Dollhouse: ‘Echoes’ (S01E07)

Following the incredible series turning point episode (“Man on the Street”) was ‘Echoes’, an important display that Dollhouse can (and should) be an ensemble-driven series and not the Eliza Dushku show.

In this episode we see a lot of the past and different sides of each character… most importantly why Echo/Caroline came to be at the Dollhouse.  Caroline attended Freema University and afterwards expressed a movement to exploit the most powerful drug company in the world, Rossum Corporation, for animal testing.  Her plan was to break into the building and videotape the mistreatment of animals at the labs, then showcase the video to millions online.  Unfortunately, this plan caused Caroline’s boyfriend, Leo, his life.

There’s no doubt that the Rossum Corporation is evil, but there’s a mystery surrounding it that I’m curious about.  There’s certainly a link between the Dollhouse and Rossum… but exactly what is the link?  Is the Dollhouse just a research program for Rossum, or maybe Rossum’s sole purpose is to supply Dollhouse with the technology and drugs it needs?  Is there an even greater corporation over-seeing both?

Anyway, a problem rises at the Rossum Building.  There is a drug within the lab that makes people trip and lose control of their own decision making.  A student kills himself when he takes a large dose of the drug, which creates a panic for the corporation when a vial is reported missing.  The Rossum Co-Chair comes to Ms. Dewitt and tells her he needs an army of Actives to find the missing vial and to find an anecdote to the drug’s reaction.  The Actives are necessary because they’re believed to be unaffected since their minds are different from regular people’s.

So all the Actives are sent to the Rossum Building to begin their investigation and quarantine of those already infected.  All except for Echo, who is already imprinted and carrying out her new personality as a sex slave… until she sees a breaking news report on television about the problem at the Rossum Building that triggers flashbacks.  She’s unsure about what the flashbacks mean, but she acts on impulse saying she has to go there to save “him.”

The episode takes a hilarious spin-around when the drug begins to affect everyone.  We see a silly side of Ms. Dewitt and, well Topher’s always a goof-ball so there wasn’t much a difference with him.  Also, Langton and Dominic become affected.  Then against what Topher hypothesized about Actives being unaffected by the drug, the drug hit them as well… but with a different effect.  Each Active had flashbacks of their past, just more evidence that the ‘wipes’ aren’t as effective as they should be.

Topher, somehow remaining in control during the trip (which might have something to do with him being a heroin addict in his past) discovers that the drug’s effect will eventually wear off since everyone has a relatively small dosage… which means that the kid who killed himself was overdosed involuntarily, or in other words he was murdered.  Meanwhile, Echo/Alice meets Sam who wants to avenge his dead friend by collecting evidence against Rossum to bring them down.  With the help of Echo’s flashbacks they both sneak into the lab where Sam turns against Echo by drugging her more and revealing his real intent: to sell the vial to another drug company for billions to help his mother’s financial problems.

Like always, Langton comes to save the day by knocking out Sam after a foot-chase from Echo.  We then see Ms. Dewitt talking to Sam in the interrogation room we’re familiar with seeing Caroline in before becoming an Active.  The deal is that Sam signs himself to the Dollhouse for five years and in return his mother will escape her money issues.  This won’t be the last time we see Sam in the series.

Oh, and what about the whole Agent Ballard situation?  Well, it wasn’t really touched on too much… all that happened was Mellie was recalled by the Dollhouse.  It seemed that her mission was to take Ballard’s mind off of the Dollhouse.  He’s been removed from the FBI and has endangered Mellie’s life, but that still doesn’t stop his passion to keep digging.  Since Mellie has failed, she’s back at the Dollhouse.

This episode gave us a lot of insight about Echo/Caroline’s past, which was vague before and now is much clearer.  Also, the episode sort of put the skeptics straight that Topher or Ms. Dewitt could be Actives, since their reaction to the drug wasn’t the glitches the Actives experienced.  I still want the Alpha mystery to surface soon.  To me, that’s when Dollhouse will hit it’s absolute peak in storytelling.  But these last two episodes, breaking free from Fox’s shambles, brings out the importance of every single character and the role each of them have.  This is the correct direction to take the series.  We know Echo is the central character that everyone is after, but seeing her as a catalyst for a bigger issue will only transcend Dollhouse.  I’m just beginning to wonder if there is a larger and bigger storyline to carry this series onto multiple seasons.  Let’s just keep watching what Joss throws at us.

