tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8151143541803928464.post7569950297800743237..comments2023-10-29T03:41:26.309-05:00Comments on ZachsMind: Stradivarius Stratocaster RevisitedZachsMindhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11736997572266455429noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8151143541803928464.post-37739428589739246992010-02-20T19:45:20.804-06:002010-02-20T19:45:20.804-06:00Very thought provoking response. I appreciate your...Very thought provoking response. I appreciate your slices of mind, don't get me wrong. It's a rare and precious thing when someone reads my rambling and takes the time to respond in kind. <br /><br />With that said, I can't repeatedly just blame the network every time this happens to Joss. It's very easy to just lay the blame on FOX repeatedly without more evidence. I like to believe Joss Whedon can do no wrong, but objectively the series had a rocky start and didn't really get its sea legs until halfway thru the first season and by then FOX realized it would never get a mainstream audience no matter what they did. Without an audience, there's no advertisers. <br /><br />Presuming FOX got Buyer's Remorse five minutes after they signed the contracts is idealistic but not sound. FOX couldn't keep their doors open if all they do is make bad business decisions. There's a method to their madness. It boils down to money, and FOX was unable to sell the Whedon/Dushku property properly. Whedon couldn't deliver what they needed to sell. <br /><br />That might have more to do with the underlying message Dollhouse was making than anything else. When you make corporate greed the bad guy (while not impossible) it's very difficult to sell that to greedy corporations. They prefer to think of themselves as the good guys. Don't ask me why.ZachsMindhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11736997572266455429noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8151143541803928464.post-7144399017504777202009-12-21T12:51:48.053-06:002009-12-21T12:51:48.053-06:00Another thing about the roles Eliza has had to por...Another thing about the roles Eliza has had to portray in comparison to the other cast members -- many of hers have been written similarly while most of Dichen Lachman's roles have been more stereotyped, over-the-top caricatures that are of course going to make her look like she has more range than Dushku. I believe Eliza to be far superior to Dichen, though not as good as Alan and Enver, it's just that Sierra gets to be British and a geek and ruthless assassin while Echo is playing people with less extreme personality traits who are more like every day people you'd meet on the street... or see as the main character in another TV show. You couldn't really write a whole TV series based on many of Sierra's personalities because they've been so left field, but Echo's have been more of the average person type you see as main characters on TV. <br /><br />One last thing -- I don't believe that the main character of a TV show can make or break it. There are plenty of successful TV shows on air right now where the main character is the least liked one. I watch a lot of TV and read a lot of forums and it seems to be a huge trend that the lead actress is hated upon. I've read countless boards bashing the lead actress's acting abilities along with much whining that the supporting cast is more interesting and they wished that the show had more about them. It almost seems like a rule on TV that the main character has to be the most bland one while the supporting characters are the ones who get to have all the risk. <br /><br />Why did Dollhouse fail? My money is more on Fox than any of the acting or the writing that went into the show that people found to be less than stellar. As revealed recently by Joss, Fox wanted to back out of Dollhouse five minutes after they bought the show. Fox pretty much did everything they could to insure that Dollhouse would debut to a tiny audience and they did nothing to keep that audience around. If anything, the only reason that Dollhouse got a season 2 at all was so Fox could get on Joss's good side so he could possibly develop other shows for them in the future that were less racy and controversial than Dollhouse was in its concepts. Fox wanted Dollhouse to die, and so it did. I just think that Fox were hoping that despite whether or not they were comfortable with it, that they could do nothing to support the show and maybe, just maybe, there'd be a miracle and millions would buy the DVD like they did Firefly and Dollhouse would become a modest hit without them spending a single cent extra on a show they stopped wanting to make the moment it sunk in that Dollhouse is a show about more than just Eliza Dushku being hot and kicking ass.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15325784105858532980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8151143541803928464.post-19086154932870017452009-12-21T12:51:16.353-06:002009-12-21T12:51:16.353-06:00I think you completely missed the whole point of E...I think you completely missed the whole point of Eliza Dushku portraying Echo in this essay. How many times do Joss and Eliza have to say that Echo was never supposed to be completely different in every persona she was imprinted with? The whole point of Echo was that there was a thruline running through her personas, that there was a sameness and that Echo was still Echo in spite of the imprints. Joss said something in an interview along the lines of, "You can't shut off the Eliza" even though he believes that Eliza is a versatile actress. He explained that it's the same for Echo. You can't shut off the Echo, even if there's a new person in her head. So in that respect, I think Eliza couldn't have been more perfect for the job. There is a little Eliza in everything she does, but she's also shown great versatility in the role. It wasn't required for her to disappear into it because Echo doesn't ever completely disappear. I think everyone who reviews the show and criticizes Eliza for not completely disappearing into the role is forgetting that facet of the show and the character. <br /><br />I've seen Eliza completely change her voice and mannerisms for certain roles in Dollhouse. Just look at Echo in Grey Hour when she gets wiped while in the safe. Eliza completely changed everything about herself in that scene. Same thing with blind Esther in True Believer, Rebecca Minor, the hillbilly chick in Briar Rose/Omega, the mommy in Instinct, and Kiki. Hell, the only times I think Eliza has been weak on the show have been in either badly written characters/episodes or when she had to portray nothing but passive confusion like in Echoes when she's Alice trying to remember. That was painful to watch, but I really can't blame Eliza. Her lines were painful even on paper and I can't really imagine any actor being able to make constant confusion engaging, interesting, or like a defined personality. Maybe Enver could or Meryl Streep because they are exceptional, but I don't know that most actors could. <br /><br />I do agree that Joss is too close to Eliza to properly criticize/direct her. There are some things that Eliza does that I think could easily be changed if someone just said, "Hey Eliza, every time you portray this emotion, you use this gesture." Just listen to the commentary in Ghost. Eliza is criticizing her Eleanor Penn, saying how difficult it was, while Joss is praising her to high heaven and thinks her Eleanor Penn is just perfect!Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15325784105858532980noreply@blogger.com