“The Left Hand”

By the time that “The Left Hand” aired, it had already been announced that the second season of Dollhouse would be the show’s last.  The development of the Sen. Daniel Perrin storyline made it seem like the Dollhouse Corporation was on the cusp of being exposed and that the show was in fact ready to end.  But then all the twists and turns and cross-twists and turns of this episode suggested that Dollhouse was actually prepared to last for a while if it had the chance, thus proving Joss Whedon’s mastery at hedging his bets.  His past TV experiences certainly conditioned him to be thus adept, having created one show that was cancelled and picked up by another network (Buffy) and another that lasted only one season and then became a movie (Firefly).
After the fast and furious revelations of the previous hour (Perrin is a doll, his wife is his handler), the highlights of “The Left Hand” were the Topher-centric moments.  Imprinting Viktor as Topher to give Topher support from himself was a stroke of genius and when he discovered that fellow Dollhouse scientist Bennett Halverson was actually a woman, I was thrilled that our beloved Topher had found a love interest.  As for guest star Summer Glau as Halverson, my hopes were not high.  I had seen her on The Sarah Connor Chronicles and thought that she was fascinatingly cute but pretty boring as an actress.  But her scenes with Fran Kranz as Topher were nothing short of delightful.

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