Thanks to the power of Twitter, it became clear the Fox is bringing the axe down on Dollhouse. No one should be surprised. Dollhouse consistently underperformed in the ratings and was a constant burr in the saddle of Fox executives who had no idea what to do with Wheadon’s prostitute Sci-fi action show. Though the show has been notoriously uneven, there are moments when brilliance shine through. This week was the epitome of that unevenness.

Its clear that there is a spy inside the Dollhouse. To make matters worse, Mrs Dewitt is on vacation and completely out of pocket. This leaves the overly aggressive Lawrence in charge. Eventually Topher decides to send in the actives as support. He implants Sierra with a super spy’s profile and sends her into the NSA to try to find out who is behind the sabotage.

Agent Ballard has been obsessing over the Dollhouse to the point of near madness. Suddenly, his girlfriend/ active November reappears and tells him that she is indeed an active and that someone on the inside has programed her to spill the beans to him. Thought he now knows that “Millie” is an active, he can’t let on or else the Dollhouse will kill him. Its an interesting turn for a character who has been almost useless up until this point.

Now with Sierra posing as an NSA agent (apparently all asian-ish girls look alike) she breaks in and discovers who the mole is. Unfortunately, she’s captured and it looks like the Dollhouse may have lost an active permanently. In the Dollhouse world though, the NSA isn’t badass enough to keep the actives in check and she’s eventually returned safely to her pine box.

While all of the chaos is raining down on the Dollhouse we finally see where Dewitt is. She has been having Victor come to her programmed as a lover. Its a silly moment, Dewitt is emoting about her role as head of the Dollhouse to one of the Dolls. She even goes so far as to break down and sob. Its all very un-ice queen of her.

Now with Sierra out of the picture, Topher decides to imprint Echo, at her request, with his super spy mojo. After questioning everyone, Echo finally deduces who the real spy is. Its Laurence the super aggro security expert. He’s been working as a mole for the NSA. The NSA is interested in turning the Dollhouse toward their own clandestine spy operations. After a tense scuffle with Echo, Laurence is captured. Dewitt decides that she’s going to put him in the dreaded attic and for the first time, we get to see what that is. It isn’t pretty. Laurence struggles and fights even getting getting access to a gun and shooting DeWitt in the process. Despite the struggles, Laurence is wiped and his body hauled away into storage.

Dewitt promotes Boyd as her new chief of security, severing his ties with Echo. Interestingly, Echo seems to be regaining elements of her free will. And though she is bonded with a new handler, it is clearly with some hesitancy.

A good episode over all, it was a genuine surprise to have Laurence as the culpret. Though I thought his undoing was somewhat anticlimactic, it still was cathartic to see him wiped and boxed. The whole Sierra breaking into the NSA scene (not to mention her escape) was absolute rubbish; but Echo’s involvement in the takedown and Ballard’s betrayal where more entertaining than I would’ve guessed. Sadly, with the end in sight we can only hope the network hatchet men give us a proper finish to the series.