NOTE: I apologize for the length of this recap/review; I’m still experimenting with the format I’m most comfortable with for doing these sorts of posts.

Dollhouse took another step up in quality this week after the slight fumble last week. In fact, aside from the opening scene where Echo serves as a doula in a secluded estate perched on an icy mountainside — which will surely engender endless theories about why someone would need to hire an Active to aid in childbirth, aside from the helpful and foreshadowy line “I want to forget!” — this episode was once again a marked improvement over its predecessor.

A scene with Boyd and Topher once again explores some of the nuances of the Actives and biology, in general. Topher’s worried about the “flocking” that the three main actives are exhibiting, which is likely a way for the show to explain away why the same four Actives will so frequently be seen cavorting in future episodes when their memory of past cavorts has been erased. This also emphasizes something left implied to this point: the Actives are completely wiped every time they’re brought back to the Dollhouse. Which is a convenient way of escaping the questions other Actives might naturally have when one is on a long-term mission. It also ensures Actives can’t develop long-term relationships even with other Actives or staff. The takeaway from these scenes, for me, was that the Dollhouse is very good at what they do.

After this prelude, the mission of the week is introduced. Here, we learn that (supposedly) nobody on staff knows what the missions are, and the risk factor is determined by a computer program. I don’t see how this could be done unless that program was a full-on artificial intelligence, and beyond that the handlers of the Actives are also fully aware of the mission as they observe it at all times. But for now, I’ll take them at their word, under the assumption they’re lying in some way. Either way, Echo’s mission this week has been rated as having “special requirements.” Meanwhile, a Voiceless Higher-Up calls up DeWitt about the progress of the Ballard mind fuck. They’re working on it, but not fast enough to warrant a goodbye from the VHU.

And now Echo’s “high risk” mission starts off and she’s a hooker. Look’s like that misogynist Joss Whedon has struck again. After the hot and heavy gyration’s of Taffy, Echo’s role du jour, the head of security for the hotel comes by offering a bit of champagne to get their dirrtiness, and Eliza Dushku’s over-the-top sexy squeals, up to their suite and away from the hotel lobby. We see Taffy’s client, now shirtless and chugging back the champagne, chasing her down the hallway and into the arms of the aforementioned head of security who wisks her away to his secret hideaway with its impenetrable keypad-based security, whose code Taffy dutifully observes for future use. Once in this fortress of securitude, the head of security gently consoles her and offers her a pay-off so that she’ll not sue either the hotel or her customers. What’s saddest about this is that I could totally see hotels having stacks of cash sitting around to pay off disgruntled hookers. Anyways, Taffy is outraged at this insult and refuses the money and then knocks the dude out and gets on her bluetooth headpiece, which would have looked so cool and spy-ish only a few years ago and now simply seems quite banal, to inform her team she’s in. “Blue skies,” she catchphrases to the unconscious guard. She said it earlier too, but I can only type it so many times without bashing my head into my keyboard and I need to use it at least once more later on. And as the credits play, I once again have to express my appreciation of its length, even though it’s still much shorter than a truly great credit sequence, such as Six Feet Under’s or Carnivàle‘s, requires.

After the break, Taffy’s wonderful breasts are discussed, and a line as bizarre as “honest to blog” was in Juno is uttered in the course of said discussion when Taffy says “You can mention that when you blog about this later.” I guess it’s cheap way to explain that the guy she directs to blog is the tech guy for the job. Though really, I don’t think “I was aiding in the illegal theft of something last weekend and this chick I was working with had awesome boobs” is really the best thing to put on your blog. Incredibly personal discussions of the cause of your broken heart? Go for it. But leave illegalities out of it, m’kay?

