All of this has happened before.

After watching "The Attic," the latest Dollhouse episode, I've come to a few conclusions about Joss Whedon. First, he loves The Matrix. "The Attic" wins the title of Most Obvious Whedon Matrix Homage: Adelle sends Echo, Victor, and Sierra into a computer program where they meet an old man who explains the plot, while their bodies reside in creepy, shrink-wrapped, goo-filled coffins* (I know). "The Attic" not only highlighted Joss' Neo boner, however, but also awakened me to numerous plot/thematic elements that have recurred throughout his body of work.

A Joss Whedon Series by Numbers

1. A Beautiful Girl (Buffy/Echo/River) is transformed into a living weapon (Slayer/Active/Alliance Science Project) by Creepy Old White Men (the original Watchers/the Rossum Corporation/the Alliance).


2. Girl acquires a resigned father figure (Giles/Boyd/Mal). Mentor originally sides with the Creepy Old White Men, but his love for Girl (his surrogate daughter) eventually forces him to see the light.


3. Girl acquires a gang of plucky sidekicks (the Scooby Gang/Victor and Sierra/the crew of Serenity). Two of the sidekicks should have adorable crushes on each other.


4. Girl falls in love with big, pretty Boy (Angel/Ballard/this one doesn't apply to River, since she was insane); Boy broods a lot/feels responsible for Girl's safety, even though Girl saves his ass more often than he saves her's.


5. Girl allies herself with Charismatic Jerk (Spike/Laurence Dominic/Jayne) out of circumstance, only to realize that Charismatic Jerk kind of rules.


6. Girl eventually learns to harness her powers by fighting myriad villains (it's best if the villains represent Real World Issues).


7. Obligatory Matrix Homage Episode ("Restless"/"The Attic").


8. Girl destroys Creepy Old White Men by sharing her power/enlightening the general population (Buffy activates the Potential Slayers/Echo "wakes" her fellow Actives/River unveils the secret of Miranda).

Now, I like Joss Whedon an awful lot, and this post doesn't take Angel (his second most successful series) into consideration (I would argue that as a Buffy spin-off it grew out of these conventions - it's basically this story from Boy's point of view). Nor does it acknowledge that Mal, not River, served as the chief Firefly protagonist (again, River's insanity made it impossible for her to serve as the lead - Firefly is this story from Mentor's point of view). Those caveats aside, I'm inclined to speculate that Joss Whedon only has One Great Story in him, and that his followers have been watching variations of it for the last 10+ years. It's a vital story, but it feels like I'm watching one of those episodes where we experience each act from a different characters' point of view, with the acts combining to form the larger narrative**. In short: "The Attic" felt like Joss Whedon by the Numbers, not the work of Joss Whedon, Original Creative Genius.

*I watched "The Attic" with Roommate Joe, who had never seen Dollhouse (I failed miserably at explaining the plot to him). Poor Joe struggled to understand what the hell was happening until Echo popped out of her tank, upon which he exclaimed "Oh, they're in the Matrix!"

** And for the love of God, may he tell the next act on cable!