House 3x08 - "Whac-a-Mole"

[bironic]

Oh, my heart.

This is what happens: A series teases me with slashy jokes, I circle it warily until it seduces me with top-notch writing and acting, I let it in, and then it causes me PAIN. Character-driven pain, that is, not poorly-constructed-show pain. Why? Why must there always be pain?

And why is it so much fun to curl up on the couch and wail about the rending heartstrings?

Five quick things:

1. "Love note from Tritter." Vindicating every decent Wilson/Tritter fic that's been written with the angle that Tritter's using & abusing him to get to House.

2. I love pissed-off Wilson. Protesting to the ticketing-by-proxy officer, yelling at the pharmacist (of course he'd know the guy's name and use it even when he's furious), fighting with his lawyer*, snapping at his busom buddy Cuddy, arguing with Cameron, and finally losing it with House. It's taken three years, give or take a few minor breakdowns along the way ("Babies & Bathwater" and "Safe," for instance), to wear him down to this, and man, is it a wonderful, painful thing to witness. FIX IT, HOUSE, YOU MORON.

* Wilson mentioned a Michael sometime during his aborted appointment. I assume he didn't mean Tritter, and another lawyer was mentioned immediately afterwards. Michael = Wilson's usual attorney?

3. Was anyone else amused by Chase in the sauna, looking half-dead? Aren't you supposed to be used to heat when you're Australian -- or at least more tolerant of it than your northeastern American colleagues?

4. "Fight with the wife?" Thus vindicating every decent story that casts Cuddy as the sly slasher. And House or Wilson's line, I can't remember whose, in which it was phrased as Tritter attacking "us," together. And then Wilson ordering House out of his office before that awful, resigned remark about how at least now he knows House isn't going to help him through the mess he got him into. Of all the times House could have chosen to alienate Wilson, this is just about the worst. It's also in character. Which is of course what makes it great drama. It hurts all the more having followed on last week's heels. House sure has a funny way of showing how much he doesn't want to push the friendship till it breaks. Idiot.

5. I was so convinced Wilson would give up and become the titular "mole" for Tritter, and just as relieved when he, at least, held true to the claims of last week's episode and protected House even though it meant shutting down his own practice and having a falling-out with the very man he's sacrificing for. Who knows how long he will be able to hold out? I'd like to think House will cave before Wilson does.


...I'm gonna go work on my post-"Son of Coma Guy" story now for comfort and pretend that it explains why Wilson started out so irritable and how House transitioned from confessing that he doesn't want to lose Wilson's friendship to riding past him on a bus bench in the cold. *sniff* My heart. I love it.


* * *

Commentaries: nightdog_barks, noydb666, Pru, stephantom, daasgrrl, asynca (WARNING: adult content), axmxz, usomitai

Post-ep fic: "None" by savemoony (drabble, Wilson gen), "Wait" by nakannalee (H/W PG-13), "Crossing Borders, or One Way House Could Have Apologized, If He Wasn't Such an Asshole" by ignazwisdom (H/W PG-13), "In Over Your Head" by pwcorgigirl (triple drabble, H/W gen)

Comments

[stephantom.livejournal.com]

I know. The pain! Agh. They're trying to give us whiplash, with last week and this week's episodes...

House sure has a funny way of showing how much he doesn't want to push the friendship till it breaks. Idiot.

I'll agree, however, I don't think House actually really did much here. It's all happening because of his original screwup with the Vicodin, but things getting worse this week than they were last week isn't really his fault - that he's not acknowledging his original mistake isn't helping though.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Yep -- last week softened us up and this week went in for the kill. I love it.

House may not have done much -- and even that's arguable -- but he certainly didn't help make it better, beyond pimping loaning Cameron out part-time to write Wilson's prescriptions. Now that he's seen that Tritter has no problem targeting the people House cares about, and now that he has a taste of how far Tritter's willing to go to hurt those people within the bounds of the law, House should be revising his original decision not to apologize, back when it was only his pride on the line and not, say, his best friend's career. As Wilson pointed out mid-tirade, the psychosomatic shoulder pain hints that he is experiencing some guilt, and that's a good sign. But how much more damage will be done before he takes some sort of action? Will he ever take action, or will he continue to stick to his guns, refuse to cave to the bigger bully, and argue that anyone else who gets caught in the crossfire had it coming to them?

[stephantom.livejournal.com]

Hm.. I hadn't even considered apologizing to Tritter as an option. I doubt that would do any good at this point. I feel like House's thinking toward this situation is, "I may have screwed up - it caused a shit-snowball, and now I (along with everyone else) have to wait for it to pass." Not the best approach, but on the other hand, what else is he supposed to do, really? Turn himself in and go to jail?