Whiskey’s White Gown from Dollhouse, Epitaph One

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So I did a Dollhouse-themed yoga getup earlier this year during Season 1, at which point I was enjoying it well enough to keep going, but maybe a little dubious, and I still liked Firefly better. As the season progressed, though, it kept getting better and better, ending with the unbroadcasted episode Epitaph One, a depressing preview of the Dollverse’s future. Now we’ve seen where the show is going, I’m dreadfully curious to find out just how it’s going to get there; luckily Fox renewed the show – unexpectedly, I should add – and the second season started yesterday, although I’ll be watching on Hulu tonight (yep, I’m one of those coveted new media viewers).

Epitaph One had Whiskey wearing this dress, although I hope it’s not too much of a spoiler to say that the hem really ought to be blood stained and I couldn’t quite bring myself to do it tonight. So far I’ve really liked the costumes for Dollhouse – I bet it’s got to be fun picking out what to wear for all the different assignments. (There’s a sort of meta-costuming aspect to it, too, as we’ve seen a huge costume warehouse in the Dollhouse itself. I would guess that there is some sort of costume director position in the Dollhouse, as I somehow can’t see Boyd picking out those crocheted thigh-highs for Echo…)

So, it’s the 26th, let’s talk Halloween. Like I did last year, I want to do a month’s worth of Halloween costumes. I really like the idea of four “themes,” a new one for each week, and I got a lot of great suggestions, so now I’m putting it up to a vote! This is just for what I’ll do for the first week, so feel free to give me more suggestions for weeks 2-4.

By the way, no one has guessed my favorite Prismacolor yet…

Red Tank Top and Gray Yoga Pants Inspired By Echo in Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse

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So Brian and I watched Firefly and Serenity earlier this year, and I completely fell in love with the show. I haven’t yet seen any of Buffy or Dr. Horrible, but when I heard about Dollhouse I decided that this time I wouldn’t let Joss Whedon’s next potential hit pass me by, and I’ve been watching it on Hulu. I watched the first episode with Brian, and the next few on my own (my husband having bailed muttering jokes about “quantum leap with spas” and so on). Just as the hype had it, the second episode was better than the first, the overall beginning was kind of weak and episode six was tons of fun. The show is about an organization (the Dollhouse of the title) that removes the memories and personalities from their “volunteers” and hires them out as perfect human beings implanted with the personality and skills necessary for whatever job the client wants. In between jobs, the “dolls” are returned to a childlike state (one poster on the Whedonesque blog noted that they sounded a lot like lolcats — I has a book! — and I wish I could unread that because now I can’t not crack up at some lines) and spend the days in comfy clothes, doing yoga and eating lettuce. I’ve liked the subtle costuming so far, even if there aren’t the opportunities for fantasy like there were with Firefly.

I think Topher’s rather put-upon assistant Ivy is going to end up being the programmer Topher talked about in, I think, episode four — Topher seems to think that his rival Yuma Takahashi is definitely a guy, and rejects the idea that whoever disrupted the programming could be a girl when his assistant suggests it, but Yuma is a suggestive sort of name. “Yuma” seems girly to me, and there’s at least one actress with the name, but “Yuuma” seems more like a guy’s name; I wouldn’t expect Topher to know the difference. (The captions had it as “Yuma,” but that doesn’t signify much, I think.) Anyways, that’s my contribution to the rampant speculation, and I hope I’m right because I look forward to her smacking him down at some point. (For some reason I can so see a bewildered Topher with a line like “I thought all their names ended in ‘ko’?” A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.) For her to be the person who contacted Ballard seems like it might be too obvious, though.

Edit, April 6 – on rewatching Grey Hour, Topher says, I think, “Yumio” while the subtitles say “Yuma.” Yumio being a pretty manly name, I’m not so attached to my theory as I once was!

Six’s Red Dress from the Battlestar Galactica Miniseries

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Actually, I’m not a huge Battlestar Galactica fan, but my husband goes nuts over it. We watched the miniseries together, and I was glad I saw it, but there’s only so much bleakness I can take in my entertainment. Ever since then, we have this pattern where I look at his laptop screen or the TV and ask “What’s going on now?” or “Have they all killed each other yet?” or “Has that Gaius got what’s coming to him yet?” and he will explain it to me, and about half of it will go over my head and the rest of it allows me to form an understanding of the fragments I watch. I follow along enough to know what’s going on, but not quite enough to care, I’m afraid. But I do love this dress that Six wears, especially showcased in this takeoff of the Last Supper.

Brian wants me to do the Viper pilot uniform (the one on the left), and I will by and by to please him, but I’m feeling lazy tonight so just a simple red dress. If you are cutting this out, I put hopeful little tabs on the dress straps, but I think I would recommend you remove them altogether and treat the dress as strapless.

