. Battlestar Galactica had its share of strong female characters — President Roslin, Kara Thrace, Athena, Three, Six — but this is something more. It’s sad, but it’s rather startling to see in the far-too-male world of science fiction television. And it’s incredibly welcome. Because these characters’ actions are believable, are entertaining, are contradictory and stupid and brilliant and right and wrong in just the way real humans behave. Caprica is not a show about fathers. And it is not merely a show about mothers and daughters and friends. It is a great show about mothers and daughters and friends — and fathers too.

Pro wrestling features athletes who are performers, and we all know that there are a lot of athletes and performers who are jerks. But Mick Foley isn’t one of them. The veteran wrestler is now donating half the proceeds from his latest book to survivors of rape in Sierra Leone (through Child Fund International). The other half is being donated to RAINN.

But Foley’s support of victims of rape and abuse isn’t stopping with money. He’s also donating his time as an online counselor for RAINN:

They have my first name when they sign in. There are times when the [screen] goes dead. Some women understandably may not want to talk to a man. But for the young lady I talked to, I think she appreciated my perspective. I told her I have four children, including a daughter about her age. She was very worried about what her parents might think. In those cases you have to continually reassure victims that they are victims. We let them know how brave it is for them to reach out for help.

It would be easy for Foley to live in comfort, to take the proceeds from his books and invest them in himself, to use his fame as a wrestler to make his life easy. Instead, he drives a 2002 minivan because it works (and because, he says, it helps teach his kids that nice things aren’t everything), and he donates his time and money to helping make the world a better place for victims of sexual abuse.

I don’t know about you, but I think Mick Foley has figured out what this whole life thing is supposed to be about.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t see anything beating this movie:

I still have no idea who this guy is, but the made Steven Colbert happy, and he’s Russian.

Via Chris Bodenner

If you’re ever feeling down about your life, feeling like you’re sick and tired of being sick and tired, just ready to give up, take a gander at how Roger Ebert is holding up.

The longtime writer and movie critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, best known for his work on the shows Siskel & Ebert and Ebert & Roeper, was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. In 2006, he began undergoing radiation therapy for the cancer, therapy that ultimately killed the cells in his jaw and weakened his carotid artery to the point that he nearly bled to death. Today, Ebert is unable to speak, eat, or drink; he has no lower jaw (surgeries to repair it have repeatedly failed, and Ebert has given up on the process).

A lesser person might be embittered, frustrated, and despondent. And yet, as anyone who’s followed Ebert’s writing or tweeting of late knows, Ebert is far from those. He has written about his affliction with grace and humor, and a strong acceptance of his new normal. That doesn’t mean that he doesn’t recognize or mourn what he’s lost, but he does it gracefully, as with his post from January in which he discussed his inability to consume food or drink:

Isn’t it sad to be unable eat or drink? Not as sad as you might imagine. I save an enormous amount of time. I have control of my weight. Everything agrees with me. And so on.

What I miss is the society. Lunch and dinner are the two occasions when we most easily meet with friends and family. They’re the first way we experience places far from home. Where we sit to regard the passing parade. How we learn indirectly of other cultures. When we feel good together. Meals are when we get a lot of our talking done — probably most of our recreational talking. That’s what I miss. Because I can’t speak that’s’s another turn of the blade. I can sit at a table and vicariously enjoy the conversation, which is why I enjoy pals like my friend McHugh so much, because he rarely notices if anyone else isn’t speaking. But to attend a “business dinner” is a species of torture. I’m no good at business anyway, but at least if I’m being bad at it at Joe’s Stone Crab there are consolations.

The entire column, as with much of Ebert’s writing, is worth the click-through; snippets really can’t do it justice.

Ebert has faced his illness and the recovery from it without wallowing in fear, or clutching for answers. He has held fast to his humanist beliefs, even at a time when the idea of an infinite, perfect afterlife might bring some comfort. He has accepted his own mortality with a wisdom that I, struggling with the prospect of a non-life-threatening disease that can be cured relatively easily, envy deeply.

That essay deserves quoting too, for Ebert gets close to how I feel about the meaning of life, even as I hope for something beyond the life I have:

I know it is coming, and I do not fear it, because I believe there is nothing on the other side of death to fear. I hope to be spared as much pain as possible on the approach path. I was perfectly content before I was born, and I think of death as the same state. What I am grateful for is the gift of intelligence, and for life, love, wonder, and laughter. You can’t say it wasn’t interesting. My lifetime’s memories are what I have brought home from the trip. I will require them for eternity no more than that little souvenir of the Eiffel Tower I brought home from Paris.

That’s a beautiful sentiment, and spot on; this life is blessing enough. If we are lucky enough that there is an afterlife, it is a bonus; we do not need it. We are gifted enough already.

Ebert is in the news because of a new profile of him in Esquire, one that portrays him as he is — not as a saint or a martyr, but as a person who has experienced a severe illness and who is still dealing with the scars left by it. A man who is not so lost in his suffering to forget to care for those around him, including his wife, Chaz, who he is clearly still in love with after 18 years of marriage, or his late partner on Siskel & Ebert, and his good friend, Gene Siskel, whose death at the hands of brain cancer still affects Ebert. In what is perhaps the most poignant part of the piece, Ebert shows his interviewer a piece he wrote about Siskel (showing previously written work is easier than using his text pad, which speaks for him these days):

Ebert keeps scrolling down. Below his journal he had embedded video of his first show alone, the balcony seat empty across the aisle. It was a tribute, in three parts. He wants to watch them now, because he wants to remember, but at the bottom of the page there are only three big black squares. In the middle of the squares, white type reads: “Content deleted. This video is no longer available because it has been deleted.” Ebert leans into the screen, trying to figure out what’s happened. He looks across at Chaz. The top half of his face turns red, and his eyes well up again, but this time, it’s not sadness surfacing. He’s shaking. It’s anger.

Chaz looks over his shoulder at the screen. “Those fu — ” she says, catching herself.

They think it’s Disney again — that they’ve taken down the videos. Terms-of-use violation.

This time, the anger lasts long enough for Ebert to write it down. He opens a new page in his text-to-speech program, a blank white sheet. He types in capital letters, stabbing at the keys with his delicate, trembling hands: MY TRIBUTE, appears behind the cursor in the top left corner. ON THE FIRST SHOW AFTER HIS DEATH. But Ebert doesn’t press the button that fires up the speakers. He presses a different button, a button that makes the words bigger. He presses the button again and again and again, the words growing bigger and bigger and bigger until they become too big to fit the screen, now they’re just letters, but he keeps hitting the button, bigger and bigger still, now just shapes and angles, just geometry filling the white screen with black like the three squares. Roger Ebert is shaking, his entire body is shaking, and he’s still hitting the button, bang, bang, bang, and he’s shouting now. He’s standing outside on the street corner and he’s arching his back and he’s shouting at the top of his lungs.