In short order, all the men on the team have their roles defined. The blog guy is the tech-head, the “professor” is the one with domain expertise of what they plan to steal, and the guy pushing for the murder of the incapacitated head of security is the macho muscle that has no real purpose other than to argue for the most violent solution to any given problem. But Taffy, much like Baby, is not one for being put into corners and asserts her dominance with zeal explaining the “no-kill” order their boss has issued for this theft and that she knows to never second guess a client. And wear comfy shoes.

Now that everyone knows she’s the boss, she exposits that their job is to break in to an extremely secure vault which happens to be completely insecure right now due to an hour-long system upgrade hence the episode title “Gray Hour.” They break in and the other criminals quietly wonder why, if Taffy is the best, they’ve never heard of this criminal superstar. Put simply, she likes the quiet life and isn’t looking for attention. Which is a quick way of the show getting across that you don’t need to be famous to be the best at what you do, thus justifying virtually any mission the Actives might have in the future. And to emphasize that she’s simply another instance of the phrase “the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist,” she promptly breaks through a very impressive looking vault door and leads them all into an artwork trove. After the professor makes us all aware of the value of the items in this vault, one painting alone is worth $17 million he says, we learn what they’re here to steal: the Parthenon.

Meanwhile, Agent Ballard has returned from the hospital with a gun shot wound, some drugs, and a sneaky suspicion that Lubov/Victor is lurking in the shadows. He interrogates Lubov about the picture he received from Alpha two weeks earlier and demands to know who gave him the tip that turned out to be a trap. Lubov was given the tip by someone — with a Georgian accent “Russia Georgia,” not “Sweet Home Georgia,” which Ballard Joss-fully corrects “Alabama” — who now knows that he’s in cahoots with Ballard and so wants protection. Ballard says he’ll help so long as he never sees Lubov again.

Returning to the vault, the professor exposits that Turkey, when they were in control of Athens, allowed the Earl of Elgin to take these small marble engravings from the Parthenon so while it’s not stolen per se, there’s probably a good reason it’s holed away in a vault. (Although, while doing a bit of perfunctory research for this post, I found out that these so-called Elgin Marbles are actually on display in the British Museum and Britain has publicly denied requests for their return to Greece, so all of this is a little misleading historically speaking.)

This little tidbit of historical information, leads the thieves to deciding that Greece hired them to steal the marbles back. As this pointless discovery is fleshed out by the non-professors, the professor is unartfully attempting to close the vault door behind himself locking them in and him out with the marbles. The tech-head tries to stop him but gets a gut full of ancient sword for his troubles, and they’re all stuck inside the vault as the professor makes a clean getaway. Luckily, Taffy’s got an outside man.

She calls up Boyd, who’s waiting in his surveillance van, to inform him of the man leaving the hotel and her desire that he not get away. The muscle attempts to interject with the brilliant line “how are you getting reception down here?!” but is shut down as Echo explains to Boyd that she’s got things under control and can get them out of the vault before the gray hour is over. But as her conversation with Boyd ends a sharp shrill noise rings out through the phone. Echo looks confused and quietly asks “Did I fall asleep?” Oh shit.

After the break, Topher is regaling a coworker with his opinions on the various nuances of his brain manipulating genius. It’s like this show knows how to get me all hot and bothered. Unfortunately, before the show can get me completely titillated, Topher notices that Echo’s vitals have gone off the charts. Her behaviour in the vault isn’t much better as she shudders in the fetal position “shall I go now?” awaiting her preprogrammed response. The muscle is confused and decides, as per usual, that the solution to the problem is more violence. Amazingly, it doesn’t work.

Boyd, on the other hand, has got his shit well in hand. He shoots the professorial prick just for the fun of it and gets the marbles. Meanwhile, Topher is explaining to DeWitt how Echo has lost hers. Her vitals are off the chart, and despite explanations from others, Topher knows that her pulse rate, with her current personality, would never go over 65 BPM. Something went wrong. Luckily, they’ve got a recording of Echo’s conversation with Boyd, and Topher is terrified when he hears the high pitched noise that ends the call. After a bit of befuddlement, he explains that Echo has been remotely wiped, something that has never been tested and shouldn’t have even been possible. Echo has essentially been born again without the comforts the Dollhouse has built into their wiping protocol. And she certainly won’t be able to help herself.

