Safe in the "Land of Flowers"

The adventure began today! After many adventures in the tying up of any number of loose ends FryDaddy and I left North Carolina for the humid sunshine of St. Augustine. Sort of like home, but with Spanish moss. The Slayage 4 conference officially begins tomorrow, but we wanted a day to nose around America's oldest city, so we arrived today. I don't know that we'll find Ponce de Leon's famed Fountain of Youth, but we've already discovered a killer gelato shop and there's an old Spanish fort to climb around on tomorrow before the conference kicks off.

You can see a bit of St. Augustine's history by clicking on this link. Who knows, we might even visit the alligator farm. (Does that mean they farm the alligators or that the alligators are pulling the plows or something else entirely? Hmmm.) Flagler College is our host and you can learn more about them by clicking this link. That's the main building in the picture at the top of the post. It began life as a grand hotel, then became Flagler College in 1968.

We've already run into a number of Whedonians who also arrived early for the conference. From the looks of things, this is going to be a very good time! Papers are due to be presented that range in topic from exploring the character of Cordelia to examining the role played by music in Whedon's shows to the theme of neurological tampering. The challenge here is deciding what you feel like you MUST see, since so many interesting papers are scheduled opposite each other.

Tough choices must be made. That's another lesson the Whedonverses teach us.

The Fourth Time's the Charm!

Much has happened since I last posted upon the final episode of Dollhouse. Notably, Whedon was tapped to direct the film version of The Avengers (the Iron Man one, not the Emma Peel one. I adore Robert Downey, Jr., but I don't want to see him in a leather catsuit), which has fans buzzing about what he'll do with a big-budget movie. The casting is not yet complete, but I'll admit the possibilities are tantalizing.

Also, Slayage 4 draws near. In about ten days, I'll be leaving for the fourth biennial conference on the Whedonverses. I'm delivering one of the keynote speeches at this one - I'm the Sunday one, if you look at the draft schedule. It's an opportunity that has me both thrilled and a little cowed. The writing of the speech is going all right (I think) but there's still some work to do there and summer school starts next week, so I'm likely to be quite busy. But I love this conference! I've gone to the last three - missed the first one, drat! - and the energy of the participants is palpable. Such a wide range of subjects and approaches! Details on the conference have hit the local paper and I imagine there will be more press coverage; let's see if they paint us as whackos or as scholars (of course, "whacko scholar" is an option as well.)

More on that as it draws closer and I'll be posting from the conference itself.

The other big news is that I won't be going to this conference (held in St. Augustine, FL) alone. Long story, so let's just say that Adventuress has embarked on her most exciting adventure ever - I found someone whose quirks and oddities dovetailed nicely with my own and we married at the beginning of May! (Yay, throw rice, blow noisemakers!) There were no bridesmaids in apple-green taffeta as Anya wanted in "Hell's Bells" and it was quite a lovely (and very small) ceremony. St. Augustine will be somewhat of a delayed honeymoon for us.

And yes, he'll be presenting at the conference as well. Obsessions should be shared, I always think!

Broken Dolls & Empty Chairs

The run of Dollhouse has concluded. Props and costumes are being auctioned off and the imprinting chair will never be used again. I stayed spoiler-free, but I've since read some of the reactions from critics and fans alike and I have to say that I fall firmly on the side of the "meh" crowd. I wasn't impressed, and that hurts to write. I've been so pro-Whedon for so long now that it's an onerous chore to be one of the ones saying that this one didn't work, it never felt like a labor of love, and no, it's not Fox's fault. Yes, it was a terrible time slot, but something has to go there. (And it's worth pointing out that The X-Files did just dandy in that slot way back when.)

I don't want to nitpick over minutiae and there's no need to. There were major problems here. The dialogue was clunky, the plot line felt rushed, and there were holes in the plot you could have driven that truck-taken-from-Mad Max through. (I actually have a theory that most of "Epitaph Two" had its origin in one too many late-night writing sessions fueled by cheap red wine and post-apocalypse movies.) Tech has ruined the world, unleashed Reaver-style madness upon the earth, yet the roads are clear? And ex-Dolls have volunteered to have yet more tech implanted into their very skin? Sure. I'll buy Adelle as the Earth Mother growing strawberries first. Oh, wait - that was in there.

Really, this just wasn't very good. I say it's Whedon abandoning his tried-and-true approach of "don't give them what they want, give them what they need." I didn't want this (nor for that matter, did I need this.) Further, I may be alone in thinking the Echo/Paul mindmeld was just beyond Hallmark schmaltz; plenty of other viewers put it as the Best. Ending. Ever., right up there with Angel's "Not Fade Away."

I, on the other hand, do not.

