House — Episode 5 (Season 6): “Brave Heart”
The medical mystery was intriguing on this week’s House, but the medicine was shaky from the beginning, resulting in a rather pedestrian solution. Plenty of so-so soap opera, if you like that sort of thing.
The patient this week is Donny, a police officer with a deathwish. His father, grandfather, and great-grandfather all died at age 40 due to a sudden heart problem. He is convinced that he is going to die at forty as well, so he has started to take crazy chances at work, certain that he will be dead soon enough anyway. In his latest escapade, he fell 30 feet trying to jump from roof to roof after a parkour-ing thief and ended up with a concussion, a couple of broken bones, and a punctured lung. When Cameron hears about his family heart history she admits him for evaluation, to the dismay of House who thinks Donny’s family history nothing more than a coincidence.
The initial differential diagnosis for Donny, focusing on a suspected genetic heart condition, includes Marfan syndrome (an inherited disease of the connective tissue that can affect the aorta and heart valves), Brugada syndrome (an inherited abnormal heart rhythm), and familial hypercholesterolemia (an inherited condition that results in very high cholesterol and early heart attacks). Foreman orders some vague “genetic testing” in addition to an EKG, cardiac catheterization, and echocardiogram. All of the initial tests are normal, so Foreman and team proceed to run further genetic testing on the conveniently available remains of the patient’s father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. It is also discovered that Donny has a son he didn’t know about, so DNA is collected from him as well. Once again, all the tests are negative.
House decides it is time to send Donny home as there is no evidence of any disease. He and Chase tell the patient that he has the very rare (and completely fictional) condition known as Ortoli Syndrome, and that it can be successfully treated with the (fictional) drug Nabasynth. They give him a few breath mints as a placebo and send him on his way. Only it doesn’t work out so well. Donny collapses, dead, four hours later in the laundry room at his apartment complex.
Foreman has Donny’s body moved to Princeton Plainsboro so they can perform the postmortem. As he and House begin the autopsy, starting the Y incision, they notice the body is bleeding, which shouldn’t be happening in a corpse that old. Suddenly, Donny sits up and screams. It turns out he wasn’t dead after all — and no one noticed. He is readmitted to the hospital, and after a brief period of lucidity, becomes essentially unresponsive with a dangerously low blood pressure (though this is forgotten soon enough and he is awake for the rest of episode). The new differential diagnosis is tetrodotoxin exposure (the toxin from the fugu, of pufferfish), sick sinus syndrome (a condition where the heart’s natural pacemaker isn’t working right), or a sinoatrial block (another abnormal heart rhythm). House suggests the underlying problem may not be in the heart at all and recommends the team look elsewhere. Chase proposes some sort of metabolic disturbance and Foreman suggests an autoimmune disease (actually he suggests that the family suffers a “pre-disposition to an autoimmune disease”, but clearly they all had more than a mere disposition). He suggests anti-Ro antibodies (a marker for autoimmune disease) which can lead to heartblock. House concurs and Donny is started on steroids.
There is no improvement, in fact, Donny begins to complain of a severe headache that later becomes jaw pain and then a severe tooth pain. He finds a heavy surgical clamp, conveniently left in the room, and pulls his own tooth out. The team has the tooth evaluated by a dentist (using a specialist, for once) and it is normal. They now decide that Donny must have bone cancer with paraneoplastic syndrome. The inheritance is explained by Li Fraumeni syndrome (an inherited condition where patients have a high chance of developing cancer at an early age), which makes people more likely to develop bone cancer. A gamma scan (a bone scan to look for cancer) is performed but is normal — there is no bone cancer.
House now decides that the condition is a nerve problem and diagnoses Donny with hereditary sensory autonomic neuropathy, type I (an inherited degenerative nerve disorder). He is started on carbamazepine (an anti-seizure drug that can provide partial relief of pain in HSAN1). Almost immediately after starting the drug, Donny loses bowel control, so the team decides they once again have the wrong diagnosis. Autoimmune is suggested once more, but shot down. Wilson’s disease (an inherited disease of copper metabolism) is also suggested, but House notes Donny’s liver functions are normal. The counter suggestion is that his liver is so bad, the labs look normal, so they decide to go ahead and start him on the treatment for Wilson’s disease, penicillamine (rather than, you know, actually testing the liver). Later, while bantering with Cuddy, House has his Eureka! moment and deduces that Donny has a berry aneurysm slowly growing in the brain in just the right place to press against the part of the brain responsible for the heart. Some quick brain surgery and both Donny and his son survive to live a full life.
The medicine had some problems this week. As usual, major complaints are in red, minor in blue, nit-picking in green:
Berry aneurysms can be inherited, but 5 generations of patients with an aneurysm at the identical location in the brain — out of all the arteries in the brain — growing at an identical rate. If you buy that, I have some oceanfront property to sell you in Arizona.
Are the cardiac centers and tooth pain centers even near each other in the brain?
Cardiac catheterizations can have serious complications and they’re not undertaken lightly. I doubt any self respecting cardiologist — at least one who wants to keep her malpractice insurance rates somewhat affordable — would perform a cath on a healthy forty year old with no cardiac symptoms. EKG and Echocardiogram are probably overkill too, but at least they’re not invasive.
Bone Marrow DNA is “more pure?” DNA is DNA — it’s the same whatever cell you take it from. If the blood isn’t “pure enough” surely there are easier — and less painful — ways to get a sample than a bone marrow biopsy.
So this week, in addition to being the team leader and a neurologist (who missed an intracranial aneurysm — the bread and butter of his profession), Foreman is:
A pathologist
A cardiologist
A radiologist
A geneticist.
Sequencing the cardiac sodium channel, in a hospital lab, in a day. Right. See me about that property in Arizona. Even with modern equipment, gene sequencing is tricky, time consuming, and a specialized skill.
HSAN1 doesn’t fit the case at all.
For once, they don’t get a brain scan, and where is the solution? The brain.
At least run some simple tests before declaring it to be Wilson’s Disease.
Verbatim from my wife: “If I were House, I would just walk around the hospital having random conversations with people until I have my Eureka! moment and solve the case.”
I thought the medical mystery was very good this week, but the initial presentation and the Lazarus-like return; I give it an A-. The final solution was pedestrian, an incredible stretch of coincidence, and didn’t really fit all that well. I give it a D. The medicine overall was barely okay — not good, but not horribly bad — like a car accident where the car isn’t a total loss — and earns a C-. The soap opera was plentiful, but nothing spectacular. For the second week in a row, it earns a C.
Last week’s House review
A list of all prior House reviews
October 19th, 2009 at 11:12 pm
I didn’t see the dead cop “coming back to life”.. nice swerve! It actually made me almost spill my dinner b/c I jumped when Chase did. I would LOVE to see the outtakes from that scene one day…. :D
License or no, since when do the Surgical Doctors also moonlight doing Autopsies??? I know that with budgetary cutbacks Cuddy has been telling them for 6 years now to “do more with less” but ‘cmon… How much does doing all their own procedures AND the autopsies really save PP?? They do need to leave a little bit of work for someone else to do… After all the Hospital IS staffed with a few more then 6 employees….
Now about Chase…. Man his deterioration has been quite pronounced over the last 2 episodes….”I crossed the line and now I’m having trouble crossing back” he tells Foreman tonight…. Ya think??
