The good; Very, very good ep, lovely way to round out the series and a great send off for the characters. Many, many nice little features including Harding and his allergy to shellfish again and Victor still having Ernesto the Acrobat in his memories.
The bad; Joss WHY NO COMMENTARY? You didn't do one for the last ep of Angel either. Or are you saving it for Special Edition DVDs to fund your new project? That said the dinner party is a nice touch.When Adele leads the Dolls into the streets outside where have all the butchers gone? The idea that Victor, Echo and Sierra have to hide underground for a year to escape Topher's pulse is just silly.
Best line; Alpha; "We're not freak shows. Well OK I am. And Echo. But Adele's a class act all the way" and Adele; "I'm glad you didn't clean up" Alpha; "It spoke to the schizophrenic in me. Well, both of them actually"
Packing heat; everyone armed to the teeth. For a guy who says he doesn't like guns Joss puts a heck of a lot of them in his shows.
Echo kissage; 5 In the missing scenes we see that Echo/Rebecca got all kissy with Joel in the back of the van at the end of The Love Supreme
Capt subtext; Note the tender way Adele feeds Topher whom she refers to as 'darling'. She offers to die with him but he wants her to live. Mag seems to have the hots for Kilo and vice versa. Adele and Echo finally embrace. The butchers are now wearing suits, do they represent the network executives that cancelled the show?
Notches on the Dollhouse bedpost; Paul and Echo appear to have become occasional sexual partners but not romantic lovers. Victor/Anthony and Sierra/Priya are lovers and have a son.
Total number personalities; note 'mini-me' refers to herself as Caroline? But in every other way she's Echo, able to access all the memories in her head. Ballard refers to 100 people in Echo's head. 101 including him. Surprisingly the series doesn't end with Caroline getting her body back, she's just one of the personalities in Echo's head.
Echo; 101 Sierra; 13 Victor; 11 November; 3
Total LA dolls; Kilo again, for a second I thought it might be Ivy. We also have Romeo and Yankee 11-Echo, Sierra, November, Victor, Mike, Tango, Alpha, Whiskey, Kilo, Romeo, Yankee
Subverting the Hollywood cliché; Psycho killer Alpha pops up in his usual sinister fashion....and get's a great big hug from everyone!
Bondage; Paul and Echo in chains Sierra tied up; 2 Ballard; 3 Echo; 7 Victor; 2
Kills; Echo kills the Rossum honcho for the last time. Once they get into the fight with the Reavers...sorry butchers, you just lose track.
Sierra; 3 kills Echo; 5 November;1 Victor; 2 Boyd; 4
Know the face? Nate Dushku, Eliza's brother plays one of the Clive Ambrose's, he was also in the Angel ep 'Orpheus' as the armed robber in the doughnut shop.
18-Whedon alumni-
Missing scenes;.
The deleted scene from this ep is reminiscent of the ending to The Tripods, Zone, Mag and mini-me stumbling across a deserted camp but ready to start again. You can't help but feel bad for Adele when she tries to pick up Victor in the bar in Stop Loss, he actually offers to take her home but she knows she's not the girl he's waiting for.
Reminds me of; Wizard of Oz again, the 'great and terrible' Caroline. The method by which Rossum force Topher to work for them is similar to how Lorne is forced to work in Vegas in the Angel ep 'The House Always Wins'. Sierra/Priya appears to be auditioning for the remake of Little House on the Prarie. In contrast we have Mad Max Victor.
Whedon clichés; strawberries again! Also in Alpha we have the series greatest villain becoming the series greatest hero (Spike, Angel, Illyria, the agent in Serenity;the movie) Maimed characters. Rich and powerful families who cover up the evil deeds of their wayward sons. Top security installations which aren't secure at all. Loving self-sacrificing mothers who risk all for their children. Corporate politics literally played with deadly seriousness. Monty Python quoting villains. Offices full of zombies. Strawberries. Sleeper agents. One girl who holds the secret to everything. Villains who become heroes.
Breaking the programming; Note the butchers are now using guns, they're evolving too.
Questions and observations; So what happened between the events of The Hollow Men and Epitaph 2? An awful lot it seems! Presumably everyone makes their way back to the Dollhouse once the world starts going to hell. What happens between Adele and Echo so that Echo is on the point of killing her in Epitaph One? Presumably the vaccine that makes everyone immune to imprinting is derived from Echo's spinal fluid as we saw in the previous ep? Does Alpha have the same ability and is that how he created safe haven? What does Topher go 'huh' for at the very last moment when he looks at the 'Remember' wall? Love Adele's new family, her, Zone and mini-me ex-Caroline, she can start again, ever the Shepherd leading them into the light (we've seen how good she is with kids from her relationship with Victor/Sierra's son). Alpha finds it amusing that Romeo refers to him as a 'luddite' (groups of disgruntled workers who opposed the industrial revolution). Nice that they could work Summer Glau into the final ep through Topher's vid.
So what happened to Ivy, Dominic, Alpha, Perrin, Whiskey etc? I guess we have to leave it to the fanfic? Who kept sending Ballard all the clues to the Dollhouse, was it Alpha? I like Joss' idea of Echo and co as the post apocalyptic A-team, I'd watch that.