In the vault, the muscle is working on getting Taffy back, but all Echo can do is repeat the things he’s told her to say. “Taffy’s gone man, and she’s not coming back.” the tech-head says as he cradles his gut wound. Which leads us to Sierra waking up in the Dollhouse brain-changing chair. “Blue skies,” she catchphrases to DeWitt who says she needs Taffy’s help. Taffy’s back, people.

After the break, we get a scene where the tech-head teaches Echo about art. He talks about the appearance of art, and how it can either be about what you see or about what is. “That’s what art’s for: to show us who we are” he says romantically. It’s an interesting little scene where the discussion about the art around them effectively mirrors Echo’s disintegration under the stresses she’s experiencing. It would be nice if the scene was a little longer, even though it’s a little shoe-gazy, but the muscle decides it’s time for more muscle. He calls them all weak and busts out a drill to… I’m not really sure what he plans to do with it, he does know vault doors have protection against that sort of thing, right?

SierraTaffy is livid back at the Dollhouse, that she got passed over after all the work she put into planning the Parthenon heist. She repeats EchoTaffy’s story about never second guessing clients. She even adds on the comfy shoes bit, to emphasize how meaningless the distinction between the first Taffy and the new Taffy is. They’re both the same person, just in a different body.

Now that Topher’s had some time to process what happened, he feels the need to barrage the audience with completely meaningless technobabble about “neurotropic factor” and how impossible it would be to break through all the firewalls he put into place. He’s certain that this isn’t a one-man hack. Which is a little odd given his scenes with DeWitt later on. He calls up Boyd to ask if Echo seemed normal when he took her out tonight. Boyd answers but wants to know why it matters. I’m beginning to wonder that myself. Was he thinking that Echo did the remote wipe to herself? That it was an inside job? Oh right, the show just needs a credible reason for Boyd to know that Echo’s in trouble. And so Boyd calls up DeWitt to complain that he was left out of the loop. And then he demands from the professor a map to the security room they entered the vault from. SierraTaffy continues her role as an exposition machine, explaining that while she has all the skills needed to solve this problem there’s a time factor as well. There are only nine more minutes left in the gray hour, so there’s no way for her to do the job in person, but if Echo can follow instructions everything will be all right.

Tech-head continues his art lecture series, soon to be released on his blog and available on iTunes, and Echo offers the crucial information that she likes sky. And that there’s a mountain in the painting they’re both looking at. She then asks what her name is and explains that when she’s “there,” her name is something else. Is this an example of her memory persisting, despite what Topher’s instruments indicate, or an example of the depth of the base state programming of the Actives? Is she programmed to have the name Echo when she’s in the Dollhouse? It’s a seemingly pointless digression, but it may be important in future episodes. Either way, tech-head is sick of Echo’s child-like persona. He asks her to get something from his bag. As he prepares the syringe, he explains to Echo that they’re fucked and the only way that door will be opened is by the security guards outside, who will take them to prison.

“What’s prison?” Echo asks. “It’s a place with no sky” Tech-head helpfully answers. The look on Echo’s face as she hears this description of prison is deep with meaning and memory. She’s been in prison before. “We’re bad guys.” Tech-head says as he slide the syringe up to his arm. But death is the easy way out, says the muscle. He takes the syringe away, lifts the no-kill order, and takes out a gun.

Topher continues to explore the list of possible hackers that could have remote wiped Echo. Although, that list should probably be pretty small given the secrecy about Dollhouse’s very existence. In fact, after throwing away his most recent accusation for being a hack, he says “there’s only one person I know, who could achieve a remote wipe. And he’s dead.” The look of confusion on his face lingers until just before the camera cuts away when it quickly shifts to one of understanding.