For him to try and seek absolution and being told the ONLY way he could get it was that he had to turn himself in, that DOES NOT fit within his personal ideal of being morally justified for doing what he did at all.
“What am I to do? What does God need me to do”? Chase cries to which the Priest replies “You cant have absolution without first taking responsibility. You have to turn yourself in to the police”.
What gets me about that exchange is that Chase in his “moral arrogance” would actually have the cajones to think that God agreed with what he did. “Just forgive me” was his arrogant appeal in the confessional. I thought he went to the Seminary prior to becoming a Doctor? He should know better then think that forgiveness is something given on a whim just because he feels he deserves it..and he of all people should know God’s take on the issue and know that it wasn’t his. Guess he conveniently forgot “Thou shall not kill” among the many biblical reference he would have known having been a seminary student.
His justification to the priest: “What? And go to jail for the rest of my life? Whats just about that? I did the right thing, there *has* to be another way”.
I’m sorry, Chase deserving absolution is about as morally ‘right’ or ‘just’ as Diballa deserving to be murdered by him. For the 2nd week in a row, Cameron suspects, but what exactly does she suspect? She knows Foreman is in on it but she doesnt know what ‘it’ actually is… Having to get drunk to come home and face Cameron….that just reeks (no pun intended) of ignorant inconsideration.
Cameron’s instinct to ‘fix’ whats broken in Chase is kicking in and he wants no part of it so this “rift” is seemingly setting the stage for a showdown… presumably in November when Jennifer Morrison’s last scenes are aired. So guess how this all plays out….someone leaves and someone stays, I wonder which is which.lol.
Looks like now that House is “cured” he will no longer be needing the services of Dr. Nolan after what, 2 outpatient visits? This is an unfortunate choice the writers are making which is too bad because you dont get over what House went through that fast…period. I think the writers are missing something here that should be obvious to them and they are making IMHO a big mistake in making House’s recovery trivial and less then credible.
It was also very cool to see the old House back, the old borderline sexual harassment banter w/ Cuddy and his browbeating the Doctor’s he was forced to do rounds with were all ‘classic’ House with just a touch of the old venom thrown in for good measure. House v.2 seems to be on the right path, Wilson thinks so, why else tell Amber’s ghost “You see, he really IS getting better” and smiling at the end.
October 19th, 2009 at 11:15 pm
Sorry… I meant to say Foreman not Chase… I got Chase on the brain..
October 19th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
No mention of the mysterious whispers House kept hearing in Wilson’s apartment? (For a time, I thought Wilson was “gaslighting” House, and in a sense he was, but not deliberately or maliciously.)
October 19th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
differential diagnosis for resurrection go!
October 19th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
I loved the soap opera! I thought Chase was brilliant, and I’m a Huddy through and through.
Found the patient to be a little dull but managed to follow the medical mystery well enough, as I usually do with the old cottages. I struggle to follow when Olivia Wilde has anything to do with it.
Thought the Wilson storyline was absolutely heartbreaking and a little creepy. I think he needs proper help :(
October 19th, 2009 at 11:29 pm
Surprised you didn’t mention Foreman doing the Y-incision with a bone saw.
October 19th, 2009 at 11:36 pm
@ MrBuddwing :
It was House hearing through the central air vent in the floor of his room, Wilson talking to Amber. House confirmed this by getting up after the 2nd ‘episode’ and looking for then finding the vent and going to Wilson’s room and opening the door after hearing muffled speech from behind it.
October 19th, 2009 at 11:45 pm
I would just like to remind everyone that on my list of potential diagnoses I had:
1. Lupus.
2. Not lupus.
… And I have therefore got the diagnosis right every single week. So why am I not leading in the tally, hmmm? I put it down to a conspiracy!
Incidentally, I also meant to have “massively ridiculous coincidence” as one of my options, but I forgot. Would I get more points for that this week?
October 19th, 2009 at 11:49 pm
Scott,
Could I trouble you for an official comment? It can’t possibly be legal that a doctor gives a patient a placebo and a fictional diagnosis.
October 20th, 2009 at 12:12 am
Was anyone else more interested in the story behind the thief than in anything else that happened this episode? That chase scene was so ridiculous (four cops waving their guns around, telling him to stop moving, and then not shooting him as he shimmies away up a drainpipe?) that at first I thought they were filming a movie in the show. And then when the patient came back to life, I thought it might be another House dream/hallucination episode.
October 20th, 2009 at 12:25 am
The thief was unarmed…while police may threaten people with their firearms, they actually aren’t supposed to shoot someone if they aren’t being threatened.
October 20th, 2009 at 1:14 am
Donny sits up and screams. It turns out he wasn’t dead after all — and no one noticed.
Scott this was the part I was looking forward to your take on. Really no sign that he was alive. Would his condition have made that possible? How besides the low blood pressure? Also, wouldn’t he have bleed much more from the incision that was made with a SAW! at the autopsy?
Also tell the bunny and kitty sorry from me. :(
I see a link from you I got to know. :)
October 20th, 2009 at 1:44 am
I too was shocked to see resurrection during autopsy. Shouldn’t his brain have died long ago? (Was House mad for not wearing any protective gear during that incision?)
How did the thief make the jump? The gap was way too big. The cop must have been contemplating suicide for quite some time to attempt a jump that he was nowhere near making.
October 20th, 2009 at 2:11 am
I don’t know if the PotW’s condition could reduce his vitals to the point where no one would realize he was still alive, but apparently fugu poisoning is able to bring a person so low that the law in Japan is that anyone who collapses after eating fugu must be left for 3 days before an autopsy or burial can occur. I’ve heard of cases where a person who slipped into a diabetic coma was declared dead only to later rise up.
October 20th, 2009 at 3:06 am
So this week, in addition to being the team leader and a neurologist, Foreman is:
A pathologist
A cardiologist
A radiologist
A geneticist
AGAIN… please stop complaining when the stars of the show are actually in the episode instead of random people. They can’t bring in a new specialist every week without hurting their star’s screen time. It’s never going to happen, so please drop the complaints.
October 20th, 2009 at 3:33 am
No eye protection during the autopsy. Just the thing when you’re using a rotary saw that throws blood everywhere. ;)
October 20th, 2009 at 4:31 am
Just think that the autopsy is pretty sloppy – normally you will put a block of plastic under the back, this will allow the arm and head to drop backward whilst pushing the chest upward to make it easier to cut open.
And I always thought (never done it before), that a Y-shaped incision is usually start off from top of each shoulder and run down the sternum, but not the other way around? And resurrection with a massive scream,,,,ehumm?
October 20th, 2009 at 5:02 am
To think, Donny can live a nice life with his son after filing lawsuit for being given a fictional diagnosis by a non-licensed medical professional. :)
Probably among other things.
October 20th, 2009 at 5:06 am
Love your wife’s comment. :)
October 20th, 2009 at 5:12 am
the criminal at the start of the episode seems to be a traceur ( practitioner of parkour) which would explain his agility and skill in movements.
October 20th, 2009 at 6:02 am
Another great review Scott, what time do you watch the episodes? Because by the time I watch the episode at 5:00 am the day after it airs, your review is up.
October 20th, 2009 at 6:03 am
I was glad to read that about the bone marrow DNA–even as medically naive as I am, that struck me. But I guess that was only one of many problems in this episode.
