Dollhouse: Epitaphs

Dollhouse: Epitaphs #1-5

by Andrew Chambliss, Jed Whedon, Maurissa Tancharoen

The Rossum Corporation's Dollhouse technology has gone viral with a synchronized phone call that wiped the minds of everyone it reached, turning them into mindless killers. Those who avoided the call—including show favorites Echo, Alpha, Mag, Zone, and Griff—must try to survive in the sudden apocalypse and be wary of Rossum's expansive technological reach. This is only the beginning! Collects the complete Dollhouse: Epitaphs miniseries.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Science Fiction, Fiction, Dystopia, Graphic Novels Comics, Media Tie In

160 pages, Paperback

First published April 11, 2012

About the author

Andrew Chambliss is an American television writer and producer. He is well known for working on series such as Dollhouse, The Vampire Diaries, and Once Upon a Time.

Reviews

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

This series is very similar indeed to the Serenity comics, in that they attempt to fill in gaps left by the premature curtailment of the stories told during both series' TV runs. I re-watched Season 2 of Dollhouse in preparation for reading this and that re-familiarisation was probably necessary as I'd forgotten a lot of details from Epitaph 2 (the final episode) that this fairly short comic run attempted to explain. (My memory was hung up on the Magic Bomb plot device that still annoys me - even good writers can fail, especially when they know they don't have the proper amount of time to tell their stories.)

I was delighted to see more of Mag and Zone, who were the real stars of the first Epitaph episode and disappointed not to see Topher, who was the stand-out character of the show as a whole. The stories themselves really serve to further illustrate what we have missed out on: Dollhouse would have been great if it had 5 years or so to tell its story properly. As it is, it remains a relatively obscure Whedon effort that was too challenging for Fox or for the viewers who stayed away in hordes.

[Jammin Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this graphic novel based on the Dollhouse series created by Joss Whedon and starring Eliza Dushku. In this story, Rossum develops tech that wipes the minds of everyone that picks up a phone, and then develops future tech in their attempt to find and kill Echo (Eliza Dushku's character from Dollhouse). Meanwhile, Alpha and Ivy (also from the original Dollhouse series), lead a team to help save Echo and develop tech to reverse Rossum's problems. I enjoyed revisiting this world and liked the teenage boy Alpha added tech to, in an order to help him save the day. Fun pics and great story.

[Artemy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just finished watching Dollhouse the TV show, and I grabbed the comic book immediately after that. Now, I do think that the show managed to tie a lot of lose ends remarkably well, considering the limited time they had left after the news of cancellation. But it is still nice to have this comic to clear up some of the questions left unanswered. Basically, if you liked Dollhouse — and I did, a lot — you will most likely enjoy this book. It's not required reading, not many important things are revealed here, but it's still great to see some more backstory. I wish the writers would include Adelle and Topher, my favourite characters, but sadly, they are absent from the book. And that would probably be my only complaint. Still, enough of the good stuff here to justify picking this volume up.

[TJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this years ago, but having just rewatched all of Dollhouse I thought now was a good time for a reread. And really — I forgot how good this was! I remember not being as intrigued by this cast of characters since they were minor characters from the series, but this time around I was so intrigued! While I do wish we’d seen Alpha’s journey to being a hero, getting this insight into how his mind works post-apocalypse is so interesting; his guilt and struggles with his original self could have easily made him one of the most complex characters from the show... if we’d gotten to explore it more. But like I said, this was way better than nothing! The Ivies were also really, really thought provoking. It’s sad to think that all of them would either be dead or wiped by the end of the show, besides maybe the original. And the fact that Ivy was working with Alpha before anyone else is so interesting; there’s a story there of how and why they teamed up, and I wish we’d seen it! The survivors from Epitaph One being in the story felt like an obligation, but I liked how they tied into the plot by the end and it was a cool way to introduce them towards the path of that episode. I know Adele, Topher, Saunders, Tony, and Priya are all safely locked away in the LA Dollhouse during these events, but they were missed in this series! I wish we’d gotten a second volume, showing those characters in the apocalypse future more. Still, this was such a fun read for fans of the show! Great development for Alpha and Ivy, establishing the future and its Epitaph characters more, and connecting the two timelines. 5/5 stars

[Bry · Rating 3 out of 5]

When this show was on television I watched every episode - not because I loved it but because like Fox I was a bit gun shy to give up after only 1 season. Firefly taught us all a lesson. Sadly though season 2 didn't make it much better for me. And now this story picks up where the series ended, and correlates with the future episodes the show did.