It’s not anger at his plight. Ebert’s anger is focused on more righteous, more evil things, like the corporate wizards at Disney who think blocking his tribute to a fallen friend is somehow protecting the market for the release of a Siskel & Ebert box set some day.

Ebert can’t shout, of course, and yet he can; his writing remains cogent and his mind remains sharp. He is standing against the coming darkness — the darkness that comes for all of us — with his head held high, without apology. Seeing the photo in Esquire, the one that accompanies this post, Ebert wrote, “Not a lovely sight. But then I am not a lovely sight, and in a moment I thought, well, what the hell. It’s just as well it’s out there. That’s how I look, after all.”

Ebert is wrong about one thing: he is still a lovely sight. He’s a brilliant writer and by all appearances a good and decent man. Not perfect. But good. Here’s hoping that he continues to be for many years to come.

So the obsessive Dollhouse fans in the audience may have noticed that I’m not posting my reviews. I’m hoping to enter this competition and my dollhouse writing energy is going towards that. I will start on full reviews after I’ve submitted my essay in mid-February. But in the meantime I thought I’d open up a thread so people could talk about it.

Some thoughts:

• The show went down hill a lot in the last three episodes I think (after a run of truly fantastic episodes). Possibly it was a mistake to try and take the show that far into the story. Epitaph 2 was, in the end, a more powerful ending to the future than what we got, I think if they had tried to tell less of a story it would have been more effective.
• I take back anything mean I’ve ever said about Eliza Dushku - she was great all the way through these end episodes.
• The portrayal of Keith Harding rather marred the finale and the ideas about people’s relationship with food it portrayed was really depressing. It must suck so much to believe that your appetite is all consuming and you must control it at all times, because being fat would be horrendous.
• Sierra & Victor 4 eva.
• The second to last episode was really incoherent - I can’t even work up the will power to get offended at the worst bits (mostly stuff involving Paul Ballard), because it made no sense.
• I thought it was neat that Mag was into girls - but it would have been even neater if Zone hadn’t talked about it so much (although I liked the point that they were making that these people had fought together and knew so little about each other).
• The Attic was good, but sub-Restless, and had even skeevier politics around race.
• When Paul died we burst into applause - but why the hell won’t they let him stay dead.
• How did Topher become my favourite character?

I really enjoyed Dollhouse, but don’t think that the last few episodes celebrated what I loved most about it.

The recently completed Battlestar Galactica was the story of the death and rebirth of humanity and its creations, a story of humans hunted by their creations to near-extinction — only to reconcile with their creations in order to start anew on a fresh, untamed planet, with their erstwhile enemies as allies.

One of the interesting things about that fresh start was that it was just that — a complete reboot of humanity, jettisoning any technology more advanced than agriculture. Of course, that was partially because BSG was set roughly 140,000 BP, and you can’t have us only inventing electronics in the 20th Century if we were using them 140 millennia ago.

Now, I never found the idea that humans might trade technology for a new start as ridiculous as some people — after all, if technology came a hair’s-breadth from destroying you, you may want to emulate the Amish as well. Especially if you could do it in Africa, with a pretty yellow sun overhead and plenty of food to eat that wasn’t derived from algae.

But there are other reasons that the survivors of the Fall of the Twelve Colonies might want to give up technology. After all, while the Colonies were portrayed as earthlike in their existence, they weren’t Earth. These were peoples with a different history than ours, who had seen technology literally rise up against them and destroy everything they held dear.

That history begins with Caprica.

The new prequel, set 58 years Before the Fall, is the story of two grieving fathers — Daniel Graystone and Joseph Adams — both of whom lost their daughters in a terrorist bombing of an elevated train. (Adams lost his wife as well.) Zoe Graystone was a brilliant, temperamental 16-year-old with a fervent, heretical belief in monotheism — and a boyfriend whose fervor led to the bombing. Tamara Adams and her mother, Shannon, are innocent bystanders.

Adams is a defense attorney from Tauron, a member of a persecuted minority. He’s Capricanized his name — he was born Yosef Adama, but such a name makes him seem more ethnic. He does business with the Tauron mafia, who like many minorities chose a life of crime over toiling as second-class citizens. He does so reluctantly — he has a conscience, and he doesn’t like the violence associated with the mob. But he works with them because they helped him go to college, because his brother is a part of them, and because honestly, it’s easier than the alternative.

Graystone, on the other hand, is a multibillionaire, the Caprican equivalent of Bill Gates, only he’s played by Eric Stoltz, so he’s both more attractive and creepier. He’s working on a defense project — a military robot, one that can be used for defense. It’s not going that well, though — a rival from Tauron has developed a new processor that could doom his project. But he’s not as concerned about that as he is about data left behind by his daughter, including a link to a virtual night club full of unspeakable virtual perversions — including bland ones like orgies and drugs, and more sadistic ones like torture, murder and human sacrifice — all set to bumping techno music. (This is not farfetched. As Graystone’s guide, Zoe’s friend Lacy, notes, the first use for the virtual imagers Graystone himself invented was pornographic — and porn was one of the first serious industries to tap the internet. All of this has happened before….)

But nothing in this virtual club is more odd than Zoe Graystone’s avatar.

That’s because Zoe’s avatar is not just an avatar. It’s Zoe, more or less — a copy made by Zoe before her death, one that includes her memories, her personality, her likes and dislikes, her faults and strengths. The copy is made from many sources, including her school records, medical records, television viewing habits — things that could be used to make a good simulacrum of any human.

And thanks to his daughter’s genius Daniel Graystone finds the chance to do the unthinkable — to raise his daughter from the grave.

Daniel finds an unlikely ally in Joseph, who he meets at an information session for family members of victims of the bombing. He uses Joseph’s connections to steal the Tauron technology that could make his daughter live in the real world — albeit in a body that is made of metal. And he promises Joseph the same — a resurrection of his daughter, and his wife.

Joseph ultimately balks when Daniel shows him the proto-avatar of his daughter — she’s afraid, confused, and certain that something is terribly wrong. Joseph agrees, believing that there’s something Frankensteinian in what Daniel is doing. And yet Daniel is trying to do what any heartbroken, desperate parent would do if they could do it without punishment — bring back his daughter. To let her live the life she was supposed to live, before it was senselessly snuffed out.

Is such a thing Right? I don’t know. I do know that I would rather rip my right arm off than even think about my daughter coming to harm. That I can’t bring myself to write the comparative sentence between myself and Adama or Graystone because the mere thought is too painful for me to bring into enough clarity to express it in English. Suffice to say that I would gleefully make a deal with Satan himself if it guaranteed my daughter’s safety through a long and happy life. Eternal damnation would be a small price to pay. Simply messing with the laws of the Gods and Nature? That’s kid stuff.

That doesn’t mean that there will be no price for violating those laws. Just that in that pit of grief and despair, I can imagine being able to justify almost anything, grasping at any straw, praying to any false idol.

