The good news is that “Vows”, the premiere episode of Dollhouse’s second season is superior to the season one premiere, “Ghost”. Actually, the good news is that Dollhouse is back at all, particularly after a season that started low in the ratings and kept sinking lower. And it deserved those low ratings at first. Of the first five episodes, only “Gray Hour” really tried to do anything interesting with the series premise. The mythos of the show will say that “Man on the Street” changed all that, with Joss Whedon finally able to make the show he set out to make in the first place, with less interference from the network.

I don’t know how much freedom Whedon has now. On the one hand, the show’s not successful enough to give him carte blanche. On the other hand, it’s not like the ratings can get worse. Dollhouse was renewed specifically because Whedon has a comparably small but insanely devoted fanbase that will watch the show online and buy the DVDs when they’re released. You might as well try to satisfy them with good storytelling because you’re clearly not going to reach anyone else, especially in that awful Friday night timeslot. The last few episodes of the first season (including the heart-stopping, as-yet-unaired “Epitaph One”) showed the many interesting philosophical explorations the series could embark upon. I sat down to watch “Vows” hoping for some of that.

Unfortunately I found it kind of ho hum overall, but it did boast a wonderful Saunders vs. Topher storyline that kept me entertained and riveted. I maintain that the primary unexamined question of this whole interchangeable personalities technology is that it doesn’t address the difference between personality and consciousness. In the world of Dollhouse, you can change someone’s personality — their memories, emotions, desires — but it’s unclear what impact (if any) this has on their consciousness, that spark of life within the brain that makes a person aware. My assumption is that that personality can be copied, but consciousness cannot. This makes the final conversation between Saunders and Topher so interesting.

Saunders, after having spent most of the episode playing pranks on Topher, sneaks into his bedroom — apparently they both live in the Dollhouse — and tries to seduce him. Once this game is suspended, Topher explains that he imprinted her with faults and fears and such because he needed her to be a fully developed human being. And he answers the question she asked in last season’s “Omega”: “I made you fight for your beliefs. I didn’t make you hate me. You chose to.” This doesn’t provide comfort for Saunders, who still feels like a puppet, a phony creation. “How do I go through my day,” she says, “knowing that everything I think comes from something I can’t abide?”

Dr. Saunders has quickly become the most interesting character on the show. Her torment over knowing she is an active, but being powerless to do anything about it makes her the — early Battlestar Galactica spoiler alert! — Boomer of the series. And her frightened whimper when Topher asks why she doesn’t just track down her original identity and have it reprinted was especially heartbreaking: “Because I don’t want to die!” And yet if her original contract is honored, that’s exactly what should happen. However, if you’ve seen “Epitaph One” … well, you know. In any case, we had fantastic work from Amy Acker this week, and I hope she’s back next week in spite of the little automobile trip she took near the end of the episode — where did she get a car? Fran Kranz, much less twitchy than last season, also impressed.

The A-story didn’t do much for me though. Echo, in stark contrast to Saunders, is still the least interesting character on the show, even with all their attempts to make her “special”. Her sham marriage to this week’s creep of the week, an arms dealer played by Jamie Bamber (another BSG connection), was about as routine a Dollhouse stunt as any other engagement, with the exception that this one was long-term and that the client was knight-in-shining-armor Paul Ballard. Paul’s unresolved (and unexamined) feelings about Echo make for some nice character stuff on his end, but do nothing to make Echo more compelling. We do learn at the end of the episode that Echo has an almost complete grasp of what it means to be an active and that she remembers all of the personalities she’s ever been imprinted with. Paul, understanding what kind of power this gives her, agrees to DeWitt’s rather implausible request that he become Echo’s handler. But there’s an implicit conspiracy between the two in the scene where this relationship becomes official. They are finally, really working together.

But what is Paul up to anyway? Supposing his takedown of the arms dealer were enough to get him reinstated at the FBI. Then what? He provides inside information about the Dollhouse, which he can easily do because he has hired them? I think he still wants to expose and bring an end to the Dollhouse, but I’m intrigued to find out what we’ll learn about former Agent Ballard this season. Suffice it to say that he is not the pure of heart hero he once appeared to be. As for the weapons, I find something ironic about Ballard using the Dollhouse to help stop a weapons smuggler when the Dollhouse itself possesses the single most powerful weapon ever built.

I enjoyed Sierra recoiling at the sight of Ivy (“I’m not comfortable with Orientals.”), then suggesting a little S&M play. As for Boyd, I still think Harry Lennix is proving to be the weakest cast member. I’m tempted to cut him a little slack because he tends to get saddled with the most expository dialogue, but he also seems especially ill equipped to handle it. Where’s Anthony Stewart Head when you need him?