The problem, I think, started back with "Epitaph One," which I had problems with at the get-go. Once that existed, it either had to be regarded as canon, or it was off the cliff into "it was just a dream" land. So how do we get there? Well . . . not too well. Gamma radiation? A shiny-clean Dollhouse run by nice-guy Alpha? Character traits on thumb drives?

Sigh.

All that said, I'll still be at the front of the line to watch whatever comes next. Even the shiniest of brilliant minds misfire from time to time and I won't be a fair-weather fan.

But I'll remember this. Unlike a Doll, my mind can't be wiped.

One to Go!

Dollhouse airs its final episode next week. This is a one-week delay, as the episode was pushed back a week due to the charity concert to raise desperately-needed funds for the Haitian earthquake relief effort, which aired last night. Far be it from me to complain about a television show being re-scheduled due to such a worthy cause, but I find it terribly interesting that the concert, which is a nigh-unprecedented coming together of people and technology, should so scramble the plans to broadcast the final episode of a show which takes as one of its main themes the potential for technology to wreck human lives.

I'm caught up on my viewing and note-taking and I have to say: Hmmm. Plenty of good going on and twists and flips worthy of an Olympic platform-diving competition, but I'm still not totally sold. Which is a shame, since I wanted to buy.

The show's connection to the play R.U.R. has been acknowledged in a quick little meta-nod and I'm glad I found that connection beforehand (see earlier posts from the fall of 2009). Further, I'm looking forward to writing in more detail about the connections and inverses (inverci?) between the original source material and what Whedon has done with it.

But.

I very much enjoyed playing detective with some of the literary references - Melville's adage of the horrible body count of "From hell's dark heart, I stab at thee" is evident in "Getting Closer" (then again, Star Trek 2 as well as The Simpsons have referenced that one) and Whedon twists Eliot around so Rossum certainly ends with a bang, not a whimper in "Hollow Man" - but I still think it's just too little, too late. The show wanted to wrestle with some of the Big Questions such as the role of memory in creating identity, human trafficking (I so wanted an episode in which a Doll rescued modern-day slaves and then toddled back to the House for a "treatment," which I think would have pointed up that particular theme, but maybe it would have been heavy-handed. Now I'll probably never know.), the use and misuse of technology, pure science vs. weaponized ideas (Topher as Robert Oppenheimer, the mastermind scientist behind the Manhattan Project who upon seeing the results of the Trinity test, referenced himself as Vishnu in a very blood-chilling way), and many more besides. I suspect the problem lies in Whedon not really knowing how to create a balanced meal from such a buffet. Too many refined carbs and too much chicken-fried steak; not enough veggie medley. And don't get me started on the dessert section! "Epitaph One" lingers over the final episodes; something I warned about way back when as it seems to box in where you can go.

Let's see what the final episode brings us and yes, I'll miss Dollhouse when it's gone. But I think it's time to move on to another project. And some breakout stars have been added to the Whedon family, Enver Gjokaj (Victor/Anthony/occasionally Topher) chief among them.

The House Is Closed

It was a good run and a valiant effort. I "hmmed" a good bit when the news came out no episodes of Dollhouse would air in November - it's sweeps time, after all and that's when all-important advertising rates are set. But now it's official - Dollhouse will finish its run (the finale will most likely air in late January) but it's gone to the scrap heap of canceled shows.

Whedon has assured fans that we'll know about his next project by the time the final episode airs and we'll see what direction he'll be going in.

Many fans are understandably upset about this, but no one is particularly surprised. Friday night is the "death slot" for network television and Dollhouse never attained stellar ratings. As I've posted here, I found the show to have flashes of nigh-brilliance, but also some anvil-heavy storylines, characterizations, and direction.

Back in 2003, Whedon said in the New York Times interview that his "favorite fictions . . . are about the getting of strength and that's probably the most important theme in any of my work" and Dollhouse wanted very much to be going in that direction. Alas, the path through the woods has been barred by a Fox, but I can't much blame the Fox for acting according to his nature.

Maybe this frees Whedon up a little - they're in the process of filming Episode 11, meaning there are still two to film - plenty of time to jazz things up, especially now that there's no worry about Pleasing the Network Masters. Amazing how freeing that can be. Let's go out with a bang - or at least a loudly slamming door.

Then again, I've always been a sucker for the idea of toys (Dolls, if you will) becoming real - a concept Whedon must have a liking for as well, considering his writing credit for Toy Story and certainly one he's been working with here. So let's end with this from the classic for children of all ages, Margery Williams' The Velveteen Rabbit:

The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else. For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it.

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

"I suppose you are real?" said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive.

But the Skin Horse only smiled.