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Joss Whedon's Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Act III review

Sarah Dobbs


The final episode of Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is up - so you've got just under 48 hours to catch it before the whole thing disappears...

Wow.

Um. I'm kind of lost for words. That really wasn't what I was expecting the ending to be. At all. I guess it just shows how long it's been since Buffy finished, that I've somehow forgotten just how much Joss loves to break up happy couples and thwart expectations, but... wow.

Maybe I'm just being petulent, but I really didn't enjoy that. Obviously, it was great to finally see Bad Horse, but under the circumstances it doesn't seem like a good thing that Dr Horrible got into the Evil League of Evil, and Captain Hammer's "everyone can be a hero" song went on for way too long. (I love Nathan, but that went on for too long.)

And then there's Penny. I really thought we'd get to see a different side to her; I thought there'd be some kind of twist, that she wouldn't really be this shy, cute, overly perky adorable girl the boys were fighting over. Because ultimately she was just a trophy, wasn't she? It's just that no-one got to win her. Joss essentially put her in the fridge. And that she died with her faith in Captain Hammer intact is a bit galling, too - surely she's not that blind?

Urgh. I don't know. I'm just feeling a bit disappointed, I guess.

Watch Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog at Dr Horrible.com, or download the episodes from iTunes. Or, for more Whedon-related reviews, check out our reviews of Buffy season 7.

 

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User's Comments

Re: Joss Whedon's Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Act III review
Posted by silverpooch on July 19, 2008 08:25:35 AM

I've come to terms with the fact that Joss did not make the movie I expected, and that is why he is so good at what he does. He set us up and twisted all our expectations about what is good, what is evil, how they get that way. We want to believe that the first layer for Dr. Horrible (that he is evil) is false and welcome the sweet, geeky kind of guy his second layer is. That is who we think he is. Then we are surprised when we find out that the third layer IS just like the first, except much deeper emotionally. He is now the worst villain in the world, gaining everything he wanted, while losing everything he cared about. Joss went and made a damned tragedy of a super villain origin story without giving us the proper setup or clues. It really was shocking. It took three viewings before I could get over the shock and cry a little for the sweet, geeky guy who was left all by himself at the end, without any real emotion to sustain himself.

Re: Joss Whedon's Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Act III review
Posted by vanekl on July 19, 2008 03:33:02 PM

"... without giving us the proper setup or clues." Please. This was a mockumentary. The entire video was joke after joke after joke, mocking each character. Even the props were mocking the characters. Nobody got spared. Penny was mocked for her willingness to take things at face value. The point Joss is making, based on all the clues he litters throughout, is that everybody was not only flawed, but blind to their personal flaws. Just because NPH is cute doesn't mean he gets a free pass. He was evil, and even though he was incompetent at it, he still reaped its fruits. If you are crying in sympathy for the "sweet, geeky guy" then you missed the point of the satire. If you cried because a man chose the wrong path and wasted his life and the lives of others, that is different.

Re: Joss Whedon's Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Act III review
Posted by poetam on July 19, 2008 06:48:17 PM

Well, in lieu of the past writer's strike, I think Captain Hammer "corporate tool" represents the networks. Penny represents past projects aka "Firefly" and Dr. Horrible is Joss Whedon. With these parallels in mind, the story makes a lot more sense, and in a sense, wouldn't networks want us to believe that Horrible is still evil, though embarking out into a new world. The writer can't move onto new projects until they properly say goodbye to their past ones. So Penny's death becomes a sort of closure, and perhaps all of "Dr. Horrible's Sing A-Long Blog" is that closure as Joss is moving on to work on other projects after his issues with networks. So with that in mind, Dr. Horrible, though a very political breakthrough, is still great, as it is that breakthrough.