Speaking of former watchers, Alexis Denisof makes an introductory appearance in this episode as a crusading U.S. senator going after the Rossum Corporation. I trust we’ll be seeing more of him.

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

It wasn’t the gangbusters kind of season premiere I would have liked, but it wasn’t a dud either. And it’s clear the series is going to remain character-focused most of the time. I’ll leave you with these snappy last words from Topher and Saunders.

Topher: “You’re human.”
Saunders: “Don’t flatter yourself.”

When fans of Dollhouse mourn its inevitable cancellation this month, we will point to three episodes as evidence of what might have been. “Man on the Street” and “A Spy in the House of Love” will be two of them. “Briar Rose”, this week’s excellent entry and the penultimate episode of the season, will be the third.

I have been very, very careful to avoid being spoiled about which actor would be portraying Alpha, the former active who went crazy and started slicing up people’s faces. I knew it was a casting choice that excited people, so I guessed it was probably a Whedon alum. When I saw Alan Tudyk’s (Firefly) name in the opening credits for this week’s episode, I figured he was probably the guy. When they introduced him instead as a housebound, marijuana-growing expert in environmental systems, I began to wonder if maybe they decided not to credit the Alpha actor, and were going to have, say, James Marsters show up at the end. But as soon as Tudyk started gleefully shutting down all the Dollhouse security systems (after telling Ballard that he couldn’t), I knew my initial instincts were correct.

And by the way, what a performance! Tudyk was hilarious for most of the episode (and credit Jane Espenson for writing some wonderfully zany dialogue), but his transition for neurotic tech expert to stone cold psychopath was startling and entirely convincing. It makes me sad that we had to wait the entire season to get this character, and now … well, how much more of him will we get?

“Briar Rose” is full of solid performances. Special mention has to go to Enver Gjokaj (“Victor”) for his spot on impression of Reed Diamond’s boxed NSA agent Dominic. Even Topher seemed unusually subdued (for him) while explaining his idea to implant Echo with a grown up version of a troubled young girl in need of help. That storyline, by the way — Echo counseling the child prostitute — was both resonant and out of place. Yes, it ties neatly into Paul’s attempts to rescue Echo from the Dollhouse (and suggests that Echo may need to “think of herself as the prince”). But during those scenes, I felt like I was watching another show. I do hope we get some kind of resolution about the little girl though. There’s a good philosophical debate to be had about whether the DH can be a force for good as well as … well, maybe not “evil”, but certainly less morally defensible motives. If Echo’s grown-up disturbed girl can turn the actual disturbed girl’s life around — well, does that even the scales at all?

Ballard remains my main source of joy with this series, and his early kiss-off to poor Mellie was just so painful to watch. He makes a comment to Alpha early in their quest that, in effect, the dolls aren’t actually people. Shades of Battlestar Galactica there — not surprising, I suppose, considering Espenson wrote for that series and Tahmoh Pennikett was a regular. It gets a little meta-heavy, though, when Topher uses the word “frak”. Anyway, there’s no question that Mellie’s pain over the way Paul treats her is genuine — hell, she’s ready to fling herself off a bridge before her handler shows up and takes her back to the DH. Poor, Mellie. She really drew the short straw.

But how would Ballard have reacted if Mellie really had jumped off the bridge? Doll or not, that’s the permanent end of someone’s life (not accounting for the possibility of implanting her original personality in another body, which to me is nothing more than a photocopy), even if her emotional attachment to him can be chalked up to “programming”. But she’s not Caroline, and for some reason, she’s the only doll Ballard has any real interested in rescuing. Oh, he wants to bring the whole operation down, yes. But his single-minded purpose is to bring Caroline out of there, even though he really should have no reason to think that would be any less dangerous to him than rescuing Mellie would be.

We’re left with Boyd and Adelle debating whether or not they can put Ballard in the chair. Boyd rejects the idea on the grounds that Ballard hasn’t agreed to it. Adelle, who sent Dominic to the attic without a second thought, naturally disagrees. Which brings me back to a thought I had early on in the series: why don’t they just capture Ballard and write over his real personality with a nearly identical one that doesn’t have any interest in pursuing the Dollhouse? Isn’t that a more sensible solution than trying to kill him? Well, maybe that’s what they’re going to do.

Right now, though, the threat of Alpha — who has written a specific though heretofore unknown personality on Echo and left with her — seems more important. For the moment, Ballard and the Dollhouse have the same goal.

I can’t wait for the finale next week.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

“Carrots! I’m growing medicinal carrots. For a friend. They were here when I moved in!” Comment away, but please no spoilers for future episodes.