Dollhouse: Gray Hour - Echo becomes a thief and loses herself on the same day.

POSTED BY: Haken
UPDATED: Thursday, March 12, 2009 19:18
VIEWED: 11220
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THESOMNAMBULIST

Monday, March 9, 2009 1:57 AM

Originally posted by PhoenixRose:

Quote:
However, seeing as how the Dollhouse is obviously tracking Ballard, and would presumably know what Alpha looks like, I find it a little far-fetched. Their ultimate goal when it comes to Alpha seems to be to take him out. He's dangerous, to them and in general.

Well what if Alpha and his escape into the real world so to speak, is an experiment to see how a blank active (tabula Rasa) would cope. Remember Topher noted how Echo, Sierra and Victor grouped together... Perhaps this is what Alpha/Ballard is instinctively doing by trying to locate the Dollhouse.

Now how he came to be an agent and 'look' different is part of his evolving on the outside. The fact that the Dollhouse are reluctant to get rid of Ballard would suggest they have some kind of vested interest in what he does, and just how he goes about it. So keeping him under observation is just part of the procedure. For now.

Remember the call DeWitt received when she was with the client. She was nervous. The bosses above her clearly have an agenda, a more sinister agenda...

Maybe :D

PHOENIXROSE

Monday, March 9, 2009 2:12 AM

I'm sorry, that holds no water. While you're right that DeWitt was nervous, I think it was for entirely different reasons than you're speculating. Alpha isn't a tabula rasa, that's been well established. He's a "composite event" who injured or slaughtered several tabula rasa actives and employees of the Dollhouse, including Echo's previous handler, the previous Siera, and Doctor Saunders, and he fled. He was reported assassinated by the higher-ups in an effort to keep panic down. Topher fears him; he's afraid like a little girl. Alpha and the composite event in general are, I believe, the ultimate plot of the show.

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BYTEMITE

Monday, March 9, 2009 2:25 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by TheSomnambulist:
A very enjoyable episode.

Can I just ask, and forgive me for not reading everyones posts, but is anyone of the similar mind to me that Alpha is the FBI agent? Would that make sense?

I noticed in the previous episode how; he wiped out his attackers with extraordinary force - and I'd have to go back and watch it again- but did he not hold a similar stance over his defeated attackers in the basement to that of Alpha as Alpha did overlooking Echo back at the Dollhouse? And with blood on his hands...?

It may explain why he knows about the Dollhouse and no-one else does. Seeing that residual memories do remain in an active, it would clarify why he knows Caroline/Echo is a Doll.

Anyways - I liked this one alot and Eliza was excellent when doing the heist, right back to her Faith mode, and the drawing in the steam was a touch of genius!

As someone said earlier - Dollhouse I'll now watch on it's own merits, not necessarily because it's a Joss show.

Actually, yeah. o.0 That brief look at Alpha screwing around in that apartment and preparing the file to put on Ballard's desk, I noticed they look kind of alike from the back (same hair colour, similar haircut at least). I just couldn't figure out how that could possibly work. Some sort of fractured personality thing? Like in Fight Club? With the Alpha personality leaving clues for Ballard? It'd sure fit the theme of the show...

PHOENIXROSE

Monday, March 9, 2009 2:37 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
Some sort of fractured personality thing?

Said that, didn't I?
Still makes no sense to me, as i said, but I guess we'll see.

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BYTEMITE

Monday, March 9, 2009 3:51 AM

Sorry, sometimes as I'm reading a thread, I respond to a comment before I read the comments that follow it. :)

THESOMNAMBULIST

Monday, March 9, 2009 9:24 AM

Originally posted by PhoenixRose:

Quote:
I'm sorry, that holds no water. While you're right that DeWitt was nervous, I think it was for entirely different reasons than you're speculating. Alpha isn't a tabula rasa, that's been well established. He's a "composite event" who injured or slaughtered several tabula rasa actives and employees of the Dollhouse, including Echo's previous handler, the previous Siera, and Doctor Saunders, and he fled. He was reported assassinated by the higher-ups in an effort to keep panic down. Topher fears him; he's afraid like a little girl. Alpha and the composite event in general are, I believe, the ultimate plot of the show.

Hey Phoenix.