Another thing, though, which leaped out as I was reading Scott’s breakdown: supposedly Foreman and House were doing the autopsy to find out why Donny had died, i.e. to confirm whether or not it WAS heart failure. But since they didn’t get very far, they don’t actually know why Donny “died” and came back to life. Maybe he is allergic to breath mints?
New treatment for flatlining patients: saw the breastbone open.
Re. Chase’s confession.It was going nowhere because Chase was not sorry for what he did.That is the first requirement for being forgiven–to believe there is something to forgive. Apparently he was going to the confessional for therapy, because he must have known that. The priest should have started with inquiring about repentance instead of just leaping to the conclusion that “I killed a man” means “I committed murder” and that Chase must “go to the police.” If Chase was sorry, he could be forgiven, though his penance might involve some kind of restoring act. Sorry is the first step.
Maybe Chase was just fantasizing the confessional. Like Donny was playing dead.
Did we ever hear what happened when Chase drove two hours to tell Donny’s ex that Donny was dead, BTW.?
October 20th, 2009 at 6:41 am
Well the writers are bending reality a little more than I can appreciate (I’m all for fantasy, but I prefer my medical shows, like my CSI shows, to remain somewhat in touch.) Howabout a one day exhumation of 2 people and a gutpile? The one day test on the DNA Scott mentioned, a friend of mine familiar with some police depts always cracks up at how quickly DNA results comes back to these CSI labs.
But yes, the big question Scott – could his heart have slowed/stopped to the point of being declared dead, only to miraculously come back to life later? Wouldn’t oxygen deprivation make him a vegetable by that point?
October 20th, 2009 at 7:06 am
Thanks for the review and laugh… first time I made a bunny cry.
October 20th, 2009 at 7:09 am
maybe the catheterization is a synonym for an electro-physiological-examination (i’m german the examination is called EPU in german. u put a catheter via arteria femoralis in the heart and stimulate, to see if there is any critical state)
Intra-cardial ECG and Stimulation in order to provoke a abnormal heart rhythm or V-fib. Brugada patients can be identified via this exam.
October 20th, 2009 at 7:23 am
Beaton, not just doing a Y-incision with a bone saw but NO EYE PROTECTION!!!! (Dead horse though.)
October 20th, 2009 at 7:36 am
I have yet another reason to hate the Yankees. My DVR only caught the first 20 mins of the episode because of the game.
At least they lost… now I’ll have to wait till next week to see it when the episode goes online.
October 20th, 2009 at 7:44 am
Bunny and kitty! <3 Seeing the links went back to PD, I just had to click. So sue me =P
October 20th, 2009 at 7:44 am
Why was there no brain damage after having his heart stopped for so long?
October 20th, 2009 at 7:45 am
“there is no bane cancer.”
Does Venom cause cancer?
October 20th, 2009 at 8:07 am
@mike
Actually I was thinking that as well …
Then they said it was extreme bradycardia … I haven’t gotten there yet (still a first-year med student), but is that possible?
October 20th, 2009 at 8:26 am
Official Comment
I didn’t comment on the “alive during the autopsy” scene because it’s not entirely outside the realm of possibility.
At least once or twice a year there’s a story in the news about someone found alive in the morgue or at autopsy. As others have pointed out, the patient in question usually doesn’t fare that well — coma and/or brain damage. (Now this patient was shown afterward all but comatose, a point conveniently ignored for the rest of the episode).
Usually it’s not as much a medical mystery as an administrative SNAFU. Patient is found down, EMT declared him dead. Shuffled from one hospital morgue to another and no one ever rechecks ’til the patient starts moving or moaning. So he may have had periods of “extreme bradycadia” but his heart may have been beating better at other times.
October 20th, 2009 at 8:28 am
All I could think last night was, man, Scott’s gonna go to *town* ripping up the medicine in this episode.
Hope this question hasn’t been addressed before and also that it isn’t stupid: Is it normal/common/feasible for a doctor to be notified of a discharged patient’s death so quickly?
A lot of House plots seem to hinge on emergency services finding The Team seconds after a long-discharged patient collapses from the requisite Second Incorrect Diagnosis Syndrome.
October 20th, 2009 at 8:29 am
Having read your tales of a medic it’s good to know you got married. Congrats. You should add that story somewhere. As for House…….. Is Brian sure that Lisa Sanders (Assistant professor of Clinical Medicine at Yale) is more than just a name paid to be attached to the show? Does she really consult?
October 20th, 2009 at 9:00 am
I was definitely concerned from last weeks preview since it looked like a ’stab’ at a Halloween episode of HOUSE. Having little to no medical knowledge made it fairly entertaining but the recovery from ‘death’ was ridiculous by any stretch of the imagination.
It was good to see HOUSE back in form with a pinch of Ver2 sprinkled around. I’d be surprised if he doesn’t still visit the therapist a couple times before he leaves Wilsons, considering that he is still under ‘observation’.
I hope this Chase/Kibala(?) storyline finishes quickly. I almost wish a new dictator( his son? ) would just spring up to prove that killing one man changes nothing. He needs to repent by providing medical care overseas.
October 20th, 2009 at 9:00 am
It seems to me that loss of bowel control wouldn’t be such a profound new symptom as to make them completely rethink their diagnosis, especially after the extreme traumas that guy had just gone to.
October 20th, 2009 at 9:10 am
Don’t have much. Loved your wife’s comment. Hee!
Also, I feel sorry for Wilson, but he needs professional help. Maybe even more than House at this point. People grieve in different ways and in different times. But telling a picture of your dead girlfriend how your day is more than two years after her death can’t be very healthy. He’s unable to move on. And, again, I realize that people move on at different rates, but some people should seek out grief counseling. If only be able to talk about their feelings because Wilson obviously feels he can’t talk to anyone else.
Kat
October 20th, 2009 at 9:18 am
I wonder just how many of us owe the bunny and kitty an apology?
Didn’t see that coming, but as someone else said – the links you provide are too interesting to pass up.
Thanks!
October 20th, 2009 at 9:47 am
Apparently Catholic priests never make turning oneself in a condition of absolution (though they can apparently strongly suggest doing so and take doing so as a sign of contrition).
October 20th, 2009 at 10:01 am
Is it just me or was the 120 hours of rounds reminiscent of House doing clinical work? Oh how I miss him blowing through case after case with sheer boredom because the mysteries are too easy. Bring some of that back. Nothing is more fun to watch than when House gets bored.
October 20th, 2009 at 10:36 am
I also had to wonder about the ethics of performing a brain stem surgery on a kid who had the potential to develop a major condition, without knowing if such an early preventative treatment would even stop it from developing again later. It makes for a nice touching scene with father-and-son going down the same road together, but I couldn’t help but wonder about the plausibility of them being so cavalier about cutting into a young, still-developing brain like that.
October 20th, 2009 at 10:37 am
Small question about “that his liver is so bad, the labs look normal”. Is that even possible, and/or would a non-functional liver not result in a lot of other quite obvious symptoms (like turning a little yellow)?
October 20th, 2009 at 10:38 am
So both Chase and Wilson need to get some counseling now.
October 20th, 2009 at 11:08 am
It tells a lot about the human nature that it seems that even after we’d made the bunny cry, we went on to make the kitten sad.
