House Review: 8x15, "Blowing The Whistle"

DAHLINGS –

It can be shattering to discover that someone you worshipped has shortcomings. That is what happens to the POTW, Army Biff, in “Blowing The Whistle”, when he finds out his father’s death was not honorable, but a drunk-driving traffic accident in which Dad killed a pedestrian.

Now for the important, shattering, truth: at times I have mixed feelings about House MD. I actually shed a few tears after the episode. Not because of the episode. Your faithful correspondent is deeply saddened that the show she has been intimate with for years is packing its bags and leaving. I know you are all shocked and amazed that I have any shortcomings, but there you are.

With only a handful of episodes left, so it’s hard to tell what is important or unimportant, or unimportant now and extremely important later. In latter seasons, they built up to some major astonishments (for example, in Season 6, discovering that Dr. Nolan, House’s psychiatrist, had been advising him behind the scenes all season without the audience’s knowledge). This episode is surprisingly good, which this season means mediocre in any other season.

Perhaps one of you out there could explain the POTW’s A-story to me. Army Biff (Arlen Escarpeta) leaked a video of a civilian massacre, yes? He will go to prison, yes? His by-the-book brother is well and truly pissed, yes? Army Biff feels it is a matter of honor to let the public know what the military is doing. Biff’s Brother (Sharif Atkins) feels it is a matter of honor not to let the public know what the military is doing. Have I gotten this straight?

Army Biff was a more significant presence than most of the season’s POTWs, with a more compelling story, even if I had trouble following it. Army Biff refuses treatment unless he is given a public forum for the video he leaked and his reasons for doing so. Both sons venerate their late father and each feels in his own way that Dead Dad would approve of what they are doing. Biff knows that his dad died in an accident, but he suspects a military cover-up. However, it is Biff’s Brother who covered up the accident. I did wonder why it would be so shattering to find out that your father killed someone accidentally while drunk…well, perhaps that would upset one a tad. My apologies.

The show might have cast two actors with a passing resemblance to each other. Atkins does a lot with a little, most of which consisted of standing about scowling with disapproval.

House sits with Army Biff and gives a speech about honor. It sounds fairly close to an old-time House monologue :“You’re not doing this for honor. You’re doing this to please your father. And the pathetic thing is, the man you’re trying to please never existed.” (House daddy-issues alert!)

The B-story, taken from “Half Wit” and a few other episodes, has House pretending to have liver failure. In "Half Wit" he faked brain cancer to get experimental drugs to get high. It would have been much more fun if he had let Wilson in on his scheme, as he had when he faked having syphilis to screw with his team in an earlier episode.

"Breaking The Record" for scenes set in the men's room while House is taking a crap

Adams is the one who diagnosises hepatic encephalopathy from a few vague symptoms. Everyone gets very freaked out. He's sick! Maybe he's dying--again! It is obvious that House is again trying to screw with his team. It is Chase, the team member who has known House the longest, figures out how House has been doing it. I mean, Chase has been to this rodeo before.(Note: Jesse Spencer has shaved his neckbeard! God, he’s beautiful. But I digress.)

There were two clinic scenes this time. As often happens, those were some of the best parts of the episode. However, in the first clinic scene, Wilson sounds so much like House that it’s possible Hugh Laurie wasn’t available that day and Robert Sean Leonard was swapped in. But still, highly amusing to see the patient busted for compulsive nose picking. In the second, House has a hungover clinic patient hop on one leg while singing the “iCarly” theme song.

Taub has been freed from the confines of that godawful marital soap opera, allowing him to be the Taub we all know and love. (His gaming name is Taubinator!)

Yet another gaming scene. Taub wins, which means House is dying.

Park gets to be the self-righteous one this go-round, and she is more entertaining to watch than Adams. I may dislike her intensely, but she has a personality to dislike intensely. But if you were deathly ill, would you want someone nattering away at you about right and wrong? If he wasn't so weak, my bet is Army Biff would take a swing at her.

Wilson is around more, which is always a treat. As I wrote above, I do wish House had let Wilson be his co-conspirator, rather than let his friend worry along with the others. Wilson looks harried and unhappy in most of his scenes. I am hoping that this is the character, not the actor. But then, Hugh Laurie has been phoning it in all season and it’s almost over, so why try too hard? It’s still a shame.

After the past two episodes, “Blowing The Whistle” is a definite improvement. Let us hope the upward trend continues. In what fashion the series ends is anyone’s guess. Your faithful correspondent hopes that the series ends with House and Wilson getting married.

Feel free to discuss in the comments. Bear in mind that I am always right.