While I conceed that I'm reaching here I still feel there are enough plot 'gaps' if you will to arrange the facts in such a way as to make Alpha Ballard. The split personality thing is one such device (although I hope they don't go that route). I'm not saying I'm absolutely right - but the information that he's a composite isn't necessarily enough to dispute that Ballard is Alpha. Granted it's unlikely - but within the reality of the show I'm not ruling it out.

There's something not quite right about Ballard - he seems detatched from things somehow and the fact that he seems disengaged from his neighbours advances suggests something to me....

Anyway time will tell hey.

ASARIAN

Monday, March 9, 2009 9:56 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by TheSomnambulist:
[BThe fact that the Dollhouse are reluctant to get rid of Ballard would suggest they have some kind of vested interest in what he does, and just how he goes about it. So keeping him under observation is just part of the procedure. For now.

Killing Ballard would be a pretty brain-dead thing to do, IMHO. Unless you wanna get pinched... which is what happens when you kill a Fed. :) Instead you wanna trip him up, constantly make him look foolish to his superiors. Or, best of all, do it the "1984" way: actually GIVE him something to go on (like the 'Alliance' did in 1984 with the fake Resistance book); not enough to really go somewhere with it, but enough to keep him thinking he's getting somewhere. I think Victor is fulfulling the latter role.

--
"Mei-mei, everything I have is right here." -- Simon Tam

HELL'S KITTEN

Monday, March 9, 2009 1:54 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by ecgordon:
I wasn't that impressed with tonight's ep.

Did I hear DeWitt correctly when she told the prospective client that only the client knows all the details of the engagement? If that is what she said then it makes no sense. How would they know how to imprint the active for that engagement?

I normally try to stay away from these sorts of discussions, but, yeah... that didn't make much sense to me, either:

"I can't tell you the details, but we need someone who's unflappable in a tight situation, who can think on the fly, and who can organize a team to break into an incredibly high security vault and get out in one piece...... oh...... and here's a drawing of a piece of the Parthenon for reference..... but... um... yeah, that has *nothing* to do with the engagement." ((innocent whistling))

A few other things that bothered me:

1. Why would anyone spend hundreds of thousands - if not millions - of dollars on an engagement for a midwife? A midwife. Seriously? Midwives still exist and operate today, ya know.... The idea that someone filthy rich would rather deal with the Dollhouse for this sort of common activity is just absurd.

2. Echo's imprint was "wiped" over the phone using the squealing noise of a 54k modem. Niiiice. Sure, the "technology" they use hasn't been explained (yeah, yeah, it's not real), but to insinuate that nothing more than a series of tones and frequencies will cancel out the "real" imprint...? Weak plot device.

3. The Greek government is aware of the existance of the Dollhouse, but the US government is not. Ooookay.........

I guess those are minor complaints, but they do add up show after show. That being said, I'm still going to watch it. Unfortunately, I think that speaks more to my obstinance than it does to the quality of the show.

MALACHITE

Monday, March 9, 2009 2:14 PM

Overall, there was a lot good about this episode. I really did not find Echo and impaled art guy's escape remotely possible, though, and that ruined this episode for me. It felt like the writers put Echo in an impossible situation and waved a magic wand for her to be able to get out of it. It could be that I didn't get it. As far as I can tell, Echo escaped by running past several guards under the cover of a smoke grenade and then making her way through some passage that extends around the vault and back to the original hole they blew in the wall. How is this possible? All of the guards were at the entrance. How are both Echo and the impaled guy going to get by them? If the guards were blinded by smoke, wouldn't Echo be, too? I wonder if the writer's knew this escape was incredibly implausible, and that's why they didn't bother even trying to film anything for it -- instead just leaving it to our imagination.

Can someone explain the escape to me?

ECGORDON

Monday, March 9, 2009 2:42 PM

The only way the Ballard-as-Alpha theory could hold water is if several of his scenes were only in his imagination and/or he has multiple personalities and/or he has had plastic surgery. In the first episode he was in the FBI offices and interacted with several other agents. Plus, DeWitt and Dominic both know Alpha and also know what Ballard looks like. Since Echo was already an active at the time Alpha went psycho it cannot have been that long ago, no time for him to have become an FBI agent, that is unless he was already an agent before he was abducted by the Dollhouse and turned into Alpha.

Sorry, just not working for me.

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