Dollhouse Is Weird, Rich, and Risky

Joss Whedon likes to mash up unexpected genres, so after creating teen soap-meets-vampire noir Buffy, it's hardly surprising that new show Dollhouse is a provacative sci-fi procedural "bubbling with Philip K. Dickish mind games." It's too bad it probably won't last, writes Emily Nussbaum in New York, because it has the potential to be rich and intriguing.

"It’s not simply a procedural, but several procedurals, nested like Russian dolls," writes Nussbaum: The eponymous organization reprograms girls into fantasy-fulfilling dolls; a hunky FBI agent tries to hunt it down, and star Eliza Dushku, a doll named Echo, starts uncovering memories from past assignments. It's the complex themes that redeem the show, writes Nussbaum, but "I have my doubts whether network TV can truly embrace weird." (More Joss Whedon stories.)