More House
Jan. 13th, 2008 10:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakHaving finished the second season of House because this show is certainly addictive, I have a few more thoughts:
Three Stories lived up to its announcements; great episode, and not just because I have a soft spot for tv going experimental with narration. I really hadn't figured out House was using his own operation as an example until just seconds before it was spelled out, wheras with the second season finale, I immediately deduced we were in House's head, not in reality. But then, many shows I've watched did an episode taking place in the head of one of the characters and exploring his psyche that way, with the three most outstanding examples being Farscape's Won't get fooled again, Babylon 5's The Very Long Night of Londo Mollari and BtVS's Restless (which takes place in four minds instead of one, admittedly, but is still an incredibly brilliant example of this particular subgenre). By contrast, the DS9 take on the concept, Distant Voices, is entertaining but quite clumsy by comparison and not especially deep. The House example is somewhere in between, imo; it amused me to no end that they called the shooter whom House's mind then turned into his equal/alter ego "Moriarty", and I found it fascinating that he imagines Cuddy both curing his leg and taking his intellectual brilliance away, which offers food for interpretation of how he sees Cuddy, the fact she performed the operation on his leg back then, the hold this gives him over her since and their working relationship. And the climax, House imagining himself killing a patient to prove he, House, is hallucinating, is incredibly disturbing and also fascinating re: House. But the episode as a whole never quite reaches the dazzling heights of first three examples I gave.
All in all, I liked the second season slightly better than the first (which I also liked); it developed the characters further, as it should, and threw some interesting curveballs. (Oh, and aside from "Moriarity", we also got the dead patient of House's with the surname of Doyle and of course his address, 221B. Elementary!) Details from the second half of s1 and from s2:
- it was bizarre to see Chi McBride as Vogler after having seen him as Emerson first; he doesn't quite have the ability to instantly imprint himself as a different character (imo as always) that some other actors have (for example, I never had trouble seeing Julie Benz as Rita not Darla on Dexter, or Michael C. Hall as Dexter not David, despite having loved both actors in those earlier roles before). Vogler himself, after a promising introduction, was a tad too obvious an antagonist for House, too much the boo-hiss embodiment of the pharmaceutical industry. Which doesn't mean I wasn't amused by scenes like House's dream where he tells a repentant Vogler his diagnosis and rubs his back (after having walked without a problem, a neat detail fitting for a dream), and didn't cheer during the scene where Cuddy at last goes up against him and wins, but - I wish they had kept him as someone genuinenly well-intentioned, instead of making him personally vengeful against House. That would have made him more interesting an opponent.
- otoh, other familiar faces instantly became whoever they were playing; Greg Grunberg in particular was awesome as the grieving husband of the dead woman whose liver House needed, and it was very amusing to see first Tom Lenk (Andrew on BTVS) and then Adam Busch (Warren) in two consecutive episodes as excentric patients. Thomas Dekker, aka Zach in Heroes, was good as the teenage faith healer; pity he seems to be so full of himself in rl, but then, acting is what he's paid for.
- Cameron, take II: no, still don't get the hate. I mean, it's not like her dead husband backstory takes more room than Foreman's juvenine delinquent and mother with Alzheimer backstory (which is far more often referred to) or Cash's daddy issues, dead alcoholic mother and seminar backstory, or any more a typical tv trope; and while her making House take her to dinner as a condition of coming back was out of line and inappropriate, it wasn't presented as a prelude to instant romance but as a mistake, and Cameron dealt with House's rejection during said dinner (and his analysis of her reason for crushing on him) with far more maturity afterwards than House dealt with the whole Stacy thing (more about that in a moment); we didn't see her pining for House ever after, she got over it, and her character wasn't defined as "the one who had a crush on House" . I appreciated we got some scenes with her and Cuddy in season 2 (female character interacting with other female character is, alas, still noteworthy on tv), and that they weren't about dating but about issues like how to deal with a colleague stealing your work, sort of. That she had a positive relationship with Chase and the one night stand wasn't treated by either of them as something other than it was, instead of resulting in either a romance or a destroyed working relationship and neither of them got brooding or drama queen over it was refreshing. The fallout with Foreman resulted in some terrific scenes, such as the one with Cuddy already mentioned and then later the one where Foreman, fearing for his life, deliberately contaminates her.