Cinematical: ‘Scenes We Love’

Cinematical has this series of posts where they pinpoint scenes in movie history they love.  Their most recent post was from a movie I absolutely love:  Before Sunset.

http://www.cinematical.com/2009/03/27/scenes-we-love-before-sunset/

The most goes through a lot of the feelings I have for the movie.  This is my favorite romantic-genre film of all-time (Sorry Titanic and The Notebook).  The dialogue is second to none and the chemistry between Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke explodes off the screen.

For those who have seen it, I’m sure you’re aching as much as I am for a third part.  I need closure from the characters.  I need to know what happened in the next five minutes after the fade to black!  I think I’m going to go read the screenplay now…

Box Office Results: Monsters/Aliens rule the movie universe

Studio Estimates for March 27-29:

1.  Monsters vs. Aliens – $58.2 million
2.  The Haunting in Connecticut – $23 million
3.  Knowing – $14.7 million
4.  I Love You, Man – $12.6 million
5.  Duplicity – $7.6 million

7.  12 Rounds – $5.3 million

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Like no surprise, Monsters vs. Aliens won the box office this weekend with an impressive $58.2 million.  The steeper 3D tickets surely played a part with its gross, but this family film plus good reviews is always an equation that equals success.

The newly released horror film, The Haunting in Connecticut, took the runner-up spot with $23 million… more than any of us predicted.  I, for one, was surprised by how many people keep going to see these teen horrors.  It’s an endless parade of supernatural, ghost stories or slasher films that are cheap to produce and easy to attract the teen demographic.  Heck, kids still like to get scared.

Last weekend’s three releases remained in the Top 5 for a second straight week, which means the John Cena action film, 12 Rounds, failed to impress and only made $5.3 million (good enough for the #7 spot).

As for our predictions, we did pretty well.  Everyone, aside from Phil, guessed the films in the Top 5.  Chris ate his predictions by not giving Monsters vs. Aliens the respect it deserved.  Sheehan’s predictions were only off by $23 million while mine were only off by $21 million.  So I think overall, the Predictions Panel did a fairly good job this weekend.

Check back on Friday for our new predictions.  There are 2 films coming out:  Greg Mottola’s follow up from his super-hit (Superbad) with the John Hughes-esque Adventureland… and the return of Vin Deisel to the Fast and the Furious franchise.

The Weekly Top 5

1.  The Twilight DVD flies off the shelves.  Released on Saturday (3/21), over 3 million copies were sold, good enough for cracking the Top 5 best first day DVD releases over the past two years alongside with The Dark Knight, Transformers, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

2.  Lost “He’s Our You” (S05E10) was arguably the best episode of this season.  Back to flashbacks to develop Sayid’s past and his killer instinct, the episode concludes with a stunning intention that Sayid has already regretted.

3.  The cast of the Three Stooges remake: Jim Carrey, Sean Penn, and Benicio del Toro.  Are more people stoked for this, or are more people scratching their heads at the casting?  Me… I’m scratching with interest.

4.  Friday Night Lights is back for TWO more seasons! After AOL TV listed this as the 10th best TV Drama of all-time… I finally have faith that shows with low ratings can still survive with acclaim alone.

5.  I Love You, Man > Role Models. There’s really no reason for me to compare the two besides them both being non-Apatow R-rated comedies, they both have Paul Rudd, and I watched both this week.  Okay, maybe they are somewhat comparable.

Lost Reaction: He’s Our You (S05E10)

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This is classic Lost at its best! This episode reminded me what the flashbacks are supposed to be about. What’s that you ask? Character development. When we get to see into the past and the choices the characters have made in their lives, it opens up new doors to who we thought they were. Sayid has always been one of the more dynamic characters on the show and in “He’s Our You” we got to see him at many points through his life. We get to see him as a child who kills a chicken without hesitation, we got to see him as a killer with no goal while working for Ben, then as a man who’s given up on life and just works building houses, then finally we get to see a real interesting side of Sayid…a vulnerable side. This is when he gets taken advantage of and captured by a bounty hunter.

The whole episode is about a man, who throughout the whole show has really been in control of everything around him, loosing that control. He has to play into destiny. His destiny to be on the island. So in the current time we see Sayid captured and has to play along so as not to blow the cover on what Sawyer’s got going on. Some interesting stuff happens but let’s jump to the main point…the end…the shooting of little Ben Linus.