Ciao,
Elisa and Fletcher

Random notes:

Seizure in the cold open - check
Blood in odd openings - check
Sarcoidosis - double check

Hugh Laurie looks weird.

Thank God Dominika wasn't around.

Nothing can make me care about Adams having sex. Seriously. Nothing.


DISCLAIMER: Before all of the House/Cuddy fans explode, yes, I miss Cuddy and I miss Lisa Edelstein.

Review: House Ep. 8x13, Caveman Of The House

DAHLINGS -

Much like the doctors vying for the title of team leader, the writers of “House” are striving to see who can write the worst script before the series’ end. Sarah Hess and Liz Friedman have a strong lead with “Man Of The House.”

This script is a strange mix indeed: a cauldron of outdated sexual politics, sitcom, and…what was the third thing? Oh, yes, the patient of the week, a marriage counseling motivational speaker named…um…er…Biff. Sorry, but it's easier to call them all Biff.

A professional speaker who urges men to be more like women and get in touch with their feelings, Biff collapses and falls off the stage.

House announces that because of evolution, it is impossible to change the way men act. (Does devolution explain the change of his character from tortured genius to bullying baboon?)

It seems that Biff had a life-altering experience three years prior, when he was beaten up in a fight in a sports bar. Since then he became a changed man, from hard-driving corporate shark to someone with very strange hair and moist, sensitive eyes. Biff claims his wife has changed “my life and my diet.” He’s gone red meat and gluten-free, which means he can now only eat cardboard. She beams.

For no other reason than for wacky shenanigans and false conflict, House starts a contest among his team for highly undesirable position of team leader. Why anyone would want a job that humiliated Foreman for years is beyond me, but it’s going be hilarious!

Whenever the camera pans around the diagnostics room, I’m distracted by the redecoration, including the mysteriously vanished garage door into Wilson’s office. Who directed this episode, Greg Yaitanes?

But wait! There’s more! Flying in from Sitcom Land it’s the long-lost Dominika, House’s green-card bride. She’s adorable. Her accent is adorable. Her long brown hair is adorable. She needs to keep her adorable self in the country, which means to pretend having lived in marital bliss with House for the past six months. So they need to learn every fact possible to each other, coached first by Park, then by Wilson. He has seniority because he has been married three times.

(Side note: in an interview prior to Season 8, when asked if they were going to bring back Dominika, David Shore said no. Apparently he felt the show needed more breasts now that Lisa Edelstein is gone. And in the new world order, they have to be nonthreatening breasts. Dominika’s breasts are adorable.)

She offers House $30,000 to pretend to be her real husband as opposed to her pretend-real-husband—they are married, yes? So isn’t he her real husband? My head aches already. God, she’s adorable. She dances around House’s living room to Amy Grant songs. As much as I actually like the character, this woman needs to get a fatal disease.

Oh, dear, your faithful correspondent forgot the patient! There’s been some diagnosing, wrong naturally. Do you really care if I recap the diagnoses so far? No, neither do I. I’ve watched the episode twice, and I don’t know if I have the stomach to do it again.

House goes to Biff and asks if he was hit in the groin during the bar fight. The answer is yes. While they discuss it, House drops things, asking Adams and Chase to bend over to pick them up. Biff never takes his eyes off House. Which either means he has no sex drive, or he’s a fanboy who can’t stop staring at HL.

The blow turned Biff's testicles purely ornamental, which is why he is so sensitive and preaches feelings and makes pottery. And has no libido, even though his wife is the hottest woman on the show. Although less adorable than you-know-who.

House orders injections of testosterone. Biff’s wife obviously hopes that among the side effects will be getting laid more than every six months. The shots make him leaner, meaner, craving hamburgers, and cracking lascivious remarks about her ass.

The oh-so-funny B-story has House and Dominika posing in various outfits in front of a green screen, which can then be made into travel pictures. For the Las Vegas picture, they don huge Elvis wigs.

Taub asks to talk to House alone. Taub feels the team should be friends, not competitors. How long has he worked there? House announces that Taub is no longer a man because he is raising children. (Huh?)

And House is wearing a Hawaiian shirt and a giant Elvis wig.

GOOD GOD, WHAT ARE THEY DRINKING IN THE WRITER’S ROOM? WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE AND HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO SIT THROUGH THIS NONSENSE? A CHIMPANZEE TAKING A CRAP ON A NEWSPAPER WOULD BE BETTER THAN THIS!

Oh, dear, pardon my outburst. So unlike me!

"Who can turn the world on with her smile?"

Meanwhile, the patient gets jaundice. Don't they always? By the end of the episode, he’s so yellow he looks like Big Bird crossed with Donald Trump.

