Academic

What would have made "Dollhouse" more interesting

By Tung Yin

Joss Whedon apparently has something of a cult following based on his past works, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Firefly," which meant that his new show, "Dollhouse," started with a built-in fan base.  Personally, I never got into "Buffy" or "Firefly" -- the former because it seemed too "teen" for me (in a way that "Veronica Mars" did not), and the latter because it got canceled almost overnight.  But I decided to give "Dollhouse" a try, especially after the similarly-themed "My Own Worst Enemy" got yanked after 8 or so episodes.

The premise of "Dollhouse" is that a secret organization keeps a group of "actives" available for paying clients; each active can be downloaded with different personality composites, allowing them to be anything needed, from hostage negotiator to safecracker to whatever.  (If you're thinking that this premise was done in NBC's mid-1990s thriller "The Pretender," you're right.)  When the mission is over, the active is "wiped" and returned to an innocent state, waiting in the Dollhouse for the next mission.

You can see the appeal of such a show for an actor/actress: you get to play a different character every episode.  (Reportedly, this is why Martin Landau turned down the role of Mr. Spock in the original "Star Trek" in favor of Rollin Hand on "Mission: Impossible"; Hand was the team's master of disguises.)

Unfortunately, Eliza Dushku, who plays "Echo," isn't gifted with the most acting range, so she ends up playing each mission more or less the same.  Just compare her to Dichen Lachman, who plays Sierra (another active), and you can see the difference in acting range.

In addition, it's hard to build any emotional connection to a character who is the same physically but otherwise a chameleon in personality.  The show is attempting to address this by suggesting that the "wipes" aren't working 100%.  Maybe that will work.

But I think it would have been far more interesting if they had done essentially the reverse -- have the personality be downloaded into different "bodies."  This is a pretty common theme in modern British sci-fi, particularly work by Richard K. Morgan and Peter F. Hamilton.  Morgan's "Takeshi Kovacs" series posits a future where cortical stacks copy your mental processes and memories, and physical bodies are just "sleeves" to be grown as needed.

Of course, this would obviate the need for any "star," since every episode would be a different body (though you could return to favorite bodies from time to time, I suppose), but would allow the development of a long-term character.  Indeed, it would be interesting to see how different actors approach the challenge of playing the same character!  (For a pretty good example, see how Nicolas Cage and John Travolta played each other's characters in "Face Off.")

Full post as published by The Yin Blog on March 16, 2009 (boomark / email).