First - the art because that is the most important part of graphic novels to me. I love the coloring in this. The colors during a majority of the story are warm colors, muted, and shadowed. But then when there is violence the colors become much brighter and warmer. The art also goes back and forth in the amount of detailing. At some points peoples features are very exact and others they are as vague as possible. This seems to depend on how important the character is or how crazy they are at the moment. The chapter beginning images were fantastic - especially Noto's. So beautiful.

The characters, especially Alpha and Echo look exactly like their counterparts and were the most detailed. It was weird at first seeing Alpha as a good guy though, and Echo didn't even show up in the story until about 3/4's through. And Paul Ballard looked nothing like the original character from the show unfortunately. And Felicia Day's character Maggie needed more definition - just giving a vague female character red hair doesn't make HER Maggie.

The plot seems to take place between the end of the series (in the present timeline) and set up the action for what took place in the future episodes of the show - people are being imprinted through the phones, hand held devices, and finally through broadcasts on radio waves. Only now we have back stories for Maggie, Trevor, Zone, etc. So if you wanted those holes between the present and the future in the show then this volume will give you that. But it didn't add much new to the overall story, but then again this is only volume 1!

All in all it was a great addition to the Dollhouse franchise and I think I will keep reading the series to see where the story goes.

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m a huge Dollhouse fan. I was devastated when it was taken off the air and was left with so many question – the biggest and most mysterious of these was: What happened in between the end of season 2 and the Epitaphs?

This graphic novel starts to answer that question. Previously published as a set of five issues, now bound in one handle volume, it’s a must have for any Dollhouse fan. The storyline is true to the TV series and the illustrations are brilliant.

Alpha is my favourite character and this instalment of the Dollhouse story features him doing a fantastic job as the lead – Echo takes a back seat and isn’t involved very much. I again have to mention how brilliant I think the illustrations were – there were scenes when Alpha was struggling to keep all of his personalities under control and just from the drawings you could tell which “Alpha” was in control.

I also loved the Ivies. They added some comic relief but were also a clever and insightful look into imprinting and philosophy. Trevor was a great addition to the team too.

I’m not usually one for graphic novels – I think the comics I’ve read before have been the True Blood ones – but I thoroughly enjoyed reading Epitaphs Volume 1. It was fantastic to be drawn into the Dollhouse universe once again and I feel like a few of the questions I had have been answered.

[Nicky · Rating 4 out of 5]

I haven't actually seen Dollhouse, but I heard good things about it and I generally trust Joss Whedon's imagination, ever since I saw Firefly. So, when I saw this on Netgalley, I requested it and read it as soon as I was given access to it. The art is great throughout: the artist/s captured the actors very well, and it all comes together nicely. I think I liked the scenes of Alpha's fragmenting hold on his personalities most -- I wouldn't have believed, knowing Firefly so well, that you could make Alan Tudyk look that evil.

The story itself is pretty standard for speculative fiction, I guess: it involves people's brains being wiped so they basically become zombies, trying only to kill others and convert others to be like them. It's played out pretty well, though. The Ivies and Alpha are extremely interesting -- philosophically and in terms of figuring out what's going on in their heads -- though Trevor is a bit of a cipher for the reader, a way in to the story even if you don't really know what's going on (i.e. you haven't watched the series).

Definitely interested in watching the series now, and I think I'll pick this up in hardcopy for my collection.