House and Dominika welcome the immigrant agent, Nate, to House’s apartment. Nate doesn't find it strange that a beautiful young woman is married to her creepy uncle. Everything is going beautifully until Nate asks to speak to a neighbor. He opens the door and—there’s Wilson! Wearing a silly hat! Wilson has dropped in from Sitcom Land to pretend to be the wacky British neighbor. But the real occupant of the apartment shows up. Ruh-roh!

Nate orders House and Dominika to be in his office at ten the next morning. Dominika might be deported! House is threatened with jail for the 35,000th time! What’s going to happen?

Long story short, the judge is so impressed by how adorable Dominika is that he’s going to let her stay for six months. But she has to live in marital bliss with House full-time. They will be spot-checked at all times of the day or night. I was hoping for deportation, but that would have been so season two.

Biff now has turbo-nads. For starters, he tells his wife that “he’s going to be the man in this relationship.” In fact, he’s going to make some kind of deal whether she likes it or not. In two viewings I did not get what the deal was, but it doesn’t matter. He’s Doing What He Wants, Damn The Torpedoes, Because That’s What Men Do.

"Can you believe anyone watches this?" "No one does. That's why we're cancelled."

After viewing some old videos of Evil Corporate Shark Biff, House has some kind of epiphany. House and Taub go see Biff. House announces that chronic hoarseness is a symptom of chronic thyroiditis. Biff’s not hoarse now, but he was three years ago. And chronic thyroiditis comes and goes. The Magi-Cam goes into Biff so that House can rattle off some gibberish that means, “you’re sick.”

They’re going to treat Biff with steroids. Testosterone and steroids! Biff will Hulk out! Maybe Chase will get stabbed once more! House says, “Kicked in the nuts is kicked in the nuts.” I rewound the scene to see what that had to do with anything. I still don’t know. Enlighten me in the comments, won’t you?

But Biff spoils the fun by refusing the testosterone, despite the health risks. “I’m a better man without it,” he sighs. His wife leaves the room to hang herself because now she will never have sex again.

Cut to wacky C-story: House is putting the team, save Taub, through a series of idiotic contests (suturing pigs’ feet) for the bafflingly coveted position. Taub gets it by offering to split the difference in his salary with House.

At the end, as Amy Grant blasts on the soundtrack, House comes back to his apartment to find it immaculate and hideously decorated. Adorable Dominika is doing adorable dance aerobics in the kitchen. Cut to House making a series of facial expressions until he says (and I want you to know I said this with him): “Honey, I’m home!”

Ruh-roh.

Ciao,
Elisa & Fletcher

Review: House Season 8 Ep. 10, "Runaways"

DAHLINGS -

It would seem that, in its return to basics, “House” has established several ongoing motifs.

1) The team does almost all of its work without him. However, House
occasionally swings by for the epiphany. Or to say “put him on interferon”.
2)There is an amazing amount of time spent on meaningless mind games and
high-larious pranks.
3) Park is quirky and says “surprising” things.
4) Adams is a hologram.
5) Foreman is in almost every scene. Which is odd, because he’s not on the team
anymore. As Dean of Medicine, he’s getting more screen time than Cuddy did. I adore Foreman, but really. Doesn’t he have a large teaching hospital to run?

On a cheerier note, your faithful correspendent could actually recall this week’s episode, “Runaways.” Last week’s episode, “Better Half,” was so dull it could have been a filmed blocking rehearsal. Even now I can’t remember the plot…oh, yes, early onset Alzheimer’s, a fascinating, tragic disease that the show managed to make neither fascinating nor tragic. It was even irritating when House spoke Portuguese. Yes, House knows every single language ever invented, but please, just once, show, have a translator come in! There was some kind of prank war. And fisticuffs.

What “Better Half” clearly demonstrated was that the chemistry between House and Wilson seems to have evaporated. The rapport is no longer, the relationship is no longer there, it’s two actors in a room. Neither of them particularly interested in what’s going on.

Hmmm, I remembered more than I thought I would.

Back to “Runaways.”

Right at the top, House announces for the 107,406,321th time, “People don’t change.”

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, BANISH THIS PHRASE TO THE BLACK HOLE OF WRITER’S PURGATORY! PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE NEVER USE IT AGAIN! IS IT SO MUCH TO ASK THAT IN A SEA OF CLICHÉS, YOU CAN’T LEAVE OUT ONE???

Ahem. I beg your pardon. It’s a bit of a sore point.

