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bironicHouse season premiere tonight.
First of all, let me get this off my chest: Wilson, you manipulative bastard! I get the tough love thing, I get what you were trying to do in "Detox," but convincing Cuddy not to tell House that his patient actually made a miraculous recovery thanks to his not-so-wild guess accomplishes nothing; House will find out—after all he did for them, the wife will be contacting him to say thank you—and it's not gonna be pretty. I don't like your patronizing-chummy arm-over-her-shoulders move and I don't like how you're hiding behind Cuddy like you did last time.
I also don't like how Cuddy gave in to Wilson so easily at the end, as if she needed someone to tell her what to do after the exhaustion of holding out against House. I suppose I ought to have seen it coming; Wilson and Cuddy's collusion was set up right at the beginning when they sat in her office deciding how to present their cases. And as noted back in May, it was foreshadowed in "No Reason" when House caught Wilson lying about how he agreed with Cuddy's decision to use ketamine while he was unconscious. See also "Detox" and more innocuous scenes like Wilson saying "I'm on it" to Cuddy at the beginning of "Need to Know." Not new behavior, not by a long shot, but this...this is upsetting. Even though I like when Wilson upsets me. Keeps us on our metaphorical toes.
Most of Wilson's screen time tonight was love, though, and there was quite a bit of it to chew on. My little notes from the first half of the episode include things like "W♥," and that scene in the middle in Wilson's office needs to be re-watched to pick out all that was going on between them, as well as the part where he tells House to send the guy home, because I think there's something to be learned there about Wilson's approach to his own patients. Slashiness throughout the hour, of course: Wilson staring at House's groin in Cuddy's office, predicting what he'd say for each case file, hanging out on their new indoor balcony and taking the fall for the grape-pegging, wincing at House's skateboard antics, and delivering lines like "Keep working it—feeling will come." Plus, this had to be one of the show's best transitions ever, if not the best: Wilson starting to describe levels of happiness, saying "I'm not going away" when House tries to leave halfway into the first one, and then we cut to the surgery observation room and hear "...the fifth level of happiness is..."
On a completely unrelated note, who was I talking to about ear bleeding on this show and how we were due for some? Whoever you are, vindicated!
House/Cameron. I'm not militantly pro- or anti-H/C, so I didn't mind when House started in on whether she wanted to have a drink with him, etc. However, I did not like Cameron's response—"Are you serious or are you just trying to change the subject?"—because that line is pure Wilson and does not belong in her mouth. Cameron cannot turn into Wilson to win House over. Unfair, writers. Unfair.
It was interesting to see House and Cameron's roles reverse from early Season One, with House trying to downplay the risks of the test to the patient's wife and Cameron correcting him over his shoulder to prevent the woman from experiencing false hope that her husband might recover.
What else, what else... Cameron's big smile when House asks what she did over her summer vacation and the ensuing crumble when he turns away to continue his coversation before she has a chance to reply was just priceless, as was House bouncing his big tennis ball off the back of Chase's head. (Lots of House/Chase lovin' too;![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
synn, you were in my thoughts.) Brilliantly delivered lines from Cuddy ("His pancreas is gonna explode because his brain is on fire!") and Foreman ("He's bleeding in his brain!"). And tired!ducklings in the hall and two-thirds!mutiny in the scans-viewing room are love. And the college girls checking House out.
Am digging the new color scheme, too, all brown and green and beige and peach.
Uh, but what was with the Hugh Laurie porn at the beginning with the running and sweat and crazy music and then again at the fountain? I laughed through most of it; I didn't know what else to do. That stuff contributed to my suspicions that we were being presented with another hallucination-ridden trick of an episode, up to and including Wilson's incisive little speeches that echoed the ones he made in "No Reason," everyone's offhand references to House's hallucinations, the hospital's sudden balconied atrium, late night visits to Cuddy's bedroom, and of course the thigh being fine.