Re: Joss Whedon's Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Act III review
Posted by michaelklouda on July 20, 2008 04:00:32 PM

The series was brilliant and sad. The fact that people are discussing it and continue to think about it is what makes it great. A happy ending where Dr. Horrible gets the girl and decides not to be bad would feel sweet but it would be an empty ending without energy to propel things forward - even if there is no more to it beyond these three acts. I certainly hope that there are more and with the excitement behind this how can there not be. There is too much interest and money to be made from it for there not to be more. I think that the idea that Penny is Firefly is a great concept and that Captain Hammer is the Networks, with Joss and his team are the Evil group of supervillians. The networks are an issue and they kill or manage to screw up the best projects - simply for advertising money. Entertainment needs to be more than big business. Money can support it and make things possible, but it can not be the purpose. Joss, keep on fighting the fight! We'll be there right with you.

Re: Joss Whedon's Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Act III review
Posted by SarahDobbs on July 20, 2008 07:10:21 PM

Having watched it a few more times and recovered a bit from the shock of that ending, I'm feeling a bit more coherent (but really, the first time I was just sort of sitting there, slack-jawed, wondering what the hell just hit me...!)

I think the bit where Dr Horrible attacks Captain Hammer is really well-done - it's the first time we've seen him out being evil, with innocent bystanders there, and we can sort of see him through their eyes. Previously, we've been seeing his spin on his evil, with his justifications and his frustrations at things not going as well as he'd like. Now we're seeing how, actually, a supervillain is quite scary, even if they're not thoroughly successful in their attacks, and I thought it was really good, really really creepy and really powerful.

There are a lot of good lines in Act III, too ("Give my regards to St Peter - or, whoever has his job, but in Hell" and "I think this is what pain feels like" are really good, and also, y'know, both Nathan's, which is nice). But ... argh, the Penny thing aggravates me. During the "so they say" song, she expresses doubt about her relationship with Captain Hammer and whether she's actually happy, even though everyone seems to think she should be, but that's pretty much all we get. In the end, she still has (misplaced!) fear in Captain Hammer, who's abandoned her. I hate that. I want her to have a bit more oomph; sure, she's sweet and innocent and manages to see only the good in everyone, maybe, which is why she can be friends with "Billy", but she's not Kaylee - in the end, she just comes off kind of stupid, which is frustrating. Er, and Kaylee lived to see another day after getting caught in the crossfire.

(Did anyone else notice that the bits of death ray disappear out of her in the process of Dr Horrible picking her up off the floor, BTW?)

I think maybe the story could have worked along the same lines as we saw, but it needed more time to develop, and it needed to not finish there! It's just too abrupt. :(

Re: Joss Whedon's Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Act III review
Posted by SarahDobbs on July 20, 2008 07:13:50 PM

"Hammer meet Nail" is quite funny, too, given that Dr Horrible cast himself in, er, not a very good role there, really. I do love the "get a pic - do a blog! Heroes are over with" line, though. Argh. So conflicted.

I'm also sure it doesn't really need saying, but I'll say it anyway: Neil Patrick Harris is amazing. His voice and his face and his mannerisms; he's fantastic, and I want to see him in about a million more things. I'm actually going to go and buy myself a Starship Troopers DVD right now.

Re: Joss Whedon's Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Act III review
Posted by galahad_progeny on July 21, 2008 05:29:27 PM

I actually think Penny's dying line is the most significant and well thought out of any of the dialogue. It may not say the best things about Penny, but that fits just as well. She's not the princess Dr. Horrible wants her to be, in the end she's just a normal person with normal hopes and fears, and (as in all Joss Whedon's work) the same capacity for self-delusion. And, more than that even, the story isn't really about her, it's about Dr. Horrible. There is not a thing she could have said as she died that would have torn him up more emotionally than that. In her dying moment she still can't see him as he wants to be seen. And in a death scene, which is so often used to bring two characters together in a moment of perfect clarity before it all slips away, Penny's unexpected line takes even that away from Dr. Horrible. Not only does she die, but he never gets that final connection. He never even gets a glimpse of true love. Joss Whedon has written some gut wrenching deaths, the absolute heartbreak of Tara dying or the sudden, senseless loss of Wash, but he's never written a death so absolutely calculated to hurt. As many have said, that moment alone really brings the viewer back to the fact that this is a story about a villain and being careful what you wish for.
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