I did not see that coming! I should have, but I didn’t. Moving along, it sucks that we all know that little Ben isn’t dead. You may be asking yourself, how do we know this? Well we know it because we see Ben all grown up, and the laws of time travel say no matter what you do in the past you can not change the future, because what ever you do/or don’t do, you’ve already done or not done. Get it?  Sayid doesn’t know this, but this action makes complete sense in the evolution of Ben because Ben trusts no one. Ben trusted Sayid and got shot, lesson learned. It will be interesting to see what happens to Sayid and how little Ben survives. Tune in next week to see!

– Sheehan

Box Office Predictions (March 27-29)

Just like last weekend, there are three new releases… we have a cop-action film, a horror, and an animated 3-D kids movie.  Already we have a winner.

Monsters vs. Aliens is the title for Dreamworks’ new animated feature.  Its first 3D film boasts a nice cast of voices that include Reese Witherspoon, Seth Rogen, Hugh Laurie, and Stephen Colbert.  The idea of monsters against aliens seems highly entertaining, just like if they would ever make a pirates vs. ninjas movie (come on, who wouldn’t see that?).  Anyway, playing in over 4,000 theaters and the higher cost for the 3D effect, expect Monsters vs. Aliens to easily win the box office.

Next we have 12 Rounds starring WWE professional wrestler John Cena.  I don’t know about you but whenever I see a wrestler in a movie (unless it’s Dwayne Johnson… see I don’t even call him ‘The Rock’ anymore) I cannot imagine the movie being good.  Cena’s last film, The Marine, did open to $7 million, which is pretty decent.  But I don’t have much expectations for 12 Rounds to have a major impact this weekend.

Finally, the horror… The Haunting in Connecticut.  From the studio of horror, Lionsgate, is this PG-13 frightfest that will probably do pretty well in the box office since it’s a teen horror movie.  There have been so many horror films already in the first three months of this year, and for the most part they’ve done quite well.  Will The Haunting in Connecticut keep the horror streak alive?

Here are our predictions:

My Predictions:

1.  Monsters vs. Aliens – $53 million
2.  Knowing – $13 million
3.  The Haunting in Connecticut – $12 million
4.  I Love You, Man – $11 million
5.  Duplicity – $7 million

Chris’ Predictions:

1.  Knowing – $18 million
2.  Monsters vs. Aliens – $16 million
3.  I Love You, Man – $15 million
4.  The Haunting in Connecticut – $12 million
5.  Duplicity – $8 million

Phil’s Predictions:

1.  Monsters vs. Aliens – $40 million
2.  The Haunting in Connecticut – $20 million
3.  12 Pounds – $13 million
4.  I Love You, Man – $10 million
5.  Knowing – $8 million

Sheehan’s Predictions:

1.  Monsters vs. Aliens – $50 million
2.  I Love You, Man – $15 million
3.  The Haunting in Connecticut – $14 million
4.  Knowing – $12 million
5.  Duplicity – $9 million

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Let me be a reminder that Chris makes his predictions without doing any research or having much knowledge of the upcoming movies.  He’s the member of the Predictions Panel that tries to prove that guessing the box office isn’t exactly something you can prepare for.  That being said, he’s the only one who doesn’t think Monsters vs. Aliens will top the box office.  In my opinion, he’s going to be way off with his $16 estimated gross.  The rest of us has the Dreamworks animated feature wiping out the competition… our range is $40-$53 million.

Phil’s the only one who believes that Cena’s 12 Pounds will crack the Top 5 while the rest of us have Duplicity filling up the #5 spot.  Our most consistent predicted film is I Love You, Man… with a range from $10-$15 million.  While last weekend’s champion, Knowing, is all over the map with our predictions. 

Let’s see how our predictions hold up.  Check back Monday for the results.

Review: I Love You, Man

I Love You, Man (2009)
106 minutes
Rated – R
Directed by John Hamburg
Starring:  Paul Rudd, Jason Segel, Rashida Jones

Grade:  A-

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Meet Paul Rudd.  He is comedy’s equivalent to a wing-man as much as Barney is in ‘How I Met Your Mother’ (the reference is perfectly fitting and not obscure since Jason Segel stars in the CBS sitcom).  He was a part of Will Ferrell’s news team in Anchorman, offered his clingy and sensitive side to Steve Carell in The 40 Year Old Virgin, showed Seth Rogen what it’s like to be married in Knocked Up, and alongside Seann William Scott he mentored kids in Role Models.  In all of these roles, he graciously took a back seat and fulfilled the part of the supporting cast.  Now, Paul Rudd finally has the chance to star in an R-rated comedy.  Needless to say, he nailed it.