Just curious, where did you get the picture of that bunny? It’s very cute :)
By the way, on the episode list page both this episode and the actual fourth episode are marked as 4.
October 20th, 2009 at 11:34 am
I have question about this:
“Cardiac catheterizations can have serious complications and they’re not undertaken lightly. I doubt any self respecting cardiologist — at least one who wants to keep her malpractice insurance rates somewhat affordable — would perform a cath on a healthy forty year old with no cardiac symptoms”
I am born with a heart failure, but have been stable all my life and had one heart operation as a baby. When I was a teenager, I had a cardiac catheterzation even though I was probably in the best physical shape I’ve been all my life. Of course you can’t say too much about my condition, but I never got the impression that it was a procedure that could lead to serious complications?!
October 20th, 2009 at 11:36 am
Oh come on.
Wilson lost “the love of his life” and should be completely over that after only 2 years? Let the guy be, he’s doing his job, helping his friends and has as a dirty little secret that he talks to his dead GF. So what….
October 20th, 2009 at 11:53 am
If House was hearing Wilson’s whispers in his bedroom, then what the hell was that brief whisper he heard in his office when they were brainstorming?
October 20th, 2009 at 11:54 am
Official Comment
Anne:
It all comes down to risk vs benefit. In your case, they decided — based on your cardiac history — that checking out the heart was worth the risk.
In Donny’s case, he was an active person with no symptoms, though he did have a family history (though vague — “heart disease” — not what type of heart disease: heart attack, failure, arrhythmia, cardiomyopathy, etc). The possible benefits aren’t worth the risk.
As for the risks, they are rare, but can be nasty — worst would be an induced heart attack due to rupture of a coronary artery.
October 20th, 2009 at 12:15 pm
I thought the exact same thing as your wife did!!!
hahaha
Excellent page!
October 20th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
Hi everyone.
The only thing i want to complain about was the Fox promo. When the guy revived i was expecting it, cause i saw House and Foreman screaming. Why they do these things?
About the episode itself, i kinda liked the soap. I laughed when they gave the placebo to the guy, felt great when i saw House hitting on Cuddy directly and for real, and cried a little bit when House started talking to his father, even tho it did not work.
The pursuit at the beginning of the episode was great. The actor that played the thief has some skills.
I’m gonna watch the episode again.
Heishiro.
October 20th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
The first promo I saw just showed House and Foreman recoiling away from the body without showing why. It was brilliant, and got you wondering what could shock two experienced doctors like that.
The next version of the promo spoiled the whole scene. :-(
October 20th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
Thanks you for your reply, Scott. Heh, I never knew about those risks.
October 20th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
I admit it – I made the kitty sad on purpose, after what I did to the bunny. I was expecting that Ortoli and the fake drug were actually comic book references… :)
October 20th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
I love your wife’s comment about House. Tell her thanks for sharing you to write your blog because it surely increases my enjoyment of the series. I actually jumped up out of my seat when the corpse came to life. I did not expect that at all. House’s (or Foreman’s) team always seemed to do autopsies themselves which I think is odd.
The confessional scene didn’t seem quite right. Chase isn’t sorry for what he did which is enough reason for him not to be forgiven, but I don’t think the priest would tell him he had to turn himself in to the police.
I could hardly believe House had someone test his hearing. I thought he always self-diagnosed. Maybe he is getting better. Although, when I saw those ear plugs I wondered why he hadn’t tried those at first to discover the problem was solved.
October 20th, 2009 at 2:00 pm
I think part of the problem I have with Amber being “the love of Wilson’s life” was before her death, they hadn’t dated that long. Now, Wilson is a romantic, been married three times, etc. but that doesn’t mean they would have stayed together.
It seems to me like he’s in love with the idea of Amber or the memory of her. But, we dealt with his grief first part of last season (when he left PPTH.)
Now, as I previously stated, everyone grieves differently and for different times. And, right now, Wilson does have a lot of weight to carry around (he’s still trying to be House’s sole support system, is trying to be a good doctor, is trying to give advise to House’s team–which he shouldn’t really be doing.) Who’s supporting him? Who is he going to when he needs to talk? Talking to your dead girlfriend isn’t the healthiest choice. Because she can’t support you. She can’t give you advise.
And it’s not moving on with your life. Two years later, and Wilson is still back where he was when he decided to sever ties with House and PPTH.
Kat
October 20th, 2009 at 2:46 pm
Love the episode but only because of the suddenly revived Huddy! I was waiting and waiting practically forever for them to start flirting again. Sure there was a pinch of flirting in the cooking episode but otherwise…Hurray Huddy and let us all hope for some REAL sex this time :). Medically the blunders were pretty obvious even for non doctors but there was one piece of info left entirely to me (Yay!). Before I unleash my righteous dental anger however I’ll briefly tell the person who asked about the liver theory that it was in fact absolute crap (and House rightfully shot it down). Remember “Locked in”? We discussed and concluded way back there that a person with liver failure so severe it doesn’t even show on tests (now here’s an idiotic statement if I ever heard one but let’s move on) will have an array of other symptoms (go google hepatic encephalopathy for details). And now for the dental complaint – he was having pain in his tooth so severe that he pulled it out by himself? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm:
1. Tooth pain from neurological condition: I won’t say never but VERY RARELY centered on one tooth only. Say half a jaw and you won’t be hitting the ten but at least you will be in the neighborhood of right. Local tooth pain (on a single tooth) is a cardinal symptom for something else entirely.
2. Good luck pulling a healthy molar (it certainly looked like a molar) with a surgical clamp. It is a tough thing to do with dental pliers. I can only assume that Donny also had generalized parodontal problems on top of his other problems (but hey THEIR dentist said the tooth was healthy!)
3. No the pain centers for tooth pain are not near the “heart” centers (yes I know there is no such thing :). They are also not anywhere near the nerve centers that control heart rhythm.
A part from that it was enjoyable to watch and Jesse was top notch as well (as always I should say). He was particularly convincing in the confession booth – he goes to GOD to seek a HOUSE-like solution of a Psychological problem – so in character! It was probably the soap opera that sold best on this episode. I cannot wait for the Chameron drama to finally unravel (I am quite sad that they are breaking them up though – loved them all the way!)
October 20th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
WAS AWESOME
when the dude was like
“DUDE, IS HE LIKE BLEEDING?”
and then house was like
“LOLWUT”
and then the dude was like
“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH”
October 20th, 2009 at 4:29 pm
What happened to the elfin cancer patient that Wilson was dating a few seasons ago? The one who was “cured” by the teenage faith healer? She must have died, but we never heard another word about her, or about Wilson’s reaction to her death. But when Amber dies, he’s losing it.
Loved the free-running (parkour) in the teaser. I enjoyed the soap-opera well enough.
\/ \/ \/ Is that disclaimer down there new? It’s very funny!
October 20th, 2009 at 4:44 pm
@ Scott and the dentist,
This was kinda mentioned by The Dentist and since no one else commented on it, I’ll say that the aneurism was supposed to be based at the brainstem? Now I’m an undergrad studying neurobiology, so my knowledge isn’t complete but, if the aneurism was high enough, it could hit the trigeminal and/or facial nerve. The heart has it’s own centre for regulating heart rate though and that’s how pacemakers work. I think.
