# House 4/30: The C-Word **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 1, 2012, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467 "2012-05-01T00:54:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Fair\_Rarity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fair_rarity/32/153_2.png) [@Fair\_Rarity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fair_Rarity)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2012, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/21 "2012-05-02T02:17:40Z")
I didn’t like this episode (or most of them for the last few seasons), but I did really enjoy the end. It might have made me laugh more than anything else on House (“Sure, the CAT peed on it,” Wilson sawing through House’s cane, “I’ve been lying to you in increasing increments to see if you’d notice,” everything about Wilson’s stealing House’s guitar). ---
**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:** [May 2, 2012, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/22 "2012-05-02T02:42:53Z")
> [@mage-girl](#): > > God, I stop watching for a season and WILSON GETS CANCER!?! So it was your fault. Wilson was looking for a reason for this. Someone or something to blame, some cosmic answer, but he needed to look no further then one less viewer this season. I’ll forward your contact info to the producer, I hope your happy for making him sick. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim_r.mortiss/32/142_2.png) [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_R.Mortiss)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/23 "2012-05-03T05:57:07Z")
I want to know more about how you play pizza-box whiskey-shooters Battleship! That looked like fun!! ---
**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:** [May 3, 2012, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/24 "2012-05-03T06:17:30Z")
We watch House for the laughs. I was TERRIFIED that Wilson was going to croak at House’s place. If he had, House would have gone straight back to prison, forever. And no matter how you shake it, that’s a HORRIBLE ending for the series. The ending was great, true House. We’re still laughing about him being propped up with the ukelele. ~VOW ---
**Author:** ![MsRobyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90ced4/32.png) [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 10:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/25 "2012-05-03T10:05:43Z")
_House_ is definitely coasting. The POTW wasn’t all that interesting, I wanted to slap the mother the minute she walked in the door, and Chase was the best part of the episode. He may be an amoral horndog in his private life, but he’s genuinely caring toward his patients. Hell, I’d like to see a spin-off that focuses on the team after House leaves and they go their separate ways. That said, [I looked up thymoma](http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1999326-overview) (Wilson’s particular cancer), and from what I can tell, it’s generally treated with surgery and radiation at the stage Wilson’s tumor was. Chemo isn’t indicated until the disease is close to or at its worst. In any event, chemo is generally pretty stressful on the body and can cause permanent damage at normal doses; I can only imagine how bad that damage would be at the doses he got. Overall, I’m getting the feeling that the writers and producers are sick of the show and just want it to end, already. ---
**Author:** ![Jormungandr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@Jormungandr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jormungandr)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/26 "2012-05-03T13:42:41Z")
> [@alice\_in\_wonderland](#): > > That’s why there was all the angst with Wilson talking about his former (now dead) patients who died despite typically good recovery rates for their particular cancers - he didn’t want to chance a 75% recovery rate, or a 90% recovery rate - he wanted to throw as much chemo at the tumour as possible to knock it down to increase his chances of recover to 100%. > > That’s why he had a 33% risk of dying from the dosage of chemo he was getting, and why he and House had to do it on the down low and also why he was SO sick - chemo makes you sick; however, at regular doses it’s not ‘drop dead right this second’ sick. That’s what bothered me about the episode. He traded a 10-25% chance of dying for a 33% chance? ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/27 "2012-05-03T14:29:45Z")
> [@Jormungandr](#): > > That’s what bothered me about the episode. He traded a 10-25% chance of dying for a 33% chance? I think Wilson’s thinking was this. Some cancers, like prostate, take awhile for things to get bad, so at first the treatments are not that agressive, you kinda beat down the cancer, it comes back later, you beat it down, it comes back again, and eventually there is fair chance it gets you (and some that it goes away/something else unrelated gets you first). So, ONE way to measure the effectiveness of the treatment procedure is on average how many more years do patients live after getting the bad news? And of course, many patients do NOT wanna go with the “it could kill me now” procedure when the doctors say there is a good chance the less aggressive treatment will buy you years and still likely work. Wilson is willing to risk it all RIGHT NOW for the possibility it will go away and stay away because you beat the shit out of it. Kinda the lottery theory of cancer treatment. And I think the point he made about doing this while he was still strong and healthy makes some sense as well. ---
**Author:** ![Edward\_The\_Head](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ce73a5/32.png) [@Edward\_The\_Head](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Edward_The_Head)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/28 "2012-05-03T14:36:52Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > Wilson is willing to risk it all RIGHT NOW for the possibility it will go away and stay away because you beat the shit out of it. Kinda the lottery theory of cancer treatment. And I think the point he made about doing this while he was still strong and healthy makes some sense as well. That’s pretty much what I was thinking as well. He said he didn’t want to die in the hospital and he’d rather die now then the horrible way people die in the long run. ---
**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:** [May 3, 2012, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467/29 "2012-05-03T14:46:53Z")
> [@VOW](#): > > We watch House for the laughs. > > I was TERRIFIED that Wilson was going to croak at House’s place. If he had, House would have gone straight back to prison, forever. And no matter how you shake it, that’s a HORRIBLE ending for the series. > > ~VOW House probably wasn’t joking when he jokingly said he’d already come up with a some places to ditch Wilson’s body if that did happen. Come to think of it, the best place likely would have been back at Wilson’s house, hooked up to a bunch of chemo and painkilling equipment on a sweat stained couch or on the bathroom floor covered in puke. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/house-4-30-the-c-word/620467.md?page=1)