Tim answers three questions from TimMinear.net

hah! I love Tim's strike idea.

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New Joss/Tim show! *bounce*

The first thing I thought of was Molly in Neuromancer.

I think a lot of people will see it as girl exploitation, but sadly, I don't think that will cause the show to fail. I think it's more likely to help it stay on the air, all the blank-brained horny young males tuning in to see what sexy situation Echo is in this week. Although I doubt most of the stories will be sex fantasies, that's actually kinda dull. (But at least one has to be, you know! They ought to do that one, like ,second, because everybody will be waiting for it, just to get it out of the way and to grab the attention of the aforementioned males that all the stupid advertisers want to woo.)

I think naming her Echo was deliberate. I think this is going to be a long metaphor of female awakening to awareness of exploitation and awareness of personal power. Such a metaphor can't be done without including the exploitation, so there will certainly be exploitation on the screen. The important thing will be what's done with it after it's introduced. God, I hope it lasts. I have no trust ini Fox at all to keep even that 7-episode committment.

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Fox? Ordering episodes of something then misscheduling and cancelling something after 6 episodes? That doesn't happen. Much.

Yeah, Whedon's all about his names, and Echo says it all.

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Hey, Hec, you've spoken for me! And more coherently than I can without more coffee!

Both. Though I'm fairly certain that Joss and Tim and Eliza combined will turn out interesting stories that are more than Maxim beat off material. However, I do think Joss has kind of a tin ear for how certain things will ping (Seeing Red, Dead Lesbian Cliches) and I think the immediate response to the show in the media will be to the iconography.

Right. And it'll be a tricky balance. I'm sure I'll probably watch, enjoy, and also want to throw things at the writers. Hell, I've got plenty of practice, what with comics and Supernatural.

And as much as it sounds like Echo's going to be discovering the joys of agency (it's like Ibsen! updated!), for me, starting from a baseline of Exploited Female for your central character is problematic.

This doesn't make it bad TV viewing, but it does give me pause.

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And as much as it sounds like Echo's going to be discovering the joys of agency (it's like Ibsen! updated!), for me, starting from a baseline of Exploited Female for your central character is problematic.

This, exactly.

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Problematic in what way? Or rather, from what level I suppose?

(I'm not being awkward - just curious)

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Particularly since he's created such strong women characters before, I think you'll see people feeling betrayed.

If people feel betrayed by the iconography of a television show... I don't think the creators should care. I dunno, I'm not really concerned about whether it's awarded the same number of feminist points that Buffy (somewhat inexplicably) got.

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sounds a lot like Molly's backstory in Neuromancer?

YES! Yes, that was exactly my thought.

Also: the name of the show screams exploitation. The Big Dollhouse is an exemplar of the women-in-prison movie and in the movie Walk on the Wild Side the Dollhouse is the whorehouse. There may be boy dolls but that isn't the implication of the title. Doll Squad wasn't about GI Joe.

True. However, I confess that my first thought was of Ibsen. Which isn't to say that everyone's first thought is going to be of Ibsen, but I think it likely that Whedon was as conscious of that resonance as he was of the pulp porn resonances, and probably enjoyed the juxtapostion. You're quite right that it's a very different paradigm from that of BtVS - but that hopefully doesn't mean it isn't about empowerment - rather that it's going to be about gradually gaining self knowledge and achieving said empowerment, as distinct from having it randomly thrust upon one.

I'm not expecting it to be any more exploitative than Alias, in actuality - and I confess that I thoroughly enjoyed Alias, for all its various flaws. (I'm not proud of being distracted by Sydney in a sexy outfit and sassy wig, but...I'm weak.)

What I'm wondering is how the audience is supposed to engage and give a damn about Eliza's character, since it sounds like the premise is that she doesn't have a character. That's going to be fun for Eliza as an actor, but it's going to be damn tricky to engage the audience's affections if your gateway character is returned to blank slate every episode and has her personality reset.

However, if anyone can make us give a damn, it's Joss. (...just in time for Tim to kill her!)

...also, I'm interested in finding out about the supporting characters. That's where it's at, for me - getting a good ensemble together. Eliza is a cracking actress (and I'm not just saying this because of how unspeakably hot she is. Although I'd be lying if I said that said hotness didn't colour my perspective somewhat) and I'm interested as all hell in seeing what she comes up with - but I'll be wanting an interesting ensemble too, insh'allah.

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I guess it remains to be seen if they start off from Exploited Female, or Exploited and female.

Joss has done some interesting things with female roles. I don't have enough information to be scared of anything yet.

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I think some of the ensemble detail is out on the interweb already, Fay - I'll dig.

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