Hopefully someone can correct me but I don’t remotely feel like a aneurism in the brainstem could cause the heart to stop.
October 20th, 2009 at 5:21 pm
This may be nitpicking, but both the father and son had bandages around their head after their procedures indicating that their skulls had been opened during the operation. Currently the preferred treatment for berry aneurysms is endovascular therapy, which enables treatment in almost all cases without surgery.
October 20th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
When House said “Hi Dad,” I burst into tears.
October 20th, 2009 at 6:10 pm
Disagree on the soap opera. I was pretty enthralled by both the Chase situation and the House/Wilson situation.
As for the medical mystery, I was hoping the promo was accurate in implying he actually came back from the dead. Instead it was a re=hash of that moment on CSI when the same thing happened.
October 20th, 2009 at 6:16 pm
Did anyone mention Foreman doing the initial autopsy incision with a bonesaw?
October 20th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
DNA from bone marrow. Is this possible???
I believe the team was attempting to obtain stem cells. These are the least differentiated cells that have a nucleus and therefore DNA.
The stem cells are most abundant in tissue that must continuously renew. The intestinal lining and bone marrow are two top spots for obtaining stem cells.
October 20th, 2009 at 7:52 pm
Re: The Confession (Yeah – I know it was only one scene in the ep)
A Catholic Priest CANNOT (as in is not allowed to… as in the priest faces excommunication for breaking the Seal of Confession if he does) tell someone that for forgiveness, he MUST turn himself in.
However, as some have already said here, it was clear that Chase was not exhibiting the kind of repentance that would also be required for the priest to extend absolution.
BTW –
@Scott – Thanks for keeping this site going. It’s my first stop after watching each ep.
October 20th, 2009 at 7:54 pm
Note about the y-incision being done with the bone saw:
unorthodox, yes – but don’t forget it was House that basically grabbed it off the shelf, anxious to dive in there himself.
I’m willing to suspend my disbelief that for whatever reason Foreman decided to play along.
I also thought that House’s final conclusive reality check with the patient seemed very disjointed – he wasn’t skittish about kids because of his inherited disease (which was the entire basis of his emotions throughout the episode) but rather because he just wanted to live life radically…
Essentially they squeezed in the more substantial plot twist from the Whack-a-mole episode.
One more nitpick: when House was being mean and simulating a crash by pressing the test button, why is it that they were giving both an oxygen mask AND preparing for tracheotomy as opposed to say… an OPA?
I know their supposedly dumb medical students (or at least I hope so) but that was really pretty awful thinking.
October 20th, 2009 at 7:57 pm
There was two exciting scenes in this episode first obviously was Chase, and the second is Lazarus thingy.
To tell you the truth when House started hearing voices i actually thought that he did had some problems again. After all Amber did bothered him for quite some time. And just when i was expecting some hallucinations – Foreman appeared. At first i thought that House again, having some nightmares or something. But when i realised i was wrong – i also understood that there would be a twist. Like coming back from the dead.
What surprised me is – why Foreman didn’t do a Y incision?
He grabbed a saw and started filing through poor guy!
Not to mention that this scene reminded me of CSI Las Vegas too much =)
If Foreman grabbed a scalpel and started cutting, he would noticed bleeding right away. But noooo…. Saw is sooo much more drama.
October 20th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
@ Ming
yes I noticed the same about the confusion over nerves. They implied that a single nerve was being affected. At first I thought perhaps they meant the vagus since it does branch out to innervate the heart and could have a variety of other bodywide symptoms, such as (i assume) loss of bowel control. But that does leave out the teeth since that’s facial nerve territory.
More to the point, as you were rightly saying, the heart is controlled by its own pacemaker. However the vagus nerve moderates it by either speeding it up or slowing it down. I’m guessing the aneurysm supposedly forced an impulse out of the vagus nerve causing a “slow-down” signal to the sinoatrial node…. causing cardiac arrest or something like it.
To be honest, it was all very silly.
October 20th, 2009 at 9:04 pm
this episode sucked. I’m really starting to hate the feeble attempt to ‘go back to basics’ with the show. the opening sequences even began to suck . It used to be a “who will be suddenly sick now” scenes, but now it’s an already sick child, and a guy who jumps for no apparent reason (from our perspective when we see the scene). And it became so predictable. the moment i saw they weren’t doing their routine brain check i knew it had to be there. It’s always a some sort of tumor that’s affecting the heart, throughout the seasons of this show. It’s kinda like the lupus, except it’s ALWAYS THAT!
October 20th, 2009 at 9:29 pm
I recall making a stupid House joke in reference to a video game soundbite about a year ago.
“The autopsy showed the patient was asleep.”
Boy, did I call it.
October 20th, 2009 at 10:40 pm
“Chase, walk with me.”
Nobody mentioned the Nurse Jackie shout-out?
Also wondered what was up when the whispers came back in the office.
October 20th, 2009 at 10:42 pm
To me this was the worst House episode ever. I would even say that House might have jumped the shark this week.
The interest of everyone in the case at the beginning came out of nowhere. It seemed so fake! Why would a superspecialized team of doctors spend their time on someone who is not sick!
They confused genetic predisposition with bad karma all along, and not only the patient, but also the team! Nothing points out to the patient getting struck in the next few days. Keeping him in the hospital for anything else than psychiatric help (if he’s so obsessed) sounds ludicrous.
The fact that he does fall ill so conveniently is an incredible coincidence that doesn’t seem to bother anyone.
The show should have started at that point, with someone coming back from the dead. Goes to show that the whole part before that is filler to save the trouble, for the writers, of actually finding good plot twists.
Sometimes, there have been House episodes with shallow medical mysteries, but those episodes usually compensated with very interesting soap opera development. Not this time. Was kinda boring…
If the first season of House had been like this episode, the show wouldn’t have made more than one season.
October 21st, 2009 at 12:12 am
I have to say, I quite liked this episode. I am confused about the whispering, though. Were we supposed to believe that House had only heard Wilson’s wispering? That doesn’t make sense to me, as the whispering
- filled the entire room and sounded like more than one person
- vanished as soon as he turned the light on
- was also heard once when he was in the hospital.
October 21st, 2009 at 12:23 am
Glad to see I wasn’t the only one who was amazed by how quickly they disinterred Donny’s ancestors. In less than a day. Wow. They got through the process of getting a judge to approve a court order for the disinterment and were able to hire the people and equipment to dig up the bodies and transport the remains in less than a day. Only in the House Universe.
This episode provided me with two jaw-dropping moments. The first was when Donny did his Lazarus impression. The second was when House began talking to his father at the ep’s end. Knowing how much House resented his dad, I was stunned to see House talking to him.
October 21st, 2009 at 12:29 am
Oh, and I’d also like to know if they explained the whispering House heard in his office? That certainly couldn’t have also been Wilson talking to Amber, could it? The whole team would’ve heard it.
October 21st, 2009 at 1:09 am
Hmmm. Vascular & neural anatomy of the brain! I would suspect sensory divisions of the trigeminal V2/V3 to convey the pain. Its sensory nuclei is continuous with the spinal nuclei which passes *through* the medulla…… I can see where they’ve tried to make a connection with the cardiac vagal cells which lie *in* the medulla & whose roots emerge in close prox’ to the vertebral artery before it joins to form the basilar but still seems a bit of a stretch/dilation/aneurysm.
