If you are like me, you stayed up late Friday night just to catch Act 3 of Doctor Horrible, even though you needed to be up at 5AM to watch F1 in Germany. Chances are that there are more of you that stayed up late and couldn't give two shakes about a car race at Hockenheim, but either way, we've come to the end of Joss Whedon's great experiment. It seemed like a good idea to get a post up and see what everybody thought. A lot of it was what I expected based simply on the players involved. It stood to reason that there would be some good yucks, a bit of a twist, and since this is Joss Whedon, even...
...one of the main characters getting knocked off. Joss does like to kill people, after all.
While a lot of it felt very comfortable to fans of Whedon, there was one thing that surprised me. Obviously we all knew going in that it was going to be a musical, and having watched "Once More With Feeling" more than a few times, I knew it was in Whedon's bag of tricks. But the music and the songs were even better than I expected.
The part that stands out to me the most is the opening to Act 2 with Dr. Horrible and Penny singing separate lyrics on top of each other. It's interesting, but as the two sets of lyrics start to merge, your ears perk up. What the deuce? And when it all comes together, it's a whole other level of cool. It's a musical theater thing that's hard to pull off, and it exceeded the expectations I had going into the show. Well done, all around.
As to the bigger story, I really liked it. Even the killing of Penny, as it sets up what one can hope will be the next chapter as we see just how that plays out for Dr. Horrible. All three of the leads were great, with Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion really nailing their parts. Nathan Fillion just has charisma by the bucketful. Even when he is playing a complete jackass, and he was committed to being that jackass, he's still likable.
The show also served as one big easter egg for Whedon fans. It was chock-a-block with people from the family. He managed to get the likes of David Fury, Marti Noxon, and Drew Goddard, among others, up on screen for us. Heck, it even had costumes from Angel and Firefly's Shawna Trpcic. You can look forward to next seeing her work on Dollhouse, by the way.
At the end of the day, I find that I can only muster one complaint for Dr. Horrible. Who hires Liz Vassey and only puts her on screen for three seconds? Crazy people, that's who (I love Liz Vassey because she was in Maximum Bob). Here's hoping that we get to see more of Fury Leika in Dr. Horrible Two. Other than that, it was a smashing success.
Today is the last chance to see all three acts for free. Just click here and enjoy.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
7-19-2008 @ 1:45PM
mj said...
My son just sent me the link to it. I was totally blown away. I knew right away it was Joss's, just from the way it played. Wow. This was so fantastic!!! I guess you can tell, I loved it. More, more, more!!!
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7-19-2008 @ 2:01PM
fred said...
Yes, it was awesome!
Not that I ever doubted it, but that was really really cool, I just love it! Everybody was absolutely perfect, the songs were really great and catchy, the 2 first acts were totally hilarious, and NPH is the man.
Now I can't wait for the DVD packed with extras ! Meanwhile, I'll go watch it one more time...
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7-19-2008 @ 2:16PM
Gabi said...
I absolutley loved Dr Horrible. It had everything I could have wished for, great songs and musiv, perfect actors that completley understood what Joss was gonig for, and well, great script. And, wow, I just love Josh so much more right now, more than I even thought was possible. I am so hoping for a second DR H, and it was a great ending for that possibility too.
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7-19-2008 @ 2:17PM
Argent said...
hey, i'm not the only one who gets up early to watch F1? :)
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7-19-2008 @ 2:18PM
Claire said...
I really wasn't surprised by Penny's death. Joss loves to kill off major characters (Wash!) and leave his other characters heartbroken (just about everyone he's written). Who else loves the fact that Bad Horse is an actual horse?
Is there actually going to be a sequel or is that just wishful thinking?
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7-19-2008 @ 2:36PM
Dorv said...
I hate Joss for killing his characters... Forget Wash, I've never forgiven him for Tara, Anya, and Fred.
Was I the only one that, while thinking all three episodes were great, they peaked in the first?
7-19-2008 @ 2:39PM
Dorv said...
