Epitaph One

[hazelk]

Although apocalypse had been rumoured to lie in the future for Dollhouse in spoilers for Epitaph One it was never immediately obvious how programming people would cause the end of the world. The tech seemed more Blade Runner than Terminator, something that might support a tyranny or degenerate into a dystopia but total commodification rather than mass destruction seemed the more likely side effect.

It started that way. The evil corporation finally achieves full body upgrades and calls it evolution, invites the elect to join. There’s a scramble for bodies (maybe also for minds as well – carry your abducted pretty princess with you always) as the houses go into lockdown but the more fundamental problem is that they got evolution wrong, they always do. It's never about progress, a virus is as evolved as a man. The tech jumps ship from the ark of the ubermensch, inevitable when you think about it. On the basis of the aired episodes it's the most fallible process on the planet all it needs is faulty transmission to create an imprint with the urge to copy itself by remote transfer and there you have it. Like syphilis arriving in America, with no co-evolved defences natural selection and, no doubt, Muller’s Rachet will do the rest. It's the simplest possible singularity, computers don't have to become conscious, just parasitically reproducible in people's brains.

Also the military get hold of it and Topher pitches them cold calling armies of Reavers into existence. Seeing broken Topher, I don’t like him and he did terrible, careless things but I’m a scientist, I’m a little bit Topher. There were some parts, like where they were getting the personality recordings from that I did think. Because that’s how you would do it except that there are laws.

There were shout outs to other apocalypses most crudely in the budget wall of remembrance at the end but overall it felt more like Terminator than BSG. At least I got a big future John vibe off Caroline. It all began with people downloading themselves into newer younger bodies but isn't that exactly what she did? Planned to do, maybe not to Ivy specifically but how was that copy of her memories supposed to be read and if she finds herself is that the end for the Ivy model or does she just get a new tattoo and join the ranks of the Actuals? It never ends is the message, I suppose not as long as there are individuals who believe they, personally, are worth saving, remembering, making stories about. A hero is a story, Caroline is a story. Imprint the legend. And then the ones who don't want to be remembered, the undeserving with nowhere left they can slip away from themselves? That's ironic I suppose. Adelle is stuck with all she did. And between the butchers and the dumb shows, the wielders and the actuals where does the imprint Claire Saunders fit? Boyd loved the imprint. Did her constructed personality slowly fail or did she choose to revert to being Whiskey. To be her best for one last engagement or because the alternative of remembering had become too much to bear.