Dollhouse could have been one of the deepest shows on television, and I wish it had had the chance to explore it’s mythology. When you watch the great episodes, you see that this story has a real backbone; a story that would bring up questions Fox doesn’t have the balls to ask. Fox wanted a thriller of the week, those episodes were the worst. They weren’t terrible, but they didn’t carry the soul of the series. And those episodes were where the show failed.
I like a story with questions, I like questioning the motives of characters, loving them one episode and hating them the next, but understanding whey they, as people, would solve that problem the way they did. Watching Topher break down after helping Sierra murder the man that had put her in the Dollhouse was one of the best TV moments I have experienced. He has this intricate moral code that most would say doesn’t exist, but it does. It is just vastly different that how the majority of people think.
I wish Dollhouse had the chance to unravel these characters: their lives and motivations, the way the writers intended to. There is no way that they can do that in seven more episodes. There is so much viewers will never know about the fate of these characters, so much we cannot know about what happens between now and the devastation that exists in “Epitaph 1.” I am incredibly frustrated as I sit writing this, questions spinning through my mind that will never be answered, not the least of which: Why don’t more people care?
I know I get more attached to characters than some, but why does a show like Lost get to tell it’s entire story and Dollhouse doesn’t? Lost is even more obscure, even less accessible to those who have never seen an episode, but it doesn’t approach the subjects of sex, free will, or human motivation the way that Dollhouse does. That is the only explanation I have. Viewers aren’t upset when a character releases a here to unexplainable smoke monster to kill countless people on an island that doesn’t exist. But, when one woman, put through hell by a man who stole her identity and effectively raped her for months, murders him, viewers are uncomfortable. Well, you know what viewers, we are supposed to be uncomfortable. Whedon said in an interview with the chicago tribune:
The idea was always, how much of the fantasy will [viewers] accept and how much will they go, “You know what, this just is too much like real-world situations that are truly appalling and so I can’t let the fantasy happen.”
Because as I said before, when you’re dealing with fantasies, particularly sexual ones, you’re going off the reservation. You’re not going to be doing things that are perfectly correct. It’s supposed to be about the sides of us that we don’t want people to see.
Storytelling is about the challenges and changes that characters face. It is about attempting to explain how human emotion works, why do we hate the people we do? Why do we love the ones that we love? What makes a situation right or wrong? Storytelling is a way to approach these question and explore their answers in an entirely fictitious environment. The element of fiction makes it fascinating. If I turned on the news this afternoon and there was an underground building in LA that took away a person’s freewill and sold them to the highest bidder to fulfill their fantasies, I know that I would consider that wrong. But a story allows us to explore why that place exists, and why people are there. It is not black and white. The story that Dollhouse presents is not about people living four stories underground and being rented out as playthings. It is about the desperation that we feel that leads us to a world where this is the solution.
Why are people so uncomfortable with facing the realities of human existence? I can’t answer the question, just throw it to the abyss. I get why Fox dropped the show: money. If people don’t want to watch the show Fox doesn’t make money, and Fox wants to make money. If people want to watch C list celebrities make fools of themselves attempting to dance, fox will gladly give them 3 different reality dancing shows a season. Why are television viewers so shallow? Why has the desire for true storytelling been lost? Dollhouse isn’t implying that viewers support prostitution, or murder, or espionage, it is simply telling a story, and a brilliant one at that. We need to ask the hard questions. As technology makes more and more possible we need to put down our remote controls and ponder a question deeper than the color of sequins for a moment of our lives.
