“The Target”
Written by Steven S. DeKnight Directed by Steven S. DeKnight The Story The new guy renting out Echo takes her for some white-water rafting and extreme backpacking, and then they go hunting! Wait, sorry, I mean as in he starts hunting her. Boyd can’t help at first because the satellite feed to her vitals is crappy, and then because the client hired a guy to take him out so he could really have fun on his hunt. He beats the guy and goes after Echo. He finds her in the woods after she drinks from a canteen the client drugged, which makes her hallucinate Echo’s and Caroline’s flashbacks. The client shoots Boyd in the side with one of his scary arrows, and Echo’s current personality decides to turn the tables on the client using Boyd’s guns. All of this is intercut with Ballard’s continuing investigation and flashbacks to the fiasco with Alpha and Boyd joining the Dollhouse and forming the doll/handler bond with Echo, which parallels their interactions in the present very nicely. Also, it turns out Alpha is the one who put the client up to all of this. After Topher wipes Echo of this personality, she makes the same gesture the client showed her. Whoops! This one is definitely better than “Ghost.” The man-hunter scenario might be a bit clichéd, but the bond between Echo and Boyd and all the intriguing hints about Alpha make up for it. I’m officially on team Echo+Boyd (except, you know, for the part of me that already knows how that turns out in S2). Things I Liked
Things I Didn’t
The Characters Topher is very proud of his work, and he’s very bad at dealing with being the cause of badness. He wants to be the smug architect of personalities, but he’s also responsible for Alpha existing. I love how gruff Boyd is. He’s so reluctant to care about any of this, but Echo pretty much makes that impossible. She might not be consciously aware of any of this, but she won’t accept a one-sided bond of trust and respect. It has to go both ways. It feels like we’re learning less about Adelle from her scenes and more about the Dollhouse. She’s its protector as well as the one selling clients on it. And she does believe that what the Dollhouse provides is important and good, which is why she’s so furious about this psycho client slipping past their background checks. Overall Rating 3.5/5
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The Watcher's Diary
In this blog, I'll be reviewing, analyzing, and generally fangirling over excellent television. Exhibit A: the Whedonverse. Archives
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