I never got the impression that he was trying to hurt anyone, at least not physically (clearly he was trying to hurt Cuddy emotionally). Considering how hard he’s worked to save lives for the entire series, I just cannot buy into him being an attempted murderer. I think he was really hurt and had no way to deal with it with his normal stone cold logic. In my experience, sometimes when a man is pissed off, he just needs to break something in order to feel better.
Throughout the whole episode, House was being badgered endlessly to ‘share his feelings’. ‘Let it out’. ‘House, we HAVE to talk.’ ‘House, we HAVE to talk about our breakup’. (Hey! House is not the kind to share his feelings, rehash a failed relationship, or vent, teary-eyed, to his friend or his ex!) They were severely pissing him off. He showed no outwards sign of anger or irritation (though he did snap at Cuddy once), which was building up inside him. I think it was an extreme impulse to smash something, as a result of all that anger and frustration, that made him drive into Cuddy’s house. And no, I do not believe he meant to hurt or kill anyone. Driving through the wall? Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time.
I can’t wait to see how he gets out of that mess, if he returns to the hospital, or something else.
He had no way of knowing whether Cuddy’s kid was in the room, as she was too short to be seen from outside. So - depraved indifference to human life rather than attempted murder. Whatever. All the ending did was complete House’s transition from damaged antihero to whiney asshole. I used to love the character, but I now now longer care if he lives or dies.
I lean toward this impression myself. He may be arrogant and all-knowing, but he doesn’t have x-ray vision and had no way of truly knowing that he could stop in time, or limit the destruction to that room, or that someone wouldn’t return at the worst possible moment. Beyond inexcusable, and beyond callous in his disregard to Cuddy’s safety and welfare.
The only acceptable ways for him to get out of the mess are for the whole thing to be a hallucination, or to go to jail. And I rather hope it’s Tritter who arrests him, so he can say “I told you people something horrible would happen before long.”
Yep, even if he knew the room was empty when he went back to the car he had no way of knowing it was empty when he drove into it. Or what secondary damage might be done in the house.
So, if we’re going to try and interpret this through a “real world” filter, I’d be fine if he went in for attempted murder.
I agree with the crazy and visceral, but it seems a weak justification to say that House saw the people leaving the room just prior to driving into it.
For one thing, are we supposed to believe that through his vicodin and rage addled mind that he has the presence of mind to be actively making sure that they have left the room?
For another, what if they hadn’t, or if one of Cuddy’s guests went back into the room - are we to believe that he would have had cat-like reflexes and been able to avert striking him?
Ultimately I agree that he probably wasn’t trying to hurt anyone, but it doesn’t seem to square with his impulsive act of rage to suggest he made sure they were leaving the room.