This tension — between Upholding That Which is Right and Saving Those We Love — is the driving force behind Caprica. We know, of course, how it will end — with the nuclear bombardment of the Twelve Colonies, with the flight of Galactica and the fleet, with the eventual colonization of Earth (Mark Two). But how we get there — a path that, like BSG, is not straight or clear, not good or evil, but rather a road paved with good intentions — that appears to be a fascinating journey. And one that I’m looking forward to.

This two episodes a week schedule is really hard to maintain. This is a trucated review of episode 8. I enjoyed it (despite the presence of both Alpha and the supposed love between Ballard and Echo), but I didn’t love it the way I loved the previous episode, so there’s less ranting. Just a request that people don’t discuss the latest episodes in the reviews for this one out of respect for other people’s spoiler . I’ll try to get my review of Stop Loss up in the next few days, so that

I didn’t talk a lot in my last review about what had happened to Adelle – I felt that this episode shed so much light on her character, that it was worth holding some of the discussion off to this review. Adelle’s bargaining, craven reaction to Alpha, was very telling about how the three months we missed had changed her.

As Alpha said to her “All this bargaining, you don’t have anything I want that I can’t just take.” She’s lost her ability to bluff and negotiate – she didn’t just have her power taken away in that time, but her ability to use power, the desire to be in control and her belief in her ability to do so.¹

I think part of it is that she’s lost the lies she used to tell herself, the ones where they were doing good. She knows she’s brought about the apocalypse for her own personal power, and I think that knowledge is one of the reasons she can’t assert herself the way she used to.² She told herself all sorts of lies, and she doesn’t have those lies anymore. All she has left is the will to survive.

I don’t think she’ll stay like this forever though, something must happen. The Adelle we saw in this episode would let Clive Ambrose take Victor’s body to eat crab in for the rest of his life.³.

The new Adelle has implications for the rest of the dollhouse. One of the things that we had been seeing, over the course of the show, is that those running the dollhouse were regularly deciding that it was easier to let people have some freedom than maintain total control.⁴ Echo wasn’t really acting like a doll, Victor and Sierra were spooning. The process some dolls went through in Needs worked (from the point of view of the dollhouse) in making them easier to manage, as did some freedom. But Adelle doesn’t feel like she can allow them that freedom anymore. Her grasp on power is too tenuous.

Her reaction to Echo, Ballard and Boyd makes perfect sense. Her response to Echo seemed particularly cruel, and well designed. I found it distressing to watch Adelle use Victor against Echo. Echo and Victor had been allies – and the situation she was in was terrifying enough without the breach of trust there.⁵

We even got a tiny Victor and Sierra moment, and I’m all about tiny Victor and Sierra moment. (although obviously I prefer large Victor and Sierra moments, or Victor and Sierra episodes, or “The Victor and Sierra Show”) I enjoyed Noir Sierra (that’s what she was right? I’m not an expert on film genres). It’s a shame that we haven’t seen more of that sort of thing, in the show. One of the many aspects of the show that Fox didn’t support.

I wasn’t overcome with excitement when I learned Alpha was going to be in these . I think Alpha was one of the biggest missteps of season one. Serial killers are profoundly uninteresting, and every decision they made about Alpha’s store made him more boring. I’m not a massive Alan Tudyk fan anyway.

But if they have to bring back Alpha I can think of worse things for him to do than go round systematically killing all the men who have hired Echo. In fact, by the old measure that the character who is meanest to Ballard is my favourite character for the episode, he was my favourite character for this episode (more on that later). It was particularly enjoyable to see him blow up Matt of the inane fantasies, because I hated that guy and who doesn’t love a pun?

Of the characters we’ve seen on screen that have had sex with an active 6 are dead (Hearne, bow-hunting guy, Matt of the inane fantasies, Nolan, teaser guy in a caravan and Ballard), 1 got stabbed in the neck, 1 is in prison, and 2 (Joel Myner and Adelle) seem to be intact.⁶. That’s a much better ratio of rapists to consequences than in the real world. ⁷ Although how the dollhouse remains open with that survival rate among it’s clients is becoming more and more of a mystery.

I liked the return of Joel Myner (and the visual image of him running away from Paul Ballard down the beach was hilarious – I’d run too). Obviously he’s an entitled rapist creep, but I always thought it was interesting that the dollhouse was giving him what he wanted – not what he needed. That by giving him Rebecca every year they were ensuring that he could never really live in this world. He appreciated Rebecca in Echo, which I thought was awesome.

The bait and switch was beautifully done. Even if I had to grit my teeth through Alpha’s speech about how Ballard must really love Echo because he didn’t sleep with her. He quotes Nietzsche, what on earth does he know about human relationships?

But, clearly all that is forgiven, if Ballard is truly dead. At the end of watching Meet Jane Doe I was talking about how much I hated Ballard and the many ways I wanted him to die. But I knew that none of them could possibly come through “Ballard can’t die,” I said “But he could go into a coma, wouldn’t it be awesome if he was in a coma.” Dollhouse has a weird habit of granting my wishes,⁸ so now Ballard’s in a coma.

Let’s hope it’s the permanent sort of coma. I understand that Tahmoh Penikett probably hasn’t been written out of the series and Epitaph One gets a little pesky at this point, but they could have imprinted Ballard with someone else (or that could be Alpha with Paul’s personality viewed through Echo’s brain). The only problem there is that I don’t think Tahmoh Penikett’s two and a half emotions make him doll material as an actor.

It’d be annoying if Echo and Ballard were a tragic love story (they were together and we killed one of them – it’s a new things Joss is trying). But far less annoying than watching him. How are we supposed to view Ballard? How do the writers see Ballard? At this stage I honestly have no idea. The last two episodes were constructed like an epic love story. As if the audience had been hanging out for the kiss since the beginning of the series. But they had to know that a large chunk of their audience were chanting “Go Team Alpha!” Ballard was always creepy, they knew he was creepy – they had him having sex with a dead Caroline and raping Mellie. So why do this? Why take Echo in this inexplicable, ridiculous and unearned direction?

But all’s well that ends well I guess – go coma!

1. I don’t think any of the characteristics she lost were characteristics to be admired in a human being, but she’s definitely a very different character without them (back)
2. Incidentally, I’ve seen it suggested in several places that they’re doing a season 5 of Angel and she’ll turn out to have a deep plan. I think this goes against everything we’ve seen in her character development in this episode. I also think it doesn’t make any sense – she hasn’t just joined some secret society or killed someone, she’s given Rossum the plans of how to bring about Armageddon. (back)
3. Making the Adelle we see now compatible with Epitaph One is, I think, an extreme challenge for the writers. I think they’re probably up to it (back)
4. This bares more than a passing resemblance to real life (back)
5. Not that poor Victor could help it – and more in the “is there anything Enver can’t do” files (back)
6. I am assuming that baby guy didn’t have sex with Echo – because they were new parents and she wasn’t what he needed (back)
7. A fact that almost makes me uncomfortable. One of the things that bothered me most about X-files was that it was a moralistic universe – almost all the time, particularly in the early seasons, everyone who died deserved to die. While it’s satisfying to have people killing rapists left, right and centre, that’s not how the world works. I’d much rather watch an uncaring universe than a moralistic one, even a moralistic universe which shares my moral understanding (back)
8. I complained that there wasn’t enough relationships between the dolls and I got Stage Fright (which I still think was under-rated). I complained that they were using sexual violence to tell stories, rather than telling stories about sexual violence and I got Man on the Street. (back)

It is hard to review an episode where you adored most of it, but had to watch some scenes through your fingers because you didn’t want to know (the closest I can come up with is the last episode of Buffy – there’s a special feminist cut that only exists in my head and doesn’t include Spike).

