There, I said it.
I'm about to be lambasted by friends for this, especially those who are fans of Whedon's previous tv series, but I'm coming to the point where I think Dollhouse is his most ambitious show, and his best-crafted. This is where I duck Ian's flamethrower.
I don't even want to address the louder, less reasonable cross-section of feminists who haven't even really watched the show and have condemned it as an extreme objectification of women, but of course I have to. First they obviously aren't truly familiar with anything previously created by Joss Whedon and his stable of writers--as I challenge anyone to provide an example of a female character of theirs who isn't strong, capable, competent. . .who isn't either equal or superior to all of her male counterparts. These people have been providing us with powerful, intelligent, strong women to watch, enjoy and respect for years. To say that this show is just the masturbatory fantasy of every basement-dwelling socially awkward male out there is both a disservice to the show and its creators, but a clear indicator that someone really hasn't been watching the show.
The one thing this show doesn't do is hit its viewer over the head with a message. It doesn't shine a light on how skeezy someone is to pay for a programmable playtoy for the weekend; it doesn't spend all of itstime questioning whether it's appropriate to use a technology just because we have the ability to use it (though both instances do occur in the show, neither are dwelled upon to the point of preachiness). If there's a moral to take away from the show, part of its perfection is that we each have to come into it on our own, navigating the many layers of ethics and morality the show has put forth to come into our own understanding of what this show has to say about our society, about our humanity.
For me, the greatest joy in this show is the debate it brings me, internally and externally with fellow viewers (most particularly Denise). I think the show completely turns the idea of good and evil completely on its head--as I don't believe there's a single character in this show who could fit the definition of a good guy. There are no saints here, only varying degrees of sin, of immorality and amorality, of ethical complexity. Again, I welcome someone trying to proveto me otherwise, because from where I stand there are no good-guys on Dollhouse, only varying degress of better guys. I think the ethical discussion this show demands is the most intriguing, makes this show the most complex of Whedon's to date, and is perhaps destined to be its very downfall. Too many of us want our entertainment simple and to the point and absolutely brain dead. For every Arrested Development and Veronica Mars that falls, ten Big Bang Theories, Two and a Half Men and Tyra shows rise.
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I agree that this is by far his most ambitious show, but it only makes sense that it would be. This is a show that is truly based in reality--Buffy and Angel while based in the real world were not in our reality by any stretch of the imagination, and Firefly, while taking a realistic view of the future and space travel was set in the future and had space travel--not very realistic. The Dollhouse, on the other hand, takes place in a world that is familiar, and addresses desires/fears/issues that are common to humanity.
I think it is moving a bit too slow to get where it is going, so on the well-crafted note I have to disagree, but only slightly. The last few episodes have been entertaining, interesting, and have raised some problematic issues like is Dewitt a doll? Who is the mole? And how can we rally behind Ballard when he knows Millie is a doll but will continue the charade anyway to get what he wants. These are strong themes, I only wish they had been developed a little earlier in the season. However, I will say that if this show gets to continue for a few more seasons it probably will be his best crafted show. For now, though, I am not completely convinced.
It is a morally ambiguous world Whedon has created (and those are always his most interesting, that is why Angel and Firefly/Serenity were so compelling for me) and that ambiguity IS what makes the show shine. I hope he gets the opportunity to keep developing it because there is a lot of potential here. He just has to live up to it.
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