[The Lost Dreamer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I loved the TV series and I always thought that it could keep going as a comic. Anyway, this story is far from que quality levels of most of the TV episodes. The best point of the post-apocalypse distopia after the "doll" technology goes out of control is that in the TV series we only get a glympse of how fucked up the world ends up being. Two episodes of that was more than enough to provide a perfect feeling of what the whole series was about. This story happens shortly after the first outbreak and, although Alpha was a sadly unexplored character, it lacks the emotion and freshness of the original. I found no interest at all in the story and the characters are pretty basic. After reading the Firefly comics, I expected so much more of these :(

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why read: Received for review

What impressed me: Epitaphs starts off after the Dollhouse TV series ended, managing to both continue the story as well as remind fans of what went down those last few episodes without rehashing ad nauseum. Fan favorites are easily recognizable, visually as well as through action and dialogue. Dollhouse was a constant build up towards its way too early conclusion and this first volume of Epitaphs gives more of the same - building up to something even bigger.

What disappointed me: Nothing.

Recommended: Dollhouse fans will love this continuation of the story, and it may just pick up new fans along the way.

Continue series: Yes, absolutely.

[Stephen Melvin · Rating 5 out of 5]

A couple of weeks ago, I was having a conversation with fellow Whedon scholar--name drop alert--Michael Starr about the Whedonverse comics. We both shared the same basic sentiment: Fray was excellent but what we've read of the continuations of Buffy and Angel were just so-so. In typical Starr fashion, he launched into an analysis of the difference in mediums, how television with its limited budgets could hamstring some of the more fantastic elements. Comic books do not share those limitations. Thus, we get Giantess Dawn, Twilight and ... Well, others would venture into territory that is spoliery. We both agreed that the print medium goes a little over-the-top.

That said, I am a huge fan of Dollhouse and am currently doing some scholarly work on the show. I ordered the comic continuation in order to get more insight. I expected again to be less-than-dazzled. I was wrong. Though many of the major players from the series are missing and others only show up towards the end, the narrative managed to keep the same tone as the series, or at least the "Epitaph" episodes.

It's not so much a "Season 3" as an in-between, filling in some of the gaps left between "The Hollow Men" and "Epitaphs Part 1 & 2." To say much more would be spoiling the story, but suffice to say we get the backstory of Meg and Zone as well as a deeper understanding of Alpha.

I know the show was far from a hit, and, sadly, it didn't evoke the fan rage that the cancellation of Firefly did. (Though the fear of a similar backlash as well as expectation of DVR views and DVD purchases gave us a second season. See Erin Giannini's Joss Whedon vs. the Corporation for a full account.) It's a shame we didn't get to see this play out on the television screen. Nonetheless, for those who wanted more of the scrappy, plucky anti-heroes vs. Rossum, there's enough here to temporarily wet one's whistle.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

{This review was originally published on Clear Eyes, Full Shelves.}

I adored the television series Dollhouse and was thrilled to learn that it's continuing in graphic novel form--unfortunately, this installment disappointed.

If you're not familiar with Dollhouse, the television show developed a cult following in 2009-2010 with it's captivating stories of an evil corporation that ran an underground network of "dollhouses" that allowed wealthy clients to rent people whose personalities had been wiped out and replaced with temporary personalities and skills. Basically, clients could order up anything they wanted from the menu. The show centered around one "Active" (what the people who's personalities had been wiped) named Echo, who remembers small amounts from each personality temporarily placed in her mind. This excellent Joss Whedon-lead show explored fascinating themes about identity and individuality and also had kickass scifi and action elements.

(Please note, this review contains spoilers for the TV show from this point forward, so if you don't want to be spoiled for the show, go hit up Netflix, get caught up on Dollhouse and come back to this review.)

The graphic novel series, published by Dark Horse, takes place before the two episodes of the show that are set after the two episodes (Epitaph 1 & 2) that follow the technology that creates the Dolls spreading like a virus, creating a legions of zombie-like people that can be controlled by Rossum Corporation. In this post-apocalyptic world, there are only a few survivors who are trying to save humanity.

Much of the action centers around Alpha, the seriously screwed up rogue Active who became obsessed with Echo in the television series. And therein lies my problem with this contribution to the series story.

I simply don't care about Alpha, he served his purpose in the series, but when I think "Dollhouse," I think "Echo."