I’m going to start with the non-awesome: the unnecessary, unearned, out of nowhere, unawesomness of Ballard and Echo.

To start with the scenes in her apartment were badly written. Echo actually starts a conversation “So about that thing that happened three months ago, which we would have talked about already so I don’t need to explain it to you, but the audience has just seen it so I’ll start talking about that.” Then it’s exposition central, not made any less exposition central when Echo tells Ballard ‘you knows this’ and he doesn’t have the wits to reply ‘but the audience doesn’t.’ Even a plausible, non-creepy love story would be hard to tell with such clunky dialogue.

The three month skip forward was a real problem, Ballard and Echo’s relationship and (I can barely type this) the fact that she’s in love with him feel completely unearned. And as someone who would never have liked this development, no matter how well it was done, part of me is glad that we missed out watching most of it.(Although I could have totally got behind it if they’d made it all about Ballard’s creepiness) As it was I had my fingers over my eyes for some of the scenes. If they’d taken the time to do it right it would have gone longer, and that’s the last thing I wanted.

But, in terms of drama, in terms of making good TV, we need to see why she’s in love with him (if we’re going believe that she is, which obviously I’m denying – I actually think she was lonely and he was there, and you do strange things when you’re isolated and dealing with so many imprints). Until this episode we had no idea how she felt about him, except that she saw him as an ally. Now suddenly we’re supposed to see it as love?

But the real problem with Echo and Ballard was, as always, Ballard. I didn’t think it was possible for the writers to make me hate Ballard more for *not* sleeping with Echo, but oh look I do.

Ballard believes that Echo has the capacity to decide to return to the dollhouse – to a situation where she will have sex she is not consenting to on a fairly regular basis – but not to consent to sex. That’s a fucking patronising attitude to take. She expresses that this makes her feel like a freak, and he doesn’t even engage with her feelings. He is not interested in her, or her desires, never has been, and feels entitled to make decisions for her.

Which isn’t to say that I think that Echo and Ballard should have slept together (I really don’t). Just that the way the writers have portrayed them not sleeping together has made me hate him even more.¹

I think the writers could have told this story but made Ballard less obnoxious - if he’d expressed his unwillingness to have sex with her as something about him rather than something about her. For example, if they referenced what Ballard did to Mellie and Madeline – if he’d told Echo the story and made that the reason he didn’t feel uncomfortable.

My favourite line with the episode (and Eliza Dushku delivered it perfectly) was “I try to be my best” – full of attitude. God he deserved it.

OK that’s most of the whining about this episode – now to the awesome. Apart from the problems with the Echo/Ballard relationship, the three-month skip forward really worked for me. This clearly could have been a seasons worth of material, and a lot of the stuff in the dollhouse would have been more satisfying with a build-up over time. But I found this episode fascinating and easy to follow.

I enjoyed not knowing exactly where the characters were, and making increasingly accurate guesses. The slow reveal of Echo’s actual situation were great (except where this revealed Ballard’s continued existence). But it was within the dollhouse that this story telling method had real strength. I think our lack of knowledge illustrated a truth about the situation where no-one was sure what was going on, or where they stood, or who they could trust.²

My only concern was that the episode felt a little bit weirdly structured. In the teaser we had a brief scene inside the dollhouse and an even briefer scene of Echo. Then we cut to a longer scene with Echo, which covered everything in the teaser scene and more, and then we cut to three months later. I think the episode would have been more coherent if the teaser had established the situation, and the rest of the episode was three months later. It’s not like Dollhouse hasn’t had long teasers before – the teaser for Spy in the House of Love was ten minutes.

The politics, and implications, of Echo and Ballard were completely fucked up, but I did appreciate that it wore the rest of its politics on its sleeves. In the scene at the grocery store they brought out the reality of hunger by focusing on the food and people eating. It was just a tiny segment, but it asked questions that very rarely get asked on TV, about the distribution of resources. This wasn’t some sci-fi, unreal sort of poverty, this was linked in with the very real poverty of food stamps. Like Echo and Galena, this episode asked why they couldn’t have food when they were hungry.

Then there was the portrayal of police and immigration. It wasn’t just that these police were portrayed as racist and violent, or that watching Echo beat them up was satisfying. It was that there was nothing about this which suggested that these particular cops were bad apples. They say straight out that this is how the system works. When Ballard came in their only reaction was disbelief that anyone would give a shit.

Now I’m the first to admit that I am pretty highly invested in people breaking out of prison. But I thought that whole sequence was incredibly exciting and very well done. The plan went wrong, as of course it must, but it seemed like a plan which had a chance of working, and when you’ve got Echo’s ninja skills it’s understandable that that’s your plan B. Even watching that sequence on the third and fourth time I find those break-out scenes gripping. (Although I do start to think things like: since when do the underwires of bras come out that easily). And Matt may have had the most inane fantasies in the world, but his imprint came through with her motorcycle riding skills.³

There’s been a little too much Echo rescuing woman of colour for my liking (the kidnapped girl, the pop star, Sierra and now Galena. I was going to say that she’d rescued every woman of colour with a role of any size, but then I remembered Ramierez, Victor’s handler, which is telling in itself). How about Sierra rescuing Echo for once? Or even just a WoC character that Echo doesn’t rescues who is important to the plot of an episode.

What I did like was that it wasn’t just Galena being rescued, they put in some small touches of her taking an active role – particularly finding the keys. We don’t know much about her, but she wasn’t portrayed as passive.(( I don’t really know how to talk about this; the whole terminology around being traumatised due to your powerlessness is so messed up. ‘Victim’ has been pathologised almost beyond redemption. ‘Survivor’ feels pointed at those who don’t survive. I think it’s important not to create a hierarchy of correct ways to respond to trauma. I feel that this thought should possible be a blogpost and not a footnote.)) She had obviously learnt English when she was in jail – she was prepared to fight for her life, even if she didn’t have Echo’s resources.

Echo needs other people, and she knows that. Right back in the beginning (when she got Galena into this mess) she was looking for a friend. She really is a people-person and that’s what’ll make her stronger than Caroline.

While Echo was rescuing people out of jai, over in the Dollhouse they were bringing on the apocalypse. I could have done without the Dubai-ness of the new house. Couldn’t they have been opening a new house in Winnipeg or somewhere? Clearly we’re not supposed to see American men in charge of the Dollhouse as un-misogynist. But when there’s no need why even open the door to ‘oh look at how scary and misogynist middle-eastern men are’?⁴

Apart from that I thought the power struggles inside the dollhouse were fascinating. Like I said, I think the fragility of the people and relationships in the new regime were underscored by our lack of knowledge. Were people being cautious, were they on different sides, were they playing each other?