Marks out of 10; 10/10
The bad; Joss WHY NO COMMENTARY? You didn't do one for the last ep of Angel either. Or are you saving it for Special Edition DVDs to fund your new project? That said the dinner party is a nice touch.When Adele leads the Dolls into the streets outside where have all the butchers gone? The idea that Victor, Echo and Sierra have to hide underground for a year to escape Topher's pulse is just silly.
Best line; Alpha; "We're not freak shows. Well OK I am. And Echo. But Adele's a class act all the way" and Adele; "I'm glad you didn't clean up" Alpha; "It spoke to the schizophrenic in me. Well, both of them actually"
Packing heat; everyone armed to the teeth. For a guy who says he doesn't like guns Joss puts a heck of a lot of them in his shows.
Echo kissage; 5 In the missing scenes we see that Echo/Rebecca got all kissy with Joel in the back of the van at the end of The Love Supreme
Capt subtext; Note the tender way Adele feeds Topher whom she refers to as 'darling'. She offers to die with him but he wants her to live. Mag seems to have the hots for Kilo and vice versa. Adele and Echo finally embrace. The butchers are now wearing suits, do they represent the network executives that cancelled the show?
Notches on the Dollhouse bedpost; Paul and Echo appear to have become occasional sexual partners but not romantic lovers. Victor/Anthony and Sierra/Priya are lovers and have a son.
Total number personalities; note 'mini-me' refers to herself as Caroline? But in every other way she's Echo, able to access all the memories in her head. Ballard refers to 100 people in Echo's head. 101 including him. Surprisingly the series doesn't end with Caroline getting her body back, she's just one of the personalities in Echo's head.
Echo; 101 Sierra; 13 Victor; 11 November; 3
Total LA dolls; Kilo again, for a second I thought it might be Ivy. We also have Romeo and Yankee 11-Echo, Sierra, November, Victor, Mike, Tango, Alpha, Whiskey, Kilo, Romeo, Yankee
Subverting the Hollywood cliché; Psycho killer Alpha pops up in his usual sinister fashion....and get's a great big hug from everyone!
Bondage; Paul and Echo in chains Sierra tied up; 2 Ballard; 3 Echo; 7 Victor; 2
Kills; Echo kills the Rossum honcho for the last time. Once they get into the fight with the Reavers...sorry butchers, you just lose track.
Sierra; 3 kills Echo; 5 November;1 Victor; 2 Boyd; 4
Know the face? Nate Dushku, Eliza's brother plays one of the Clive Ambrose's, he was also in the Angel ep 'Orpheus' as the armed robber in the doughnut shop.
18-Whedon alumni-
Missing scenes;.
The deleted scene from this ep is reminiscent of the ending to The Tripods, Zone, Mag and mini-me stumbling across a deserted camp but ready to start again. You can't help but feel bad for Adele when she tries to pick up Victor in the bar in Stop Loss, he actually offers to take her home but she knows she's not the girl he's waiting for.
Reminds me of; Wizard of Oz again, the 'great and terrible' Caroline. The method by which Rossum force Topher to work for them is similar to how Lorne is forced to work in Vegas in the Angel ep 'The House Always Wins'. Sierra/Priya appears to be auditioning for the remake of Little House on the Prarie. In contrast we have Mad Max Victor.
Whedon clichés; strawberries again! Also in Alpha we have the series greatest villain becoming the series greatest hero (Spike, Angel, Illyria, the agent in Serenity;the movie) Maimed characters. Rich and powerful families who cover up the evil deeds of their wayward sons. Top security installations which aren't secure at all. Loving self-sacrificing mothers who risk all for their children. Corporate politics literally played with deadly seriousness. Monty Python quoting villains. Offices full of zombies. Strawberries. Sleeper agents. One girl who holds the secret to everything. Villains who become heroes.
Breaking the programming; Note the butchers are now using guns, they're evolving too.
Questions and observations; So what happened between the events of The Hollow Men and Epitaph 2? An awful lot it seems! Presumably everyone makes their way back to the Dollhouse once the world starts going to hell. What happens between Adele and Echo so that Echo is on the point of killing her in Epitaph One? Presumably the vaccine that makes everyone immune to imprinting is derived from Echo's spinal fluid as we saw in the previous ep? Does Alpha have the same ability and is that how he created safe haven? What does Topher go 'huh' for at the very last moment when he looks at the 'Remember' wall? Love Adele's new family, her, Zone and mini-me ex-Caroline, she can start again, ever the Shepherd leading them into the light (we've seen how good she is with kids from her relationship with Victor/Sierra's son). Alpha finds it amusing that Romeo refers to him as a 'luddite' (groups of disgruntled workers who opposed the industrial revolution). Nice that they could work Summer Glau into the final ep through Topher's vid.
So what happened to Ivy, Dominic, Alpha, Perrin, Whiskey etc? I guess we have to leave it to the fanfic? Who kept sending Ballard all the clues to the Dollhouse, was it Alpha? I like Joss' idea of Echo and co as the post apocalyptic A-team, I'd watch that.
Marks out of 10; 10/10