While Echo does make an appearance in this graphic novel, she's only a minor mention until two-thirds of the way into the book, which means we're spending all of our time with other characters, including multiple Ivies (which is one of the more interesting elements, since in the television series Ivy's fate--if I recall correctly--was left ambiguous). Echo's character development addresses the core themes of the television show, so her absence takes away much of the magic from the original Dollhouse story.

Additionally, the artwork didn't rock my world.

It's the same artist as the Buffy comics, and the style is very recognizable if you've seen that television series continuation. It's like because the art is familiar to me that it didn't stand out, but I would have loved to have seen something with a bit more "wow."

What I did love, however, was the alternate art at the back of the book--it was fascinating seeing different artists' interpretations of the characters. You'd think that since they're based on real actors there wouldn't be loads of variation. However, while each was immediately recognizable, they were completely unique.

Ultimately, hardcore Dollhouse fans will likely enjoy this addition to the story. But, for people like me who really, really enjoyed the television show--particularly Echo--but aren't superfans, this installment will probably disappoint.

Verdict: Meh

Note: I received a copy of this book from Dark Horse Comics via Net Galley. No compensation or other "goodies" were received in exchange for my honest review.

[Beth Dawkins · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dollhouse was a T.V. show that ran for two seasons. It was actually set to be canceled after season one, but the fans raised hell, and season two came around. When the show originally aired I admit I didn’t watch it. Mostly because during that time my T.V. watching was limited to whatever my parents had on when I visited. Later I started watching the first season on Netflix, and then basically sacrificed a couple days for both seasons, yea, it was that good.

The comic starts after Echo takes down the Dollhouse, and the Rossum corp has used phones to erase everyone’s minds, and reprogramed them. If you have never heard of Dollhouse, then you should think about watching it, in the meantime I will give you the basics. A Dollhouse was a place where they would take people and wipe their brains, they kind of agreed to this. They would then input personalities into these same people and pimp them out to very wealthy people, or send them on hardcore missions. Echo and Alpha were exceptions, sort of, but you are going to have to watch the show to know more about that.

The comic starts out with Alpha and Ivy. Ivy isn’t actually there. She has made copies of her personality when Rossum created apocalypse on earth. This means that everyone who picked up the phone is running around killing for no apparent reason. There are a few exceptions, and those people are making tech to send out signals to wipe anyone who isn’t dead or already nuts. Alpha and Ivy meet Trevor, a kid, who Alpha tweaks to upload skills into his mind. The story also surrounds Mag, Zone and Griff. For them they have no idea what has happened, the world has just kind of fell apart.

The artwork looks a great deal like the actual characters in the show. I was delighted and surprised by this. I really enjoyed it, but I don’t know how much more I will read ARC digital scans, because the quality was awful. I wouldn’t have been upset with a little blurry, but the words were hard to read.

As for the story and characters, it took me a little while to get back into the Dollhouse mode. It has been a while since I watched the show. I think the idea that a signal could kill out your personality is pretty wild, and really awesome. As with the show it is pretty mind blowing. The fact that Alpha, who is not the sanest character, is one of the main guys is also pretty cool. I did feel like some of the dialogue was a little stiff, or too predictable. I wanted to feel more tension, especially after watching the show. It has its flaws, but it is thought provoking which for me is a pretty important.

I think I wanted to like it a lot more than what I did, or maybe I just wanted a bigger build up at the end. The beginning was very emotional, and this seems to fade out once Echo makes her appearance. It shouldn’t have, but it felt a little predictable when she showed up. This killed a lot of the buildup. I am hoping for a second volume to find out where the story goes!

[David Caldwell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This graphic novel collects the Dollhouse 1-shot and issues 1-5 of the Dollhouse series.

The story is set after Echo has made it out of the Dollhouse. The technology used to create dolls has been fully weaponized. A signal can be sent over phones to make a person either blank slate doll or a murderous killing machine. Most of the people who become blank slates are killed very quickly by the butchers. Ivy manages to download herself to help some of the lucky few who didn't answer their phones. Alpha teams up with some of the Ivy downloads to try and build an army to stop Rossum and its apocalypse. But first they need to find Echo who has gone missing.