SierraTaffy is trying to call Echo but nobody’s picking up. She explains how she’ll open the vault door. Echo finally picks up. And SierraTaffy and EchoTaffy’s similarities are once again noted by the show. They both hide their vault-cracking resin in their bra. There’s a short vault-cracking scene which doesn’t end up successful and SierraTaffy heads off to her “treatment” with her briefcase full of cash. Something tells me, she’s not going to be leaving with that money.

Because official authorities are potentially getting involved, it’s time for the Dollhouse to make sure they’re isolated, so DeWitt orders a couple operatives to be ready to eliminate Echo should the need arise. She is also explicit that she doesn’t want Boyd knowing about it, as she thinks he’s grown too attached to Echo.

The alarm has been set off, the guards are closing in and the muscle is telling Echo to shoot at the bad guys. This confuses her because she was pretty certain that they were the bad guys. So the muscle holds his gun to her and says to shoot or be shot. Echo would prefer to just go, sans shootout. Somehow, she gets it into her head to take the syringe of death and inject it into the muscle’s neck. How she knew it would harm him is left unanswered as her previous reaction to it was completely benign. Regardless, the muscle goes down and shoots off a few rounds as he does instigating a one-way fire-fight in which he fires blindly and yet somehow manages to hit every guard that the camera shows. Tech-head gives Echo instructions on how to get out and then throws a smoke grenade. Boyd follows the map drawn for him. He gets to the whole in the wall as Echo and the tech-head are making their way out.

“Are you OK?” Boyd asks. “He’s broken.” Echo responds talking about tech-head as she passes him over to Boyd. Boyd reaches his hand out for Echo to take to which she says “I’m not broken.”

Finally, Ballard gets back from his help-getting mission which turns out wasn’t so much a “help you out” mission as it was a “fuck you over” mission. Lubov is marked for capture everywhere and if he tries to leave LA, he’ll be picked up by the FBI and dropped off with a handshake at the Russian mob’s doorstep. Harsh, dude.

Well, Echo’s back to being a blank slate, the marble is intact and headed to the client and Topher says the remote wipe did no permanent damage. But that’s not what Topher is really there to talk about. He knows that Alpha was the one that remote wiped Echo. Nobody else could have done it. DeWitt needs a signature from Topher: his security clearance has been upgraded. Alpha is indeed alive. And out there. The Dollhouse is not all powerful says DeWitt. Though its creation appears to be.

Echo has returned to her calm life at the Dollhouse, and yet seems affected by these recent events as she draws a sad face in the steam of her mirror. And wipes it away.

This episode once again relied on integrating the mythology with the episodic storyline. Like the second episode, Alpha introduced something unexpected into one of Echo’s missions. It still remains unclear what Alpha’s goal is with these sabotages, but they seem to be having an effect on Echo. For example, at first glance, the thread with Boyd trying to get to Echo to help her out seems pointless, but after re-watching, it seems like they’re trying to show that Echo managed the situation without Boyd’s help. Unlike what Topher said, she did help herself. Is this a growing ability in Echo? And if so, was it instigated by this event or was it always there waiting to be demonstrated? And is that why Alpha spared Echo during his massacre?

The mythology of the show and the questions regarding Echo’s growth are deepening. I’m glad that the show is expanding the mythology so quickly, though mostly because it means we’ll probably be getting answers some time this year, and given that the likelihood of Dollhouse getting another season diminishes each week, I hope for some level of closure before Fox bitch slaps this show into oblivion. The show still suffers from the problem that the Ballard storylines are far too separate from the rest of the action. This episode took a step in the right direction by getting DeWitt involved in his story, but it needs to be even more integrated. I know I say this every week, and given that the show started at a B+ and is thus far at about an A- the improvements might seem marginal, the show really does continue to improve with each new episode. And episode seven is supposedly when the season really kicks off. I can’t wait.