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Post by Queen E on May 8, 2009 13:07:06 GMT -5
Alpha, Omega? I'm sensing a connection here...
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Post by Lola m on May 8, 2009 20:15:17 GMT -5
Oh, Doc Saunders . . . "I'm not just Bobby." Whoa! Flashback!! Whoa. So . . . this guy bought a cross-country crime spree with psychos?!? OMG! The folks who thought Doc S was an active, sooooooo right! "Whiskey, would you like a treatment?" Whoa!! Whoa!! Whoa!! "The alpha situation was an unfortunate technical anomaly." Well. That's one way to put it. Brought this thing in . . . to defile again. Hmmm. Ballard can make this go away. So, he's gonna claim he's helping them? Only, of course, he tries to spill the beans and no one believes him. Whoa. Every personality that was ever in Echo is gone? He took them? Does he want to build another multiple personality like him to be his girlfriend? Is Frankenstein's monster building his own bride?
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Post by Lola m on May 8, 2009 20:34:15 GMT -5
Oh, poor Victor. "I'm not my best anymore." Oh, Dr Saunders. She is a copy from their old doctor. And she was "the most popular" Active. Oh, and this is when Caroline was about to become a Doll! Huh. And she's being shown everything. So, she knew what she was going to be doing? And Alpha liked her, eh? Did he like her like Victor likes Sierra? "When does the hankering for tasty brains begin?" Ha! "Why is there a tall morally judgemental man in my imprint room?" Oh, Topher. You are always so very Topher. I was gonna ask why the hell they were telling Ballard everything. But they know he wants Caroline, so they're using that. And they figure they can always just wipe him later so there's no need to worry about him telling anything, I suppose. What are you doing, Alpha . . . OK, that was one creeeeeeepy scene with them kissing and the woman getting zapped. Oooooh. So, was Alpha pretending to be more wiped than he really was? And now we've got programmed bounty hunters heading out. Heh! Love how flummoxed Ballard looks. Bobby, you're scaring her? You're scaring me too!!!! "He's like Soylent Green. He's people!" 48 full personalities! Whoa. Whoa! Whoa!!! No wonder he's nuttier than a fruitcake. First thing Alpha did when he could was smash his own original personality. Like he's smashed Caroline's now. Well, that just gets even more disturbing, doesn't it. So, the downloaded personalities are fighting back? Don't want to be removed when the original person is ready to emerge again? Eeep! And what does that mean to the remnants of original person that we know are still inside of Echo? OMG OMG OMG!! He's put Caroline in this other body, so she can look at her own body and know she's not in it and . . .
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Post by Lola m on May 8, 2009 20:57:00 GMT -5
"She's responsible for all of the terrible things you can't remember." (He is totally confusing and frightening his "girlfriend", isn't he? But then, their created back-story isn't exactly happy good fun times, so I really shouldn't be surprised.) "I want back in my brain!" "You should have thought of that before you vacated the premises." "She abandoned you . . . She left you to the jackals, the wolves, the predators." Huh. This? Is a very interesting different viewpoint on all this. Are the original personalities victims? Volunteers? The perpetrators, with their own bodies as the victims . . . ? Whoa! Twisty!! "She said that I would be taken care of. And that I would be safe." "Do you feel safe?" Confused. "I'm with her." Ha!! Oh!!!!! "You can evolve. It's in you, I've seen it." Oh oh oh!! So, this is how he sees himself. And he thinks she can be the same! Become something other than the body, or the original personality . . . OMG, the first attack was just on Whiskey. "Let Echo be number one." So that Whiskey wouldn't keep forgetting and would stay with him, maybe? And then Topher did what he did. "Greatest hits." "Understand hell now." OMGWTFBBQ!! "I'm smarter than everyone in this room!!" **Adelle gives him a look** "But less scary!" Ah, and now we come to the Jossian nub of things . . . "Their soul. Who they are, at their core. I don't think that goes away." "You'd be wrong about that." Who was the guy before. That is a good question, because of how Caroline bits keep coming out in Echo. "He's gonna make me a superior creature. An ascended being." "Do you even know what that means?!" "Do you?" "No!" "OK. So you're not better'n me." "Look where you are. You're in a lair! OK? An evil lair! You're sitting in some messed up dentist's chair letting a guy who talks to himself attach wires to your head. Which, incidentally, is my head!" Heh! ;D And Alpha assumes that putting all sorts of people into her is gonna cause her to react and be just like him. Putting in all her past personalities. But something tells me no - not at all. "Alpha, meet Omega." I think Omega is gonna kick Alpha's ass. Yep. "Now I understand everything."
