8 replies on “Dollhouse Shelved, Joss OutFOXed Yet Again”

  1. Fox and Whedon
    It’s the perfect S & M relationship.

    Come on Joss, wake up and smell the hubris!

  2. Uh … what are you talking about?
    I’ve read that post from Joss, and I didn’t see anything about the show being shelved — this post was in reference to the "shutdown" in production that happened a while back, where they stoped filming for two(?) weeks while he went back and rewrote and retooled some things.

    So where does "Dollhouse Shelved" come form?

    • Re: Uh … what are you talking about?

      So where does "Dollhouse Shelved" come form?

      "Shelved" may be a little strong, since there certainly the possibility Dollhouse may indeed air eventually, but it is without a doubt a troubled effort at this point. There have actually been TWO production stoppages so far on Dollhouse, which was supposed to take the Sarah Connor Chronicles Monday timeslot starting in early January. Instead, Sarah Connor Chronicles got a full season order for an additional nine eps that are going to air in Dollhouse’s originally planned timeslot. This was DESPITE disappointingly poor second season ratings so far for SCC, apparently meant to give Joss still more time to get his act together and please his Fox masters. With SCC going into March 2009 now at least, when we will actually get to see Dollhouse is anybody’s guess. DVD release, perhaps?

      • Re: Uh … what are you talking about?

        With SCC going into March 2009 now at least, when we will actually get to see Dollhouse is anybody’s guess. DVD release, perhaps?

        More then likely it will just be a different time slot. It’s not like there aren’t any other shows on FOX that might get canceled.

        io9’s take fro ma few days ago…
        http://io9.com/5068651/where-is-dollhouse

    • Re: Uh … what are you talking about?
      There’s another angle to this story that is hard to pin down but I think is very real. I think FOX tries to create young female stars and they use SF stories they could care less about to generate initial audience recognition with the choosen actress’s face in the SF fanboy crowd. Then the leading lady goes on to FOX movies.

      I think they did this with Jessica Alba in Dark Angel who is now a bona fide star, I think that Summer Glau is the hot FOX glam gal of the moment in SCC after her "discovery" in Firefly, and I believe that the only reason FOX has any interest at all in Dollhouse is as a vehicle to pump up Elizabeth Dushku further from their initial investment in her as the star of Tru Calling.

      Follow the money. For FOX, it is in cultivating beautiful babes in crappy cheap SF TV shows and then eventually flipping them into a big screen movie role, where the real cash is. A modern version of the old studio system.

      • Re: Uh … what are you talking about?

        Follow the money. For FOX, it is in cultivating beautiful babes in crappy cheap SF TV shows and then eventually flipping them into a big screen movie role, where the real cash is. A modern version of the old studio system.

        I don’t know if i buy this as a conscious effort … in the days of studio system actors were under contract to studios; in the present day an actress that FoxTV makes famous has no ties to 20th Century Fox — Glau and Dushku are more likely to be beholden to the casting directors and show runners that gave them their big break then they are to the network — particularly when the network kills off their show.

        I mean look at the story of how Dollhouse got started: it’ not like some random Fox exec called Dushku up and said "you owe us" … she had lunch with Whedon and it went from there.

        You’re far more likely to see people feeling an affinity to other people they’ve had a good experience working with then to parent corps of corps they’ve had a good experience with — if the network guy overseeing Firefly went on to produce feature films for 20th Centry Fox, and Glau thought he "got it" back when the show was being produced, then i can see something like that … but execs in the entertainment industry seem to move around from company to company all the time — they’re more interested in maintaining their own personal connections with talent then they are with trying to instill a sense of affinity to the company they happen to be working for at the time.

  3. not new news…
    Dollhouse production was shutdown last month, actually. Joss is just posting about it now. I thought I posted about the shutdown over at Sci-Fi Storm, but I couldn’t find the article.

    I believe it is still expected to have enough episodes in the can for a January debut, but that seems to be a tough schedule.

  4. Talk about misleading
    Wow, what kind of misleading title its that – it sounds like it was canceled.

    They want brain dead pop for the undead masses, he wants to make art – this is not new. He wants to make art in a pop medium, which requires a lot of negotiation back and forth – he knows this, and anyone else who pays attention should know that as well.

    Oh well, he’ll kill them all of anyway.

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