House 1/30

His father is R. Lee Friggn Ermey. But why bring him up? Suppose they’re building up to a dénouement between those two? House cannot possibly prevail against Gunny Hartman, unless he kills him with a defibrilator or something.

Anybody notice how the athlete’s nose neatnik also talked in prissy, ultra-formal English?

The rape-baby girl was really hot, Cameron’s looking hotter than ever, and I like it when Cuddy’s clothes are too tight…

And what was the deal with ‘every life is precious’ after she just tried to kill herself?

I also liked “I owe you 10.”

Weakest House of the season. It was just OK. I didn’t like Rape Chick, either. The whole thing was implausible for me. Veeeery un-Housey.

I liked it. Of course, that may be because the only way I can enjoy a House episode (and I often do) is to pretend that it has absolutely nothing to do with the practice of medicine.

I adore this show, but this episode really underlined one of my main irritations with it.

That’s an excellent way of summing it up. For general formulaic episodes, they do a good job and have an interesting portrayal of a complex jerk (complex, but a jerk nonetheless!). But, other than Three Stories (and tiny snippets of random episodes) whenever they try to reach higher and do a story arc, or delve into personal development, they flop horribly. The Stacey arc should’ve been far better. The Tritter arc: again, I can see the overall idea they had, but it was done so damn badly (and wasted Morse so damn much) that it almost made me stop watching for awhile. They throw things in so hamfistedly. They’ve shown they can bring the good stuff with Three Stories, so why are all these other attempts so disappointing?

It makes me so damn mad! I can see their intent. The intent and what they tried to do is awesome each time. But they just don’t do it well. Then I’m left with liking the episode for what they tried to do, but disliking it for the execution. It’s maddening!

I know it’s petty, but besides being annoying, the rape victim’s eyes were odd, like one was bigger than the other. It’s all I could focus on.

Plus, they made me cry at the end when Cameron watched the old guy die. My father died in the hospital after a long illness, so it hit too close to home. It’s the second time they’ve done that to me.

Overall, not a good TV-watching experience.

I seem to be the only one who really, really liked this episode…It was different than the rest, that’s for sure.
I kept thinking that the rape vicitm and House would end up as friends with her being able to get House to open up and at least be personable to people he’s close to. I hope we see her in future episodes, they seem like they can ‘heal’ each other for some reason. I’m getting sick of him being so stand-off-ish to the extreme. He needs to chill and become a human, somewhat, without loosing his nasty charm.

I’ve seen every House so far and have season 1 on DVD and the rest Tivo’d. I thought this one brought a lot of the personal traits House exhibited kind of back to some place where we could better understand where he comes from and why he is the way he is. I think it’ll help us better understand the dynamics of House - past and future.

Plus Katheryn is way hot. The way she talked kept reminding me of someone else and I couldn’t place who until this morning when I thought of Ally Sheedy from the Breakfast Club.

I don’t see how you can say that House was un-Housey. He was Maximum House up until the last 5 minutes of the show. Just because he opened up (after being waayyy prodded) to a beautiful woman who just got raped doesn’t make him any less ‘House’, if anything it adds to his character.

Wow! I am one of the few who thought that this show was superb! Once again, the writers have managed to polarize the audience and get them talking.
The discussions with the rape-victim and House reminds me so much of the way that my oldest step-daughter structures her discussions. She will engage me for hours in verbal jousts as she tries to determine what makes me tick. I can be a curmudgeon at times (hell, most of the time!) and she is fascinated by that. She finds talking about herself boring, but delves into people she finds interestesting or different. Needless to say, she is looking into a military career in Psy Ops!
It was in one of our discussions that I came out with the very “House”-like line that is now my sig.

First, I don’t think he would have cooperated at all. Now, if you’re talking about a new side of House that is emerging, well…it’s possible. But given his dropping out of rehab, I just don’t see him giving in to the pressure and opening up just yet. It certainly paved the way for future character development, but I think it was too much too soon.

Im having trouble watching because House is so attractive it’s painful. Not when he’s doing his crabby doc shtick, but when it was just him and the girl and he’s forced to relate to someone. Alone in a room with House–whoa.

Amazing how quickly she turned anti-abortion to having had it–a couple of hours?

Ain’t that the truth! I get Johnny Depp Syndrome when I watch House. I lose track of the plot line because I’m getting lost in his face.

That’s exactly the problem I had with this episode. It was so obvious. How convenient, she believes in God. House doesn’t. Oh, look, they’re going to the park to have some really deep conversation. I mean, we all have encounters with people that challenge and change us, but this was done in such an unsubtle way it really took me out of the story. I contrast this with Deadwood, which took an unrepentant bastard and gradually showed us his “softer” side, but in an, IMO, unforced, natural progression that I really enjoyed watching. House left me muttering, “Oh, for chrissake.”

Absolutely, and I can’t believe House wouldn’t have called her on that, after all he helped bring her back.

Yeah at first I thought I heard wrong but had to rewind the DVR when House mentioned that “she terminated” or however he said it. So evidently she wasn’t really against abortion; she just wanted to argue her point with House.

I gotta say it: I hate hate hate Cameron’s “bowl cut” bangs. Are they trying to make her look like a little boy or something??

I think everyone’s forgetting that House had no intentions of talking/opening up/wasting his time with her until she tried to kill herself. At that point he reluctantly agreed to talk to her and resisted as much as he thought he could get away with along the way. Yes, he did a lot of talking and reflection he normally hates to do, but he hates losing patients even more, so I thought this was total House.

Voting with the group that thought it was weak and annoying. It was like the writers and producers went, “And now for some exposition!” Sure, House hates to lose patients, but he never puts them before his own emotional issues. He’s played brinkmanship with Cuddy to get his pills, but all of a sudden he’s holding handsies with a rape victim, sharing his most innermost thoughts? Completely unbelievable to me. He would never have acted like this. I thought it was heavyhanded and boring – and also predictable. He was abused as a child! Well, of course he was! That explains so much! I love House and I did not like this episode at all. Pointless and forced navel-gazing, IMO.

I also wondered why the subject of Cameron’s dead husband would come up with the nurse and the old man?? I know people gossip, but is it really general knowledge and even so would the nurse talk to the old man about it? I thought maybe he would be revealed to be some long-lost somebody to Cameron.

I thought she only downed all those pills to get House back as her doctor, not because she really wanted to die.

Yeah, I figured that if all he had to do was sleep in the yard and bathe in ice he got off easy.

I didn’t consciously notice the tightness of Cuddy’s jacket but she was looking especially attractive.

Well, at least we can always count on the House threads to be lively, no matter how differently people react to a given episode.