'Dollhouse' Alexis Denisof, Miracle Laurie have opposing views of dolls

Last season, 'Dollhouse' caught a fair amount of fire for the encounters most often being about sex, turning the actives into technologically advanced prostitutes.

It was a charge that I was never entirely comfortable with, since the actives were programed to believe the fantasy of the client and therefore, honestly love them. Which is frankly, a lot worse. Well, tonight, Dollhouse took it one step further, past the bonds of romantic love and into the fundamental and animalistic instincts of motherhood. Did it hit the right note (which should be a dreadfully creepy one)?

Well, it starts out with Ballard confronting the chair and even taking a seat. There is a great exchange between him and Topher, as Topher tries to explain a bit about the process (and his own genius). It produces the best line of the night when he analogizes "The human mind is like Van Halen; if you pull out one piece and keep replacing it, it degenerates". The genius bit, however, has more to do with how he programed the mind to override the body. The slow pull back on Echo breast feeding a newborn in the next scene is appropriately creepy, as we realize she's been programed to believe she is a mother. And to lactate.

The father is clearly uncomfortable around Echo as Emily as well as the baby. Luckily, Emily has a good friend - Sierra as Kelly. While I appreciate Sierra getting some screen time, the biggest thing the scene accomplishes is getting me to ask where this man's actual friends and family are. I mean, his wife dies in childbirth and no one is helping? Not even a concerned co-worker or a social worker from the hospital? Which is a pretty big plot point to have such an inherent weakness in. Anyway, Emily is convinced Nate is having an affair and confronts him with pictures of the baby's real mother as proof of it. He smoothes it over, but as soon as he is alone, he calls Adele to get rid of Emily. Unfortunately, Emily is listening in and takes it to mean that he's plotting to have her killed.

She ends up kidnapping the baby and going to the police, only to have Ballard show up with Nate, flash his FBI badge and drag her back to the Dollhouse. They have to tranquilize her, which means Topher has to wait to wipe her. Fran Kranz packs another emotional punch into a tiny span when Echo as Emily tries to get him to help her by saying he looks like a nice man and Topher responds, with palpable desperation "I am a nice man", as if begging for validation. And in his mind, it is clear that he sees wiping her as a mercy. Except when he tries, it doesn't quite manage to override the instinct of a mother that he turned on in her head. So, she knocks him out cold and escapes, intent of rescuing her child.  Last week, I commented that Eliza shines most when kicking ass. I have to say that she doesn't do crazy half bad - especially in the confrontational moment when Nate explains to her what reality is and she asks if she can be the mommy anyway.

In the meantime, Madeline is brought in for a diagnostic. She witnesses Echo get restrained and sparks up a conversation with Ballard about how much pain Echo appeared to be in at the loss of a child. Something that should hit close to home with her, since she lost a daughter. But she tells him that her time as doll took all the pain and sadness of that loss away. It is likely the entire point of bringing her into the episode, which seems a little over-the-top coincidental. All the same, when Echo is retrieved from Nate's house, Ballard offers to tell Topher about how she is remembering so he can figure out how to really wipe her and she can forget all the lives that are seemingly haunting her. He's offering her the same ignorant bliss Madeline told him about. Of course, Echo turns it down.

Our subplot involves Senator Daniel Perrin (Alxis Denisof), who is looking for a way to expose the terrible truths about Rossum. Of course, he means unlicensed experiments and medical procedures. So, when someone drops the Dollhouse mother load on his front door step, he's beside himself in horror over the 'prostitution, human trafficking, and maybe murder '. He comments that what the file contains is better than proof - it's given him a name. Whose name? And who do you think left the file? Boyd? Alpha? Or someone we haven't met yet at all? Or were you (like me) too upset with the lack of Whiskey and Victor to be able to puzzle it all out?