Episode 12 - Omega
28 September 2009
Synopsis: In flashback we see a self aware Alpha develop feelings for new doll Echo. He is jealous that Whisky is the most requested active and so cuts up her face. He struggles as his handler prepares to wipe him and accidentally has all his imprints forced into his brain. He then goes on a killing spree including the former male Dr Saunders.
Alpha has given Echo a personality which Whisky once had where they were Natural Born Killers-style lovers. They kidnap a salesgirl called Wendy and head to his lair. There he puts Caroline’s personality into Wendy and gives Echo all the imprints she has ever had. But instead of becoming Omega as he would want her too she attacks him disagreeing that this is an advanced state of being. He kills Wendy and throws the hard drive of Caroline’s personality on to a ledge so he can escape.
Adelle asks Ballard to help her and Boyd track down Alpha. Ballard asks who Alpha was before he became a doll. It turns out he was a convicted felon and he had cut the face of his surviving victim. He and Boyd track Alpha down and Ballard saves Caroline’s personality by catching the hard drive. He agrees to help track down Alpha in exchange for November’s freedom. Dr Saunders accesses her files and sees that Topher gave her the old doctors personality and programmed her to hate him.
The Good: Another polarising, complicated episode of Dollhouse. In that sense it was a fitting season finale.
The strongest story was Dr Saunders. She discovers that she is a doll and seems pretty resigned to that fact. She now understands why she had her face cut up and how she has been treated subsequently by her employers. She snaps at Victor seeing herself in his pitiful ignorant protestations that he is no longer his best. The confusion she must feel over who she is would be fascinating to explore. For now she seems happier making a positive contribution to the Dollhouse and serving out her contract. But she makes an interesting discovery, Topher programmed her to hate him. Topher looks pretty distraught about this, which even Echo can realise. One possible implication is that Topher didn’t want to end up developing feelings for a co-worker who wasn’t real. They were bound to work together all the time and it would be easy to imagine something developing out of their proximity. Again it seems to hint at a morality and professionalism about Topher which could make him a really likeable character.
Alpha is very strong in his role again, playing the psychopath with conviction and determination. Through flashbacks we see what we suspected all along, that you can’t entirely wipe away who someone was. We have seen the righteous, rebellious spirit of Caroline seep through Echo’s personality. Now we see the disturbed, would-be serial killer found its way through to Alpha. Now with his forty different identities he believes he is better than normal humans. But just like everyone he needs someone to share his life with. I didn’t have a problem with him “breaking character” from Bobby and allowing the voices in his head to interrupt him. It came across to me like he was desperate for Echo to see the real him and embrace this new state of being.
Paul Ballard ends up saving Caroline’s life when he catches the hard drive with her personality on. It was certainly a nice way for him to end the season, saving her but not in the way he would ever have imagined. As we have seen so little of Ballard’s personality in the season I found it easier to imagine him agreeing to work for the Dollhouse. He was treated with such contempt by the FBI and doesn’t appear to have many friends. Now he is being offered the chance to help these enslaved people and do some good. His decision to liberate November was a nice moment for him. He was trying to do something kind to someone who had been so kind to him. Clearly Echo understood that a deal had been made and she intended to see out her contract, she didn’t feel she needed saving anymore.
The flashbacks were an effective addition to the story and showed us once more the weaknesses in the system. That dolls can develop feelings for one another and that handlers too can let their attachments overrule their better judgement. I liked the way Echo didn’t understand being kissed and so just completely ignored it.
Dollhouse made a clear statement here that people have souls. That they have personalities which will always make them unique. It was an attempt at an uplifting message, a more fitting tone than the slavery, prostitution angle anyway.
The Bad: I think the biggest letdown was Alpha. Like so many television shows, we were given hints of something unique and gripping but what we got was generic. The idea of forty personalities being awake inside a man’s head leads to so many possibilities. The combination of knowledge, skills and awareness looked like it would create a super-human in every sense. Someone who couldn’t be beaten in a fight or an argument because they had too much knowledge to call upon. And of course what conclusion would such a creature draw about the human race, morality and their sense of self. In the end though Alpha was much more like all TV bad guys. He liked the sound of his own voice, he was obsessed with achieving unattainable goals and was undone by his own plan. In the end he put a gun to “someone’s” head, just like every desperate bad guy, it felt like a real let down.
Perhaps the core reason Dollhouse never took off was on display too as Echo becomes fully realised and yet still sounds and acts exactly like Caroline\Eliza Dushku\Faith being good. As is so often the case in TV shows, there was no time to let this traumatic event sink in. There was no time for Echo to deal with all the battling thoughts. Instead she immediately launched into a Buffy-esque speech which failed to inspire an emotional reaction. Her defence of individual personalities was a fine sentiment but the word generic springs to mind again. There was something about Caroline passively defending her contract with the Dollhouse which sounded odd too.
The whole deal with Paul Ballard and the Dollhouse felt incredibly contrived. Ballard goes from calling out Adelle on her slave house to agreeing to work for them in one episode. It was never going to sound convincing. We know that Ballard is looking to save his own life and perhaps one day bring down the entire network of Dollhouses, so you can understand his motivations. But it seems very foolish of Adelle to trust him to walk freely toward a huge police presence so soon after threatening to send him to the Attic.
Here’s an idea for Topher. Make ten backups of someone’s original personality and send them out to ten different safe houses. It looks too casual of such a serious operation to have only two copies lying around in the same office.
The Unknown: Why did Topher programme Whisky to hate him? Why didn’t she want to know who she was? What will Alpha do next? Is Ballard working to bring down the Dollhouse or has his stance softened? Why did Boyd come to work for the Dollhouse?
Best Moment: Topher looking miserable after we learn that he programmed Whisky to hate him.
Epilogue: I almost never argue that a show can’t be fixed. I believe if you change a show enough it can produce good television. I don’t believe that just because something isn’t working that the whole operation is doomed. But after a season of Dollhouse, I’m not sure this show could ever become something really good. Purely from my point of view the twelve episodes have felt exhausting. Constantly having to point out what doesn’t make sense and what doesn’t look well explained.
In the end the concept of the Dollhouse has so many moral implications that it became difficult to know how to feel as each engagement unfolded. And for an ensemble show I don’t feel like I got enough of a glimpse as to who these people really are to care about them. If a show doesn’t make that connection with its audience then I don’t believe it can survive.
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