"I played a very bad hand very well."
So, Dollhouse. I had a weird experience watching this show because I started hoarding it like a frantic squirrel about halfway through season one. I started out watching it as it aired, and then my family and I got a bit behind. Then it looked like it might get cancelled, so we decided to save the episodes as long as we could. We watched a bit more of it over the summer after we found out it had been renewed, but stopped and started saving them again when it got into ratings trouble. Yes, I'm aware that people actually *watching* the show is what makes ratings in the first place, but hey, we were neurotic and clingy and at least half a season behind the entire time. I was so far behind I never even posted about it! Then it got cancelled, and I hoarded even more.
So, I've watched most of my banked episodes over the last 2 weeks, because I wanted to at least be able to see the finale on time. That's everything from Briar Rose to the end.
And it was awesome! The last few episodes really benefitted from marathon viewing, I think. I've heard a lot of people saying they felt rushed, but watching them back-to-back-to-back with nothing in between to break their momentum really worked for me. Of course, you could feel the story wrapping up and that sucked, but what can you do?
Anyway,
- Man, anyone who hasn't seen Epitaph One is gonna be so freaking lost. The "Previously" segment is nothing but E1. I'm betting a lot of people haven't. My cousin and her family watch the show but know nothing of the internets or its fannish workings, and they had no idea the episode existed. Ima have to show her before she watches this.
- ILU, Moody Spurgeon! You've come a long way from banging Josie Pie behind the cow shed! (If I can trace a thing back to Anne of Green Gables, you can bet I will. Over and over!) I read some article on Friday that talked about the finale and said that it opened with Felicia and mini-Caroline searching for Safe Haven, so I thought damn, Zack's character will probably have been killed off in the interim or something, but no, there he was! Silly article, dismissing Zack Ward for no reason. Zone had some of the best lines in the episode!
- Tiny Messiah doesn't entirely convince me she's Caroline, but whatever, I can live with it. How hilarious is it that 10-year-old Caroline says to Zone, "If I have to kick your ass again..." like she's pummeled him before? So hilarious. I would pay to see that.
- Neuropolis. We really have been taking cues from The Matrix, haven't we? Except I kind of hate The Matrix. I like this dystopian future much better than that one.
- Ambrose and the shellfish. OH, HOW IRONIC. You bring about the apocalypse just so you can live eat lobster forever and the apocalypse causes shellfish to virtually run out. Haha, burn.
- Except, not really, because the original Ambrose has seen the error of his ways and is probably dead from something Attic-related, not out hijacking Eliza's brother's body. It's the copies that are douchebags.
- Topher :( The worst part about the situation they find him in is that I'm pretty sure he would be able to do what they're asking. He does the opposite in the space of a few hours, after all. He's just not. I think he's deliberately stalling, even though that means one person a day dies right in front of him, because he knows that's a better option than creating the tech they want, which will kill more people. I bet in one way or another he's spent pretty much the entire last ten years trying to choose a lesser between two evils of his own making.
- T is adorable. Bordering on schmaltzy, sure, and I hate how his existence basically turns Priya into a fragile homebody, but still, adorable.
- Zone's reaction when he finds out they have to go right back to where they came from is hilarious. He really does have the best lines in the episode. The one about the postal system is a fave :)
- "She likes it when you're corny." Awwww. So, Paul's love for Echo grew right back in like a fungus, huh? Can't say I'm all that surprised, I mean, even when he was with Mellie, he had a total Gene Tierney thing going on with Caroline. That's probably why I haven't gotten sick of him like everyone else. Laura was a really good movie, y'all.
- And now we've reached the first WHAAAT of the episode. Tony? Crazy tech army commander Tony? With bonus estrangement? For all that they do a great job catching us right up with this tech army so we at least know what their deal is, there is SO MUCH plot there that got skipped over. Years and years of plot. It's overwhelming. Sigh. I really love the way they load up their mods from the USBs into that round thing and then hold it up to their ear, though. So cool.
- Aaaaaand Maurissa writes herself into basically a canon ship with Felicia Day. Who's surprised?
- OK, I'm not, but I'm kind of surprised Kilo's there at all. I'd kind of dismissed her as Topher's "demonstration doll", fairly disposable. Sorry, Mo!
- Tony and Priya. ;___;
- The Echo and Paul stuff presents such an interesting conundrum. Because it's so not about sex (which they've had, so we can stop worrying about it), and they obviously do love each other, but neither of them can get past all the technicalities of who/what/how she is. She practically exists in a different dimension than anyone else. How's that for an obstacle to romance?
- "We were born ready. Well, not technically." HA.