This is the story of the Dollhouse series taken to its next level. Rossum has escalated it's plan to take over the world. Only a few survivors stand its way of completing recreating the planet in its own twisted dystopian society.

Darkhorse comics has a fairly well established partnership with Joss Whedon in turning his TV shows into ongoing comic book series. Usually the story do a good job of expanding the shows mythos. The artists have the challenge of trying to take well-known actors(especially to their fans) and recreate their likenesses over and over in many varied situations with limited space and time to do it. Truthfully I usually find their work passable but not great. Covers are usually awesome but interiors tend to lack fine detail so at times you have to rely on dialogue to recognize your favorite characters. With Dollhouse Epitaphs, that is not the case. The artwork has been kicked up several notches with most of the pictures being easily recognizable as the actors who protrayed them. Not 100%, but better than a lot of the Buffy comics.

I would definitely recommend this to any fan of the Dollhouse series. This is the direction the show was going as anyone who has seen the DVD collection of the show will know. It might not appeal to people who are unfamiliar with the show as they will not have a lot of the background on the characters.

[Ithlilian · Rating 1 out of 5]

I hate to slap this rating out there with everyone else's but...I could barely force myself to finish this. I enjoyed the show, Joss Whedon is great, but this lacked substance. I felt disconnected from the characters, like it was an idea: brainwash people via a phone call, and then it was just let's force "dialogue" to explain that idea. They tried to explore the looks versus personality thing, the killing beings that used to be people is bad thing, and the Alpha multiple personalities thing but it was all extremely flat. To me it just wasn't well written and there wasn't enough to drag this over the pages and pages that it had.

[Christine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yes, please. I miss this show and the 5 year gap between the actual show of the LA Dollhouse and the last episode where the 'Apocalypse' has already happened definitely needs to be filled in. (At least, I think it's a 5 year gap. It might be more or less, can't quite remember.) Also, seeing Alan Tudyk's character Alpha argue with himself was both terrifying and fascinating. That needs to happen more.

Looking forward to the next volume!

[Jim · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really liked the television series, especially the first year, but I really didn't like this effort, neither the art or the story. Disappointed.

[Shawn · Rating 1 out of 5]

Absolutely disappointing. Very boring.

[Christopher · Rating 4 out of 5]

great start to the epitaph series, though the book could use some explanation for Rossum's motivation.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great look at the start of the apocalypse. A must read for anyone who enjoyed the show.

[Bean · Rating 2 out of 5]

Deep Whedonverse fan, here.

Hard disappointment with this, and I'm starting to feel disillusioned with trying any more Whedonverse comics, because I thought the Buffy continuation was a bizarre tailspin of a story and was also deeply disappointed by it.

The artwork :

It was more than disappointing. It was weird, actually. The cover art, as well as included alternative cover art proposals, were beautiful and really felt true to image for the actors represented. Then, in the actual panels, the characters were drawn in such a bland way as to be unrecognizable or interchangeable. Seriously, there were many panels when I had no idea if I was supposed to be looking at Zone or Alpha. It was disruptive to my reading to keep getting confused about this. Paul Ballard bore almost no resemblance to Tahmoh Penikett, which is odd considering the guy has pretty distinctive facial features. Mag as well did not look like the actress in the slightest, except... the red hair? I guess?

The characters:

Flat. Pretty flat. They have a 13 year-old boy murder whole crowds of people and like, apparently it's no big deal or something. Whoever wrote the comic tried to put words into his mouth occasionally to express that he's upset, but it doesn't feel organic, it feels 2D.

Echo is an extremely strong pillar of Dollhouse as a whole, and it's annoying to only feature her for like, the last 15 pages. Seriously. Echo/Caroline/Eliza Dushku was a large aspect of what always made Dollhouse compelling, and she is just shoe-horned in at the end? So disappointing.

Not enough time spent developing Mag and Zone - great potential, and yet another letdown.

On that note, why no exploration of Adele? Victor? Sierra? Topher? Especially Adele and Topher! Again, those actors/characters were major reasons for the show to be as compelling as it was, and we don't even get some measly flashbacks, at least?