- which brings me to the boys; they're doing stuff that young sidekicks usually don't, like Chase selling House out to Vogler in season 1 (which made sense under the circumstances and given Chase's daddy issues), and Foreman going "colleague not friend" and later making the aforementioned selfish but entirely believable stabbing of Cameron in order to heighten his survival chances, but between Chase kissing cancer-ridden nine year olds and Foreman relearning, they also get the "soft" scenes as well
- my, if fans dislike Cameron, they must hate Stacy. I don't have any strong feelings about her one way or the other, but I wasn't quite sure whether House's behaviour during that entire arc as meant to come across as unsympathetic as it did. (Probably yes, though; House isn't a jerk against authorial intentions otherwise, either.) See, that's why I couldn't seriously 'ship House with anyone. Between aquiring Stacy's files transcribing her sessions with her psychiatrist, and going through Cuddy's underwear, his lack of a concept of personal space and privacy (except his own when he wants to have it, of course!) really is way too off-putting. (This applies to slashing him with Wilson, too, btw. I mean, they're lovely in their scenes together, and the whole living with each other was amusing as hell, but I don't think it's a coincidence Wilson eventually moved out again. Being friends with House is tough enough; I wouldn't want to burden the poor man with romancing him!)
- all this being said: the way they play with neither Cuddy or House ever giving a definite statement to whether or not they had had sex in the past is fun, as is their constant bickering, and then you get unexpectedly intimate and touching moments like House asking for morphine by showing (for the first time on screen) his crippled leg sans protective clothing, which is both blatantly manipulative and emotionally raw on his part, and the counterpoint scene later where Cuddy tells him she gave him a placebo injection is what makes the difference to his using Stacy's psychiatry sessions to manipulate her; and speaking of counterpoint, House later in the season giving Cuddy injections that are equally confidential made for some great (and admittedly hot) scenes as well
- I am inappropriately amused by the fact Wilson had three wives, because the number of Watson's wives is one of those things where Doyle goofed up and which hence has led to endless debates; also, Wilson's marital problems, flirtations and affairs prevent him from being a long suffering saint (which otherwise given his relationship with House he would be), which is good.
Three Stories lived up to its announcements; great episode, and not just because I have a soft spot for tv going experimental with narration. I really hadn't figured out House was using his own operation as an example until just seconds before it was spelled out, wheras with the second season finale, I immediately deduced we were in House's head, not in reality. But then, many shows I've watched did an episode taking place in the head of one of the characters and exploring his psyche that way, with the three most outstanding examples being Farscape's Won't get fooled again, Babylon 5's The Very Long Night of Londo Mollari and BtVS's Restless (which takes place in four minds instead of one, admittedly, but is still an incredibly brilliant example of this particular subgenre). By contrast, the DS9 take on the concept, Distant Voices, is entertaining but quite clumsy by comparison and not especially deep. The House example is somewhere in between, imo; it amused me to no end that they called the shooter whom House's mind then turned into his equal/alter ego "Moriarty", and I found it fascinating that he imagines Cuddy both curing his leg and taking his intellectual brilliance away, which offers food for interpretation of how he sees Cuddy, the fact she performed the operation on his leg back then, the hold this gives him over her since and their working relationship. And the climax, House imagining himself killing a patient to prove he, House, is hallucinating, is incredibly disturbing and also fascinating re: House. But the episode as a whole never quite reaches the dazzling heights of first three examples I gave.
All in all, I liked the second season slightly better than the first (which I also liked); it developed the characters further, as it should, and threw some interesting curveballs. (Oh, and aside from "Moriarity", we also got the dead patient of House's with the surname of Doyle and of course his address, 221B. Elementary!) Details from the second half of s1 and from s2:
- it was bizarre to see Chi McBride as Vogler after having seen him as Emerson first; he doesn't quite have the ability to instantly imprint himself as a different character (imo as always) that some other actors have (for example, I never had trouble seeing Julie Benz as Rita not Darla on Dexter, or Michael C. Hall as Dexter not David, despite having loved both actors in those earlier roles before). Vogler himself, after a promising introduction, was a tad too obvious an antagonist for House, too much the boo-hiss embodiment of the pharmaceutical industry. Which doesn't mean I wasn't amused by scenes like House's dream where he tells a repentant Vogler his diagnosis and rubs his back (after having walked without a problem, a neat detail fitting for a dream), and didn't cheer during the scene where Cuddy at last goes up against him and wins, but - I wish they had kept him as someone genuinenly well-intentioned, instead of making him personally vengeful against House. That would have made him more interesting an opponent.