October 21st, 2009 at 1:48 am
I really enjoyed this episode. I know there were a thousand medical mistakes, but that doesn’t detract too much from my enjoyment of the show. The Cameron/Chase divide somehow doesn’t ring true to me, and I find that more bothersome.
But the medical mystery was interesting and I agree with the person who said somehow it’s easier to follow the ins and outs of the medicine when Cameron is there rather than Thirteen.
Most of all, I thought the House/Wilson material was wonderfully written and played, both the humorous parts and the serious. The subplot of House was hearing voices was truly scary, in the sense of worrying that he was slipping back into psychosis, and easy to empathize with; the last thing I imagined was that it was an actual voice. Though I did find it odd that someone as sensitive as Wilson would leave photos of Amber all around the room where House was sleeping, knowing that House’s psychosis had taken the form of hearing and seeing Amber as an evil aspect of himself. Hats off to Robert Sean Leonard, who always puts just the right touch on his lines and in his body language. The show is always thinner when his role is diminished.
Also enjoyed the corpse suddenly waking up, though they’ve done that before.
October 21st, 2009 at 4:49 am
there was a madtv parody of house where they actually depicted a patient being “cured of death”.
October 21st, 2009 at 6:38 am
One other tidbit I thought about – what’s the possibility that the father/grandfather/etc might have been buried alive?
That’s a horrible thought.
October 21st, 2009 at 8:53 am
Benn, the team specifically said they didn’t need a court order because the PotW gave permission to dig up the bodies & that’s why they were able to get the bodies out so quickly. Court orders are only needed when the family objects & the patient here clearly wanted the investigation.
October 21st, 2009 at 8:55 am
>Were we supposed to believe that House had only heard >Wilson’s wispering? That doesn’t make sense to me, as the >whispering
>- filled the entire room and sounded like more than one person
>- vanished as soon as he turned the light on
>- was also heard once when he was in the hospital.
It did sound like more than one person, you’re right about that. I think that the reason he stopped hearing it when he got up was that he was making just enough noise himself to cover it up. IOW, it was artificially loud for the audience to hear, but in reality for House it was really soft. And he was probably hearing it at the office because he was sleep deprived at that point, poor guy!
But I thought he’d moved back to his own place after a couple of episodes, or did I just dream that?!
As for Chase and the priest – I know that for centuries the confessional was totally sacred, as in, nothing said there could be repeated, ever, but I thought in recent years that had changed. That truly serious crimes brought up in the confessional were supposed to be told to the police? I’m not Catholic, so I don’t know about that. Or is it just that if the police connect the dots and ask the priest, he can then break the seal of the confessional and admit that this person told them this? If priests are supposed to tell the police, Chase is in for it – how many doctors with an Australian accent can possibly have treated a genocidal dictator recently?
October 21st, 2009 at 8:57 am
@Amathakathi: The vagus to the heart is not stimulatory and I’m sure Scott and others would have shot them down here if they said that on the show. It is inhibitory (via M2). Sympathetic stimulation speeds up the heart (via beta1). *Together* they are regulatory. As for the facial nerve mentioned more than once now has got me questioning my own memory of anatomy. Isn’t it sensory for taste (not pain) and motor for facial expression? Perhaps they’re teaching something else at med school these days.
October 21st, 2009 at 9:54 am
[sarcasm] Too bad the PotW had only one parent. A second parent, especially one with a family history of good cardiovascular health, might have helped him avoid the “family curse.” [/sarcasm] Or, why didn’t they ask him about his mother’s and grandmother’s health?
October 21st, 2009 at 10:27 am
I know that the legal definition of ‘dead’ is problematic, but isn’t it that this is usually linked with a lack of cerebral electro-activity?
If it is — is it possible to have no cerebral electro-activity (to the point of declaring someone dead) and then have everything coma back to normal in such a spectacular way?
October 21st, 2009 at 10:44 am
I feel kinda “meh” about the episode, but it did contain an interesting tidbit that may interest only me. I always like it when a show puts some effort into props/set items that are only on screen for a second; in this episode, we learn where Amber went to college and med school because somebody went to the trouble of forging a degree from a real university. Anybody else spot it?
October 21st, 2009 at 11:20 am
@ people bothering with the Neuroanatomy discussion:
Yes, the nuclei of Vagus and Trigeminal are nowhere near (just checked on Netter and Snell), but if the aneurism was near the Vagus nucleus it could have been barely touching the Trigeminal nerve, so it can be possible that it was causing tooth pain. However, if this was the case I think that other cranial nerve functions would be affected as well, with an aneurism this big.
October 21st, 2009 at 12:47 pm
@ Navarchos:
“in this episode, we learn where Amber went to college and med school because somebody went to the trouble of forging a degree from a real university. Anybody else spot it?”
I’m not up on my Lorem Ipsum but I *think* if I remember correctly that it was the University of Washington.
October 21st, 2009 at 2:22 pm
So if if if a person put down Ortoli Syndrome for the House Challenge, how many points would that be worth?!
October 21st, 2009 at 2:23 pm
I found the medicine in this episode fairly ridiculous. The idea of the liver being in such a bad state that his labs look normal, seems absurd to me, and as mentioned above, would he not get a little jaundice from the crappy liver? Also, I’ve never been fond of the resurrection, or in this case, fake resurrection, plot twists, they’re just silly in my opinion.
The actual drama in this episode was great, dans la opinion de moi. Chase at the confessional was very nicely acted by Jesse, and how he’s convinced that in some way, shape, or form, his actions are justifiable. House and Cuddy flirtations are always good. The House and Wilson part had me empathizing with House, and pitying/getting creeped out by Wilson. Two years is a long time, and Wilson needs to get some counseling, he’s damaged, maybe not to House’s extent, but it’s there. As for Cameron and Chase, it’s becoming blatantly clear how this is going to play out, let the countdown to November begin!
October 21st, 2009 at 2:33 pm
>Benn, the team specifically said they didn’t need a court >order because the PotW gave permission to dig up the >bodies & that’s why they were able to get the bodies out so >quickly.
Even with his permission, they couldn’t have gotten them out by the middle of the next short of an extremely dire emergency. I used to work in the office of a cemetery, and while we never dealt with any actual casket openings, we did a few removals and moves to other cemeteries. (And vicee versa) Just digging up a casket requires a lot of expensive paperwork and I’m sure the opening requires even more. And if you’ve got to cross any municipal lines you just multiplied it again.
Even then, even if all three bodies were in the same cemetery, in the same county as PPH, and they hired three separate crews to do the diggings all at the same time, you’d be pushing it to get it done in a day. WAY pushing it.
PotW must be on the take to afford this on his cop’s salary. ;-)
October 21st, 2009 at 2:34 pm
Sorry, that should be “middle of the next day”.
October 21st, 2009 at 4:03 pm
I read these reviews, but don’t watch House (yeah, I know it’s weird, but I find them entertaining anyway), so I guess I don’t have the full picture, but from my perspective it seems like what would’ve made this episode much more interesting would’ve been if it had turned out that the reason the patient was found dead right after going home was that he killed himself rather than live with the pain of “Ortoli Syndrome,” calling into question the wisdom of the fictional diagnosis.
