Would it be terribly pretentious, fan girly or anal retentive of me to admit that Dr. Horrible’s last shot nearly brought me to tears?
Here’s the thing: One should always expect hidden depth from Joss Whedon’s work – the kind of depth that reaches its maximum efficiency through subtlety.
In the case of Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, we have this musical about a lovable wannabe supervillain, his tormentor and the girl of his dreams, with brutally catchy songs and a healthy amount of irony. Not even the revenge song at the end of act 2 and the final confrontation between Dr. Horrible and Captain Hammer were exempt from that sense of irony and fun.
But if Penny’s death was the event that propelled Dr. Horrible to become truly evil, the very last shot of act 3 gave Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog a whole different meaning. This story is not simply about the birth of a supervillain who mindlessly operates to cause chaos. It’s about a man who achieves his dreams at a terrible cost and becomes so consumed with grief that he can no longer feel.
Am I reading too much into it? Maybe, but that’s what I got from it.
To all the writers of this little gem: Good Work!