What I’m Watching: Doll and Em (Season Finale)

Doll and Em: Season 2, Episode 6 (B+)

Looking back at my review of the season one finale of this show from a year and a half ago, I noted that I closed it by saying that I wouldn’t fight for this show to be renewed. I feel very differently now, since I believe that this season evolved to a new level, giving Doll and Em something to do aside from quibble awkwardly about their roles in each other’s lives. Casting Evan Rachel Wood and Olivia Wilde as versions of themselves playing the characters in their play was brilliant, and having Ewan McGregor pop by to play himself and possibly impregnate Dolly was also superb. This finale was great because it featured so much, including both mothers coming into town to jab each other about accommodations on the flight and support their daughters. Evan and Olivia quitting after seeing the angry draft Em wrote was a fateful event, highlighted by Doll and Em’s reluctant acceptance of Olivia’s harsh question about whether it would be an appropriate time to call them that dreaded four-letter word, and it led to what was inevitable and so fitting from the start: Doll and Em playing the parts that they wrote which they constantly argued weren’t their real selves. Fortunately, the show was a resounding hit, and it’s nice to see a happy ending. I’m not sure if this show will be back, and who knows when, but I would be pleased to see more of it since it was a unique and enjoyable delight this year, not so substantially greater than the first but eye-opening and entertaining in a very different and refreshing way.

Season grade: B+
Season MVP: Dolly Wells