Inara Serra’s Red Satin Gown with Gold Girdle from The Train Job episode of Firefly

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As I noted earlier, Brian and I have been watching Firefly (and we just finished the full series plus the movie, so spoil away if you feel the need). I enjoyed it a lot, although I felt that some of the later episodes were rather weak and that the first five minutes of the movie changed a lot of my perception of the whole first season, which is a kind of jarring way to start out a movie. Brian had to pause while I was going “Wait… what?” In general I loved the dialogue and the characters, but the thing that really hooked me was Inara Serra’s costumes. Inara is a Companion, a sort of futuristic geisha or courtesan, and her clothes are amazing. She wears mostly warm colors (lots of reds and golds) and sumptuous fabrics and has this great style, sort of a mashup of Asian and Indian influences with a big dose of 1930s starlet. I want to paperdoll just about everything she wears! Look at this page with her outfits. Brian and I watched the Dollhouse pilot and weren’t all that impressed, but even if the next few episodes aren’t all that great I’ll probably keep watching just because Shawna Trpcic, the same costume designer that did Firefly, worked on Dollhouse as well. (So far most of the costumes are centered around yoga pants, but that tiny white dress Echo wore to the guy’s birthday party was smashing, even if she probably had to tape it to her thighs.)

I’m afraid the banding looks horrible on this one, and the color isn’t all that great either — the real thing is really pretty, if I do say so myself, and the scanned version is a pale imitation. I’ve been putting off the search for a new scanner, but it looks like I’d better get started. If anyone has any suggestions, I’d appreciate them!

Kaylee’s Pink Shindig Dress from Firefly

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Happy Valentine’s Day, paperdoll fans, and you’ve got to admit that even if it looks like it was bought in a store, this is a delightful Valentine’s dress. Brian and I have been into watching Firefly lately, and we’re almost through the series. (So please don’t spoil anything from the movie or the last few episodes just yet; I know River Tam beats up everyone but I don’t want to know any more.) Kaylee, the ship’s mechanic, falls in love with this dress and gets to wear it to a party. In this very same episode Inara wears what may be the most gorgeous dress ever, but there’s just something about this dress that’s so very Kaylee, and probably instantly recognizable to every Firefly fan.

Don’t be surprised if you see an Inara outfit here too, or two or twenty, because I swear every episode she wears something new that just bowls me over… but for now it’s all about the layer cake dress. Until I revisit the ‘verse, then, do enjoy these Firefly paper dolls. Holly also did two Kaylee outfits for one of her dolls, which you can find here and here. Thanks also to Can’t Take The Sky, a Firefly fan site with great screen captures.

Sarah Palin’s Pink Jacket and Grey Pencil Skirt from the Katie Couric interview

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There has been a good deal of interest in Sarah Palin paper dolls of late; I don’t intend on doing any more, but they do exist elsewhere. Here’s a reasonably respectful Flash game with her, and here’s a more critical take, done as a traditional doll.
And the last in my four-day series of 2008 American presidential election figures, Sarah Palin. This is the outfit she wore for her interview with Katie Couric.

I’ve got some people searching for Palin’s pink jacket, so here’s the image that I used as reference: Sarah Palin Meets With Foreign Leaders During UN General Assembly. There’s more from the same set, which can be found by going to Getty Images and searching for Sarah Palin, date range 9/24/2008 to 9/24/2008. This is also how I found my pictures of the other three, if anyone needs reference for them.

I expected her to do a little better in the poll, considering the splash she’s made in American news for her “sexy librarian” look, but she’s just barely holding her own over Hillary and the pantsuits as I post this! Well, one more day to vote…

Starting tomorrow, I’m going to do a month of Halloween costumes; politicans have been well and amply covered, but please feel free to post other suggestions!

Moxie’s Tonic’s pink shirtwaist inspired by Pushing Daisies

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So I saw that Moxie Tonic had linked to me, and when I clicked through the first thing I saw was this sweet, hot pink dress she had made. It’s inspired by a character’s dress from a TV series called Pushing Daisies, although she made some changes to it. I don’t actually use hot pink much, so of course I wanted to try paperdolling it… It’s not quite like the original, I’m afraid, I think I didn’t get the collar right at all, and there’s too many buttons. I’ll pretend that it’s so blindingly pink no one will notice…

Sadly, though, my scanner kind of ate this one — I don’t know why, but when I scanned it, it previewed normally, but the actual colors ended up being weirdly super-saturated — yes, it’s possible even for hot pink — and it seemed to come out more… coarse, somehow. Lily’s gown yesterday did that too. (Plus this one has a few bands on the skirt…) It means I had to play around in Photoshop and try to make the coloring look like what I had, although it’s a lot less pink now, and it’s not so bad when resized. (The large image you see is 25% of the original, which ends up hiding a lot of flaws.) When I get a new scanner, I’m rescanning it, and then you all can enjoy how it’s supposed to be. On the upside, the dress looks pretty cute in blue, too.