- otoh, other familiar faces instantly became whoever they were playing; Greg Grunberg in particular was awesome as the grieving husband of the dead woman whose liver House needed, and it was very amusing to see first Tom Lenk (Andrew on BTVS) and then Adam Busch (Warren) in two consecutive episodes as excentric patients. Thomas Dekker, aka Zach in Heroes, was good as the teenage faith healer; pity he seems to be so full of himself in rl, but then, acting is what he's paid for.
- Cameron, take II: no, still don't get the hate. I mean, it's not like her dead husband backstory takes more room than Foreman's juvenine delinquent and mother with Alzheimer backstory (which is far more often referred to) or Cash's daddy issues, dead alcoholic mother and seminar backstory, or any more a typical tv trope; and while her making House take her to dinner as a condition of coming back was out of line and inappropriate, it wasn't presented as a prelude to instant romance but as a mistake, and Cameron dealt with House's rejection during said dinner (and his analysis of her reason for crushing on him) with far more maturity afterwards than House dealt with the whole Stacy thing (more about that in a moment); we didn't see her pining for House ever after, she got over it, and her character wasn't defined as "the one who had a crush on House" . I appreciated we got some scenes with her and Cuddy in season 2 (female character interacting with other female character is, alas, still noteworthy on tv), and that they weren't about dating but about issues like how to deal with a colleague stealing your work, sort of. That she had a positive relationship with Chase and the one night stand wasn't treated by either of them as something other than it was, instead of resulting in either a romance or a destroyed working relationship and neither of them got brooding or drama queen over it was refreshing. The fallout with Foreman resulted in some terrific scenes, such as the one with Cuddy already mentioned and then later the one where Foreman, fearing for his life, deliberately contaminates her.
- which brings me to the boys; they're doing stuff that young sidekicks usually don't, like Chase selling House out to Vogler in season 1 (which made sense under the circumstances and given Chase's daddy issues), and Foreman going "colleague not friend" and later making the aforementioned selfish but entirely believable stabbing of Cameron in order to heighten his survival chances, but between Chase kissing cancer-ridden nine year olds and Foreman relearning, they also get the "soft" scenes as well
- my, if fans dislike Cameron, they must hate Stacy. I don't have any strong feelings about her one way or the other, but I wasn't quite sure whether House's behaviour during that entire arc as meant to come across as unsympathetic as it did. (Probably yes, though; House isn't a jerk against authorial intentions otherwise, either.) See, that's why I couldn't seriously 'ship House with anyone. Between aquiring Stacy's files transcribing her sessions with her psychiatrist, and going through Cuddy's underwear, his lack of a concept of personal space and privacy (except his own when he wants to have it, of course!) really is way too off-putting. (This applies to slashing him with Wilson, too, btw. I mean, they're lovely in their scenes together, and the whole living with each other was amusing as hell, but I don't think it's a coincidence Wilson eventually moved out again. Being friends with House is tough enough; I wouldn't want to burden the poor man with romancing him!)
- all this being said: the way they play with neither Cuddy or House ever giving a definite statement to whether or not they had had sex in the past is fun, as is their constant bickering, and then you get unexpectedly intimate and touching moments like House asking for morphine by showing (for the first time on screen) his crippled leg sans protective clothing, which is both blatantly manipulative and emotionally raw on his part, and the counterpoint scene later where Cuddy tells him she gave him a placebo injection is what makes the difference to his using Stacy's psychiatry sessions to manipulate her; and speaking of counterpoint, House later in the season giving Cuddy injections that are equally confidential made for some great (and admittedly hot) scenes as well
- I am inappropriately amused by the fact Wilson had three wives, because the number of Watson's wives is one of those things where Doyle goofed up and which hence has led to endless debates; also, Wilson's marital problems, flirtations and affairs prevent him from being a long suffering saint (which otherwise given his relationship with House he would be), which is good.