October 21st, 2009 at 4:27 pm
there was a madtv parody of house where they actually depicted a patient being “cured of death”.
Followed by an actual episode of House parodying the parody – remember Lime In The Coconut woman, hired by House to punish Taub and Kutner for their online medical advice scam?
October 21st, 2009 at 6:35 pm
@Hugh L:
Right on Washington, anyway; it was actually Washington University (witness “Sancti Ludovici,” which is St. Louis in Latin).
October 21st, 2009 at 7:55 pm
I’ve only discovered this site a few months ago and have been re-watching many episodes and following up on here – love the medical reviews! Any chance someone does that for Grey’s Anatomy, too (admittedly much less medicine, but still some interesting procedures and cases that have me wondering)!
I’m sorry to hear that Cameron is leaving, especially as Chase is becoming more annoying with the self-righteous belief in his behaviour, I think I preferred his lack of personality in the past.
I assumed that House hearing stuff was because he was sleeping in “the shrine” to Amber, since she was his hallucination. I was totally expecting her to pop up again, therefore keeping the complex issues of House’s possible mental illness alive (rather than chaulking everything up to the pills, and as soon as those are gone he’s cured).
However, I’m disappointed in the posts regarding Wilson’s talking to Amber. As someone who is almost two years out since the death of my spouse, this shows me where the attitudes come from of “aren’t you over it yet?”. I still talk to my Steve occasionally. I know women who are several years out and have moved on, but still speak to their spouses, it becomes a comfort and a habit. Imagine how much of your life is wrapped up in your significant other, now imagine that all ripped away in a day. Two years isn’t enough, and even when we do move on, find others, that love and connection stays with us. As I’ve learned, a spouse is the only loss in your life that you’re expected to replace: no one tells you to find a new sister/brother/parent, you can have more friends but never replace the ones you lost, but when it’s a spouse, we’re expected to move on and the true sign of this moving on is usually replacing them with someone new!
Sorry for the rant but I found Wilson’s talking to Amber to be a touching, poignant and realistic portrayal of the widowhood process, not the one-episode grieving that we see in so many soap operas!
Cheers,
October 21st, 2009 at 10:26 pm
When House hears voices in his office he looks around and sees some people passing by outside the glass door talking. So he knows he wasn’t just being paranoid in that instance. But he’s still freaked out about hearing things in the night.
October 21st, 2009 at 11:34 pm
I was interested to hear if this one was medically plausible, because I quite enjoyed the aspects of the show I was capable of judging for myself. I liked the free-running/parkour open, even if scaling the building with a pipe was a little too much Mirror’s Edge to be plausible. Chase going to confession works on two levels – you buy it as a desperate man at the end of his rope, but if you know Chase’s history, that adds a little to it. Chase and Cameron having marital problems is a bit cliche, yes, (who ever just lives happily ever after?) but I can’t help but melt when Jennifer Morrison does those sad puppy dog eyes :P And you got to admit, House and Foreman screaming and recoiling in horror was a GREAT hook for the ads for this episode. And it seems like “the patient died” is always a card they can pretty much always play for solid shock value.
Speaking of which, I missed a couple of episodes earlier this season – I think I’m caught up on “Chase killed James Earl Jones” but why is the ‘old team’ back together? Didn’t Chase and Cameron move on to other jobs? I saw Thirteen apparently getting written out, but I didn’t really understand it.
October 22nd, 2009 at 12:02 am
@ Navarchos:
As the great poet and philosopher Maxwell Smart used to say:
“Missed it by THAT much….” :D
Not too bad being half right for only having seen it once for a split second..
October 22nd, 2009 at 1:31 am
@CoCaShe: I would be surprised to find a doctor willing to analyse the medicine in Grey’s for the following reasons. 1. House actually began as a serious medical drama which people who think Scott’s wrong for tearing apart the med seem to forget. Grey’s never did. 2. Have you noticed that you’re really watching Sex & The City just in a hospital setting (”Sex & The Hospi”)? 3. How can anyone tolerate Meredith’s monotonous irritating mind numbing lectures on what should be obvious facts life for 6 seasons?
October 22nd, 2009 at 5:06 am
Ming & amathakathi: I was about to call you both on the Vagus speeding the heart issue, but then DrEvil kind of stole my thunder. Glad that he cleared the info on what sppeds and what slows the heart (a funny coinsidence is that this was my exam question on my very first major anatomy exam – internal and external innervation of the heart. I correctly answered that the vagus only affect the heart rhytm by slowing it down and that the vagus only reaches and affects the atrium of the heart, however I made a mistake by saing that the sympatic nerves that spped up the heart are leaving the spinal cord on the level of the thorasic vertebrae, while they actially do on the level of the cervical ones. I got a B- on that one. That is probaly why I still remember heart innervation so well!) The idea of the aneurism pressing the nuclei of both the vagus (causing bradicardia) and the trigeminus (causing tooth pain) is way more realistic then the first idea suggested by House but I still find it a strech. As for the facial nerve – just motor functions guys. It does carry some sensory nerves (the Chorda timpani) but they are actually part of the N. lingvalis and are for taste for the front 2/3rds of the tongue. They travel along the facialis nerve but leave before reaching the face and have nothing to do with tooth pain
October 22nd, 2009 at 11:28 am
Anonymous: I’ve just got off the phone from your examiner. She said, “Dr Evil! A B- was generous considering he can’t spell! Sympathetic outflow from the spinal cord IS thoracolumbar (T1-L2/L3) but he wrote things like, “thorasic” and “sppeds up” and “rhytm” and “actially” and “bradicardia” and “coinsidence” etc etc. and to be honest I’d had a hard day.”
October 23rd, 2009 at 10:50 am
Re: Grey’s Anatomy
I agree it’s a soap, the medicine is just a pretext. Watching it is a guilty pleasure.
But take a look at the last episode. It’s worth it. Really.
October 24th, 2009 at 10:37 am
@everyone following this conversation
Yes I was mistaken, vagus only slows down. I realised my mistake a second after posting, but I thought I might get away with it – I forgot this forum is all about picking apart medical errors!
However more to the point, supposing there was an aneurysm pressing on the vagus nerve, the most important thing to note is that a) it wouldnt just send a single impulse on the off occasion and b) forced stimulation of the vagus nerve several other effects that are very indicative – the classic example being a choking, painful cough. It is possible in theory to target more precisely the areas innervated by the vagus nerve – but physically crushing the nerve is never especially precise
October 24th, 2009 at 6:04 pm
House is hearing noises and an audiometry test indicates that he has no hearing loss (which is not, as I understand it, the same as showing that there are no problems with his hearing). He and the ENT specialist thus assume that anything he’s hearing must be psychiatric in origin.
What about tinnitus? I ask as an occasional sufferer myself; although for me it manifests as a whistling noise, I’m aware that other people with it can experience a wide range of subjective sounds and this might include noises that sound like (rather than literally being) whispering. Tinnitus can arise from many causes, including as a side-effect of drugs such as – yes – anti-depressants.