In many ways this was Adelle’s episode just as much as it was Echo’s. We see now the monumental consequences of her paranoia in the two parter. Olivia Williams (and the costume department) did a great job of conveying Adelle’s new status and just how hard it was for her. She was clearly kept on just for the sake of humiliating her, as she had to get Topher to sign-off on things. She had already lost so much by the time we saw her.

She regained her power not through her wits, her bluffing, or her ability to play a very bad hand very well, but by stealing something. What we saw was crawling back, even though she tried to insist that she was claiming some power. I think her character has been fundamentally changed by this, and it’ll have huge implications. I think Episode 10 was very revealing about where Adelle’s character is, but I’ll leave that to my next review to discuss.

And then there’s Topher, who needs a better hiding place. Like everyone else in the Dollhouse he’d learnt to play games. And, as Harding was surprised to discover, he was smart enough to put it all together. These developments fitted so well with the Topher we saw in Epitaph One. (And I think knowing where we’re going absolutely enriches the show). I think if you told me after I saw Ghost, that Topher was a tragic character I’d end up having much sympathy for I wouldn’t have believe you, but it’s true, and it has felt very real.

While there wasn’t enough Victor and Sierra in Meet Jane Doe, at least there was some. It’s amazing how much can be done with those two in under thirty seconds. We never saw the relationships that the scientists developed, but we don’t need to. Topher wipes them, and the scientists part, but then Victor and Sierra walk away together. They really are the most awesome couple in the history of the universe (or at least the history of TV).

I’m not saying that we should forgive Adelle for bringing on the apocalypse. I’m just saying that if Victor and Sierra had been split up that might have been worse than a burning car and a smudged Felicia Day.

I think that scene had its problems though, while it’s possible they were making a point when they had black woman in an Asian woman’s body being silenced while a bunch of white people applauded, I think it was too subtle (particularly given as a sizeable chunk of their tiny audience was thinking ‘oh look Maurissa’). And the only reason I’m giving them the benefit of the doubt that they might have been trying to say something, is because the person being silenced was the writer of the episode, which obviously adds a layer of complexity. Plus I’ve seen some other stuff she’s done and she’s clearly thought about issues around race, appropriation and identity.

Then just as Adelle has reclaimed her house, asserted her dominance over Topher and made it clear that no one is ever going to challenge her again, Echo comes back. (Don’t these people know they’re on Joss shows, saying things like that is asking for trouble) Now usually I’d make fun of slow-motion sequence with swelling music. But Echo’s return was epic and I loved it. I think it was something about Eliza Dushku’s performance made that whole sequence. That and the moment when she recognised Victor and Sierra and they recognised her. Seriously this show needs to build on those relationships rather than show Echo always interacting with Boyd and Ballard, the tag-team of annoying masculinity.

Eliza Dushku was really good in this episode – really phenomenally good. She nailed every moment (even the ones I didn’t want to see). I’ve always thought she was engaging, but sometimes her performances quite work for me (in particular I had real difficulties with the eyes half shut remembering Echo of early season two). But in this episode it all came together. Every single one of those changes, and characters and emotions was clear. She wasn’t alone, of course, Olivia Williams was the other stand-out, and everyone else, except Tahmoh Penikett and his three expressions, were fantastic.

I’m so very sad there’s only 5 to go (given that I’ve already watched A Love Supreme).

1. Although at this point, Ballard could lead a revolution, solve my internet problems, provide me with a lifetime supply of Whittakers Dark Almond Chocolate and magic the ideal sources for my PhD out of thin air and it’d probably make me hate him more. (back)
2. At the beginning of the ep Topher states that he will never trust a woman again, and by the end of the ep he’s set the apocalypse in train by trusting a woman. Dramatic foreshadowing is a dangerous thing (back)
3. Possibly the woman who wore the dress that was actually a shirt, also modified the scrubs Echo wore. I’m pretty sure standard issue scrubs don’t include bust shaping. You know Fox is getting desperate when they’re like “But, but, but, this script says Eliza Dushku is just wearing baggy clothes and scrubs – we have regulations against that kind of thing. Can they be sexy scrubs?” (back)
4. OK and this is a bit of an extended rant, but the whole OMG Harding is bad because he’ll send the actives out to a guy who likes to inflict pain thing didn’t work for me. Just as the ‘we don’t hire out the actives to be submissive, didn’t work for me. Dominatrix Echo liked to inflict pain, I’m sure she’d be a perfectly fine person to send out an active too (if the universe wouldn’t collapse from the weight of that one.) Boyd in particular has always taken the position “the most objectionable sex for actives to have is sex that I’m not into.” To me the key question seems to be will they hire out dolls on engagements where the imprint isn’t going to consent? I think that was supposed to be the implication of him quoting Marquis de Sade, that he didn’t want someone who would enjoy it. But that whole side of the dollhouse, and the lines people draw has been so muddy. I know the original desire to explore desire was destroyed by Fox, and maybe there was a point to these lines but never got to be explored. But I think it’s unfortunate that the show has ended up drawing boundaries around acceptable desire based on categories other than consent. (back)

So after a month off Dollhouse has returned with double episodes. This means my reviews will probably be even later, and a little shorter than usual. This week’s episodes were a two parter, so I’m reviewing them together. I’ll be reviewing the episodes that aired on the 11th separately (and they’ll be long reviews, even for me)
As you probably know the show has already been cancelled. For anyone who is interested in its history I recommend this interview with Mo Ryan. This quote is particularly telling:

The problems that the show encountered weren’t standalone versus mythology. Basically the show didn’t really get off the ground because the network pretty much wanted to back away from the concept five minutes after they bought it and then ultimately, the show itself is also kind of odd and difficult to market. […]But there was… We always found ourselves sort of moving away from what had been part of the original spark of the show and that ultimately just makes it really hard to write these stories. It makes it twice as hard as usual. [Normally] you have that sort of kernel that you’re building on that’s completely solid. You know, “She is a little girl with super powers.” “He is a cranky doctor who always gets it right.” Whatever it is you sort of can build off that. When you’re trying to back away from your central premise at the same time as you’re making that [show,] it gets complicated.

Read the rest of this entry »

I’d really been looking forward to this episode. In fact a couple of days before I dreamed that I’d watched it and in my dream I thought “That was good, but not as much Sierra as I was expecting”.¹ As we were sitting down to watch Belonging I said “At this stage my expectations are so high that if this episode doesn’t change my life it’s going to be a let-down.” I’m not saying it changed my life, but it certainly wasn’t a let-down.