Last point about the characters: this is a hot take, but the whole Alpha character development thing? Nope. I don't buy it. I think it always was a weak, opportunistic bit of writing, trying to paint this sensationalistic multiple personality character who's valiantly fighting to be good. It sort of worked in the show because the whole point was that, at his core, Alpha was originally a serial killer with low empathy for others, and his composite event fractured him (whereas Echo makes this cohesive, harmonic whole). The show (until the epitaph episodes) kept him true to his serial killer core. Making a redemption arc for him just tries to stretch my suspension of disbelief past breaking point.

On the concepts:

What always drew me to Dollhouse, the show, was the psychological and philosophical musing that was always central to its episodes. What is freedom? What does it mean to be free or not free? How do people in an inherently unethical position rationalize to themselves that they are doing ethical acts? What is the self? Who are we if our self can be removed? If we have no memories left, is that person dead? What are the ways in which exploitation are obvious, and what are the more subtle forms of exploitation? Many Dollhouse episodes explore these concepts elegantly and beautifully! (Gray Hour, Man On the Street, Echoes, Needs, Spy In the House of Love, Briar Rose, Omega, Belonging, Stop-Loss).

This comic just doesn't do much to explore the concepts any further. It's mostly just a lame apocalypse-zombie comic. The mindless zombies are coming! Shoot them with your rifles! The end.

The one interesting moment was when the writers explore the concept of, if there are multiple Ivy imprints, how eventually these will diverge to become multiple different people. That was cool! But it lasted for all of half a page, whereas the puerile teen boy jokes about different Ivys banging, somehow lasted for pages and pages.

I think what the comics should have done was not fill the gaps between Epitaphs One and Two, but flesh out the show as it should have been, BEFORE all the apocalypse stuff. We all know Dollhouse absolutely RACED to the end before it was ready. Season 2 especially, but even Season 1 was too rushed. Honestly, it is such a disappointment for yet another Whedon opus to have such brilliant potential and yet crash and burn. Comics would have been a great way to rectify this, and yet. Another wasted opportunity.

[Michael Helm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Epitaphs Comic
This is a 6 part series put together in 1 volume a year or so after the series ended.
Yes, I count 6 distinct sections, not 5. It looks like it was not continued as a comic series beyond this point.

Since I'm not familiar with the series yet (just sampled episode) I am not sure about the details of the comic's relationship to the series. One of the main stars, Echo, doesn't appear until the last episode altho she's on the cover. Alpha, a bad guy in the series, is conflicted and is struggling to be a good guy. Other people not sure. The young boy Trevor is a new intro, I think.

The premise is that sometime after the events of the series, Rossum, the company in charge of the Dollhouse project, finds a way to download some kind of programming code thru audio on people's phones (& later thru other devices). This causes masses of people to turn into some kind of manic zombies and terror breaks out everywhere. Mass killings, destruction, apocalypse, &c. Should be contemporary with date I am writing this! This is the opening page or so of the story. Functionally I believe it is sometime after the conclusion of the tv series, but not long. The story follows various survivors of this apocalypse, many of whom were important characters in the tv series.

Interesting - Fiona Staples of Saga did some drawings of Ivy, included at the end. Would've been great, it's too bad she didn't get the contract. The comic just lacks something in its drawing at times … it needed something better. A lot of times, the people are a bit purple, other times they are in warmer colors.... I wonder what is going on there.

The story is interesting but the best features of it aren't developed. It was clearly architected for a continuing series that didn't get continued, where this development could've taken place. There is some interesting character development going on with Alpha, Trevor, and to some extent the multiple Ivys (this needed a lot more issues to really get into).

People are purplish…. that is nagging at me.
I haven't seen the other Whedon-based comics so I can't compare them at this time - from other reading they are stylistically close.

[47Time · Rating 3 out of 5]

These people worry more about having sex with others having their own identities, than survival. 'Look, I'm playing with myself. But is it moral to do so? It feels so good!' If the imprinting - some sort personality overwrite - is done so easily via sound, why don't the infected just use loudspeakers everywhere? No, they carry around these handheld devices they build from scraps, so the range is short and the good guys at least have a chance. That's like Jedi not using the Force during duels because swinging a stick is so difficult to do. It doesn't make sense to me.

