I know that I said that certain previous episodes of Dollhouse were laying the foundation for “Epitaph One”, but this past Friday’s episode, “Meet Jane Doe”, added the framework on top of that foundation and, I dare say, started to add in the insulation and airducts for the finished project. While Echo had her own storyline this week, the real action went down inside the Dollhouse as revelations, betrayals, and oh my freakin’ God moments were in abundance and my head is still reeling!!!! To the recap!
The Set Up
Topher fills Ivy in on all the stuff that went down in Washington, D.C. and how Bennett has a less cooler office, he then declares that he will never trust another woman as long as he lives. Meanwhile, Boyd fills Adele in on Echo’s whereabouts which could be anywhere besides D.C., due to Echo probably hitchhiking. Adele wants Ballard and Echo back in her peripheral, even it means finding Echo dead somewhere.
But Echo is actually in a small town in Texas, where she is ravaging garbage cans for food. Sad image seeing Eliza Dushku looking for food.
Echo wanders into a grocery store where she is pushed out by the owner for almost eating an orange without paying for it. He mentions sarcastically that money grows on trees and Echo spots the ATM and begs for it to spit out money. HA! But she then notices a Latina woman being harassed by the cashier for trying to buy food with food stamps (which boggles me, because what damn grocery store refuses food stamps?). The woman is then asked to leave the store and Echo feels sorry for her. So Echo steals some crackers and makes a run for it. She finds the woman outside and hand her the goods. The Sheriff shows up with a deputy and the two run for it. Galena, the Latina woman, is captured by the Sheriff, whose name is Rand. The deputy on the other hand gets his ass handed to him by Echo after he pulls a gun on her, triggering Echo memorizing her fighting skills. After this beatdown, Echo realizes something and walks off.
Wonder Woman
Three months later…
Echo is now Jane, a nurse who works at the local hospital. She agrees to take over for another nurse to look after the local jail inmates. When Jane/Echo gets to the jail, Sheriff Rand asks if he knows her. Jane/Echo says no. She is then let into the jail’s infirmary, where she is reunited with Galena and the deputy she KO’d, who treats Galena like an inmate from Caged Heat. She
asks the deputy if he speaks any Spanish and he says no. Jane/Echo then proceeds to speak Spanish to Galena, telling her that everything will be OK and to remember that she was the one who got her the food that day. She then notices that Galena’s ribs are broken her and hasn’t been tended to. Jane/Echo then proceeds to question the deputy who play stupid to the bruise. She slick takes a picture of Galena and then gives Galena some pills and instructs her to take one a day before she eats.
Jane/Echo returns to her house (huh?) and notices that someone is there. He attacks and Echo flips the guy, who is none other than Ballard. He gives her some pointers on counterattacking someone and Echo simply says that “A girl likes to be chased every now and then.” HUH?!??!?!
Obviously these two have been in cahoots for awhile, but they are planning on busting Galena out of jail. Ballard asks Echo about how she accessed her personas, which Echo says came easy. But Echo wants to access muscle memory for the big bust the next day. She then tells Ballard that if they succeed in busting out Galena, then she is ready to go back inside the Dollhouse. Whoa!
Later over a candlelight dinner, Echo explains that she thinks that her ability to access her personas is due to Bennett’s toying with her with Bennett’s perception of Caroline, a perception that Echo didn’t like. When Ballard declares that Caroline has been resourceful from the start (she tracked him down and demanded that he not take her back to DeWitt) and that DeWitt is Caroline’s enemy, not Echo’s. But Echo declares she is NOT Caroline and that’s that. She declares that Ballard is her best friend, and he says that he wants to keep it that way. Echo doesn’t care. She wants some sex. But Ballard has manners and morals and doesn’t know who he would actually be doing the horizontal polka with. Echo declares that she is Echo and that she has ha everything under control. Then the two engage in a MONTAGE OF TRAINING!!!!
Back at the L.A. Dollhouse, Boyd is lighting into some guys ass about Echo’s whereabouts, but we find out that he actually talking to Ballard about bringing Echo back safe and sound…and ready. He also mentions that Echo is getting smarter, but that means that her brain is slowly deteriorating. When Echo asks who was Ballard talking to, he fills her in on Boyd saying that he’s ready when they are. WHAT WHAT WHAT!??!!??!
At the prison, Galena swallows her pill and while she is on her way to lunch, she collapses and has a seizure. The officers call in Sheriff Rand and Jane/Echo, who proceeds to give Galena instructions in Spanish on what’s about to go down. Echo then injects Galena with a drug to make her appear dead. Echo then calls a time of death, but actually sets her watch to when Galena will wake up. Sheriff Rand doesn’t need another dead inmate on his hands and wants Galena’s medical files so he can tamper with the end results and wants Jane/Echo to dump the body. The deputy takes his sweet time getting Echo and Galena out the buildind and Galena wakes up and scares the crap out of the deputy. Sheriff Rand realizes something is up and he puts both of the women in a holding room. While there, Echo has a sharp pain in the head that causes her to repeat herself and collapse. Then Echo comes to and pulls an Imprint to get them out of the room. The women are then cornered and Echo pulls another Imprint and takes both men down. They make it to the door, but Deputy “DER DER DER” comes and tries to take out Echo. She beats his ass and escapes with Galena. Echo takes out another guy and takes a motorcycle after pulling another Imprint. The two women drive off.
