Whedon: Dollhouse Not Canceled Yet
Monday April 20, 2009
Wash lives! Alan Tudyk (Firefly) guest stars May 1 as Stephen Kepler, the Dollhouse's agoraphobic designer, in the next-to-last regular episode of Dollhouse's first season.
© Carin Baer/FOX
"Obviously our numbers are pretty soft, and there it is, but we live in hope," Whedon told Sci-Fi Wire.
The numbers look pretty bad for both Dollhouse and its stablemate, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Neither the Whedon name, the Terminator brand, nor Fox's memorably camp promotions featuring saucy entendres from stars Summer Glau and Eliza Dushku did much to boost either series. Even the April 10 finale of Terminator ranked fourth in its time slot, getting a third of the viewers garnered by CBS's perennial winner Ghost Whisperer.
Dollhouse has been doing just as poorly, matching the ratings Whedon's previous series on Fox, the cult favorite Firefly, was getting just before it was axed in 2002 only 11 episodes into a 14-episode order.
Nonetheless, the producers of both series insist that nothing has been decided. Entertainment Weekly has already reported Terminator canceled, but Fox hasn't confirmed, and writer Ashley Edward Miller denied the report.
Whedon, meanwhile, stands behind his show. "I'm really proud of the episodes that are coming out," he said. "More than that, I can't really ask."
The Dollhouse episodes that are "coming out" include a 13th episode that wasn't part of the package set to air on the Fox network. Essentially, according to Whedon, Fox wanted 13 episodes of Dollhouse (to make the series more marketable overseas) but could only pay for 12. Whedon came up with a compromise.
He says he told Fox: "'I'll tell you what. I'll shoot a post-apocalyptic thriller that's all on our sets in six days with a cast of four other people, then we'll pepper it with different bits from our regular cast, and we can do it all during the schedule. It'll cost you half. I can do this.' And I was so in love with the idea that I just came up with off the top of my head, and that's what it turned into. It's one of the best episodes we've ever made."
The anomalous 13th episode features Felicia Day, who starred in Whedon's between-projects phenomenon Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. "It's the best script I've ever read," Day said. "When I read it, I was like, 'Are you sure you want me to do this?' Because I was kind of blown away by the role."
Matt Mitovich at TV Guide pointed out that key supporting actors for both series have already found other opportunities. Sarah Connor's Brian Austin Green will star with Gabrielle Union in the CW pilot Body Politic, and Dollhouse's Tahmoh Penikett and Laura Vandervoort (Smallville's Supergirl) will star in Sci Fi's latest take on Riverworld.
Comments
Dollhouse was never as good as it was expected. I think it’s because everyone thought it was going to be a show about programmable “spies” or similar, and it turned out to be a whorehouse, where your every fantasy can come true. Not a real turn on for many people outside the core Joss Whedon fans. Terminator, on the other hand, has gotten really great over the last 7-8 episodes. The direction they are going is very intriguing, and the characters are all very believable and likeable. I thought Fox would give this one the green light, especially with the highly anticipated new movie coming out this summer, which should surely increase viewership of the series for the fall premiere. But, if I have learned one thing over the years, Fox has no patience for any show that does not make a million dollars overnight, or does not have the name American Idol on it. They would play American Idol 7 days a week, if they could…
I sure hope the viewer rating monitoring has changed because so many of these shows are now watched on TIVO. I tivo all 3 of the aforementioned shows even on different networks and I watch them at my leisure and enjoy the “heck” out of them. So yeah maybe I didn’t watch TTSCC finale the night it aired but I sat back and enjoyed it immensely on another night. What does that say? How many 1000s of viewers are doing the same?
The opening episodes of Dollhouse were duds - who cares to follow a character that isn’t even a character but has her mind wiped at the end of each show? But the show did a real turn around at episode 6, broadening the focus to cover more residents of the ‘house and exploring some great sci-fi concepts. It will be a shame if the show gets canceled just when it’s gotten so very good.
The Nielson people insist there rating system is accurate, even though people Tivo, and watch online, and some still record these shows. The Nielson families, have been the death nail for a lot of quality shows. Besides, Friday is the second worst night to have a television program on. The reason Ghost Whisperer does well is because that is just the type of a Nielson family would watch on a Friday night. FOX assumed that a bunch of geeks would all be at home on a Friday night and would watch these two shows. I think the last several episodes of SCC were the best of the season, I have to agree with a few of the previous posters, Dollhouse is a show about a company that pimps about programmable people to a bunch of power elites. Considering all the human trafficking going on these days, I guess a show about the power elites having to take it up notch didn’t really catch on.
Nielsen tracks DVR usage as well. The industry is well aware that more and more people are “timeshifting” their shows. So you can’t blame DVRs for shows falsely being attributed with low ratings.