Dollhouse: Haunted - Echo is a dead person.
Posted by HAKEN
Saturday, April 25, 2009 7:01 PM
Adelle imprints Echo with the her dead friend's memories and personality to solve her dead friend's own murder. How cool is that? Bet Sherlock never saw that coming.
'Haunted' is the 10th episode in the series. Two more to go. Three if we're lucky and 'Dollhouse' gets renewed.
However, renewal might be difficult. Low ratings from a couple of weeks back, plus skipped an airing last week, and then a lead in with ratings challenged 'Prison Break' tonight. It's almost like pouring salt over an open wound.
The latest episode didn't help matters. 'Haunted' was rather...how shall I put it? Not what FOX should be showing for the home stretch with only two episodes left? Hmm...yep.
'Haunted' isn't a totally bad episode, it just didn't have the oomph to continue the series momentum built upon by the last trio of arc heavy episodes.
The Good:
Life everlasting, now that's an interesting use of the imprinting technology. I'm sure there are ethical and technological reasons why it shouldn't be used for that purpose, but the episode never quite delve into it. Instead it meandered across a whodunit and focused on relationships, love, and a sense for closure when someone passes away. For sentimental reasons, this was okay.
Other major good point with the episode: Eliza is fully clothed for a change. Though, I must admit, I wouldn't mind seeing her in that dominatrix outfit again. Shiny!
The Bad:
The whole Topher subplot along with the message it carried, while interesting and fun, ultimately didn't have the same impact as when it was first told to us in 'Needs.' Why rehash the whole 'we have needs, we have to connect' message? We get it. It's been imprinted onto our my brains. With only 12 episodes in the season and only 2 to go after tonight, there's no need in repeating the same message over and over again. Should have moved on, but instead this all ended up being a filler for a (arrgh) standalone episode.
The Ugly:
Ballard's entire interaction with Millie seems forced and confusing. Most of the time I couldn't tell if Ballard was at a lost for words or if he was disgusted, pissed, etc.. It's like Ballard was channeling an evil version of Horatio Caine from 'CSI Miami.'
Ballard's actions certainly don't clear things up for me either, especially after he learns Millie's true identity. There's a very adult two word term for what he did and it starts with the word 'grudge' and ends with...I'm sure you can figure out the rest. At this point, I can't tell whether he cares about the other dolls besides Echo or not. Regardless, Ballard definitely has issues with Millie--most likely for all the wrong reasons, however confusing they may be.
That's pretty much it. I'm still reeling from the fact that this was a standalone episode. Doesn't make sense to me at all. Hopefully enough people will remember tonight's otherwise forgettable episode and come back for Alan Tudyk as Alpha next week.
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