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You know how good this episode was? The fact that it contained 0% Paul Ballard isn’t even on my top ten list of awesomeness. But, before we begin, lets have a moment of ‘Yay’ for the absence of Ballard. I don’t even need to choose my favourite character of the episode by who insults him the most.²

Everyone was their best in this episode, including Eliza Dushku. I know some people aren’t interested in the character Echo – but I always have been. From the first episode I have liked both Echo and Eliza’s performance. And this was a very fine episode on both counts. There are real subtleties in the differences in the way Echo interacts with people now. I loved that they drew out Echo’s growing understanding of language with Topher’s ‘they’re in my shirt’ line.

This season she’s been a bit closed off and inaccessible – as Boyd said she’s learned how to lie. How deep a game is she playing? How much is she conscious of what she was doing. Did she just want to help Sierra, or did she also want to change Topher? Is she using the doll persona as an act? It’s a challenge, both acting and directing, to take this path of her development, but at the moment I’m finding it very satisfying.

My favourite aspect of it all is that Echo is doing a great job of organising in the dollhouse – she’s got Boyd and Ballard completely committed to covering for her, Victor and Sierra developing their solidarity,³ and she even seems to be able to get Topher to do what she wants. After her individualism in Echoes and Needs, I’m really appreciating that. Next I’d like to see her actually talk to Sierra – there’s so much potential just sitting there with that friendship – make it happen writers.

Although in this episode, I even appreciated her individual acts of resistance: reading and writing. The leaf as her only book mark, really emphasised how much what is taken from people is the ability to experience time, to grow and to learn – to read one page and then another. The notes that she left herself on the lid of her pod are heart-breaking. Not just because they’re so simple - the ‘Victor loves Sierra’ ‘Sierra loves Victor’ couple could have been written on a school toilet. But because of how hard she’s fighting to retain what was done to her. “Friends help each other”

I finally liked Boyd again – give that character something to do other than punch people and pass moral judgements and I start to enjoy him. Although I felt like he was given a little bit too on the nose dialogue “so she can remember”, “now the lies begin” and “She does [belong in the dollhouse] now”. From an episode of TV point of view all of this felt unnecessary and a little insulting to the audience. As a character trait it makes him pompous – which doesn’t go well with morally judgemental (and completely hypocritical). But I’m so happy he got something to do that I’ll ignore it.

Dr Saunders was being felt in her absence this episode. We learned that she had projected her own feelings on to Sierra. Claire hated Topher so much, that she missed what was happening to Sierra. In turn, Topher was driven, on some level, by proving the absent Claire wrong, and that desire not to be the bad man took him far further than he knew how to deal with.

The whole episode was very well shot (and I don’t usually notice that sort of thing until I’m listening to a DVD commentary and Joss tells me that a scene is a oner and I go ‘oh’ and feel knowledgeable), but the first Topher scene where we saw him through his magnifying lens was particularly brilliant. The dialogue and image worked together to make it clear that he is on the path to Epitaph One. I’m really looking forward to seeing how the events of this week affect him.

And a special shout-out to ‘this is your brain on drugs’⁴ Fran Kranz is just amazing in every way – to deliver such a silly line so perfectly in the same ep as he signalled Topher’s eventual downfall, and his present uncertainty followed by pain, is skill indeed.

I’ve always found the relationships between the staff at the dollhouse fascinating, and I love that they developed Topher by developing his relationships. I was glad that they built on Boyd and Topher’s relationship, it brings out the interesting in both of them. As for Adelle and Topher - I found Adelle’s creepy maternal/sexual vibe with him just as disturbing as it was supposed to be: “You have no morals so I’m going to touch your face.” I can’t wait to see where they take that.

I was unsure, at first, what I felt about our main characters being ignorant about what had happened with Sierra. The end of Needs was obvious Retconned – when Dr Saunders and Boyd talked about the man who took away Sierra’s power, they meant Nolan. And the new interpretation is a bit of a stretch. But that wasn’t my problem – I felt unsure about all of them being so clearly anti-Nolan. It felt a little clean, a little artificial, a little like they couldn’t slip below a certain level on the ‘likeability scale.’

The more I think about it, the more I’m glad the writers did it this way. I think it was stretching credulity a little bit for everyone to be “I know we took dolls from prison, dolls who explicitly said “I have no choice” and dolls so ill that they couldn’t possibly give consent, but we must do something about Sierra.” But (as Joss Whedon says on the DVD commentary to the Serenity pilot) everyone believes their righteous. Not jut in the dollhouse, everyone who is exploiting or abusing someone is a hero in their own life. To be able to tell a story that shows the range of ways people can react when they discover that they were wrong – that their abuse and exploitation is just that – is what makes Dollhouse so great.

Priya’s origin story (as Adelle and Topher saw it originally), also tells us a lot about the Dollhouse’s view of consent. Of the six dolls that we have any idea why and how they came to the dollhouse three (Caroline, Alpha and the guy from Echoes) were facing jail. The other three all appeared to the Dollhouse to be mentally ill, and not coping with that. We don’t know how lucid either Madeline or Victor were, but it’s clear that they took Priya when she was completely unable to give informed consent. Adelle is used to this, she is the one who give Caroline the contract after she says “I don’t have a choice” She is at least partially aware of the lies she is telling herself. That is why she chose not to fight on this one, even if she couldn’t do it sober.

Another interesting aspect of the relationship between the staff and the dolls was in the tiny call-back to Haunted. Topher told Sierra she was allowed beer – on special occasions – the last time we’d seen her with beer was at his birthday – when she was his friend. Like Adelle, Topher seems to protect, to care for, to identify with, the dolls that he’s interacted with. Even interacting with an imprint that has been constructed for their needs, makes the workers in the dollhouse see the dolls as more human.

But this story wasn’t about Echo, or Adelle, it wasn’t even about Topher or Sierra, it was about Priya. We’d only seen snippets of her before, but they’d been very compelling snippets, particularly in Epitaph One. From the very beginning of this episode, with the jewelry selling scene on the beach, Priya seemed so real. When she said to Nolan: “I don’t have a work visa ‘do-do-do’” – it was such a silly, little, normal moment. It made the rest of the episode even harder.

When I mentioned that this episode was going to be about Sierra, my friend was all ‘Does she get to kill Nolan?’⁵ Dollhouse is, among many other things, a story about the nature of fantasy. This episode didn’t have an engagement, but it did have a fantasy –– the fantasy of killing your rapist. Or, in the case of the viewer, watching someone else kill their rapist. Dollhouse has given this before – the fact that Mellie was being controlled by Adelle didn’t make it any less satisfying when she broke Hearn’s neck. But that was the fantasy of killing a rapist – we didn’t watch Mellie dealing with the body, the police, or the effects on her of killing someone.⁶

Belonging wasn’t the fantasy of killing a rapist, there was a body and it traumatised Priya even more. The fight was messy, Priya had a normal person’s strength and was lucky. Although I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who shouted at the screen “Topher couldn’t you have helped by providing her with Kung Fu skills. But it wouldn’t have worked if he had. And after there was blood, a body, and very few options. There were still fantasy elements – Boyd arrived on cue with body disposal skills, but it was the reality, not the fantasy that we were left with. The scene, or story, didn’t end with her stabbing him.

