Here’s an early look at my review of “Dollhouse,” running Friday in the GO! section.

Joss Whedon and Eliza Dushku

‘Dollhouse’
When: 8 p.m. Central/9 Eastern Fridays
Where: Fox (Channel 2)

Eliza Dushku says she spent four hours, over a very long lunch, persuading Joss Whedon to create a new series for her. If she picked up the tab, she certainly got her money’s worth.
“Dollhouse,” arriving tonight on Fox, gives Dushku (Faith on Whedon’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”) a chance to stretch in a major way. Here she is, in the pilot, screaming through Chinatown on a red motorcycle and dancing at a club in a sparkly white micro-minidress. Then, after a brief “treatment,” she’s all buttoned up, in a suit and glasses, hair in a bun, negotiating to free a kidnapped girl.
Future episodes find her running for her life, delivering a baby, cracking a safe and enjoying a group shower before going to sleep in what looks very much like a plush grave.
That’s life in the Dollhouse, the setting for this challenging, intriguing and sometimes extremely dark drama starring Dushku as Echo, one of a group of operatives called Actives whose personalities are wiped clean so they can be imprinted with new ones.
Clients with varied motives and big bucks then hire the Actives for “engagements” that vary wildly. A lonely guy may want just one great date, but Actives may also be hired to commit crimes, or to stop them.
As a skeptical FBI agent puts it: “I’m a billionaire. I can hire anybody for anything, and I’m going to go to an illegal organization and have them build me, what, the perfect date, confessor, assassin, dominatrix, omelet chef?”
Well, yeah, retorts Agent Paul Ballard (Tahmoh Penikett, Helo on “Battlestar Galactica”). Most of the FBI don’t believe the Dollhouse exists, that it’s merely an urban legend, but Ballard is sure it does, and his investigation forms one of the major pieces of the “Dollhouse” mythology.
Another thread, which begins to unspool next week, involves the ongoing implications of the Dollhouse massacre that brought ex-cop Boyd Langdon (the wonderful Harry Lennix) on board as Echo’s new handler.
“Dollhouse” has much going for it, including inherent variety in its story lines and plenty of thrills during engagements, balanced by the zenlike but deeply eerie serenity of the Dollhouse itself, where the Actives revert to a childlike state.
Dushku repays Whedon’s faith in her across the board, especially when wearing leather pants, and there’s a ton of built-in buzz for a show that was a cult favorite from the time it was announced more than a year ago.
Many hurdles also face “Dollhouse,” though, including the Friday night time slot that led the Whedon faithful to accuse Fox of trying to kill the show as the network did his “Firefly,” which burned out on Fridays. (For the record, Whedon says, he welcomes the low-pressure chance to build an audience without having to come out of the gate as a hit.)
Some viewers are also certain to be put off by the level of violence (extreme and graphic) and sexuality (overt and ranging from steamy to creepy) in “Dollhouse.” The premiere is rated TV-14 for language, sex and violence.
But grown-up viewers who like to be challenged, fear blandness and enjoy a deftly delivered shock should rush to sample “Dollhouse.”

****
Who’s Who in ‘Dollhouse’
Echo (Eliza Dushku) is an operative (an Active) whose personality is wiped clean but who begins to recall fragments of her past life and previous engagements.
Boyd (Harry Lennix) is her handler, a former cop she’s programmed to trust with her life.
Topher (Fran Kranz) is the computer genius who erases the Actives’ old personalities and imprints new ones.
Ms. DeWitt (Olivia Williams) runs the Dollhouse but answers to potentially sinister higher-ups.
Sierra (Dichen Lachman) is a beautiful new Active to whom Echo is drawn.
Ballard (Tahmoh Penikett) is an FBI agent who is determined to prove that the Dollhouse isn’t just an urban legend.