- Once the risk to Tony went away (I was nervous for a minute) I kind of figured Paul was gonna bite it. Doesn't make it suck any less, though! :(
- Okay, I have to confess that when I saw all the blank people wandering around inside, I instantly decided that they were the people Whiskey gassed in Epitaph One, and that the gas had only put them to sleep while they were remote-wiped. So I thought that must be what keeps happening to Whiskey! She protects the house by insta-wiping its aggressors! She must be alive! I didn't catch Alpha's line about cleaning the place out at all my first viewing. Now I'm trying to ignore it, because I really want Whiskey to be alive, dammit.
- How is zen Alpha so sexy? He just stands there being still and bearded and exudes sex, somehow. He's like half sex-god, half kindergarten teacher.
- Oh, the first time I watched this, I totally thought, at this point, that he was going to "Paul out" for Echo and they were gonna make sweet sweet love. Which... would have been a different kind of creepy than what we got, I guess.
- The tech-heads not wanting to save the world seemed completely random before the commercial break, but Tony's speech makes it make sense - how addictive and awesome must it be to just be able to instantly be who and what you want to be - and be able to be that, completely and perfectly, without effort? If we had gotten more seasons of show, I probably would have been really seduced by that idea.
- So, this scene with Priya smashing the memory sticks is the first thing to convince me that maybe Tony does have a bit of a tech addiction problem and isn't just using the tech to win the war. Because she's acting very much like someone whose mate has assured her he's quitting many times and yet constantly goes back to whatever substance he's abusing. That's upsetting, even before the scene turns into an Echo grief-fest.
- ;____;
- I actually really like how there was no nonsense with people trying to sacrifice themselves in Topher's place. I was sort of thinking they'd have Adelle do it, but it never even came up. She was very loving and motherly in her relationship with him, but she didn't treat him like a child. She respected his decision. Topher was going to have to do it, and Topher understood he'd have to do it, and he was okay with that and it seemed fair to him. And no one liked it, I'm sure, but also no one objected. That's pretty cool.
- ... I really like Adelle's post-apocalyptic hair.
- Tony burning the memory sticks does seem to indicate he has, or had, a serious problem, which he is now rather aggressively giving up. And awww, Priya told T that Tony's his dad! You know, it would have been so easy to just trot out Enver like a show pony and have him do his awesome acting tricks all episode instead of taking Tony to the weird place they took him. Very interesting choice.
- I hope Mag and Zone are still snarking at each other when they're eighty. And the kid is sixty. :)
- So Alpha left to get back in touch with himself! I did not see that coming. He did say it was very hard for him to live the way he was, but I never imagined he'd want to go back to being just one person. Especially not one who was some kind of scary psychopath when he was last seen, what, fifteen years ago? Yikes. I mean, I understand the idea that his violent tendencies were such a core part of him that they couldn't be wiped away, and that the fact that he's managed to evolve beyond that to a state of peace probably means he's not going to just start cutting people up the second he gets his real personality back, but the key word there is "probably". Scary, scary stuff, having to hope that who you used to be isn't going to betray the person you've become.
- Ooh, Adelle leads the wiped people into the light just like Caroline's fantasy in Needs! And Echo dismisses it. But Caroline doesn't remember that, obviously, because it was just a little experiment that they didn't bother backing up or recording anywhere. So in this one moment, someone else really does know Caroline better than she knows herself. How sweet is that?
- I know Topher's "Huh," was probably just a reaction to seeing the memory wall at all, but a part of me will always wonder if there was some sort of message or specific thing he saw there that made him react that way. (something about Whiskey, maybe??)
- Can we talk about the symmetry of Paul being delivered to Echo in an envelope, the same way he first received information about Caroline? And okay, I know a lot of people are thinking the whole Echo/Paul thing is creepy. I say sure, but who doesn't enjoy creepy occasionally? It doesn't stop me liking the ending. It's such a literal interpretation of how we all say we keep people in our hearts after they're gone. Only, in Echo's case, she can never truly be with other people, anyway, only be them. So I really liked the bittersweet way it worked out. Also, check out Eliza's adorable drunken walk after she uploads Paul. That sold it for me. ♥
And, questions:
- What of Ivy? Did they shoot her in front of Topher? :\
- What of Dominic?? I don't even have a good theory for where he's been all this time.
- What of Whiskey??? Who is she, really? And how in hell did anyone wrest her still-beautiful body away from Ambrose? Was it Ambrose who fixed her face? And how did Dr. Saunders disappear? My instinct says "voluntarily".
- What happened to the people still in the Attic? I'm assuming some of their bodies were killed by, like, explosions and general chaos, but some of them might still be intact. Now I kind of want crackfic where the adrenaline-pumping systems ran out but the life support systems are still active, and all the people in the Attic have been living in a wonderful, magical, candy-filled virtual dreamland this whole time, skipping on rainbows and having threesomes with porn stars. And the only person in there who isn't rapturously happy is Ambrose, who knows some serious shit must have gone down outside in order for this to happen. And walks around with a literal dark stormy cloud hanging over his head. LOL.