I’m not saying it’s not satisfying to watch women killing rapists, because it is. But it fills an emotional need, an expression of our anger, life doesn’t work that way. I was really glad we saw just a bit more of the picture.

In an episode this brilliant, there was only one moment missing. Why did Priya go back to the Dollhouse? When I think about it, I can see why she would feel as if going back was her only option. But as I was watching it for the first time, I kept get pulling out of the story and asking why?

I think there are lots of answers to that question – actually that’s the problem, there are too many reasons (she was coerced by Topher and Boyd, she didn’t feel able to go on the run, she wanted out of her life). When I first watched the episode, it felt disjointed and unsure. When I thought about it (and rewatched it a fourth or fifth time) I put myself in Priya’s head, and going back made emotional sense to me.

I think conveying to the audience that Sierra was going to go back to the dollhouse in a conversation between Boyd and Topher was a mistake. We should have learned that with Priya – then her reasons would have been our reasons, and I think it would have made more sense. It could have been as simple as Topher telling Priya that she was microchipped – we only needed a beat, but the beat they gave us didn’t work for me.

Which isn’t to say Priya going back was simple, or should have been portrayed as such. The scene between Topher and Sierra at the end was so powerful, because thre was so much going on (and both Fran Kranz and Dichen Lachman kicked their incredible performances up a notch for that scene). She wanted her memories gone, and she didn’t care about the price (‘if you wake me up again’), but there was also determination, and even hope. In the end her story was about the complexity of survival.

It wasn’t ‘empowering’ (how I hate that word). But it was real, which is far more important.

As well as having just the right amount of Paul Ballard, this episode had almost enough Victor and Sierra. I’m obviously on record as a Victor/Sierra Shipper (Vierra? Sictor?). But my one concern has been the way the relationship was set up. It seemed to rinforce men as desiring/women as desired dynamic. I always believed that the relationship was reciprocal, but there was little textual evidence of that. There had been a scene of Sierra enjoying looking at Victor in episode 4, but they cut it out.⁷

Which was what made the art gallery scene so glorious. It became clear that Sierra been attracted to Victor, just as long as Victor had been attracted to Sierra. ⁸ Everything about their interaction was charming, without being ridiculous ‘love-at-first sight’.

But, sweet as it was, that was nothing compared with what followed. As I said during Man on the Street, one of the most powerful aspects of Sierra’s storyline is the portrayal of institutional abuse. Even more importantly, Sierra’s pain would have remained invisible if she didn’t have friends. The role that Echo and Victor played in making Sierra’s experiences public⁹ and supporting her was beautiful.

Echo wasn’t the only one who had a plan; Victor saw the black paint as something he could deal with (and probably his plan was less likely to have negative effects of Sierra than Echo’s). The scene in the shower was lovely in so many ways, his earnestness – their playfulness.¹⁰ Then we saw Victor’s vulnerability as well, and Sierra comforted him.

They have such an equal, reciprocal relationship (particularly now they’ve shown us the origins). I really like that. Just like I was relieved when Victor didn’t ‘invent rape’ I love the idea that in a world that doesn’t use gender as a system of control, relationships would look different.

But what was most powerful about this episode was it’s depiction of love. What I think is so beautiful about Sierra and Victor’s love is it’s simplicity. “I’ll wait here” and he does, and until she comes back every time the camera cuts to him it breaks your heart. They like being together, they want to help each other, they make each other feel better. On some level love (and I don’t just mean romantic love or love paired with sexual attraction here) is that simple.

In real life, the simplicity of love is often only really apparent in times of great stress, or absolute relaxation. All the rest of the time messy life stuff gets in the way. But the feeling is still there. The feeling that you would get the black paint pots of your friends, families and lovers and wash them out if only you knew how, the desire for someone to wait about the bottom of the stairs – those are the reasons Victor and Sierra’s relationship resonates.

The episode is incredibly sad, but the ending is beautiful. The way the dolls walked into their pods at the end of Needs was heartbreaking. They’re not doing that anymore. Their acts of resistance are intimacy and retaining information. It won’t be enough – the dolls won’t bring down the dollhouse this way. Like most institutions they’ve learned if they loosen their control it makes it easier to maintain their power. But in the meantime, it keeps Echo, Sierra and Victor strong enough to keep fighting.

1. I never used to dream about television, but since watching the Joss commentary on Restless where he describes having dreams where you watch movies and they’re weird as, I’ve had dreams like that twice. That Joss is part of not just the content, but the form of my dreams is probably just predictable at this point. (back)
2. If you didn’t know who my favourite character of the episode is you a) haven’t been paying attention to my reviews and b) Didn’t watch that episode. (back)
3. in fact she seemed to be working the Anger-Hope-Action technique with Victor pretty well – not that he needs much proding to any of those things when it comes to Sierra (back)
4. It makes me want to search out the 90210 scene from the Peach Pit where Andrea is explaining this to Brandon. Television gold that was (back)
5. One of the things I’ve loved about this season is the consequences for the Johns. Of the people we know have, or planned to have, sex with an active, we’ve had two stabbings and one jailing. That’s the sort of ratio which is fun to watch, even though it throws the profitability of the whole operation into more than a little bit of doubt. (back)
6. Buffy, of course, was designed around fantasy killing rapists. The bodies went poof – there was no stress no trauma, and when men got really misogynist she cut them in half from the balls up (back)
7. If you ask me it’s worth buying the DVD just to see that scene. I’d have cut the scene of Echo being remote wiped, before I’d have cut that (back)
8. There may have been a call from the cheap seats ‘You can ask me many boring questions. It may have come from me (back)
9. and the fact that that publicity didn’t result in unmitigated improvement for Sierra’s life was very realistic (back)
10. Small quibble the ‘indian chief’ line rang a bit false to me. So far we haven’t seen dolls have any cultural references. So far dolls comprehension seems limited to the idea that Dr Saunders is nice, and they should try and be their best. Victor didn’t understand Echo’s metaphor. The idea of ‘an Indian Chief’ that Victor and Sierra seemed to share was far more specific than that (back)

Debbie Schlussel is best known for her rabid hatred of anything that can even tangentially be connected to Islam, up to and including falafel. So it’s nice to see her branching out into some good old-fashioned hatred of other things.

What has made Debbie angry? Well, it seems Disney’s messing with a character. You’d think it would be their positive portrayal of Aladdin as essentially a surfer dude that would have Debbie upset, but no — it’s far worse.

Either Disney is trying to appease “modest” Muslims or they’ve gone the way of the rest of Hollywood and are trying to make their feminine characters more masculine.

Quelle horreur! Disney’s making their feminine characters more “masculine!” Snow White has taken up the chewing tobbaccy! Ariel is arm-wrestling Aurora! Disney princesses are acting like three-dimensional characters with thoughts and desires of their own!

But worst of all…the most nefarious act…the unkindest cut…is what they’ve done to Tinker Bell!

