Dollhouse

Rejoicing ensued when word came that Joss Whedon—creator of the beloved Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly—was returning to network TV with Fox’s upcoming SF series Dollhouse, starring Buffy/Angel alumna Eliza Dushku (Faith).

But that was months ago. And in the wake of news about the show’s troubled development process, the buzz may be turning ugly.

"This may sound ridiculously nerdy, but I’m kinda scared to get all emotionally invested with another of Whedon’s shows after the cancellation of Firefly," one person posted on YouTube.com after Dollhouse’s trailer debuted there.

We are all big supporters of Whedon, too, but we have to worry ourselves, just like these others:

"In Joss we trust, but not Fox. Should we start the ’Save Dollhouse’ petitions now? :0)>"

"So true. Let’s hope Fox doesn’t mess this up!! There is a space on the market for a show like this. Alias, Dark Angel, BTVS, Bionic Woman ... all gone. My fingers are well and truly crossed."

One of the most anticipated shows of the season, Dollhouse has had one of the most troubled preproduction journeys of any show in recent history. Dollhouse follows a group of mind-wiped secret agents who have different personalities and skills implanted in their brains for each mission. Dushku plays "Echo," one of the dolls who is starting to become self-aware. Going by premise alone, the show should be Whedon gold. But the devil is in the details. Here are seven reasons to worry.

1. Pilot issues. Whedon filmed the pilot episode, "Echo." Then it was announced that "Echo" would now be the second episode, and a new first episode was being shot. Then the pilot was thrown out completely. This is disturbingly similar to what happened on Firefly, Whedon’s last network show, which Fox canceled abruptly in the middle of its first season. In the case of Firefly, the original two-hour pilot was bumped to later in the show, and a new one-hour segment was shot to introduce viewers to the complicated ’verse of the series. In the case of Dollhouse, Fox suits were reportedly concerned that the original pilot was too hard to follow. "Once it became clear what paradigm the network was shooting for, it just didn’t fit at all, even after I’d reshot more than half of it," Whedon posted on the site Whedonesque.com. How do you not know what the network is looking for? Didn’t they tell you?

2. Work stoppage. Production was actually halted. Twice. Once for script issues on the fourth episode, and once for the sixth and seventh. Whedon said in a blog, "To get a sense of how completely turned around I was during this process, you should know there was a scene with Eliza and the astonishing Ashley Johnson that I wrote and shot completely differently three different times, with different characters in different places (actually I wrote it closer to eight times), and none of it will ever see air." Really? The creator of the show had to reshoot something three times, and it still didn’t work?

3. Bad buzz. Fans started a "Save Dollhouse" campaign pretty early on, even before the show began production.

4. Bad dialogue. I watched the trailer, hoping for a laugh. Whedon is known for his snappy dialogue and witty lines. But not this time, at least not in the trailer. Where is the "Prince of Night, I summon you. Come fill me with your black, naughty evil." Or "Every well-bred petty crook knows that the small concealable weapons always go to the far left of the place setting." In the Dollhouse trailer, we get "Did I fall asleep? For a little while."

5. Friday night Death Slot. On Nov. 10, Fox announced that Dollhouse would debut on Friday nights (starting in February), following the ratings-challenged Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Friday night has traditionally meant cancellation for shows of the sci-fi persuasion, The X-Files being the lone exception. We’re talking Sliders, Dark Angel and the infamous Firefly. The term "Friday Night Death Slot" even has its own page on Wikipedia. I’m pretty sure Fox has seen it. Contrary to popular belief, TV watchers sometimes have dates on Friday nights: "Moving a brand-new show to a horrible time and night, and moving a highly rated, already established show to a great timeslot, is just insulting," one person posted on YouTube.

6. Cast/crew issues. Viewers loved Dushku as the kick-ass slayer Faith on Buffy and Angel. They loved her as Tru in Fox’s Tru Calling, which aired for two seasons. But hot as she is, Dushku’s buzz is taking a bit of an ugly turn. Some are calling her "tired-looking" in the trailer and saying she seems bored.

Time magazine, which recently reviewed the first episode, said that Dollhouse "is less a series concept than an actress’ showcase." Of Dushku, the magazine adds, "I thought she was fine on Buffy. But she’s not exactly Toni Collette. ... Watching her inhabit her imprinted ’personality’ [of] a tough negotiator with secret vulnerabilities, I did not see her becoming another person. I thought, ’Oh, look! There’s Eliza Dushku with glasses and her hair in a bun!"

As for other cast members, the show scrapped the character of November, played by the strangely named Miracle Laurie, who will instead play a different character. The entire character description of Dr. Claire, meanwhile, was altered so that Angel alumna Amy Acker could play her. It’s arguable that such alterations are par for the course, but added to the show’s other upheavals, they are troubling.

Behind the camera, the show lost former Buffy writer Steven DeKnight early on. The good news is that he was replaced with another Buffy alumna and favorite, Jane Espenson, who is currently writing Dark Horse’s Buffy comics and Battlestar Galactica.

The Time review wasn’t all bad. It said it was both better and worse than expected. But the draw seems to be Whedon, not the actors, which doesn’t exactly scream success. "If it weren’t for Whedon’s pedigree, I’m not sure I’d be dying to see a second episode. But for me, the main draw now is not seeing Dushku become a different person every week, but getting to see Joss Whedon become a different writer every week."

7. Lack of network support. The move to Friday, the constant requests for reworking, the low-ratings lead-in: All signal a lack of support on the part of Fox. Reports say the network spent all the money on sets instead of the pilot. Sure, I get the whole "It’s called Dollhouse, so let’s make a pretty one" thing. But it’s all going to be very expensive trash once the show passes its fourth episode and gets the ax. To add insult to injury, the show debuts on Friday the 13th this coming February. Coincidentally, that’s the day Angel was canceled.