I hate Joss for killing his characters... Forget Wash, I've never forgiven him for Tara, Anya, and Fred.
Was I the only one that, while thinking all three episodes were great, they peaked in the first?
7-19-2008 @ 3:00PM
Claire said...
oh i agree part one was the best, and i still pretend like Fred didn't die. i'm just saying it wasn't surprising to me since he does it all the time.
7-19-2008 @ 3:48PM
fred said...
Well I think it's a great thing, that he kills them! Not that I always like it, far from it, but it makes everything just so much better than the usual boring happy endings where everybody lives happily ever after... always.
The simple fact that Dr Horrible doesn't have such an happy ending, that Penny died (still believing in Captain Hammer), makes the ending so much better than anything that could have been done otherwise...
7-19-2008 @ 2:57PM
StillBash said...
I have to extend my gratitude to all you folks who, after that long discussion about Top Chef's final episode and the spoilers, manage to now put all spoiler material AFTER the jump consistently. Much gratitude for that!
And also yay for mentioning Hockenheim :-) *waves his little Germany flag left over from the European Soccer Cup*
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7-19-2008 @ 3:06PM
Monkeydog said...
The internet needs more of things like this.
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7-19-2008 @ 3:10PM
Brad said...
I thought it was absolutely great, and yeah, it's not really shocking to see her die off, I knew as soon as the Doctor said there isn't going to be a happy ending for him, you knew her outcome.
The only thing that I still can't figure out is the final seconds, where he is back in front of his webcam in normal clothes. It makes me think that I am missing some like the events didn't happen, but I just can't figure it out. If anybody has any thoughts on that, I would love to hear them.
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7-19-2008 @ 3:17PM
0megapart!cle said...
The great thing about Joss' work is that you don't get a cut and dry conclusion, most of the time. I think that was going back to showing that under the veneer of the badass evildoer, there was still Billy underneath, and Billy was broken.
7-19-2008 @ 3:15PM
0megapart!cle said...
OhmygawdohmygawdohmygawdIwanttohaveyourchildjosswhedonohmygawd
Uh, ehm...
Now that that's over with, I think I can speak a little more coherently. That was so unbelievably awesome. I so want to see an Act IV. Please Joss! I know you are kinda busy, but can't you get your people together and make one more part.
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7-19-2008 @ 3:28PM
Midnight13 said...
Simply put, this was amazing. Joss put out this little film which celebrated everything he seems to encompass. Twisted humor, the desire for love, the heartbreak of loss, and of course it was a celebration of all the writers who work hard on all the shows. I couldn't stop laughing. And oh I completely agree with you Brett. Liz Vassey was on screen for three seconds and she didn't even get to sing? Great seeing her never the less. Great job Whedon!
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7-19-2008 @ 4:08PM
Blair Mitchelmore said...
I knew Joss would kill Penny, because he loves destroying love. Although, I really thought he'd come back with a coda of the freeze ray song ("With my freeze ray I will stop the pain") at the end and end the story with Dr Horrible having frozen her while trying to heal her and bring her back, thus opening up subsequent stories.
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7-19-2008 @ 5:04PM
Doug Nelson said...
It was mildly amusing. But if this exact series had been made by people no one had heard of, the reaction then would have been a deafening "meh".
It just reinforces the modern concept of entertainment where who you are matters more than what you do.
It actually made me like "Once More With Feeling" a little less, which is sad because it's my favorite episode of any series, ever.
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7-21-2008 @ 1:47PM
Bill said...
The word you are looking for is Branding and there's no use trying to imagine a world without it.
7-19-2008 @ 5:16PM
Nicolas Graf said...
even though you needed to be up at 5AM to watch F1 in Germany.
For me it was the other way round, I got up at 6AM German time just to watch Dr. Horrible ASAP ;)
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7-19-2008 @ 5:23PM
Jimmy Rogers said...
check out http://masontechbeat.blogspot.com for complete analysis of all 3 acts.
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