Yes, that’s right! They’ve given Tinker Bell a different outfit to wear!

Now, you may look at that picture and say, “Wait — uh, isn’t Tinker Bell still pretty much dressed like, say, Tinker Bell might be if it was cold out? And mightn’t that be because in the new movie, it’s supposed to be fall?” Well, sure, those would be good points if you weren’t looking for proof that Hollywood is secretly trying to turn our children into the gay. But Debbie’s way ahead of you.

Yes, Disney claims that it’s new Tinker Bell release, “Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure,” out on DVD on October 27th takes place in the fall when weather is cooler, but the weather has never affected Tinker Bell couture before. It’s a cartoon character, not a weather dependent human.

Yeah! She’s a cartoon character! Therefore, there’s no reason to try to make any attempt at a realistic portrayal of her. After all, if girls see that even fairies can get cold when it’s cold out, they might start questioning whether they too should put on tights with their skirt, maybe switch to boots when it’s slushy out, or put on a hat when the wind’s blowing. And it’s just a hop, skip, and a jump until they’re moving to Taxachusetts and marrying their girlfriends. Which the Muslims are, evidently, in favor of. Or something.

Now, you might be sitting there at your computer, banging your head against the keyboard, saying, “Jeff, I mean, not only is Tinker Bell not dressed like a linebacker, she isn’t even dressed in such a way that challenges conventional beauty norms! Far from being dressed like a lumberjack, she’s dressed…well, actually, still pretty scantily!” Well, sure, but Debbie thinks she’s not dressed scantily enough, and this will turn your daughter gay.

There’s nothing wrong with rebranding something to keep up with the times, but turning a charming, cute girly character into some masculine, butch action star is stupid. Unless your audience is strictly WNBA. And that’s called mass-market suicide.

See? Debbie doesn’t want your daughters becoming butch or masculine, and for that reason, we need to make sure that Tinker Bell is displayed in as sexy a way as possible, so that girls can see how hot she is. Because…that will keep girls from becoming fans of the WNBA, like those people.

If you’re a parent who thinks the new covered up version is a welcome change in a sexualized world, think again. Tinker Bell has been wearing a skimpy dress for decades (watch the slide show). That’s what nymphs who fly around with magic wands do.

Um…Debbie? Yeah…there aren’t actually nymphs. They’re mythical creatures. Also, even if nymphs did exist, that wouldn’t mean much, as Tinker Bell is a faerie. They are also mythical. Disney is telling a story about a character that they have nearly as much ownership of as J.M. Barrie; they can kinda, sorta depict her however they want to.

Oh, and I did view the slide show, and guess what? Even Disney worked through a number of different designs before settling on the Tinker Bell we know today. Not all were dressed in skimpy outfits, some were depicted as “tomboyish,” some as akin to the Blue Fairy, some almost alien. Not to mention that Disney was adapting her from Barrie’s characterization, in which she was portrayed as a tinker, hence the name. Funny, when thinking of traditionally “feminine” jobs, tinsmith is not the job that comes first to mind.

I can’t imagine Disney redoing the cast of “The Lion King” and dressing them for the North Pole.

You can’t? I can, if they were really going to do a “Lion King Meets Santa” Christmas special. Of course, they’d never do that, because they’re in the pocket of Big Islam.

This isn’t about putting your girls in a less sexually-saturated world. It’s about putting them in a more emasculated one, where the men are girls and the Tinker Bells are men.

And that’s never a good thing. As I always say, matriarchical societies die. They simply don’t have staying power. Butch Disney characters for girls is not a positive development.

Yes, Tinker Bell is a man, because she wears leggings. And men are totally women, because…well, we never got to that, but I’m sure it’s probably because now we can’t masturbate to our children’s videos anymore. Alas.

The fact is that Tinker Bell is a female character, and would be if she was wearing hockey gear. She would be if she cut her hair in a buzz cut. She would be if she took up a job as a truck driver. She would be if she were gay. None of those things affect her gender. They only affect our picture of what gender roles are supposed to be.

Well, to hell with gender roles, if they tell women that they can’t wear warm clothes when it’s cold out. To hell with gender roles if they tell women they can’t be adventurous, can’t be athletic, can’t be “tomboys,” because that will make them less female. To hell with gender roles if they say that men must always break the paths, and suffer in silence, because it’s not a man’s job to feel. To hell with gender roles if it says anyone has to behave or dress or think or feel a certain way to simply be the person they are.

Ironically, Debbie can’t help but throw anti-Muslim barbs into even this misogynist post. Ironic, because in truth, Debbie believes exactly what the most hardened adherent to Shari’a Law believes — that men and women are fundamentally different, and that straying outside the defined gender roles for either is something that must be proscribed. It makes me wonder why she fights so hard against those with whom she so clearly agrees.

(Via S,N!)

Definites:

13 12 Monkeys.

Leading contenders:

Bill And Ted’s Excellent Adventure

Time Bandits

The “Future Echos” episode of Red Dwarf.

Groundhog Day

The “Time and Punishment” segment from Treehouse of Horror V

“Blink” from Dr. Who

Maybes:

Primer

Time Crimes

Peggy Sue Got Married

The Terminator (or maybe T2)

Back To The Future

The Prisoner of Azkiban

I’m interested in more suggestions. Eventually, I’ll whittle it down to 4-6 items.

Also, if you’re in Portland and interested in attending, let me know. :-)

Bruce Jenner is terribly, terribly upset at Barack Obama for winning the Nobel Peace Prize. And for some reason, the Politico cares.

I think it’s only fair to run this trailer for the 1980 film Can’t Stop the Music, starring Bruce Jenner and The Village People.

The ratings aren’t looking good for Dollhouse, which is making me sad. If you’re not sold on the idea of the show this is a great fanmade site. If you want it to stay on air then they’ve got ideas of what you can here

Sorry, for the advertorial in the beginning. I can’t do anything myself you see (except write ridiculously long reviews), and I’d be really annoyed in they didn’t air episode four.

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In her review of the second season premiere of “Dollhouse,” Maia wrote “the scene that owned this episode was Fran Kranz and Amy Acker in a room,” but didn’t end up saying that much about the scene. (Which is fine, what Maia wrote about the rest of the episode was great).

PetPluto, in contrast, spent about half of her review discussing The Scene. I especially liked this observation: Read the rest of this entry »

So currently Dollhouse is watched by less people in Fox’s target demo than the total number of followers Felicia Day has on twitter. If you enjoy the show (or even just my reviews), then think about watching in a way that will get measured, because I can’t.

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This. For the win.

Incidentally, if you haven’t seen Der Untergang, I highly recommend it. It’s a masterful portrayal of the pitiful, puny end of the Third Reich — in many ways, the sort of end a megalomaniac like Hitler must have despised. I hope so, anyhow.

The following post contains an extended discussion of Quentin Tarantino’s new film, Inglourious Basterds. There will be spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film, please enjoy this short video from the 1968 Mel Brooks film The Producers. Otherwise, feel free to click below.

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