Re: squick...

Yes, we haven't seen any of it, but this far away from broadcast, having both male and female Actives doesn't lessen the squick. For the time being, Eliza Dushku is the 'face' of the series, and the experience the audience expects her to have as a young female that can be programmed as whomever or whatever the highest bidder is willing to pay for, that experience is what people expect the show will be about. As the show gets closer to broadcast and the other cast members I assume get featured more heavily, that may change. But at the moment, as the highest profile actor/actress associated with the show, that will be the first thing will think of, simply because it is the easiest and most obvious.

What can change that? Probably not much, but having promo's feature Actives being other than arm ornaments, to show that these folks have uses beyond the obvious, and Actives that are not young/attractive probably will mitigate it. If the show concept is that these are people that can be programmed to do anything, that would mean that they are needs for Actives are not not young and attractive, and even if those characters are just in the background it would dispel the idea that this environment is merely a sex shop...

Of course, asking for any TV marketing dept not to focus on the "sexy" aspects of the show, such attractive leads and romantic entanglements, is probably an exercise in futility.

If I'm reading other folks right, it's that the squick is exponential for them to the point of not being watchable. Which I grok, there are things out there I can't watch/listen to. Right now, this isn't hitting my squick buttons.

Oh, hell yeah. There's stuff that might be brilliant art that hits my buttons and I can't go near. I won't cast aspersions on the quality of the stuff, but squicks can be powerful things, and is it really worth going up against all that for an hour's worth of TV?

Very big thanks for the try, Gris, but for whatever reason, I'm only getting the soundtrack.

it's that the squick is exponential for them to the point of not being watchable.

BINGBINGBINGBING

I mean, of course I get that this is supposed to be something squicky, and that the abusers are supposed to be bad guys. That's kinda the whole point. But after watching the trailer, I'm feeling less "I have some issues" and more "would like to take a bath now".

Also, if the show is trying to balance done-in-one episodes and an arc, I assume there is probably some in-show mechanism that limits the amount of time the characters can stay in any one ID. Otherwise, since the Actives cater to the rich, there are enough mega-rich out there that it would seem logical for one to simply buyout one of the Actives for months if not years at a time. But that would be boring fiction if a character went off to Dubai for six months putting the arc story into a holding pattern.

If there is an inherent limit to what any one Active could do, that would mitigate some of the squick, because then there are some mechanisms to safeguard them, rather than being completely at their client's mercy. Not much mitigation, but some...

there are enough mega-rich out there that it would seem logical for one to simply buyout one of the Actives for months if not years at a time.

I guess that depends on how expensive they are. They may be rare enough that only the mega-rich can afford to buy them for even short times.

Hrm...

A pilot is not wholly representative of a series, of course, but see how the first 'client' is portrayed, how he is dressed, the environments he is seen in and so on. I can buy that character is an Internet millionaire (hell, considering some of the character cues, I would even consider it likely) but a billionaire on the level of Gates? Probably not.

But this is off what, 90 seconds of footage that may not survive to broadcast? Who knows. (Well, some people know but that is not the point...)

It finally clicked this afternoon why the premise of the show was so familiar to me - the same thing happened to Molly in Neuromancer.

(The trailer is off YouTube but there are a bazillion copies out there already if you google "Dollhouse trailer." I found one here.)

Right now I can't tell what I think. The line that pings me the hardest is "It's cutting edge science in a house full of hot chicks!" It's one of those classic Jossy "I get a pass on this because I'm a feminist and it's therefore all ironic and shit, right?" lines that tends to make me wince.

And yeah, my take on the "they volunteered" aspect is that when you "volunteer" to have your memory wiped, it doesn't really matter what else it said on the contract at the time. You'd never know the difference. Is it not rape if you agreed to take the roofies?

I'm very happy to see Tahmoh Penikett playing one of the good guys. I don't think I could take evil Helo.

If there is an inherent limit to what any one Active could do, that would mitigate some of the squick

Not really, because it's the mind-wipey that bothers me, regardless of what the Actives are hired to do, or for how long.