Yeah, the main plot point in this episode feels like a plot hole to me.
The guy was mentally sharp, alert, concerned about his own treatment - it’s unlikely he’s going to simply forget that he didn’t take the pills yet, especially since he has nothing to do but sit there all day and think about it.
He didn’t appear to be suicidal until the situation seemed more grim because the original treatment apparently worked.
So, really, the whole medical aspect of the plot hinged on something fairly implausible. Which is becoming typical of house as things progress. I realize the show isn’t primarily about the medicine, but it would be a better show if the medical stuff at least was plausible and made sense.
I remember during the first and second seasons, they took the time to keep the viewer up to date with the medical stuff. Tried to explain it in laymen’s terms when they could. But later the series started to both ignore the plausibility of the medicine, and also keep the viewers alienated from it - more frequently doctors would quote medical jargon to each other without coming up with explanations that would make sense to the viewers.
Don’t forget, House temporarily took care of Wilson’s dog, Hector. That relationship quickly went south with Hector chewing House’s cane, shoes, and everything else that wasn’t nailed down. As I recall, Hector did eat some of House’s pills, too.
Strictly off the topic of the script, when House named the teams, did anyone else think that the team with the dangly privates should have been called “Yanks” instead of the other team?
I actually liked this episode. Of course the cameos by Chase and Cameron seemed a bit disjointed. And I guess Foreman’s firing means he’ll come back to the fold.
I didn’t think that knife in the socket was completely out of House’s character. He’s immensely curious. He’s also been living in tremendous pain and I can see how the accident victim’s testimony about how awesome death was could have appealed to him.
Something that bugs me, I doubt you could even almost electrocute yourself that way with just 110 VAC. People are always over-scared of house current. I’ve routinely hooked up outlets & switches without turning the power off because I don’t want to do it in the freakin’ dark. If you happen to touch the hot lead, a little unpleasant zap, big deal. Sure, if you take a bath with the toaster, but not from sticking a knife into an outlet like that.
The death scene with the dog? I’m a sucker for animals, so I’ll probably never watch that scene again.
What did I miss in regards to them discovering that House’s webcam was on? What were they doing that they weren’t supposed to be?
Something else. I HATE blonde Cameron! I’m not really gaga for blondes in general. But more importantly I love smart, red-headed ‘thinking man’s bombshells’ like Gillian Anderson, Blair Brown, Laurie Prepon, Dana Delany and her…
I’ll celebrate when they portray an atheist of the sort found so prevalently here on the Dope — a thoughtful, compassionate, charitable person with a high degree of integrity and a smugless sense of morality who respects the beliefs of others.
what the hell? Cameron’s not a slut. I hope that by the big grin there you meant sarcasm, because my god, we’ve only ever seen her sleep with one guy. Liking sex and not confining it to a relationship does not make her anywhere close to a slut. I think she’s as good an atheist (assuming she is one) as any Doper. (and guess what? there are thoughtful, compassionate, charitable, moral, and respectful Doper atheists out there far sluttier than Cameron.)
In a previous scene, they were in the auditorium and House was telling them that the women’s team had come up with a theory while the men were just blindly doing tests. He said, “You wasted the patient’s time, now I’m going to waste yours,” so that’s why they were in his office. They start discussing it, and one says, “House said we can’t talk” and another replies, “He meant we can’t talk about the case.” In any event, they were talking, and about the case, so whichever it was supposed to be, they were busted.
It won’t be supernatural. They’ve done this sort of thing before (there was an episode where a kid was supposedly abducted by aliens, and one where a teenager was a conduit of God) and it’s always turned out to be some strange medical interpretation that just happens to LOOK like Garden Variety Supernatural Phenomenon Number 17.
At the end of the preview they made it look like she was seeing House’s grandfather or something, “proved” by her saying the name was Walter. But we don’t know that’s actually House’s grandpa’s name (or whatever).
Whatever Foreman wanted to do, and ended up doing over her objection/orders, was in her view the wrong procedure.
Foreman ended up being correct in this case, and he thought that vindicated him.
But she disagreed - he did the wrong thing (in terms of medical procedure, or whatever), and that’s not exonerated by saving her life.
Essentially, House breaks the rules but because he’s right they let it slide. In this case, Foreman broke the rules, and was right, but the new supervisor didn’t let it slide.
Temperance Brennan. Her occasional insults of religion are a byproduct of her lack of social skills, not venom. Lisa Simpson (sorta).
And while I agree that a (relatively) positive portrayal of atheism on network television is rare, I guess some people just have a different definition for the word “courageous” than I do. But I wouldn’t call someone a hero if he fell down a well, either. And I certainly wouldn’t give a thumbs up to an atheist doctor doing his best to fill the last few hours of my life with fear and anger because he’s incapable of respecting an alternate point of view.
I think it’s somewhat bold to display House largely as a stereotypical atheist who thinks he’s smarter than everyone else and has all the answers, but then actually make him be smarter than everyone else and have (nearly) all the answers. Moreover, he’s always dismissive of supernatural explanations, and he’s always been right.
Imagine a show with a lead character who is a fundamentalist Christian. It wouldn’t be bold to display her as sanctimonious and holier-than-thou; various shows have depicted that before I’m sure. It would be bold to display her as sanctimonious, holier-than-thou, and absolutely correct about moral issues.
Even if House is 4/5ths a stereotype (and I don’t think he’s that bad), the remaining 1/5th is the interesting part. I won’t call it courageous, but it is unusual.
Bizarro-Cuddy meant that just because the patient’s life was saved, doesn’t make it right. It was the difference between good medicine and a good outcome. Foreman was lucky, not right.
This is a good analysis, and I agree with it. We keep expecting House to fall on his face, get comeuppance, as all people who violate social norms do on TV. They played with that idea with the Tritter storyline, and I for one really thought he was actually going through rehab, sorry about his excesses, etc. But of course, he totally got away with it. Is that courageous of the network? I don’t know, maybe that’s not the right word, but it certainly isn’t the usual way characters are dealt with on TV shows.
That’s why I like it. He flouts conventions, rules, order, and gets away with things in the end. Cuddy was supposed to have him on double clinic duty hours, extra work, etc. after perjuring herself on the stand for him, but he found ways to get around that as well.
House does good things, and bad things, and gets away with both equally. It disturbs the equilibrium of the viewing public, because characters are supposed to be good or bad, and the bad people are supposed to be punished and the good rewarded. I love that House doesn’t get punished for his bad stuff. I love that living in his own head is his punishment for both his good and his bad deeds. What a marvelous character.
