# House 11/28 The Perils of Paranoia **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 28, 2011, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359 "2011-11-28T18:02:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![CandidGamera](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/candidgamera/32/2878_2.png) [@CandidGamera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CandidGamera)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2011, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/21 "2011-11-30T17:31:44Z")
> [@Meltdown](#): > > There was a scene in which House threw out a term (it sounded like “arsonist,” but it couldn’t have been, based on the context) that was unfamiliar to me. > > Anyone remember this? The exchange went something like this (I’m probably butchering the first line): > > House: Arsonists created three forms of matter. > Taub: Arsoninsts? > House: Look it up. > > Anyone remember this? I’d actually like to look it up, but I have no idea what he said. That was the Pokemon reference I mentioned! > **[List of generation IV Pokémon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arceus)** > > The fourth generation (generation IV) of the Pokémon franchise features 107 fictional species of creatures introduced to the core video game series in the 2006 Nintendo DS games Pokémon Diamond and Pearl. Some Pokémon in this generation were introduced in games and animated adaptations of the franchise before Diamond and Pearl, such as Bonsly, Mime Jr., and Munchlax, which were recurring characters in the Pokémon anime series in 2005 and 2006. > The following list details the 107 Pokémon of genera... ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2011, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/22 "2011-11-30T17:41:44Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > It isn’t Charlyne Yi’s appearance so much as her delivery that strains credulity, for me. When she’s suggesting a diagnosis in “doctor-speak,” she just doesn’t sound at all like someone who understands the words coming out of her mouth (in part because she’s kind of mush-mouthed). The effect is a bit like a skit where they have someone like Mike Tyson talking about philosophy or astrophysics. Just watch the Charlie Sheen Roast. Mike Tyson did a bunch of weird poetry stuff where he spoke just like that. It’s not mush mouth, it’s almost the opposite, like they’re over enunciating to make up for not being able to speak clearly. Tracy Morgan does the same thing. > [@](#): > > Not that the other actors necessarily understand the medical jargon either, of course, but they’re mostly convincing at sounding like they do. There’s an interview floating around where they (probably the original cast) saying at the beginning they used to spend _hours_ looking up every word and trying to understand everything they were saying to make sure it was as convincing as possible. Then after a while they realized that as long as they could pronounce it properly it really didn’t matter if they knew what it meant or not. No one at home cares if the actor knows what thyrotoxicosis is. ---
**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2011, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/23 "2011-12-01T13:31:53Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > And as far as Park’s attractiveness goes, I have the opposite problem. I have a hard time visualizing House, Cuddy, Chase, Cameron, Foreman, Wilson, Thirteen, Masters or Adams as doctors. People that spectacularly pretty rarely have the motivation to undergo the intense study needed to become a top doctor. It’s far too tempting to rely on your looks if everyone wants to give you everything in life. So maybe one or two hotties, but it’s totally flipped if the only realistic-looking ones are Taub and Park. Yeah, that’s always been a conceit of an otherwise excellent TV show. I mean from a guy’s POV Cameron, 13, Masters, and Amber (Cut-throat Bitch) were all exceedingly drop-dead gorgeous. 13 could have been a freakin’ super model! > [@Joey P](#): > > There’s an interview floating around where they (probably the original cast) saying at the beginning they used to spend hours looking up every word and trying to understand everything they were saying to make sure it was as convincing as possible. Then after a while they realized that as long as they could pronounce it properly it really didn’t matter if they knew what it meant or not. No one at home cares if the actor knows what thyrotoxicosis is. I remember reading an interview with Lisa Edelstein where she’s always asked if there’s a lot of hijinks amongst the cast while shooting and she replied, “God no!”. Even though they all \*do \*get along great she mentioned how: [ul] [li]They all have tons of jargon-filled dialog to memorize[/li][li]Hugh (Laurie) is in almost every scene[/li][li]He has to do a limp constantly[/li][li]He has to do an accent constantly[/li][/ul] She also said he stays in the American accent all day. Not ‘in character’ but just the voice. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2011, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/24 "2011-12-01T14:04:33Z")
> [@Hail\_Ants](#): > > [li]They all have tons of jargon-filled dialog to memorize[/li][li]Hugh (Laurie) is in almost every scene[/li][li]He has to do a limp constantly[/li][li]He has to do an accent constantly[/li][/list] > She also said he stays in the American accent all day. Not ‘in character’ but just the voice. Stephen Fry has said that Laurie works himself half to death playing House, and suffers from chronic back pains because of the limp, but won’t quit because the pay is so good. (I also suspect it may have something to do with his upbringing. Hugh’s father was a surgeon, an Olympic gold medalist and a Scotsman - my guess is that quitting something because it’s hard was never an option in his family). ---
**Author:** ![irishgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8edcca/32.png) [@irishgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/irishgirl)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2011, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/25 "2011-12-01T14:40:08Z")
Beginning to get bummed out. The medicine is getting so tortuously bad it isn’t funny. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2011, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/26 "2011-12-01T15:56:05Z")
