Joss Whedon Rides Again! Dollhouse is a done deal.

Wow, no sooner did the comments come in here (on the Reaper v. Buffy post) than it is announced that Joss Whedon has a 7 episode buy for his new series Dollhouse starring none other than Eliza Dushku. Coincidence? Nope, this blog is powerful. The only downside is that the network is Fox, oh slayer of countless good shows. Still, they skipped buying a pilot and went straight to 7 episodes which is pretty awesome.

With every network vieing to make the next sf/f hit (heroes,reaper,bionic woman,moonlight,pushing daisies,journeyman,sarah connor chronicles,chuck,probably some others) it was odd that the man who has not yet failed at making an awesome tv series was not in the mix. Thank god some network exec finally figured it out and got him back in the game. The premise of the show is… odd.

The idea is those with the money or connections can access this secret highly illegal facility where they can basically fulfill their greatest fantasies. Most people assume that means sex—and on an occasion it does, because that is a lot of people’s fantasies—but it’s basically scenarios. They can basically reenact scenarios of romance, adventure or anything perfectly, because they become the person that you want them to be—they become that person. They don’t act like that person, they are not a robot pretending, they become that person, and then they forget all about it. The problem is the character of Echo, Eliza Dushku’s character, stops forgetting. She doesn’t completely remember, but she does realize she is a person, and that she might have been a person before she did this, and she doesn’t know what that is.

Huh. And Eliza says that she’s already gearing up for the show and prepping to “be a different Echo every week”. Sort of like an Island meets Hostel? Or something. I can not, in my mind, imagine what this show will be like and maybe that’s exciting.

From the TV Week interview:

TVWeek: “Buffy” fans are sure to be excited, too.

Whedon: If they could only see what’s in my head right now…. They should be.

Ok.. dammit, I’m excited. There’s no reason to believe that Whedon won’t make a great show - well, there is, if Fox screws around with it. But wait, what does he have to say about Fox?

It’s a brand new day over there. It’s a completely new bunch of people and they seem really intelligent and supportive. Walking back into the building was a little strange. But no. It was absolutely the last thing I saw coming, but absolutely the right thing to do. It’s like one of those movies where you keep waiting for somebody to fall in love with the hot girl. It was sort of meant to be. … I mean, a network is a network. They have an agenda and it is not yours. And that’s OK, as long as you work hard to make the agendas coincide.

Still, I maintain some skepticism but am hopeful that they’ll not meddle too deeply. With most of the sf/f fare currently on the networks not doing overly well in the ratings hopefully Joss will get at reasonable amount of freedom to do as he wants.

As for Joss’ other mythical project, Buffy spinoff “Ripper”…

There isn’t anything new. It might become too problematic. The rights issue with “Ripper” becomes complicated. There are other characters in the woods. We may have to do some fancy footwork. Obviously I’m committed to ["Dollhouse"], but that does not mean I’m not doing “Ripper.”

I’m not holding my breath. How long has this been being discussed, I don’t know but I feel like it’s time has come and gone.

Ah well, with the writers’ strike looming it could push a spring release of Dollhouse to a Fall one. Sad! But I guess, writers have been getting screwed enough and they need to figure out their digital rights pronto, so hopefully things work out for them - and quickly. Joss needs to get writing on this thing! I already can not wait.

Nov 1st, 2007 · Comments RSS · · · · · Tags: sci-fi · the love · tv