Oh great. Here comes the shark.
This whole episode smacked of hammerhead hopping, if you ask me.
Loved the jokes, and Drunk Wilson was fun (and any show with multiple strippers is good with me) but Hallucinatory Amber was annoying and the plot to kill Chase is really contrived. To me, the whole thing has taken House from “Quirky” to “Unbelievable”. I was really dissapointed when Amber was still there at the end of the episode. Yes, “a good night’s sleep” would have been a lame resolution, but at least the nonsense would have been over.
I’m much more interested in finding out if there will be another new team next season. I think the whole series of episodes in which they played Diagnostic Survivor to end up with a new team was some of the best stuff the series has ever produced. They just have to let some of the current team go…
thwartme
The ref held up his hands as he was calling the kid’s name out; I assumed it was a signal of some sort. My question was how on earth the kid was able to catch the signals from the coach in the middle of the match?
First of all, it’s “CB” not “CTB”. They actually said “CB” once in the show. And in any case “cutthroat” is one word.
This is our favoritest episode of “House”. Just great. I find hallucinated Amber a whole lot more interesting than live Amber. Which means House’s brain is even more messed up than just hallucinating. OTOH, I can’t see how they can maintain this pace. The concept is likely to crash and burn.
So, House subconsciously wants Chase dead because he really wants …
No, he really doesn’t want Cameron; he wants Cuddy. If he wants Chase dead, it’s for other reasons (jealousy over his youthful good looks? happy relationship? popularity? lack of guilt over Kutner’s death?)
To be able to be alone. Self-sufficient. Only he clearly isn’t. But if only…
And this, too, has layers : he wishes he could live alone, because then he wouldn’t have to share credit for a diagnostic. He wishes he didn’t need a team for the right answer. But more significantly, he wishes he could be able to do just fine on his own, so he wouldn’t have to deal with the pain of losing someone.
Am I projecting here ?
ETA : oh, forgot the Fucked Up Alternative : he actually *envies *Kutner, but doesn’t have the guts to do as he did. So he drives himself to a point where he will.
Again, maybe 99% projection there 
(when 13 is taking a body shot)
[Taub or Chase? I can’t remember who] “Are you OK with that?”
[Foreman] “I paid $50 for that!”
Hilarious!
I’ve got this thing all figured out: go straight through Falken’s Maze. No, wait.
Why House tried to kill Chase:
House isn’t trying to kill Chase, Hallucinated CB (HCB) is. Since Chase can do brain surgery (among 1000 other skills) “she” is worried that House will get diagnosed with Brain Fog (or whatever), go to Chase and get The Incredibly Difficult Surgery that only Chase can do to fix House. And then it’s bye-bye HCB. Even HCB puts her self-preservation first. Why would she care if House gets sick and dies? Oops.
Doesn’t Cuddy still have the baby she adopted? About a month ago she was pissy because House prevented her from being with Baby 24/7, and then never mentioned the sprog since.
I also loved 13s argument on why she should be invited to the bachelor party.
“If I get drunk enough, I might make out with a stripper, or become one myself”. Definitely an argument that would have won me over.
I think you’re on the right track. House doesn’t want to die. Remember, he said something like “Living a messed-up life sucks only slightly less than ending one.” But he is curious about what lies beyond mortal life and envies Kutner because he wants to experience that knowledge.
Remember the episode “97 Seconds” in which House dealt with the patient who tried to electrocute himself in the clinic? He explained he had been hit by a drunk driver and was technically dead for 97 seconds and that was the best 97 seconds in his life. He was trying to recreate his experience, which he said was more meaningful than life as he was living.
This led House to attempt to electrocute himself to see if he had the same experience. He was rescued in time by Amber, since he had sent her a page beforehand.
This, even more than House being in the bus crash with Amber which preceded her death, is why I think House is hallucinating Amber, since he associates her with his attempt to learn what lies beyond death.