This is clearly the final season for House and it seems they’ve just given up. Foreman as Dean of Medicine? Even though he’s not qualified, he screwed up that clinical study a few years ago and is lucky he’s not a pariah. How to make him House’s supervisor? Easy - make him House’s supervisor. Put Foreman in as Head of Diagnostics but House as Head Diagnostician. Watch as they fight out who is really in charge. I’m not on the hate bandwagon about Charlyne Yi, but the writing for her character is horrible. She’s a resident I believe but she comes across more as a med student. I like the young padawan sort of relationship she has with House but there could be so much more than “she’s Asian therefore she’s driven.” Have her want to me a medical researcher (working on a Ph.D after her M.D. maybe?) and pissed of that she is actually doing practicum work. She respects House for all of his theoretical work and his disinterest in patients but rebels under having to work as a doctor treating people. Think the antithesis of M3 with some Amber attitude thrown in. That whole butt slap and hitting her supervisor thing? If I were her here is my defense: “Dr. Foreman and committee members. The actions I took was to defend myself from a sexual assault by my supervisor. He should not have even been on-duty due to his drunkedness - a condition Dr. Foreman knew about. Furthermore, my supervisor as effectively admitted he was wrong in an email to all staff. But despite all this, it is I who stands in front of you, the Discipline Committee. Whether you consider a sexual assault or a sexual harrassment, you are actually considering punishing the victim. I’ll say that again - you are considering punishing the victim. Dr. Foreman and committee members, so you are quite clear on my intentions if I am not fully exhonerated and do not receive a full public apology from my supervisor for the assault and Dr. Foreman for having to go through this ordeal of a discipline hearing, I intend to buy this hospital with the money I win in the lawsuit against the hospital and those two doctors and the fact that after the media hears about this, the value of this hospital should plummet into pocket-change range.” Lastly, the medicine was never the height of accuracy, but it really has taken a turn for the worse. I can’t quite my put my finger on it, but I think that it seems to be less a differential diagnosis and more “try this treatment and hope it works”. ---
**Author:** ![Blaster\_Master](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cab0a1/32.png) [@Blaster\_Master](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blaster_Master)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2011, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/27 "2011-12-01T17:40:55Z")
> [@Hail\_Ants](#): > > Yeah, that’s always been a conceit of an otherwise excellent TV show. I mean from a guy’s POV Cameron, 13, Masters, and Amber (Cut-throat Bitch) were all exceedingly drop-dead gorgeous. 13 could have been a freakin’ super model! I thought this was something that addressed relatively early in the series. I seem to remember a scene where Cameron was asking him why he hired her and he said because she was hot, that she could have coasted along on her atractiveness and chose to work hard by becoming a doctor instead. I sort of assumed that logic probably carried on with the others as well. ---
**Author:** ![Meatros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Meatros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meatros)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2011, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/28 "2011-12-01T20:07:34Z")
> [@salinqmind](#): > > The car commercial embedded in the show was almost as glaringly obvious as the Hyundai SUV one on The Walking Dead last week. I agree on both counts. I did notice another error - in one of the elevator scenes, I think Eric pushes one of the buttons (presumably to go to another floor) and the elevator buttons on the opposite wall (which we are able to see) do not light up at all. ---
**Author:** ![VOW](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/vow/32/3043_2.png) [@VOW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VOW)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2011, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/29 "2011-12-01T20:28:33Z")
Foreman also got fired from a job at a major medical center where he was Chief of Diagnostics. IIRC, a patient was moved by Foreman to get some sort of scan against the orders of his supervisor. Foreman made the right call, but his defiance and insubordination cost him his job. He came crawling back to Cuddy, and then later had the Huntington’s study sabotage on his CV. So yeah, Foreman’s credentials are amazingly less than sterling for a management position with a huge teaching hospital. Human Resources probably has Foreman on an even tighter leash than House. ~VOW ---
**Author:** ![randwill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/a3d4f5/32.png) [@randwill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/randwill)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2011, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/30 "2011-12-01T21:19:13Z")
> [@Meatros](#): > > I agree on both counts. > > I did notice another error - in one of the elevator scenes, I think Eric pushes one of the buttons (presumably to go to another floor) and the elevator buttons on the opposite wall (which we are able to see) do not light up at all. That reminds me. When we see them get on the elevator and the camera pushes in on the actors, through what should be a closed or closing door, the light on them should change slightly. A grip with a large card moved across a light would do it. That the light doesn’t change reminds me that the door doesn’t really close and I think about that rather than what is being said. ---
**Author:** ![StusBlues](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@StusBlues](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StusBlues)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2011, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359/31 "2011-12-09T17:21:29Z")
> [@Blaster\_Master](#): > > That was good, but my favorite line was the dig on Yngwie Malmsteen, even if he did pronounce the name wrong. Yngwie is such a dick, even if most people don’t know who he is, he deserves getting called out like that. It made me happy. Between that and the Pokemon reference, I’m wondering if the \*House \*writing staff is trying to venture into some version of Tarantino-hood. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-11-28-the-perils-of-paranoia/604359.md?page=1)