That ’s more like it . After two earnestly “ meh ” episodes , Dollhouse returned to constitute with a twisting tale of a sequential grampus and a college prof — and the uncanny enigma they have in common . bare , dripping wet spoilers below .
Despite a couple of defect — which I ’ll get to in a moment — “ Belle Chose ” was Exhibit A for how great Dollhouse can be when the concept is handle decent . So it ’s not surprising that it was written by Tim Minear , the mankind who give us Firefly ’s “ Out Of Gas ” and many of Angel ’s best episodes .
So what ’s the arcanum these two humanity share ? They ’re both in positions of great ability — the college prof is tenure and at the zenith of his career , the serial killer is moneyed and get in touch . But neither of them can have what they want , and their fantasies about women rest invitingly out of range . That ’s frequently the larger yarn of Dollhouse : The wealthy may already own your bodies and psyche , but they want to own your middle and mind as well . They always have some bare business , something that people ( usually women ) are ineffectual to give them freely for whatever reasonableness .
The professor wants a young , impressible , none - too - smart student ( named Kiki ! ) whom he can learn and stoop to , in a sort of Educating Rita pastiche that turns adult . It ’s not just that he wants a student to kip with him to get an “ A ” — watch those scenes where he tells her about Chaucer . ( Or “ Chauncey , ” as she insists on call him , in a endearing reference to Being There . ) And even though the prof really does have all the power in this spot — even disregard the meta - point that Kiki only be because he had the Dollhouse create her — he require to teach Kiki that she really has all the top executive . He trot out the standard second - wave feminist analysis of Chaucer ’s Wife Of Bath as empowered woman , who habituate sexuality to get what she wants . Traditionally , people view the Wife Of Bath as a harlot , a cautionary tale for charwoman , but it became fashionable to view her as a feminist heroine instead .
Here ’s the Wife Of Bath cave in the Fourth Doctor , Tom Baker , a hand job — from Pasolini ’s Canterbury Tales movie :
As that collage up top makes clean , the prof and the serial killer , Terry , both have the same fantasy about charwoman : that the women are in control , that they ’re constantly using their gender to gain advantage , and that the homo are helpless . ( The only difference is , the professor enjoys this fantasy , and insist the women are n’t whores — Terry thinks they are . )
So Terry , the serial killer , collects “ Dolls ” of his own — but instead of the mindwiped , programme puppets the Dollhouse supplying , he creates his own , interpose people with paralytic drugs and then grow them into human mannequins — they each present one of the char in Terry ’s family , who push aside him and leave him out of their games . If you really had any doubt that Dollhouse is a metaphor for how knock-down people objectify and mistreat everyone , especially cleaning woman , then the open up scenes of this instalment ought to have set you unbent .
The underlying metaphors in “ Belle Chose ” are by no means elusive — and that ’s a big part of what I love them for . They come mighty out and say it : the professor , a modelling Dollhouse guest whose phantasy is incredibly harmless and almost mellifluous , is directly compare , again and again , to the sequential killer who kidnaps women , injects them with crap , and turns them into his fully poseable figures . Both man are in denial , both men are blinded by fancy about female baron that excuse their abuse of women . And when the two finally meet — it does n’t really go well for either of them .
Because , of course , the episode takes a weird odd turning about two - tierce of the way through — the nonparallel killer ’s been downloaded into Victor ’s physical structure , and thanks to the foolishness of Saul Tigh ( helping out his fellow artifiicial person ) the VictorOfTheLambs character gets out and about . So Topher tries to shut down Victor / Terry — only to swop Victor ’s and Echo ’s imprint . So now Echo is imprinted with the misogynous consecutive kiler , while Victor think he ’s a hot teenage girl . Cue weird adult female - hate stuff from Echo , while Victor flirts with a bunch of boys and near get gay - bashed . it ’s almost too over the top , but it works — partly because it ’s great to see one more uncanny usance of the Dollhouse ’s brain - switching technical school .
But yeah , there were a couple of major flaws in the episode that did fall behind it a scrap of its sheen of awesomeness :
Flaw # 1 : The incompetence of the Dollhouse is staggering . I mean , really . This is start to damage my suspension of mental rejection . The moment where Adelle in reality turn to Topher and says something along the line of , “ We ’ve form our combat-ready with the judgment of a serial killer and turn him loose — and he has no GPS locator ! ” made me giggle . When the characters themselves gloss on how incompetent they ’re being , it ’s a bad mark . I also conceive Professor Skankypants should get a refund .
Flaw # 2 : The last human action was a lilliputian bit of a Army of the Righteous down . I ’m not trusted where you could go with this installment , after Echo was imprinted with Terry ’s pale mind , but make Echo release into the episode ’s giant ( which sort of happened last week as well ) was a spot disappointing . And then Echo gives a recollective language in which she tries to convert the three captive women to obliterate her — why not just have them splice Echo up ? The tenacious Echo ’s speech haul on , the less concerned I was that Terry ’s persona was snuff it to reassert control , and the more I feel like the episode was just spin around its wheels .
But meanwhile , the instalment also packed a ton of other awesomeness :
Adelle is awful . Her bivalent act with Boyd was one of the major highlight of the show , especially “ There is no demand to continue to interpret me . ” And then she switches , seamlessly , into an every bit great double enactment with Ballard , where she treat the uncle and he handles the evil nephew . So peachy .
All of the stuff with Paul learning to be Echo ’s handler was howling — this is the first time we ’ve seen what take place to the Actives after they ’re programmed , and the scene of Echo getting a makeover were a much - want bright spot . Echo / Kiki being all bouncy and giggly while the camp costuming hombre severalize her she ’s won a free makeover were keen .
And of course , Paul is completely in dearest with Echo — this episode reasonably much disseminate it . The whole Fast Times At Ridgemont sequence where Paul observe Echo in the shower and then watches her deed flirty later on , in extreme slow - mo . That ’s not your stock concerned handler look — that ’s a gravely schmoopy / concupiscent flavor . I kind of desire them to have Anthony Stewart Head Edgar Albert Guest lead , so he can raise one eyebrow and say , “ A coach in erotic love with an Active ? Fascinating . ”
Oh , and it ’s official : Dr. Claire Saunders is missing , both in the sentiency that nobody knows where she is , and in the horse sense that we leave out her . A spate . And it ’s sounding like despite Boyd ’s amazing tallness , Adelle really will go over his head and have Claire dragged , kicking and act as her heart out , back to the Dollhouse .
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