'Dollhouse': The Verdict

Dollhouse has generated plenty of headlines over the last year, with numerous delays and rumours of artistic differences between creator Joss Whedon and the Fox network. Now that the original pilot has been ditched and a new one assembled, the series has finally hit the airwaves over in the States - but is it worth the wait?

Fans of Buffy and Firefly will be fully aware that when the words 'Written and Directed by Joss Whedon' flash up on the screen at the start of any given episode, it's a surefire sign of quality. Sadly, this is not the case for Whedon's handling of the opening Dollhouse episode, which is largely an uninvolving mess. It's hard not to feel like a passive bystander to the onscreen events, such is the lack of any compelling dramatic hook, and the show looks like little more than an excuse for lead Eliza Dushku to play dress-up and make believe.

The former Buffy star plays Echo, an operative for a mysterious, non-government agency called Dollhouse, who frequently has her mind partially wiped and new personas and memories implanted for the sake of a new 'engagement'. Later on, an FBI Agent investigating the Dollhouse suggests that this identity erasure is tantamount to murder. An interesting premise on paper, but the pre-credits scenes - so vital in the structure of a pilot episode and selling the show - fails to sufficiently build up the intrigue. The rest of the show is hardly an improvement.

A cryptic chat between Echo and her stiff upper-lipped boss (Olivia Williams) opens proceedings and hints at a compelling backstory. Yet then we're quickly whisked off to a couple of painfully long sequences featuring Echo racing round on a motorbike and dancing around to Lady GaGa on a dancefloor with the man of her dreams. These happy memories are soon erased when her team extracts her from her location.

The problem here, and the rest of the episode, is that there's no reason to care for Echo's predicament or fate. A few hints about her and the 'Dollhouse' organisation's circumstances are thrown in along the way, but are simply not compelling enough to hook viewers into the on-screen events. Alongside failing to successfully establish the show's premise, a self-contained story featuring the abduction of a 12 year-old girl fails to impress.

It all feels rather laboured as Echo, in her new guise as the facilitator of the exchange of the girl for the $5 million ransom, has guns pointed at her and has some painful childhood memories (not hers) come back to haunt her and help her tackle the kidnappers. Again, this is all depicted in such a subdued and undramatic manner that it's hard to greet these developments with more than a shrug. Where is the wit and punch so abundant in Buffy?

Dollhouse throws up plenty of questions, but fails to make us crave answers in the same manner that a vaguely similar show like Alias managed to do in the space of its opening few minutes. It's early days for Joss Whedon's new show and it deserves time to develop and expand upon its central ideas, but the omens are not good given its soulless opener. One can't help but wonder how vastly superior the original pilot that Fox rejected is.


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