I Love You, Man is (I’m sorry but I just have to say it) a bromantic comedy – a romantic comedy but between two guys – starring Paul Rudd and Jason Segel with a wide range of TV actors for its supporting cast.  The premise is simple and silly enough to carry the film without anything feeling forced or out of place.  Peter (Rudd) is engaged to Zooey (played by the beautiful Rashida Jones).  While talking and planning out their ceremony, it became apparent that Zooey had a surplus of friends for brides maid while Peter had… well no friends (at least none that were guys).  So Peter now desperately embarks on a number of man-dates to find a best man for the wedding.

Of the men he attempts to befriend: Barry (Jon Favreau), Doug (Thomas Lennon of Reno 911!), Mel Stein (Murray Gershenz), and Lonnie (Joe Lo Truglio)… none of them work out (in hilarious fashion).  So Peter practically gives up and continues with his job as a real estate agent in Los Angeles trying to sell Lou Ferrigno’s (that’s right, the Hulk) mansion.

Finally, he meets Sydney Fife at an open house and his world changes.  Heck, if I ever met a person like Sydney Fife my world would change too.  Sydney a kind of guy who lives every day like it’s his last.  He doesn’t have many responsibilities and just goes wherever his feet take him.  He’s also brutally honest and open, yet has enough testosterone to fill his entire garage with, literally.

The whole brilliance of this movie is the relationship between Peter and Sydney.  I think there are more guys on Peter’s side than most would like to admit, or even show.  Sure, most guys have their group of guy friends who go hiking and play poker and drink at bars… but how many friends do guys have that extends even further than that?  This is what Sydney teaches to Peter: the guidelines between best friends, the do’s and don’ts and the rights and wrongs in a relationship, what should remain confidential and what should be confronted, etc.  Sydney brings out all the masculinity that has been hibernating inside of Peter all of his life.  For Peter, it’s liberating to cut back and just yell his lungs dry.

Like traditional romantic comedies, Peter and Sydney hit a rough patch to suspend their fantasy perfect match.  Though there are hardly any spoilers in romantic comedies, I won’t continue the plot synopsis because there were a few minor surprises along the way.

I Love You, Man is a laugh out loud affair.  I didn’t expect any less from the duo of Paul Rudd and Jason Segel.  I suspect that many of their scenes together were ad-libbed and only mildly scripted, which was the right choice.  This is a stronger buddy film than Pineapple Express and a funnier film than Forgetting Sarah Marshall.  Heck, this is the best Judd Apatow film that wasn’t produced by Judd Apatow.  I was having such a good time during this film, I simply didn’t want it to end.  And that’s saying a lot.

Dollhouse: ‘Man on the Street’ (S01E06)

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So was the episode as good as all the hype that led up to it?  In my opinion, hell yes it was!  This was the episode that Joss Whedon said was what his vision of the series should be… while the first five were what Fox wanted.  Give Whedon his creative freedom and he will produce.  Immediately there was a different tone to the episode.  It didn’t follow the formula where we followed Echo’s new personality, in fact she was a minor character to the bigger picture in “Man on the Street.”

I really enjoyed the documentary feel of the townsfolk’s reaction to the myth of the Dollhouse.  It not only threw in a lot of different perspectives, but it also showed how the public really has no idea what the Dollhouse is capable of.

Agent Ballard had the leading role in the episode.  He first followed a lead to a dot-com billionaire (Patton Oswalt) where he expects there to be some Dollhouse interaction.  Well, he’s right and who’s the Active who meets Oswalt?  None other than Echo.  The look on Ballard’s face when he finally is speaking with Caroline is spectacular.  Of course, Caroline is Echo and Echo’s imprinted personality is Rebecca… so Ballard got no where speaking to her.

Anyway, within seconds Ballard took out four body guards while Langton extracted Echo from the scene to safety.  So Ballard was left with Oswalt and they shared their life stories to each other.  Oswalt actually had a very tragic, touching way of using the Dollhouse repeatedly every year on the same day.  He spoke about his wife who supported him through the years he struggled with video games.  Finally when he got a big break with “Bouncy the Rat” he bought a big house to surprise his wife.  On the way to meet him at the new house, she was struck by a truck and was killed.  So Oswalt could only imagine what joy she would’ve felt when he told her the news.  Instead of only imagining, he pays for the Dollhouse to send his wife in the form of one of their Actives so he could live the happiness he never experienced.  This was truly the first really moving story of the series.

