Dollhouse: Belonging

By Sonia Aurora
There comes a time when you realize that you have to be honest with yourself about your relationships. You want to like someone, but deep down, you just know it’s not gonna work. And oftentimes you realize that you might not love them even though they aren’t doing anything necessarily wrong. They might even be doing a bang-up job, their very best, but you’ve already checked out, so no matter what the fan-fare, you know it’s over.

The truth is, I’ve been sort of faking my love for Dollhouse.

You see, I’ve wanted to love it. I really did. There were definite flashes of genuine interest during the courting phase. I made the requisite excuses for it too, especially in the beginning, when it hit it’s height at episode 6 and then it went up and down in terms of story and showcase. But deep down, I knew this was no Buffy. This was not Serenity. It was related, but mostly it felt like a distant cousin that shows up during the holidays and you wonder how you’re even related to them. And when other, more important stuff happens, that side of the family gets a little ignored.

So after watching “Belonging”, weeks ago, even though I felt great in the watching of it, when I sat down to write my review, I couldn’t do it. I had a hard time mustering up the words to gush, because it felt pretty fake. Because I knew the clock was ticking. And then it was confirmed: Dollhouse was cancelled. And so even though Joss was drinking to cope with the pain I mentally checked out. I mean, Fox had too, deciding not to air for about 2 months. I’d erased its existence from my memory. I couldn’t invest anymore. Hell, even kleargear.com neglected to send me the Dollhouse shirt I’d ordered in the spring.

But then 2 new episodes aired last Friday and I realized I ought to stick it out til the end. It wouldn’t be fair not to at least see it through since I’d invested so much time already. Because I’d wanted to love it, because at times I did, because I did want to like it and spend a few years with it. To do this for Joss, for the newly unemployed Dichen Lachman and Enver Gjokaj (hopefully, not for long).

So I traveled back to re-watch “Belonging”, which was one of the more disturbing Dollhouse episodes to date. It was complex, filled with moral dilemma, and stretched the acting chops of many of the secondary actors (secondary to being billed to Eliza). And I’ve often said there is so much talent in this cast, it was nice to see them at the forefront. It was also nice to be able to revisit the show at it’s height, rather than at one of the lows.

I also love Sierra. Dichen is, by far, one of the better and more layered actors on this show, or any other, for that matter, from her first entrance as a no-nonsense SWAT member down to giddy fan girl and racist 60’s wife- which was only a minute’s worth of screen time. There is no doubt that Joss can spot and will hone talent. I am equally as impressed by Dichen’s weekly performance as I am Enger’s Victor. In “Belonging”, what was also most interesting about this whole unraveling was to see the Very Bad Side of someone becoming a Doll. While Echo (Caroline) and November (Mellie/Madeline) chose their fates, it was sniffed at in earlier episodes (especially “Needs”) that Sierra came in under a seedier pretence. And here we finally saw it unfold.

We’re first introduced to Priya, Australian street artist with an “adoring” stalker who wants to showcase her art. Enter gallery opening and Dollhouse attendees, all there to convince Priya that said stalker (Nolan, well connected to the Dollhouse) is amazing and she should date him. As when she’s a doll, she’s drawn to Victor, and wants to leave the party with him. Nolan can’t make her love him, unless, of course, he plies her with drugs to induce psychosis, which we come to learn. And so a year goes by with frequent engagements of Nolan and Sierra, he being the obedient love bug he wanted. He even takes Polaroids of each encounter and collects them in a desk drawer as his little psychotic trophy case. Until, Of course, no one realized this and in the course of this hour Topher puts it all together.

Adele gives a verbal one-two punch to Nolan, who’s arrogant enough to request Sierra all to himself. (And the Brits can really flail insults veiled sweetly in that accent of theirs, who else can make saying, “Given that you’re a raping scumbag one tick shy of a murderer- I don’t recall… Do you take sugar?” sound Shakespearean?). But when she tries to combat the whole Nolan taking Sierra/Priya, she gets Miss Lonelyhearts thrown back in her face (ouch). So there then comes a series of flashbacks and present time to show a quasi relationship of how Priya came to be Sierra, through Topher’s eyes, who was chosen for his Dollhouse post in large part due to his compromised morals. Even though Priya pleads with Topher that she’s in hell and being “poisoned” (with anti-psychotic drugs that are inducing the actual psychosis), he’s convinced he’s helping her come out of her ravaged, insane mind. I think when he finally pieces together the dupe he feels all those compromised morals flowering open.

So Sierra gets uploaded to be Nolan’s plaything forever and you hope that Topher ingrained her with badassness but what he did instead is made Priya 2.0 – savvy and able to confront Nolan no longer as an innocent, but as a woman whose just discovered she’s been used as a plaything for a year. The confrontation is a solid girl power one (in terms of how she verbally berates him) but then it gets physical. Nolan is [insert bad language here, and here], but Priya’s also physically strong enough to stab him and kill him. And Topher made sure to also equip her with a direct 911 call to Topher, who comes in the midst of a murder, and he was only trying to help. Langdon comes in as Dr. Dissect and they cover up Nolan’s murder, making it look like he took an extended vacation without Sierra/Priya.

Priya chats up Topher that she left one nightmare to wake up in another, and that no matter what, when they’re done using her as a doll, she wants all her memories back except for that day with Nolan, when she killed him. She wants to make sure Topher can keep that secret. “I can keep it, but I don’t know if I can live with it,” he responds. “I know I can’t, but I don’t have to,” replies Priya, before going back to being Sierra.

Oh, and not to forget Echo – she’s been keeping a hidden diary with keywords and leaves, essentially a memory diary. When Langdon confronts her he realizes that at some point this Doll has learned how to lie…

This was a great episode, but I guess for the Powers that Be too long in coming. I can understand that. I’ve felt waves of elation and frustration as the show has been on, wanting more, expecting more, then getting more, only for it to be abated again, and then the cycle of want, expectation and delivery to go again. I hope that the series finale brings it all for a complete closure, if only to know that it ends with a satisfying bang.

About Sonia Aurora: Aspiring screenwriter and seamstress, Sonia’s dream is to write life-changing films while product-placing her own line of handbags. In 1999, she wrote, co-directed and co-starred in the short film Dr. Lovestrange, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bug, a satirical homage to Stanley Kubrick set amidst the panic of Y2K (Featured on ifilm.com & Coming Soon to YouTube!). While Sonia waits patiently for the Studios to call, she continues her selfless, humanitarian efforts (think Mother Teresa) through her scripts, short stories and sewing (a true triple-threat!), knowing all the while that someday her efforts will indeed save (or at least mildly tweak) the world. She still struggles with which picture to kiss before bedtime: her boyfriend’s or Bruce Campbell’s. And, in the interest of time, she’d like to start thanking the Academy now.