Dolls were created to provide people with companionship. The dolls are regular people (and hot), but with their minds overwritten. When the tech went viral, they turned into killers and started infecting everyone around them. A doll with multiple personalities named Alpha recruits 13-year-old Trevor to lead a war against Rossum Corp that created the technology.

The story is a pretty solid survival tale, not unlike the zombie-fest that still seems popular for some reason. The infected are still resilient, but at least they have some directives that sound cool. The survivors must band together to make it and their odds are slim, but they make it from one small victory to the next. Nothing special.

[Gbolahan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was better than I expected. Occasionally seeing Tudyk's face drawn out, smiling sardonically, hearing his voice in my head, pitying Alpha, this was much better than I expected. Heartfelt, funny, violent (without too much gore, just the way I like it) and canon. I didn't watch season 2 of the TV show though, however this was easy to follow from the end of season 1 where I left off like...10 years ago? Damn, it's been so long. I have even forgotten what Echo looks like, the face that keeps coming to my mind is Summer Glau's Cameron in the Sarah Connor Chronicles.

New characters brought in, old characters doing their cameos, Alpha's eternal struggle, this was very well done. Let's see if they have more hidden somewhere.

[Brendan Diamond · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. Filling in a small piece of the puzzle that bridges the end of Dollhouse proper and the two "Epitaph" episodes, this graphic novella captures the tone and tenor of what I've long argued is Joss Whedon's most thought-provoking work without sacrificing the show's integrity to the far more malleable medium of the comic book. Epitaphs would have made an excellent two-part episode, and it's a worthy heir to a phenomenal series.

[Sharlene · Rating 4 out of 5]

I stumbled upon this while browsing the library's comic catalogue. It's been some years since I've seen the TV series and it was fun re-entering the world of Alpha and Ivy and Echo. Apparently this comic is takes place after the series and before the "Epitaphs" episode. The Active tech is going viral.
Great illustrations. I loved how the characters look just like the actors! Good storyline too. Makes me want a rewatch

[Hung · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 Stars rounded up.

These Dollhouse comics are not as good as the Firefly comics.

In this mini series, we follow (the now good guy) Alpha and his mini army trying to link up with Echo and other survivors to fight back against Rossum.

It has been a long time since I saw the TV series. I can't even recall why Rossum brought about this apocalypse. Regardless, it was good to hang out with Alpha, Mag, Paul Ballard and Echo.

[Sean · Rating 2 out of 5]

So, evil corporations being evil is a tried a nd true troupe in fiction. Here, Rossum is up to evil and its goal is to...yeah, doesn't make sense. And you have two stories playing out separately but get intertwined for a moment because...yeah, not sure. Echo is the biggest draw to Dollhouse and she barely makes an appearance. This book was an odd vehicle. Not sure what the plan was here but it didn't work.

[Katie Kaste · Rating 4 out of 5]

The survivors of the Rossum personality takeover are coming together in this graphic novel. The characters you know and love make appearances but aren't the main characters. I did enjoy this expansion of the Epitaphs from the TV show, but there was nothing new or life-changing in this graphic novel. I enjoyed it and will probably continue catching up on the Wheadonverse comics I can track down.

[Lilli W. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sad there was no Topher Brink or Adelle DeWitt or Dominic Lawrence or Victor or Sierra, but it was cool seeing more of Alpha. It was very disappointing we couldn't see his redemption arc on the show, but there's enough context to understand what happened. The multiple Ivies were pretty interesting too. I liked how this series gave character insight into Zone's actions in Epitaph Two. Decent art, good continuation that fills in the gaps between the end of the series and the Epitaphs.

[Josh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decent follow-up to the cancelled-too-soon TV series. Epitaphs works as a standalone comic also, but it resembles a generic zombie book from that perspective. Covers are accurate to the actors from the series and the interior art is fine, if nothing to write home about. Worth a read for fans of the often overlooked show.