There are sooooo many calculated gaps in this story, it's like a map leading to fanfic mecca. Some major group fanon is going to emerge in the next year or so to fill in the missing pieces. It's going to be fascinating to watch. :)
So, I've watched most of my banked episodes over the last 2 weeks, because I wanted to at least be able to see the finale on time. That's everything from Briar Rose to the end.
And it was awesome! The last few episodes really benefitted from marathon viewing, I think. I've heard a lot of people saying they felt rushed, but watching them back-to-back-to-back with nothing in between to break their momentum really worked for me. Of course, you could feel the story wrapping up and that sucked, but what can you do?
Anyway,
- Man, anyone who hasn't seen Epitaph One is gonna be so freaking lost. The "Previously" segment is nothing but E1. I'm betting a lot of people haven't. My cousin and her family watch the show but know nothing of the internets or its fannish workings, and they had no idea the episode existed. Ima have to show her before she watches this.
- ILU, Moody Spurgeon! You've come a long way from banging Josie Pie behind the cow shed! (If I can trace a thing back to Anne of Green Gables, you can bet I will. Over and over!) I read some article on Friday that talked about the finale and said that it opened with Felicia and mini-Caroline searching for Safe Haven, so I thought damn, Zack's character will probably have been killed off in the interim or something, but no, there he was! Silly article, dismissing Zack Ward for no reason. Zone had some of the best lines in the episode!
- Tiny Messiah doesn't entirely convince me she's Caroline, but whatever, I can live with it. How hilarious is it that 10-year-old Caroline says to Zone, "If I have to kick your ass again..." like she's pummeled him before? So hilarious. I would pay to see that.
- Neuropolis. We really have been taking cues from The Matrix, haven't we? Except I kind of hate The Matrix. I like this dystopian future much better than that one.
- Ambrose and the shellfish. OH, HOW IRONIC. You bring about the apocalypse just so you can live eat lobster forever and the apocalypse causes shellfish to virtually run out. Haha, burn.
- Except, not really, because the original Ambrose has seen the error of his ways and is probably dead from something Attic-related, not out hijacking Eliza's brother's body. It's the copies that are douchebags.
- Topher :( The worst part about the situation they find him in is that I'm pretty sure he would be able to do what they're asking. He does the opposite in the space of a few hours, after all. He's just not. I think he's deliberately stalling, even though that means one person a day dies right in front of him, because he knows that's a better option than creating the tech they want, which will kill more people. I bet in one way or another he's spent pretty much the entire last ten years trying to choose a lesser between two evils of his own making.
- T is adorable. Bordering on schmaltzy, sure, and I hate how his existence basically turns Priya into a fragile homebody, but still, adorable.
- Zone's reaction when he finds out they have to go right back to where they came from is hilarious. He really does have the best lines in the episode. The one about the postal system is a fave :)
- "She likes it when you're corny." Awwww. So, Paul's love for Echo grew right back in like a fungus, huh? Can't say I'm all that surprised, I mean, even when he was with Mellie, he had a total Gene Tierney thing going on with Caroline. That's probably why I haven't gotten sick of him like everyone else. Laura was a really good movie, y'all.
- And now we've reached the first WHAAAT of the episode. Tony? Crazy tech army commander Tony? With bonus estrangement? For all that they do a great job catching us right up with this tech army so we at least know what their deal is, there is SO MUCH plot there that got skipped over. Years and years of plot. It's overwhelming. Sigh. I really love the way they load up their mods from the USBs into that round thing and then hold it up to their ear, though. So cool.
- Aaaaaand Maurissa writes herself into basically a canon ship with Felicia Day. Who's surprised?
- OK, I'm not, but I'm kind of surprised Kilo's there at all. I'd kind of dismissed her as Topher's "demonstration doll", fairly disposable. Sorry, Mo!
- Tony and Priya. ;___;
- The Echo and Paul stuff presents such an interesting conundrum. Because it's so not about sex (which they've had, so we can stop worrying about it), and they obviously do love each other, but neither of them can get past all the technicalities of who/what/how she is. She practically exists in a different dimension than anyone else. How's that for an obstacle to romance?
- "We were born ready. Well, not technically." HA.
- Once the risk to Tony went away (I was nervous for a minute) I kind of figured Paul was gonna bite it. Doesn't make it suck any less, though! :(
- Okay, I have to confess that when I saw all the blank people wandering around inside, I instantly decided that they were the people Whiskey gassed in Epitaph One, and that the gas had only put them to sleep while they were remote-wiped. So I thought that must be what keeps happening to Whiskey! She protects the house by insta-wiping its aggressors! She must be alive! I didn't catch Alpha's line about cleaning the place out at all my first viewing. Now I'm trying to ignore it, because I really want Whiskey to be alive, dammit.
