Remote mind wiping? How about remote mind-blowing? “Belle Chose” was easily the best episode of the second season of “Dollhouse” and among the top two or three of Season 1. Sure, a serial killer storyline might not be original, but the way it was handled was, and actually brought home the thorny issues “Dollhouse” plays with about identity, nature vs. nurture and whether we’re more than just a collection of memories. The opening scene alone was worth it — the trés creepy image of living mannequins, drops of sweat leaving tracks in their overly made-up faces, while Wally Cleaver with a mallet played his “games.”
Joe Sikora as Terry Karrens and Michael Hogan as his majorly in denial uncle, Bradley Kerrens, had small roles, but both left a big impact. Sikora spent most of his screen time unconscious, but when he was awake, he was very awake and very disturbing. (He reminded me of Corin Nemec as Harold in “The Stand” miniseries.) And I’m always happy to be reminded of Corin Nemec, my first, and longest lasting celebrity crush.)
Through both seasons of “Dollhouse,” there’s always a strong part of the episode (if there wasn’t, I wouldn’t keep watching) but there’s also a weak link, too. A lot of times it’s the mission that Echo is sent on, especially if it involves her playing some weirdo’s blank slate date. “Belle Chose” really didn’t have a weak link, except some awkwardly obvious dialogue from “Mom” victim when she talked to the other girls Terry had kidnapped: “We have names, remember that. We’re human, we’re not his toys.” Personally, I think better advice would have been: “Let’s find something pointy and try to get the hell out of here.”
Enver Gjokaj is awesome. He’s a really good mimic and more than equaled Sikora’s creepy factor as the newly-made Terry. I’ve been impressed with his ability to slip into different characters ever since he became Lawrence Dominic. It was also great to see Ballard in his element. Instead of following Echo around with puppy-dog eyes, he got to be big-bad FBI guy when he interrogated “Terry.” Adelle of course leaned in real close when he got to his speech about Terry surrounding himself with fakes and copies so he could feel powerful.
The comparison between the interrogation and Echo as Kiki learning about “Chauncey” from the Professor of Hormones (Arye Gross) wasn’t quite as powerful as it was maybe meant to be, but it showed how girl power can have two very divergent effects on men. Women in control made Terry homicidal and twitchy while it was a turn-on for Professor Gossen. (It reminded me of the lyrics to Soul Asylum’s “String of Pearls,” — “cause death was one thing, but women made him nervous.”)
Last season, Adelle defended the Dollhouse by pointing out that it could be used for good like maybe curing pedophiles. Here’s what “Belle Chose” brought up: we all see murders, pedophiles, rapists as evil. We believe they choose to do these things because they are evil and that while these people obviously are “sick,” that they can be held responsible for what they do because it’s a choice. On the other hand, we accept that alcoholics, serious gamblers and over-eaters are addicts, and that something in their make-up is responsible for their addictions. I’m not above that — I’m not ready to get all sympathetic with the rapists and murderers of the world. I want them punished as much as the next person, but it does raise a kind of scary question: what if it’s not their choice to do evil so much as they wear born that way? Brain chemistry.
The reason we can accept genetics as a contributing factor to addictions to gambling, alcohol, food, etc…is that although these addictions affect the people who love the addict, they don’t physically hurt anyone else. And we have concrete examples of addicts recovering from those addictions. What we don’t know is if anyone can recover from homicidal or sexually perverse urges. Echo ended her time as kind-of Terry by urging Terry’s victims to kill her, as him, because he’d “never stop.” She was recognizing that whatever sick desires were spurring Terry could never be cured.
I knew as soon as they proposed the remote mind wipe that somehow Echo would end up getting Terry’s personality. That made me nervous since Victor was doing such a good job of it, and I worried that Eliza Dushku’s version would be similar to her silly Southern murder sidekick to Alpha. But she was good. Nearly as menacing as the two earlier versions of Terry, plus it was crazy to see the reactions of Terry’s victims when the girl they thought would be their savior was just another version of him.
What I didn’t see coming was that Echo/Terry was going to stab the Professor. I assume he ended up living, but it would have been really something if she’d killed him. (And until Langton busted in, I thought she had.) Suddenly, the Dollhouse would have created a murderer. They could free Caroline when her contract is up, but they would have sullied her forever, even if she didn’t know it.
“Belle Chose” was just really well-balanced. Everyone got to play and they wisely didn’t focus too much on Echo’s mission. The episode was deliciously dark — dark the way you know Joss Whedon can do — but also had some of the funniest lines of any episode. Victor’s gender switch into Kiki was brilliant, especially when he ended up punching out the guy in the crowd (Andrew DiPalma, who I recognized since I just watched him in the highly disturbing “Deadgirl.”)
It was also interesting to see Terry become a girl. How does a murderer who has problems with women handle becoming a woman? Eh, he/she just keeps on killing. This was one of the most brutal of “Dollhouse” episodes with all the mallet whacking going on. And I liked how they also played with the question of can you turn the “good” people (in this case, the captive women) into the “bad” people if you push them far enough?
As much as I appreciate all the questions to ponder, it was just nice to have a really creepy, darkly funny and highly entertaining episode.
A few more thoughts:
– Best lines:
Boyd Langton: “Topher has ethical problems. Topher.”
Topher: “Victor’s loose, he doesn’t have GPS, and apparently he’s a serial killer.”
Ballard: “Terry Marion Karrens. Is there any part of that that’s not a girl’s name?”
– I hope Terry and Bradley Karrens come back. Or did Ballard pull the plug on Terry? The noise at the very end of the episode kind of sounded like flatlining. I also hope “Dollhouse” doesn’t take two steps back after this one.
– Echo has obviously been retaining some of her personalities for awhile now, but they’ve been mostly harmless personalities. What happens now that she’s got a homicidal one in the bunch?
– Imagine if this had been the first episode of “Dollhouse” (minus some of the later plot developments.) Hmmm….
– It was a nice use of the “goodness gracious” tagline to point out the Terry switch since it brought back Faith’s use of “five by five” when she jumped into Buffy’s body.
