Oh, that explains it. I haven't seen the very last minute or so; we had satellite issues.

It's very cheering to hear good things, finally, this week and last week. But, for fuck's sakes, it took us a long slog to get here!

Have normal, non-fannish people been making happy noises about the show? Have we any reason to think that the episodes of worldbuilding (or whatever the earlier episodes were supposed to be) have been a good thing for the audience?

The earlier episodes were all higher rated than the 'Fox let control of the series go to Joss' episodes.

I've kept a very close eye on the reaction on non-fandom sites. We've got past the point of people thinking Echo was a robot (which went on for several weeks) to people starting to like the show. Reaction is still totally mixed, though.

I started out defending the show here against the This-is-evil vibe. The more I watch of it, however, the more I think it's a bit of a fuck up in terms of messages. The show casually dresses up Echo as a slut, has her saved by a man (last week), has her prisoned by a woman (this week), has the kiddy actives getting rapped... mostly without discussing what's going on. It's beginning to really offend me. I thought they were going to go somewhere with it, but I suspect... not.

Frankly I found it totally skeevy that the "resolution" for Sierra's utterly traumatic rape issues is... to have another man be romantically interested in her. It gives me nasty flashbacks to fanfic where the rape survivor is healed by the magic penis of the fannish BSO.

I'm not sure I liked that episode much, actually. I mean, the writing was pretty good, but I don't know that we got much further with the arc, and I have decided that Caroline is really damned naive. She's got no sense of strategy. I want her to out-think her opponents, and instead she just kind of rushes into things. She's not Buffy.

Consuela, a man also punched rape boy, remember.

Caroline is a moron, which - yes - doesn't help. In terms of arc, we're back at the beginning. Victor didn't even stand and wait for Sierra at the end.

The glitching actives have all been reset, taking a huge step back, so here's my hope: Paul becomes relevant. Paul starts making giant leaps of progress and he becomes pertinent to the story and helps actually drive it. Rather than briefly showing up in a tacked-on scene after what I thought was the end of the show. (I'm not even going to mention that watch-from-the-hall opening bookend). Crap, just did.

Why did they have to put November is such a dull outfit compared to the other escaping actives?

She was a hottie in her pajamas, though. Rrrowr.

I can't actually think of a good use for Paul. He's no threat to the Dollhouse, let's face it. And he couldn't be the Dollhouse's new cook.

I found it totally skeevy that the "resolution" for Sierra's utterly traumatic rape issues is... to have another man be romantically interested in her

Her resolution was stated by Adele as being the confrontation. But then they had to keep her conscious for plot reasons until the kiss, and so they could all go out like a string of lights.

I have decided that Caroline is really damned naive

This was the closest to impressed with her that I've been. But she still nets out pretty low--lower than Paul. They're meant for each other. Her idea to walk the actives out into real life was completely moronic, but taking out the power and calling Paul both surprised me. I thought they were out of her demonstrated lead. I guess she did get the Rossum building blueprints, but that was all handwavey magic.

has her prisoned by a woman (this week)

This week? How about the whole series? What do you mean by this week? What am I forgetting?

ita, Claire. Claire gave them the idea of how to fix all the self awareness issues over the last few months.