Their conversation continues with Oswalt commenting on Ballard’s obsession and love for Caroline.  Ballard doesn’t deny it, and neither should you.  This creates quite an interesting thought/conflict in the series.  Brad Trechak from TV Squad suspects Ballard to be Alpha, which kind of makes sense if he’s in love with her.  Since Alpha went nuts, spared Echo, and is now supposedly roaming the world… it could very well be Ballard, right?

Anyway, there’s some funny business going on in the Dollhouse.  Sierra has been crying at night and freaks out when Victor touches her softly.  It’s discovered that Sierra has been raped and Langton is immediately on the job, which results with him punching Sierra’s handler through a glass screen.

Now in Ms. Dewitt’s office, it’s revealed that she has cameras watching Ballard’s apartment.  Ballard has become quite close with his neighbor now and has quite uncharacteristically told her everything about his project of bringing down the Dollhouse.  The mean Dewitt then plans to send Sierra’s handler to kill the neighbor, Mellie, and to have Echo revisit Ballard to do some damage.

Well, Echo and Ballard have a totally awesome fight scene, which ends with Echo telling him that someone inside the Dollhouse altered a message to her imprint.  She tells him that they’ll be in touch through Echo’s body, but he needs to back off the investigation in order so the people in the Dollhouse won’t watch him so closely.  Echo takes Ballard’s hand and shoots a cop and tells him that Mellie’s in danger.  Inside the apartment, Sierra’s handler is attacking a helpless Mellie.  The phone rings and the machine picks up… instead of it being Ballard, it’s Ms. Dewitt who says a code phrase that turns Mellie into a kick ass fighting machine who kills the handler.  And then Dewitt says another code phrase which turns Mellie back to Ballard’s girlfriend.  Crazy!

Oh, and the episode concludes with Echo, as Rebecca, meeting Oswalt outside of the house.  He tells her the good news to his wife and she explodes with happiness.  It was quite emotional.

So this episode definitely moved the series foward.  We learned that Ballard is being watched closely by Ms. Dewitt and that there’s someone inside the Dollhouse doing some double crossing.  Who can it be?  My guess is that it’s Topher’s assistant who would have the knowledge and access to change the imprint when Topher was distracted with Langton.  Does that mean that Langton is somehow involved as well?  It’s very possible.  Langton is the moral one in the show.

Anyway, I hope Dollhouse continues this forward motion through to the next episode.  Screw Fox’s limitations… let Joss free!

Box Office Results: Knowing thrills audiences to the top

Studio Estimates for March 20-22:

1.  Knowing – $24.8 million
2.  I Love You, Man – $18 million
3.  Duplicity – $14.4 million
4.  Race to Witch Mountain – $13 million
5.  Watchmen – $6.7 million

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Despite fairly negative reviews for the Nic Cage thriller, Knowing rose to the ocassion and won the weekend’s box office with almost $25 million.  The bromantic comedy that many felt had a chance of taking the top spot, I Love You Man, came in second with $18 million.  And the last new release this weekend, Duplicity, came in third with $14.4 million.

Rounding out the Top 5 was Race to Witch Mountain and Watchmen, who has now grossed a total of $98 million in three weeks.

As for our predictions, I was the lone predictor to say Knowing would take the top spot.  The Panel did mediocre with the guesses this weekend.  We’ll try to do better next time around.  Check back on Friday when three new releases hit the screens:  12 Rounds, The Haunting in Connecticut, and Monsters vs. Aliens.

Lost Reaction: “Namaste” (S05E09)

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I needed to sit on this episode for a little bit. I’m just not quite sure what to make of it.

What I do know?  It was awesome!  I love that we didn’t have to wait more than three episodes to find out what happened to Frank and his plane full of people. But them landing on the other island is interesting.  What will they find on their island?  Well we know they find Christian and he’s in a Dharma place with pictures of all the years’ inductees into the initiative. WTF?  I am baffled by this.  I think Christian is alive and has been since the plane crash just like what happened with Locke, but how is he always in the right place at the right time to confuse the shit out of me.

Meanwhile, where the hell is Faraday? Did he get zapped into another time/dimension? Or did he die? Or did he just leave the island? I’d like to think that he is (somehow) Jacob, and that he has transformed into this invisible being that likes to rock in his chair and move cabins around on the island… just kidding.

So next week looks like it’ll be an interesting episode.  I imagine that Sayid gets loose and has to continue pretending he’s a hostile/other.  It should be fun to see what happens.

- Sheehan