A teenage runaway arrives the clinic with an ear bleed. This was once the hospital where seeing House was truly the last-case scenario. Desperate people came from other countries because he was a world-famous diagnostician. Now, it seems, all one needs is a trip to the clinic or the ER and House pops up, ready to go.

The teenager is supposedly homeless but she has set up shop in an abandoned house. Can’t recall her name, so let’s call her…Biff. Poor Biff has Druggie Mom. Druggie Mom and Biff briefly reconcile when Druggie Mom tells Biff, “I only did drugs after you were asleep, honey.” “I love you, Mom.”

House no longer has an ankle monitor on, so he drags to team to oh-so-wild-and-crazy places. Such as a shooting range, where he dresses like Elmer Fudd. Then a turtle race, in which Park gets to be quirky at a turtle.(Don’t these doctors have tests to run? Laundry? Anything?)




House’s biting wit is on display when he can’t stop giggling over the name “Pooholtz.” Straight out of Oscar Wilde’s playbook.

Foreman’s extramarital affair ends when he learns the wife has told the husband and the husband doesn’t mind. It makes no sense, but it’s just as well, as the wife is an even worse actress than Park.

Taub…remember when Taub was a wonderfully dry, snarky doctor? About two decades ago? Taub’s storyline is one of the best arguments for Planned Parenthood that I’ve seen yet. He bonds with the Sophii by telling them about football.

ANYWAY, Biff’s diagnosis is worms. Rather like the girl who went fishing with her parents and ate undercooked trout and ended up with tapeworm, Biff went swimming with Druggie Mom and contracted worms. Druggie Mom goes to bond with Biff. But Biff has run away once again, just as…somebody else ran away. I mean, the B-plot is always the A-plot on training wheels.

And there were two wacky civil way reenactors.

My hand on the Bible, I am not making any of this up.



Next week’s episode is supposed to be iconic.

ETA: As I was writing this, the Fox network announced that it is bumping “House” off the schedule for the month of March, extending “Alcatraz” in its place. You may draw your own conclusions.

ETA Part Two: Feel free to discuss this review in the comments. However, personal attacks will not be published.

Ciao,
Elisa

I Am Addicted To "HOUSE MD": A Shamed Confession

DAHLINGS -

As mes fidèles lecteurs aimant know, I do not watch television, except when it is necessary (the Academy Awards, for example). However, because you know everything about moi (my life is an open book with only some of the pages torn out), I feel I must throw myself on your mercy and confess:

I have become completely addicted to the television programme "House MD," starring Hugh Laurie. Last night I even pleaded a headache to an important event so that I could stay home and watch the latest episode! I have NEVER done that, dear readers!

For an intimate evening, yes, but never for television.

I became aware of Hugh Laurie on television as the idiotic twit Bertie Wooster (along with Stephen Fry) in the delightful British series "Jeeves and Wooster," based on the P.G. Wodehouse stories. In fact, I only saw Hugh Laurie playing idiotic upper-crust twits, in the many variations of "Blackadder" starring Rowan Atkinson, the gentleman leering at the top.


So it was a complete shock to see him, with stubble and gruff American accent, playing Dr. House. So much so, in fact, that it took me over a year to be able to watch the programme without giggling whenever Hugh Laurie spoke, and not because of the wit of the dialogue. He seemed so deeply miscast.



Although he is a huge improvement over Alan Alda, who annoyed me in "M*A*S*H*", as a child, the few times dear darling Mama let me near a television set. (She disapproved and preferred that I read elevating books or fashion magazines.)

But then a close friend, who felt sorry for my isolation while I am engaged in my literary endeavors, gave me the first three seasons on DVD. Dear readers, I watched him. And soon I was, as they say, hooked. I will not be writing about it much in this blog-thing, because for one thing my assistant can hardly contain her snickering--

CUT THAT OUT, YOU BLOODY FOOL! IN THIS ECONOMY THERE ARE A MILLION OTHER PEOPLE WHO WOULD LEAP AT THIS JOB!

Excusez-moi. As I was saying, I will not be writing about it here, because I am already embarrassed enough, and this is a place to discuss Fashion In The True Sense. Medical shows do not have much of that (particularly with all of that blood--ugh). However, I will opine that Lisa Edelstein's wardrobe is particularly lovely, and for a slender woman she does have a divine bosom.


Dieu merci, they keep that skeletal Olivia Wilde in a hospital coat much of the time. In any event, last night's episode had me on the edge of my divan, and I look forward to more.

I feel so cleansed. Merci, dear readers. (And one hopes that Dr. Taub does indeed commit suicide, as they keep hinting, although that seems a tad obvious.)

Ciao,
Elisa & Bucky the Wonderdog