Speaking of which: Someone please explain to me how House can run eight miles daily and walk without a limp and hop off stools onto his right leg and kick doors open and slide right-side-first into patients' rooms (okay, adorable) without a problem when a significant portion of his thigh has been removed. I was under the (mistaken?) impression that part of the reason he needs his cane is that there isn't enough muscle left in that leg to fully support him. What we saw tonight suggests something else entirely: that his handicap is entirely due to pain. That if it weren't for the pain of walking/running/standing/jumping/whatever on his damaged leg, House could do whatever he wants with it.
I did like the twinge of returning pain and Wilson's reference to House being middle-aged. I mean, obviously the pain will come back, because the writers aren't stupid, and obviously all this cheeriness is temporary, as House and Foreman established in whatever episode came right after "Euphoria" and as Wilson repeatedly asserts in the beginning of this show ("I've changed." "No you haven't." "No I haven't."). Agh, so much to read into this: that Wilson needs House to have not changed, that House fears the return of his pain so much that he's willing to risk losing his medical license by stealing a page off Wilson's prescription pad, maybe even that House is running so much because he knows the ketamine won't last and he wants to get in as much activity as he can before he loses mobility again.
Oh! another quibble. Aside from the "needing to learn the meaning of the word 'no'" reason, Cuddy claimed not to want to inject the cortisol into the brain tumor guy* because House was working from an unsubstantiated hunch. But House works from hunches all the time! He makes huge leaps of faith that involve much worse procedures than cortisol that horrify his team and colleagues until he turns out to be right. Cuddy's reasoning rubbed me the wrong way; it felt like the plot device it turned out to be.
* Who looked like Mark Warner, yes? Sort of like how scurvy girl resembled the heart transplant's daughter in "Sex Kills"? Two more instances of the casting team's tendency to bring in actors who look the same.
I was actually kind of hoping the guy wouldn't get up after the cortisol injection. The writers had broken the show's formula just enough with the pair of patients and House being kind and Cuddy steadfastly refusing to give in to him that I thought they might show him reaching for the high of the solved puzzle where there really was no puzzle, and having him deal with that. Only...they didn't, because there was a puzzle after all, and House solved it, and he's going to find that out. It's good in the sense that House hasn't lost his touch as he'd feared and it propelled him to forge Wilson's signature on a Vicodin prescription to get the high he thinks he needs in the only other way he knows how (another thing that'll blow up in his face), but disappointing in that the formula still holds. Pain or no pain, House is still (almost) always (eventually) right.
Wow, that turned out longer than expected. I also don't think I've done an episode recap with so many House fans on my f-list. It's a little scary. Except, come to think of it, most of you don't live here and won't see this ep for months, so I suppose it's kind of the same as before.
ETA: Note to self - other people's episode commentary & discussions - thewlisian_afer, daasgrrl, captain_tulip, usomitai 2 3, firestorm717, Pru, stephantom & 2, catalase, m_butterfly.
First of all, let me get this off my chest: Wilson, you manipulative bastard! I get the tough love thing, I get what you were trying to do in "Detox," but convincing Cuddy not to tell House that his patient actually made a miraculous recovery thanks to his not-so-wild guess accomplishes nothing; House will find out—after all he did for them, the wife will be contacting him to say thank you—and it's not gonna be pretty. I don't like your patronizing-chummy arm-over-her-shoulders move and I don't like how you're hiding behind Cuddy like you did last time.
I also don't like how Cuddy gave in to Wilson so easily at the end, as if she needed someone to tell her what to do after the exhaustion of holding out against House. I suppose I ought to have seen it coming; Wilson and Cuddy's collusion was set up right at the beginning when they sat in her office deciding how to present their cases. And as noted back in May, it was foreshadowed in "No Reason" when House caught Wilson lying about how he agreed with Cuddy's decision to use ketamine while he was unconscious. See also "Detox" and more innocuous scenes like Wilson saying "I'm on it" to Cuddy at the beginning of "Need to Know." Not new behavior, not by a long shot, but this...this is upsetting. Even though I like when Wilson upsets me. Keeps us on our metaphorical toes.