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:12:05 GMT -5
Reposting here because it is most relevant to this episode:
MIchelle posted an excellent pre-review of tonight's ep (no spoilers) so once that new thread opens up maybe I'll put this over there as well. But I thought this tied in so very well with KM's comments and the ensuing discussion here:
Today at 9:32am, Michelle wrote:
MOST! excellent. Plus, bonus points for the Chuck mention and parallel! Did you put this over on the Dollhouse thread as well?
These paragraphs speak directly to the discussion that has been going on about how it's been hard to get engaged with the show's core characters because they lack that cohesive and compelling family unit.
Even before I read this I was going to make a comment about how it's tough to get emotionally invested in a character who .... isn't there next week. They keep changing and since we can't see (much of) the real person it's been hard to form an attachment.
I thought this part was excellent analysis:
One of the most interesting things about "Dollhouse" is that Whedon and his writers have taken away from themselves one of the foundations of any TV show -- characters whose natures don't change all that much from week to week. The questions "Dollhouse" asks may have made things uncomfortable for viewers (and that may be one reason for the show's low ratings), but the writers first made things uncomfortable for themselves, by not relying on a predictable set of motivations for several key characters. Sure, in the early going, the dolls' frequent personality changes made it hard to invest in them, but "Dollhouse" has pulled off an uncanny trick: It's made me conscious of what's missing -- the dolls' real selves -- even when I'm interested in the roles they are playing on particular missions.
Those "active" scenes work on two levels: You never forget what's been taken away from them, even as you become interested in what they're doing on a mission. And when they're back at the Dollhouse and wandering around as simple-minded dolls -- well, those scenes have such poignance and sadness now. (I'm sure that's exactly what Fox executives were looking for when they commissioned the show, right?)
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:12:29 GMT -5
First reaction: This needed to be 2 hours long.
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:15:16 GMT -5
Oh, Doc Saunders . . . "I'm not just Bobby." Whoa! Flashback!! Whoa. So . . . this guy bought a cross-country crime spree with psychos?!? OMG! The folks who thought Doc S was an active, sooooooo right! "Whiskey, would you like a treatment?" Whoa!! Whoa!! Whoa!! "The alpha situation was an unfortunate technical anomaly." Well. That's one way to put it. Brought this thing in . . . to defile again. Hmmm. Ballard can make this go away. So, he's gonna claim he's helping them? Only, of course, he tries to spill the beans and no one believes him. Whoa. Every personality that was ever in Echo is gone? He took them? Does he want to build another multiple personality like him to be his girlfriend? Is Frankenstein's monster building his own bride? Maybe Whiskey is also somehow the inside man/plant. Didn't Dominick say "Whiskey?" We did not learn the answer to the question of who was implanting Echo and November with hints to Ballard. She didn't care who she used to be because she "knows who she is." Maybe somebody who was pre-programmed to override any additional programming? [hmm, probably not since she went along with the crime spree]
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:21:18 GMT -5
Second reaction. Yes, some things tied up.
I loved that Ballard bargained for Madeleine to be "set free." Of course I thought he was talking about Caroline but the instant I saw Mellie I knew that it made total sense and I should have expected it.
How about Boyd's "there's always a girl" line. Methinks there is more backstory there still to be told.
"Save the girl." Pylea anyone?
So Alpha's core personality was a bastard to begin with, while Caroline's was the animal lover, save the world type. He may have been a genius but he clearly couldn't see beyond his own prejudices to understand that she wouldn't necessarily want to do as he did.
Besides, most of her imprints were also positive people, so combining them all wouldn't make her a bad person.