- How is zen Alpha so sexy? He just stands there being still and bearded and exudes sex, somehow. He's like half sex-god, half kindergarten teacher.
- Oh, the first time I watched this, I totally thought, at this point, that he was going to "Paul out" for Echo and they were gonna make sweet sweet love. Which... would have been a different kind of creepy than what we got, I guess.
- The tech-heads not wanting to save the world seemed completely random before the commercial break, but Tony's speech makes it make sense - how addictive and awesome must it be to just be able to instantly be who and what you want to be - and be able to be that, completely and perfectly, without effort? If we had gotten more seasons of show, I probably would have been really seduced by that idea.
- So, this scene with Priya smashing the memory sticks is the first thing to convince me that maybe Tony does have a bit of a tech addiction problem and isn't just using the tech to win the war. Because she's acting very much like someone whose mate has assured her he's quitting many times and yet constantly goes back to whatever substance he's abusing. That's upsetting, even before the scene turns into an Echo grief-fest.
- ;____;
- I actually really like how there was no nonsense with people trying to sacrifice themselves in Topher's place. I was sort of thinking they'd have Adelle do it, but it never even came up. She was very loving and motherly in her relationship with him, but she didn't treat him like a child. She respected his decision. Topher was going to have to do it, and Topher understood he'd have to do it, and he was okay with that and it seemed fair to him. And no one liked it, I'm sure, but also no one objected. That's pretty cool.
- ... I really like Adelle's post-apocalyptic hair.
- Tony burning the memory sticks does seem to indicate he has, or had, a serious problem, which he is now rather aggressively giving up. And awww, Priya told T that Tony's his dad! You know, it would have been so easy to just trot out Enver like a show pony and have him do his awesome acting tricks all episode instead of taking Tony to the weird place they took him. Very interesting choice.
- I hope Mag and Zone are still snarking at each other when they're eighty. And the kid is sixty. :)
- So Alpha left to get back in touch with himself! I did not see that coming. He did say it was very hard for him to live the way he was, but I never imagined he'd want to go back to being just one person. Especially not one who was some kind of scary psychopath when he was last seen, what, fifteen years ago? Yikes. I mean, I understand the idea that his violent tendencies were such a core part of him that they couldn't be wiped away, and that the fact that he's managed to evolve beyond that to a state of peace probably means he's not going to just start cutting people up the second he gets his real personality back, but the key word there is "probably". Scary, scary stuff, having to hope that who you used to be isn't going to betray the person you've become.
- Ooh, Adelle leads the wiped people into the light just like Caroline's fantasy in Needs! And Echo dismisses it. But Caroline doesn't remember that, obviously, because it was just a little experiment that they didn't bother backing up or recording anywhere. So in this one moment, someone else really does know Caroline better than she knows herself. How sweet is that?
- I know Topher's "Huh," was probably just a reaction to seeing the memory wall at all, but a part of me will always wonder if there was some sort of message or specific thing he saw there that made him react that way. (something about Whiskey, maybe??)
- Can we talk about the symmetry of Paul being delivered to Echo in an envelope, the same way he first received information about Caroline? And okay, I know a lot of people are thinking the whole Echo/Paul thing is creepy. I say sure, but who doesn't enjoy creepy occasionally? It doesn't stop me liking the ending. It's such a literal interpretation of how we all say we keep people in our hearts after they're gone. Only, in Echo's case, she can never truly be with other people, anyway, only be them. So I really liked the bittersweet way it worked out. Also, check out Eliza's adorable drunken walk after she uploads Paul. That sold it for me. ♥
And, questions:
- What of Ivy? Did they shoot her in front of Topher? :\
- What of Dominic?? I don't even have a good theory for where he's been all this time.
- What of Whiskey??? Who is she, really? And how in hell did anyone wrest her still-beautiful body away from Ambrose? Was it Ambrose who fixed her face? And how did Dr. Saunders disappear? My instinct says "voluntarily".
- What happened to the people still in the Attic? I'm assuming some of their bodies were killed by, like, explosions and general chaos, but some of them might still be intact. Now I kind of want crackfic where the adrenaline-pumping systems ran out but the life support systems are still active, and all the people in the Attic have been living in a wonderful, magical, candy-filled virtual dreamland this whole time, skipping on rainbows and having threesomes with porn stars. And the only person in there who isn't rapturously happy is Ambrose, who knows some serious shit must have gone down outside in order for this to happen. And walks around with a literal dark stormy cloud hanging over his head. LOL.
There are sooooo many calculated gaps in this story, it's like a map leading to fanfic mecca. Some major group fanon is going to emerge in the next year or so to fill in the missing pieces. It's going to be fascinating to watch. :)