I’m still watching Joss Whedon’s “Dollhouse,” and I’m becoming mildly intrigued. Television reviewers had only been given episodes 1-3 when they made their initial, mixed at best, reviews of the series. I wanted to wait until I got through episode 4 before I starting making any pronouncements.

So now here’s a tepid one. The story has great potential as an allegory for women struggling for agency in a increasingly subtle patriarchal world, but it is fulfilling that potential at a snail’s pace. And the feminist themes are being continually undermined by the marketing of its star, Eliza Dushku, who recently posed on the cover of Maxim.

I don’t agree with Nancy Franklin of The New Yorker that the “primary qualification Dushku brings to the part is that she graduated with honors from the Royal Academy of Cleavage.” In fact, I could easily see her growing into the role or the role growing into her.

Like Sarah Michelle Gellar’s Buffy, Echo, Dushku’s character, is valued by others because of her stereotypical beauty. It’s an explicit part of her skill set, as the operators of the Dollhouse put it. Like Buffy, I’m confident (and I can begin to see the seeds being planted) that Whedon is planning to play off of the stereotype and assumptions — and ultimately play against them.

Franklin misses the point when she continues to say, “In terms of gender studies, it is notable that Dushku’s demeanor as a zombie is much the same as the demeanor many actresses her age resort to when trying to project an image of themselves as unthreatening and ‘feminine’: a slouchy walk, a bobbly head, and ever-parted lips.”

She is that way because the operators of the Dollhouse — and their clients — want her that way. By exposing this gendered system, the show can — potentially — undermine it. But Whedon is clearly walking a fine line here, and when The New Yorker doesn’t get it, you might need to make access to the allegory a bit clearer.

And you might want to have a word with Fox and Dushku herself about the messages they are sending off-screen (or at least outside the narrative of the show).

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Part of me rolls my eyes, and another part of me cringes when I contemplate the premise of “Dollhouse,” Joss Whedon’s new television series for Fox which premieres tonight. Joy Press at Salon sums up the premise of the show:

It stars former “Buffy” star Eliza Dushku as Echo, a young woman — known on the show as an “Active” or “Doll” — sapped of her memories and free will, who is sold to rich clients to fulfill their needs and fantasies. For each assignment she is imprinted with a fresh personality, complete with new skills, intelligence and neurological information; sometimes she morphs into a sexbot, other times she takes on the life of a highly methodical negotiator. Echo and her fellow Actives live in a giant Zen loft called the Dollhouse, blissfully unaware that they are being remote controlled by a shadowy organization.

It sounds like a science-fiction extension of Law and Order: SVU. Do we really need another show where women = victim — and she looks sexy while she’s being exploited/manipulated/killed?

Even if we see this new show’s lineage more in shows like Charlie’s Angels or Alias, that doesn’t feel any more promising. In some ways, these types of shows are more insidious, purporting to revel in female empowerment and agency while really just exposing how television executives can’t imagine a powerful woman who isn’t a cartoonish, supermodel superhero.

Fox’s marketing of “Dollhouse,” moreover, seems to revel in all of my fears. In combination with their “Terminator” series, Fox decides to evoke 70s sexploitation films as it points out that “Friday’s Got Grindhouse,” starring the “Dames of Deception.” It might be a light-hearted parody, but the satire has no point other than to emphasize that you can “Double Your Pleasure” with women who are “Hotter than Hades.”

In this context, it should come as no surprise that …. I cannot wait to watch the “Dollhouse” premiere.

There’s a new Joss Whedon show on television! Hallelujah!

If you are not familiar with Whedon’s work already, here’s just two things you need to know:

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