I quite honestly expected the wedge/Caroline to die/be destroyed. Joss kills people off. I guess there was no value in killing Caroline since we hadn't become invested in her (and I STILL love that analysis Michelle directed us to about why it's been so hard to get invested). I thought maybe the basis of next year would be Echo figuring out who she is without Caroline.
My thoughts are clearly not exactly organized.
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:23:08 GMT -5
Another thought about next year.
Ballard has decided to work from within the belly of the beast. He IS able to look beyond Caroline. IF the show gets renewed he still needs to investigate what the real purpose behind the Dollhouses is.
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:23:35 GMT -5
Oh, Doc Saunders . . . "I'm not just Bobby." Whoa! Flashback!! Whoa. So . . . this guy bought a cross-country crime spree with psychos?!? OMG! The folks who thought Doc S was an active, sooooooo right! "Whiskey, would you like a treatment?" Whoa!! Whoa!! Whoa!! "The alpha situation was an unfortunate technical anomaly." Well. That's one way to put it. Brought this thing in . . . to defile again. Hmmm. Ballard can make this go away. So, he's gonna claim he's helping them? Only, of course, he tries to spill the beans and no one believes him. Whoa. Every personality that was ever in Echo is gone? He took them? Does he want to build another multiple personality like him to be his girlfriend? Is Frankenstein's monster building his own bride? Yes. Got it in one.
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Post by Lola m on May 8, 2009 21:24:11 GMT -5
Ahhhhh! And Alpha's original personality was a serial killer. "Why did you hit me in the head with a pipe?!" "It was handy? And you wante me to kill myself!!" "We're not just humans anymore, we're not multiple personalities, we're many personalities! One of my personalities happens to be a multiple personality, but that doesn't make me a multiple personality . . . "
"Right. New, superior, people. With a little German thrown in. What could possibly go wrong."
(I'm still amazed that he really thought she'd come out the same as him. With a different starting point and a different mix of personalities inside. Classic inability to see anything other than his own point of view.)
I love watching her puzzle her way through what she is experiencing. "They had to make room for it. They hollowed me out. There is no me, I'm just a container."
"He may be crazy, but he's right. You walked away from me. You left me alone in that place." This is so freaky. Her consciousness is having a conversation, an argument, with her physicality . . .
Fight!!
Oh, Ballard. "I'm not working for them." "Just tying to save the girl."
Oh, yeah. His original personality doesn't have anything to do with what Alpha is like.
Ah, who is Echo. "I'm just the porch light. Waiting for you."
And she was going to not fulfill her contract when . . .
Dude! This is why you never just knock the villain out or tie him up or whatever while you chatter on!! You kill him!! And get the hell out of there speedy!!
Do what I say, or I blow your brain out. So, he kept her personality tape. Hmmmmm.
[Side note: Squeeeeee!! Dennis Leary Hulu commercial!! "'Cuz we're aliens. And you ain't soup yet." Ha! ]
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:30:05 GMT -5
Doc Saunders wonders why Topher programmed her to hate him to much.
Are they related? Is she is sister maybe? I NEED another season.
Yes, I do.
Not in the way I needed another Buffy season because I loved the people and would (do) miss them so much, but because it really has become so VERY intriguing. Like reading a good scifi or mystery book and only reading book 1 of a trilogy (or more).
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:32:32 GMT -5
Lola--
Thanks for all the quotes. So very many good lines.
The reference to Obama was distracting though. I didn't care for it as it took me out of the universe of the story. And it distracted me from the first part of the statement -- something about no contract valid that allows people to agree to be slaves.
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Post by Sue on May 8, 2009 21:32:58 GMT -5
okay. I yield to the rest of you folks.
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Post by Squeemonster on May 8, 2009 21:37:03 GMT -5
Lola-- Thanks for all the quotes. So very many good lines. The reference to Obama was distracting though. I didn't care for it as it took me out of the universe of the story. And it distracted me from the first part of the statement -- something about no contract valid that allows people to agree to be slaves. I very much agree with this--it took me out of the story, as well. And it felt a bit preachy to me. IMO. But other than this small moment, I loved the heck out of this episode. LOVED IT.
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