Good God! A TV Show…

Dollhouse

Since the brilliant and unexpected Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog each and every Whedon fan was looking forward to this one.

Starring unappreciated beauty Eliza Dushku and the whole 6’ 2½” of Tahmoh Penikett (Helo from Battlestar Galactica), the show revolves around the organization providing exquisite service — people ideal for the client’s job. Any job.

Tasks vary from a party girl spending the perfect weekend with young rich bachelor to hostage situation in Mexico but what makes the service really unique is that the corresponding personas are loaded into the dolls (people with erased memories who live in the Center).

Dushku is Echo, one of the dolls, and Penikett is Paul Ballard, an FBI agent obsessed with discovering and demystifying the Dollhouse.

The pilot was rather intense in the action department yet otherwise unimpressive. It definitely lacked something important. The following course of events seems to be quite predictable: Echo will be doing some crazy stuff while reminiscing things that happened to her in the past; her nasty she-boss with an accent will be ‘acting in the best interests of dolls’ as they put it; Ballard will be pursuing the Flying Dutchman of Dollhouse, and Ballard’s bosses will be pressing him to let go and drop the investigation; etc, etc.

Now, such a premise can be saved by some awesome characters. I felt that Penikett as Fed was doing his best compared to the others. Dushku as Echo was very convincing as a party girl but when she appeared in that ‘sexy librarian’ outfit, with glasses and pearl studs — well, it just didn’t click. I was as skeptical for her negotiation abilities as the guy she was working for, and it didn’t fade away.

All in all, I still have hopes for this show. We know that a miracle is required for this one to make it to full season, damn you, Fox. You brought back woman whose head was chopped off and put in a box in Prison Break, and yet we have to cross our fingers for Whedon’s child to drive further than its predecessors.

Lie to Me

This one had an ace up its sleeve — one Mr. Tim Roth. The premise was supposedly fun too: watching the character of aforementioned Mr. Roth casting light on the lies of others by studying their facial expressions.

Well, guess what: it didn’t work. Tim Roth alone just isn’t enough.

There are so many shows out there these days that center on the genius / unconventional / rather arguable approaches of some highly irritating / mildly eccentric / somewhat charming quirks and weirdos (House MD, Psych, Monk, The Mentalist to name but a few). The show so far hasn’t shown any depth. Yes, the bits about studying expressions are quite entertaining, like watching Discovery channel. The images of Jessica Simpson/former president/other infamous people caught with wildly exaggerated expressions being compared to some indigenous people are just cheesy.

The science team is as bland as the white office walls, basically walking and talking props. The challenges they have to face — not so challenging after all. The underlying conflict of the main character (there always is one) is hinted at so slightly it almost goes under the radar.

This show doesn’t deserve Tim Roth. Period.

The Beast

As much as I was biased, this one happened to be fun to watch. The story of experienced Federal agent Charles Barker (Patrick Swayze) who has his not always legit ways to serve justice and his rookie partner Ellis Dove (Travis Fimmel) working undercover is a collection of cliches but a nicely executed one.

Patrick looks rough and tough: smiles a crooked smile of a long-time cynic, laughs a throaty laugh of a frequent smoker and kicks ass. With a rocket launcher.

Travis (imdb tells me, a former Calvin Klein model) looks like an illegitimate child of Brad Pitt (circa Ocean’s [two-digits number]) and younger Ray Liotta. Also he looks constantly high, all sweaty and with runny eyes. Not so bad for a model.

Of course, some FBI bosses just cannot stand it when the work is getting done, so there’s an Internal Affairs investigation, digging dirt on Patrick’s character, and of course, the rookie partner is being torn apart by the hard choice of who his loyalty should belong to.

As you can see, the writers just opened the TV Show Writer’s Companion on the Police/FBI/Homeland Security chapter and went along in alphabetical order. But: 5 eps later I still find it entertaining, the action is there, and they have managed to cover Russian, Romanian and North Korean mobs already.

And Patrick did his best Romanian accent. See: it is fun.

United States of Tara

A Steven f*king Spielberg dark comedy about a woman coping with dissociative identity disorder, her other personalities emerging from the depths of her mind when she feels unable to handle the situation. The recently beloved Oscar-winning former stripper, creator of Juno, Cody Diablo is writing the script.

Fantastic Toni Collette plays all the identities of her character, Tara, including sexually obsessed redneck type guy, a slutty teenage girl, a Stepford wife and who knows how many others.

Tara has been on medication for a long time, but the side effects were too much, so she and her husband (John Corbett) decided it was time to go off the meds. The whole bunch of identities has reappeared and the family is not excited at all.

Long story short: despite the idea, Toni’s performance and big name in the credits, this show is definitely ‘painful to watch’ (c) Pajiba review. The family is not just dysfunctional, it’s screwed up BIG TIME. Otherwise bland husband wants to have sex with all the personalities except for his wife and Buck. The son is sex-obsessed and supposedly gay and still wets his bed at the age of 14 (spoiler: I’m not so sure about that after the ep #6). The daughter is so desperate she’s likely to have sex with any guy around (including her sleazy geeky boss at the local fast food place). Tara’s sister is more crazy than Tara herself (who was at least diagnosed and treated). It sucks to be them and it doesn’t make me feel better about my life. Call me a quitter, but the peeing episode has decided it for me.