[Review] Dollhouse 1.13: Epitaph One

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Writer: Maurissa Tancharoen, Jed Whedon, Joss Whedon
Director: David Solomon
Actors:Eliza Dushku, Tahmoh Penikett, Olivia Williams, Fran Kranz, Harry J. Lennix, Enver Gjokaj, Dichen Lachman, Amy Acker, Reed Diamond
Guest: Felicia Day, Chris William Martin, Janina Gavankar, Adair Tishler, Warren Sweeney, Zack Ward, Jordan Tartakow

The year is 2019, and the world is broken. A small band of survivors discovers an abandoned Dollhouse and as they explore they begin to understand the shadowy organization and to suspect that they may have been responsible for the current state of the world.

My Thoughts:

I'll start off by telling you that I'm usually a huge fan of post apocalyptic type scenario. Don't ask me why, I don't know. However, this episode really didn't do it for me. It felt kinda meh with just a couple of really good scenes that made it watchable.

We open the episode in some back-ally or something. I'd almost buy it, except peppering the conversation with faux slang just gets on my last nerve. A word here and there [see Pitch Black] is fantastic. Every other word seemingly see [see this episode] is just over-kill in my book. And, since tech is so dangerous, why was the guy on the other end just standing around with it waiting for her to radio in? Yes, I know, I over-think sometimes.

I'm going to say this right off hand, I don't like... any of these character really. I'm not attached to any of them, so I really don't care if they live or die in the story. Therefore, the story really loses some of its impact. Honestly, I was waiting for the head bland guy to trip his own trap and blow himself to smithereens. Unfortunately, he didn't.

Honestly, about the only thing I did like about this was the flashbacks and Whiskey. Therefore, that's what I'm going to mostly talk about.

The first flash back is Adele giving one of her hard sells to a client. Just a way to show what the Dollhouse was used for, or at least one of the things it was used for. Then we get to Topher's first day. And, right off he's clashing with Dominic. I like him better now, by the way. It was actually kind of heartbreaking to see how he'd cracked hard. Yeah, that was the scene that made the whole episode worth watching.

Oh, Ballard and Echo, really don't like them together. And that had to have been Echo, Caroline was always so damn annoying and would have been eaten alive real quick. Claire/Boyd, did love them together [did he know she was a doll?], as well as Sierra/Victor. Speaking of dolls, I love how it was a person wanting to live forever that started it all going [even more] to hell. And, in the hellish world, I actually like Dominic a lot.

Quick question: What the hell happened to November? I can only assume it wasn't Madeline, that it was a new November. Except, Sierra asked which one. Madeline? *sniff*

I'd like to know what happened to Whiskey to have her revert to the freaky blank slate that she was. And I'd love to know who that little girl was. As usual, children are freaky. Knew she would be trouble as soon as they showed up with a kid in tow. The ending, where she was supposed to be Caroline kinda fell flat for me.

Back to Whiskey. She rocked hard. I'm sad that she died, but I doubt she ever could have regained her mind.