Most of Wilson's screen time tonight was love, though, and there was quite a bit of it to chew on. My little notes from the first half of the episode include things like "W♥," and that scene in the middle in Wilson's office needs to be re-watched to pick out all that was going on between them, as well as the part where he tells House to send the guy home, because I think there's something to be learned there about Wilson's approach to his own patients. Slashiness throughout the hour, of course: Wilson staring at House's groin in Cuddy's office, predicting what he'd say for each case file, hanging out on their new indoor balcony and taking the fall for the grape-pegging, wincing at House's skateboard antics, and delivering lines like "Keep working it—feeling will come." Plus, this had to be one of the show's best transitions ever, if not the best: Wilson starting to describe levels of happiness, saying "I'm not going away" when House tries to leave halfway into the first one, and then we cut to the surgery observation room and hear "...the fifth level of happiness is..."
On a completely unrelated note, who was I talking to about ear bleeding on this show and how we were due for some? Whoever you are, vindicated!
House/Cameron. I'm not militantly pro- or anti-H/C, so I didn't mind when House started in on whether she wanted to have a drink with him, etc. However, I did not like Cameron's response—"Are you serious or are you just trying to change the subject?"—because that line is pure Wilson and does not belong in her mouth. Cameron cannot turn into Wilson to win House over. Unfair, writers. Unfair.
It was interesting to see House and Cameron's roles reverse from early Season One, with House trying to downplay the risks of the test to the patient's wife and Cameron correcting him over his shoulder to prevent the woman from experiencing false hope that her husband might recover.
What else, what else... Cameron's big smile when House asks what she did over her summer vacation and the ensuing crumble when he turns away to continue his coversation before she has a chance to reply was just priceless, as was House bouncing his big tennis ball off the back of Chase's head. (Lots of House/Chase lovin' too;
synn, you were in my thoughts.) Brilliantly delivered lines from Cuddy ("His pancreas is gonna explode because his brain is on fire!") and Foreman ("He's bleeding in his brain!"). And tired!ducklings in the hall and two-thirds!mutiny in the scans-viewing room are love. And the college girls checking House out.Am digging the new color scheme, too, all brown and green and beige and peach.
Uh, but what was with the Hugh Laurie porn at the beginning with the running and sweat and crazy music and then again at the fountain? I laughed through most of it; I didn't know what else to do. That stuff contributed to my suspicions that we were being presented with another hallucination-ridden trick of an episode, up to and including Wilson's incisive little speeches that echoed the ones he made in "No Reason," everyone's offhand references to House's hallucinations, the hospital's sudden balconied atrium, late night visits to Cuddy's bedroom, and of course the thigh being fine.
Speaking of which: Someone please explain to me how House can run eight miles daily and walk without a limp and hop off stools onto his right leg and kick doors open and slide right-side-first into patients' rooms (okay, adorable) without a problem when a significant portion of his thigh has been removed. I was under the (mistaken?) impression that part of the reason he needs his cane is that there isn't enough muscle left in that leg to fully support him. What we saw tonight suggests something else entirely: that his handicap is entirely due to pain. That if it weren't for the pain of walking/running/standing/jumping/whatever on his damaged leg, House could do whatever he wants with it.
I did like the twinge of returning pain and Wilson's reference to House being middle-aged. I mean, obviously the pain will come back, because the writers aren't stupid, and obviously all this cheeriness is temporary, as House and Foreman established in whatever episode came right after "Euphoria" and as Wilson repeatedly asserts in the beginning of this show ("I've changed." "No you haven't." "No I haven't."). Agh, so much to read into this: that Wilson needs House to have not changed, that House fears the return of his pain so much that he's willing to risk losing his medical license by stealing a page off Wilson's prescription pad, maybe even that House is running so much because he knows the ketamine won't last and he wants to get in as much activity as he can before he loses mobility again.
