Thursday, April 23, 2009

Super-Powered TV: Dollhouse 1.9: A Spy in the House of Love


All apologies for the lateness of this post... real life has me backed up on just about all my non-Heroes television viewing, and I actually forgot for awhile that I had this episode to watch. Too bad, as it is one of the best so far.

We open with a shot at the end of the story where a lot of electricity and a gunshot come from Topher’s office. From there we start the flashback...

Right to Eliza Dushku in dominatrix gear. I love you, Joss Whedon. Dominic is being left in charge; that could be trouble or so I would assume.

Boyd and Topher discuss the possibility of a spy, as Topher has found a chip in the system that alters implants. In the aftermath, Echo volunteers to help, showing she knows how the process works.

We again flashback to Mellie’s imprint. We move on in the story with Mellie again visiting Ballard’s apartment. Mellie shows that she is actually November and that Mellie has been designed as a spy against him. The spy reveals that he needs to find out why the dollhouse exists before he can understand it completely.

We return from commercial with Sierra’s imprint. She takes the place of an Asian woman who really does not look that similar. She breaks in to a facility under Dominic’s orders to find a chip. She gets it, but she gets cornered as the segment ends.

Victor is next, as he goes on a lonely hearts engagement as Roger. After visiting an older lady though, he moves on to meet with DeWitt, who is apparently the real client. After getting rid of the phone, the two have a fencing match that leads to sex. Later, Victor awakens to a weeping DeWitt, but we still don’t know why.

We move on to an imprinted Echo. She interrogates Topher, Echo, Ivy the assistant, and the doctor. But Sierra returns, and apparently Ivy is the spy. But Echo says the true spy is Dominic. He reveals himself by attacking her. They have a bit of a kung fu battle, before Echo takes him out. Echo takes Dominic to meet DeWitt. He reveals that his mission with the NSA was to keep the Dollhouse from imploding on itself.

So, we actaully take a big step forward this week, as we learn what exactly the attic is. And even in his eventual demise (mentally anyway), Dominic takes a bit of solace in the fact that eventually, Echo will bring them all down just as he predicted. Dominic has one last attempt at breaking free, even manages to shoot DeWitt in the side, but in the end he gets “sent to the attic”, and his memory left on another imprint disc.

We end with Boyd becoming the new head of security, and the declaration that Echo may not need all that much protection anymore. And we meet Travis, her new handler. But even as she takes the imprint, her eyes stray back to Boyd....

Wow, so different this week. I could have done without the odd narrative format, but otherwise this is easily the best non-Joss scripted episode so far. I am still not sure I buy Dominic as the man funneling Ballard information (why would he do that?), but we put things together to move the show forward more than we have in most of the show’s episodes. Hopefully, we can wrap up the current saga fairly well as we wind the show down over the next three (and possibly last) episodes.

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