Sheriff Rand and another deputy are about to trail them, but Ballard pulls up and flashes his FBI badge. He then proceeds to tell Sheriff Rand that he has dirt on how the prisoners are being treated in his care and if he comes after the women, then everyone in law enforcement will know about it.
Back at their hideout, Echo and Ballard see Galena off, who will now be known as Lisa from the fake ID that Echo made for her. Then when Echo and Ballard are alone, he tells her that was a test run, which Echo responds with a hot searing kiss. Ballard stops her and Echo begs for it, but Ballard asks which person is he talking to. Ballard so totally sucks here, because it is Echo, you idiot! I still get his dilemma, but come on! Boyd shows up and takes the two “home”.
The Coldest On The Planet
There seems to be changes at the L.A. Dollhouse, one including that Harding (special guest star Keith Carradine) has either demoted Adele or just took over the L.A. Dollhouse altogether. He has Adele running errands and now he is asking her to set up an Arrangement for a sadistic wannabe Marquis de Sade. Adele vents to Boyd that they used to worry about the well being of their Actives and that they used to turn people away if they had the sadistic desires that the current client has. Boyd remarks that they always had put the Actives at risk and only lied to themselves about it. Upset, Adele comments that Boyd sounds like Harding and Boyd admonishes that he doesn’t know if Adele is whiny because she can’t take care of the Actives well-being or if she is whiny cause she no longer has any control. This hits Adele in the gut. I think I would go with Reason B, FTW!
Topher belittles Ivy again after they Imprint Sierra and Victor with personas of neurological scientists to help him with his latest invention. Adele drops by later for him to sign off on a new Arrangment and she wants to know what he is working on. Topher declares it top secret courtesy of Harding, who happens to show up. He plays with Adele like a puppy and we learn that Adele is a scientist as well to some extent. But Harding isn’t interested in Adele, but he has high hopes for Topher’s presentation that is coming up.
Adele later walks into a meeting with Ambrose, Harding and some Muslim men, who are going to oversee a new Dollhouse in Dubai, that might will replace the L.A. branch since Harding wants Adele to send their Dolls to the Dubai house. Later, Boyd declares that they need to take the house back, which Adele asks how. Boyd laments that the Adele he know wouldn’t ask that type of question.
Topher reveals to all the Dollhouse employees the new Remote Wipe, from his earlier design of the Disrupter, which would work from a 50 feet radius. Harding is pleased, but notices that Victor and Sierra are “grouping”. He tells Topher that it is common and that they deal with it by separating the Dolls by putting them in separate houses. No Vierra?!!?! The audacity!!!!!
Later Topher looks troubled as he brings Adele into his room/lair to reveal that he has tried to dumb down the tech he just revealed so that he can find out what the hell Rossum wanted to do with the tech after they got their hands on it. This is where the Epitaph One comes in…
Topher says that Harding has him working on one tech, while Bennett was working on another. With each house working on their own type of device to build a whole. The end result? A Remote Wiping Device that can wipe the minds of ANYONE, not just Actives. But the horrifying thing is that Topher found out how it can be done and made schematics that he has kept hidden. Adele tells him to make sure Harding never sees it.
But later Topher comes back to his room to find the schematics gone and he freaks out. Who took it? Ivy? A Doll? Harding?
Adele.
She gives the schematics to Harding, who thinks it was all to regain her stature in the L.A. Dollhouse. She says that she wants to be on the winning team and since Rossum has the upper hand, she wants in on it. Later, Topher asks what the hell was Adele’s problem for giving Rossum the most dangerous technology ever created. Adele turns it all on Topher saying that he was the one who built it and he was also interested in the tech as well. Topher declares that he trusted Adele, who says that was the dumbest move he ever made. Then Topher gives the line of the night to Adele, “You are the coldest on the planet!”
Adele then smacks the crap out of him and tells him that he is pretty much now her whine and that he better love it as a much as a crack fiend loves his/her pipe. So the face of the villain has been revealed and she is awesome! She declares that she runs the L.A. Dollhouse and no one will challenge her again.
Enter Echo, Ballard and Boyd.
Let the games begin…
Conclusion?
Boyd says that Ballard found Echo and was nursing her to health. Echo plays her role as a Doll and Ballard says she had headaches and needs to be treated. But Adele says to see how much more Echo can take and to put her in isolation. When the three men look at Adele as if she is Medusa its self, Adele remarks that they all know that Echo is special and that they need to see how far she can go. Adele then tells Echo that’s it’s good to have her back.
End of the first hour.
Is your nose bleeding yet? Or are you depressed that The End of the World is near? I am more on the latter…
Continue to read the recap for “A Love Supreme” here.
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