Oh! another quibble. Aside from the "needing to learn the meaning of the word 'no'" reason, Cuddy claimed not to want to inject the cortisol into the brain tumor guy* because House was working from an unsubstantiated hunch. But House works from hunches all the time! He makes huge leaps of faith that involve much worse procedures than cortisol that horrify his team and colleagues until he turns out to be right. Cuddy's reasoning rubbed me the wrong way; it felt like the plot device it turned out to be.
* Who looked like Mark Warner, yes? Sort of like how scurvy girl resembled the heart transplant's daughter in "Sex Kills"? Two more instances of the casting team's tendency to bring in actors who look the same.
I was actually kind of hoping the guy wouldn't get up after the cortisol injection. The writers had broken the show's formula just enough with the pair of patients and House being kind and Cuddy steadfastly refusing to give in to him that I thought they might show him reaching for the high of the solved puzzle where there really was no puzzle, and having him deal with that. Only...they didn't, because there was a puzzle after all, and House solved it, and he's going to find that out. It's good in the sense that House hasn't lost his touch as he'd feared and it propelled him to forge Wilson's signature on a Vicodin prescription to get the high he thinks he needs in the only other way he knows how (another thing that'll blow up in his face), but disappointing in that the formula still holds. Pain or no pain, House is still (almost) always (eventually) right.
Wow, that turned out longer than expected. I also don't think I've done an episode recap with so many House fans on my f-list. It's a little scary. Except, come to think of it, most of you don't live here and won't see this ep for months, so I suppose it's kind of the same as before.
ETA: Note to self - other people's episode commentary & discussions - thewlisian_afer, daasgrrl, captain_tulip, usomitai 2 3, firestorm717, Pru, stephantom & 2, catalase, m_butterfly.
no subject
Date: Sep. 6th, 2006 03:56 am (UTC)I don't know, that just seemed like he was going too far. I know that Wilson is a liar, but this is a really big lie. What is it exactly that he thinks he's protecting House from? That's my question. Because Wilson always seems to think he's protecting House from something. Which I'm not saying to excuse him. I just wish I could see inside his devious little Wilson-y head!
Grr. Must bed now. Never enough time for fandom these days.
no subject
Date: Sep. 6th, 2006 04:58 am (UTC)Otherwise, Cameron + Wilson? Bitchy, bitchy, bitchy this episode.
Cuddy really shouldn't have given in that easily at the end, but she was already sort of leaning that way with her suspicions of House and denying him his requests, so I suppose Wilson's words were just the final push. I'm not looking forward to Cameron's self-righteousness next episode though *sigh*
no subject
Date: Sep. 6th, 2006 02:00 pm (UTC)I think the theory was that House's judgement when he's in pain and drugged is somehow meant to be more realistic than unwarranted optimism due to being on a happy high. So those hunches are likelier to be right. Which makes no sense really - actually none of Cuddy's reasoning made sense to me. But I think that was Cuddy's 'reason'.
no subject
Date: Sep. 6th, 2006 09:03 pm (UTC)I do think that Wilson's actions/attitude/manipulations is setting him up for future trouble with House, though.
Cameron cannot turn into Wilson to win House over.
Eh, it's not as if Cameron hasn't been molded into being a mini-Wilson for a while now. She wants neediness; she gets too involved with her patients; she has an odd fondness for House. I always took that their main difference-- age, gender, experience aside-- was that Cameron is far more an optimist while Wilson is fatalist/realistic. If Cameron continues to be more and more like Wilson and eventually is the best woman for House? I won't be surprised.
The HL porn was akward, wasn't it! Though with the film... or filter they used for the fountain scene, he was looking fine enough to watch him. Otherwise I thought he was... frumpy! So frumpy! On a skateboard and frumpy!
