REGULAR CAST

• Eliza Dushku as Echo
• Harry Lennix as Boyd Langton
• Fran Kranz as Topher Brink
• Tahmon Penikett as Paul Ballard
• Enver Gjokaj as Victor
• Dichen Lachman as Sierra
• Olivia Williams as Adele DeWitt

GUEST CAST

• Amy Acker as ‘Dr. Claire Saunders’ / Whiskey
• Ryan Alosio as Lars
• Angel Desai as Sophie Alvarez
• Ashley Johnson as Wendy
• Miracle Laurie as November / ‘Mellie’
• Marco Sanchez as Blevins
• Mark A. Shepherd as Agent Graham Tanaka
• Alan Tudyk as Alpha

CO-STARRING

• Natalie Graziano as Attendant
• Natalie Avital as Nina Walsh
• Joe Howard as Old Doctor Saunders

SYNOPSIS

After Alpha abducts Echo, the Dollhouse plunges into crisis. Adelle orders a full lockdown, security sweeps, and a headcount of all personnel. Victor, brutally wounded by Alpha, receives urgent medical attention. Dr. Saunders, visibly shaken, confirms that Alpha came specifically for Echo.

Topher reports that Echo has been wiped from their systems – her GPS tag forcibly removed, her vitals unreadable, and her imprints stolen. Adelle demands to know what Echo has been imprinted with, but Topher admits he has no way of knowing.

Meanwhile, Alpha and Echo speed down a freeway, Echo blissfully unaware of her situation. She thanks Alpha for her new clothes, kissing him, but grows annoyed when she realizes she left a shirt behind. Her irritation mounts, even as she blames the store clerk – who is bound and gagged in the back seat. Alpha reassures her before refocusing on their escape.

A flashback reveals Alpha’s descent into madness. On an engagement, he interrogates a beaten man, accusing him of tracking his movements. The client, terrified, reveals that Alpha and Whiskey (Dr. Saunders) were hired for entertainment, their relationship manufactured. Furious, Alpha asserts that Whiskey is real. When reinforcements arrive, Whiskey turns violent, but both are quickly subdued and returned to the Dollhouse.

In the present, Adelle reveals to Ballard that Alpha had been posing as Stephen Kepler – the real Kepler was murdered days earlier. She explains that Alpha was once an active, an anomaly who spiralled beyond control. Ballard argues that the Dollhouse created a killer, but Adelle counters that Ballard brought him inside, making him responsible for Echo’s abduction.

Alpha sets up a brutal experiment – strapping the store clerk, Wendy, into an imprinting chair and transferring Caroline’s consciousness into her. Wendy awakens, disoriented. Alpha greets her, “Hello, Caroline.” She quickly realizes she isn’t in her own body and panics. Alpha insists that Echo must evolve beyond Caroline, shedding her past identity. Echo agrees, declaring that she wants to be a superior creature. Alpha is pleased – Echo is ready to kill Caroline.

Flashbacks reveal Alpha’s fixation on Echo – his belief that she should be number one among actives. To clear the path, he viciously slashed Whiskey’s face. When handlers restrained him and sent him for treatment, the chair malfunctioned, implanting every imprint Alpha had ever received into his brain at once. Forty-eight personalities. One mind.

Now, in the present, Alpha forces Echo into the chair. Her mind floods with every imprint she’s ever had. When she wakes, she lifts a pipe, ready to kill Caroline – but instead, she swings at Alpha, striking him in the head. “Now I understand everything.”

Ballard and Boyd investigate Alpha’s past. His real name: Carl William Craft, a convicted kidnapper and attempted murderer. They visit his victim, Anita Walsh, who answers the door with a face covered in scars identical to Whiskey’s. Meanwhile, Echo and Alpha clash – Echo realizes she is everyone but also no one. Alpha calls them gods. She calls them empty. Their brutal fight escalates.

Caroline insists she must be returned to her own body. Echo counters that all her personalities agree – this is slavery. Caroline prepares to be restored, but Alpha fires a gun, killing her instantly. He holds the wedge containing Caroline’s imprint hostage, threatening to destroy it.

Topher, searching for clues, identifies an old Whiskey imprint used on Echo. Meanwhile, Alpha rants to Echo about imprinting random girls, only to kill them horrifically. Echo challenges him, realizing he hurt Whiskey because of her. Alpha threatens Caroline’s wedge. Echo dares him to destroy it – because either way, they will come for him.

Alpha shoots Echo in the shoulder and flees. Echo pursues him through an industrial power plant. Ballard and Boyd arrive as Alpha fires at them. Echo chases him onto a metal beam where he taunts her with the wedge, throwing it away. She scrambles to catch it – it slips, falling below. Ballard catches it just in time.

In the Dollhouse, Dr. Saunders confronts Topher, realizing she isn’t truly a doctor – she is a broken doll, imprinted with false expertise. When Topher asks if she wants to know who she was before, she declines. She knows who she is now.

With Alpha on the run, Adelle accepts Ballard’s offer – he will work for the Dollhouse in exchange for Mellie’s freedom. Mellie, now Madeline, signs her release papers, unaware of what she once was.

Echo is wiped. As the dolls prepare for sleep, she quietly says: “Caroline.”

TRIVIA

CONTINUITY