I agree with you on a lot of the post-- the thigh muscle, the plausibility of House's leap of logic despite what Cuddy says, not wanting the patient to get better, and what Wilson needs for/from House.
no subject
Date: Sep. 7th, 2006 12:25 am (UTC)I agree on the high level of slashiness, too. I found a lot to love about this ep (Chase volunteering to do the scans!). Not so much Hugh Laurie's suits and sneakers, though...
And just so you know, I am adding you to my friends list now because I enjoy reading what you have to say.
no subject
Date: Sep. 12th, 2006 12:35 am (UTC)I wonder how much of Wilson's behavior toward House and his addiction is coming from his unresolved brother issues. I know it's not canon, though it hasn't been disproven either, but I like the idea that Wilson's no-longer-in-his-life brother was an addict of some kind who took advantage of Wilson (his generosity, his optimism, his hope, his money, whatever) until something happened in that nasty part of town we saw in "Histories" that ended the enabling. Watching the scene in Wilson's office and again at the end with Cuddy resonates really well with that theory, I think -- the "don't play me" because he's been played before, the comment about "the high you think you need" because now that the ketamine's taken away the pain, House is more like that hypothetical brother -- and may explain why he gets angry so quickly when House comes to him for the ticket to drugs. He's seen someone he loves go down that self-destructive road before, and he's trying not to fail this time.
...Were my thoughts. I'm sure we'll see soon enough.
Never enough time for fandom these days.
Indeedy! See me take a week to reply to comments. :(
no subject
Date: Sep. 12th, 2006 12:37 am (UTC)It was a very sweet moment, despite the scheming beneath it all.
Kind of describes a lot of their relationship, doesn't it? :)
no subject
Date: Sep. 12th, 2006 12:40 am (UTC)Yeah, but... What? :O
I love how the writers are savvy enough to still be playing with as many pairings as they can juggle -- House/Chase with the pat and ball and 11th-hour loyalty, House/Wilson of course, House/Cuddy, House/Cameron, -- did I miss the House/Foreman or was that in the hallway when Foreman insists that he's learning? --, intra-ducklings banter, Wilson/Cuddy, the works. They know how to please their 'shipper fanbase without turning the show into a soap and deserve credit for it!
no subject
Date: Sep. 12th, 2006 12:50 am (UTC)I was thinking about what you said re: Cameron being a mini-Wilson, which I totally agree with and have mentioned somewhere around here before, and it made something click into place in the episode while I was watching it a second time just now. If Cameron's taking over Wilson's role by calling House on his unusual behavior and following him around and saying his lines with his intonations (example #2, "You did something for which she's grateful and you're... embarrassed?") before putting her hands on her hips, then Wilson is going to need to fill a new role. And maybe that's where they're going/what they're doing with this whole "tough love, try to change him or keep him changed" line. That maybe Wilson will be less of an accepting friend and more of the sort of to-his-face and behind-his-back manipulative friend we had back in "Detox." *shrug* I'm sure we'll see within a couple of weeks where they're planning to go with all this.
no subject
Date: Sep. 12th, 2006 01:00 am (UTC)A House/Wilson fight would definitely be fun, in a painful kind of way. Like I was just saying to
I'm still torn about Wilson's decision to convince Cuddy not to tell House about the miraculous recovery, mostly because it was a stupid time to decide to withhold information (obviously House is going to find out about this one). I get why he's doing it and that he thinks it's what's best for House. Whether he has a right to decide what's best for House is possibly the issue here, but then again, when you think about all the times House manipulated him for more selfish purposes, House seems less of an innocent victim here. I guess the biggest problem I have is that Wilson seems to be doing this to take House down a peg -- not to save patients like he tells Cuddy.
no subject
Date: Sep. 12th, 2006 03:08 pm (UTC)then Wilson is going to need to fill a new role... That maybe Wilson will be less of an accepting friend and more of the sort of to-his-face and behind-his-back manipulative friend we had back in "Detox."
Oh. That is a possibility. If that's what he becomes, though, I do hope he and House will still be able, from time to time, to be two stupid dorky friends who do things like make games out of paper-clip throwings.