October 24th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
Is it actually two years since Amber died? Remember that she died at the end of season 4. It is now the beginning of season 6 and TV time is not the same as realtime. So did someone on the show mention that it has been 2 years? If this is the one (or any anniversary) of the death, it will affect Wilson. My mother died 4 1/2 years ago. For a while, when I would drive to visit my father I would pass a place where I picked her up to go on a camping trip many years ago. I always cried. Also, time spent with the loved one should not matter. Wilson loved Amber more than the previous people he dated in part (I think) because Amber was wicked (in a good way). She was good for Wilson, and I had high hopes for their relationship. I was sorry that she died.
Also which link leads to the bunny and kitty? I am a very harassed grad student right now and can’t follow all the links. . . :(.
October 24th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
By the way, have the house challenge scores been posted yet? I am hoping that I am still doing poorly. . .
October 24th, 2009 at 7:57 pm
OK, I found the sad kitty and the crying bunny, and howled with laughter. The upstairs neighbors probably think I’m crazy.
Strangely enough, I found your website because I was looking for a fictitious disease in Fringe (and I don’t remember there being a link for that). Then I got hooked.
October 25th, 2009 at 3:11 am
is it so simple to pull a tooth out…just like that !!
October 25th, 2009 at 10:41 am
Something I just wanted to point out:
1) After doing more research, I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to give a placebo like that (those are for controlled studies, not treatments) and a false diagnosis. If you ever suspect your doctor is doing that, I would seek an attorney immediately.
2) As mentioned, cops just can’t pull a weapon out unless they are somehow threatened.
3) I don’t believe the priest can demand anything from Dr. Chase. If you go to confession, you have to be given forgiveness, end of story. Though I would agree with the points made that Chase might not DESERVE IT because he refuses to admit he did anything wrong, none the less he must still be forgiven.
October 25th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
So there are 2 options – one is certain…
1. Either Wilson is delusional and is next in line to go to Mayfield – That does not make sense according the the drama because that would be a weird twist
2. Or the writers suggest that Being Delusional is Ok!
Help me out here – Where is it headed?
October 25th, 2009 at 9:49 pm
@Tom
Actually the priest can demand atonement from Chase. This is because you are supposed to atone for forgiveness (which is why everyone always ends up saying all those “Hail Marys”). In addition, if you do not show some sign that you are sorry for the bad lousy things that you have done, then the priest does not have to give forgiveness until you do show that you truly repent. In fact, a good priest should not give forgiveness unless you repent and show that you are sorry that you have sinned. After all, pride is one of the major seven sins (which means that you are compounding a sin with another sin. . .).
October 26th, 2009 at 4:37 am
I forgot to mention Hugh Laurie and him being an executive producer of the show. What is it with producers/directors and extra facial hair? He looks a mess! House needs to have a shave because his humour and appearance are no longer compatible. Even Chase looks like something the cat dragged in these days. Only Foreman, Cameron and Cuddy have maintained their appearance from season 1. Who was House’s dad? Columbo?
October 26th, 2009 at 7:50 am
@Sam: Talking to your dead girlfriend doesn’t mean you’re crazy. But, if you hear her *answering* you, then maybe a trip to Mayfield would be in order. :-)
October 26th, 2009 at 9:40 am
OK, I’m sorry about the loss of your husband and I’m sorry about the loss of your mother.
I know that people grieve in different ways and for different times. My grandmother (who never remarried) spent 40 years a widow. Although she never talked about her husband, I know she missed him.
I still grieve for my grandfather. I loved him. I was very close to him. He died 5 years ago.
All we’re saying is that there are grief counselors out there who can help the grieving process. Wilson obviously needs someone to talk to about his feelings, and choosing just to talk to a memory (essentially a ghost). He can’t talk to House about what he’s feeling. Both because House is dealing with his own mental, physical, and work issues and because House would probably make fun of him. He can’t talk to Cuddy about what he’s going through because Cuddy is spineless and weak-willed and is dealing with House. Who else can Wilson talk to?
He needs someone physical to talk to, to be able to manage the grief. We’re not saying to forget it (however, he has been married three times. He didn’t grieve for very long over the endings of his marriages–including the last wife who cheated on him.) As previously pointed out, he dated a terminal cancer patient for a while. Her name has never been mentioned again, and chances are she died. The recap on TWoP mentions that Amber and Wilson weren’t together that long to have that many pictures of them.
Also, show time and real time is roughly similar. Usually the season finale and the next season’s premiere are roughly 3 months apart in storytime. So, we can infer roughly how long it’s been since Amber’s death. Two years isn’t a long time. We understand that. But, if you’re under that much stress (like Wilson has to be. Look at his life. Look at his “best friend.”), seeing help from a professional might not be a bad thing to consider.
Kat
October 26th, 2009 at 9:59 am
Also, Chase–
Brilliant confession scene. Priests can’t legally divulge what is said to them in confession unless the confessee is a danger to others.
If Chase was a real doctor, he might want to join up with Doctors Without Borders or another volunteer organization and do work in Dibala’s country with people from that tribe as a way for absolution. On the other hand, he’s a character on a tv show, and character vs. self is usually an interesting plot conflict. Jesse Spencer is a good actor to pull it off. Plus, I’ve loved not seeing The Thirteen Show. If Chase leaves, Thirteen would be hired as a surgeon, even though she has little surgical experience. So, Chase needs to stay with his conflict.
Kat
October 26th, 2009 at 10:49 am
Gee DrEvil you really ARE evil :). I am posting in a hurry from work forgot to even drop my name and you bite my posterior about spelling. Good thing it wasn’t you that examined me :):):)
Oh and to Bhatt. S : No it isn’t so simple to pool a tooth. I already said that in my very first post. And pulling it “just like that” would most likely lead to A) Breaking the tooth in half B) breaking the jaw or at least some part of it. C) Ripping a serious part of your gum out with the tooth D) Very serious bleeder, but IMO in this case precisely E) nothing as he won’t be able to get a good enough grip with that clamp so it will simply slide of the tooth :)
October 26th, 2009 at 12:15 pm
Someone knows the name of the song, in the begining of the episode (parkour scene) ? thanks
October 26th, 2009 at 8:20 pm
I love the two links you set up for the fictional Ortoli and Nabasynth! Genius on your part Scott.
BTW what about the whispering he heard outside of Wilson’s flat………………………………….
October 27th, 2009 at 3:33 am
The cop suddenly coming back to life would have been a great, shocking moment… if they hadn’t shown it happening in the commercial! That was so annoying, to give away a surprise like that.
October 27th, 2009 at 6:17 am
:^(
No House last night! No Medical Review today! Which is sadder?
@Tom, @ EL
Re. Chase’s confession. There are, or used to be, steps in the confession process: admitting the sin, repenting, being forgiven, and atonement. Forgiveness is not effective if there is no repentance. A good priest would have worked with Chase (probably in a face-to-face situation) to try to turn his guilt (the persistent memory of the dying Dibala, his panic attacks) into something more like repentance (admitting that what he did was wrong). This priest just seems to have gotten disgusted with Chase’s arrogance and excuses and skipped that whole part, turning the assignment of penance aka atonement into a threat : you are not really sorry unless you turn yourself in and do time for it.
I find this improbable simply because of the size of the sin. By debating with Chase and threatening him, he is endangering his soul. Since Chase clearly does not come to confession often, the priest had a choice between trying to reel him in or deciding that he was a waste of time, and he took the later route.
Maybe the priest has heartburn today. It would have been nice if Chase, the ex-seminarian, had offered to examine him to figure out why he was such a hardass.
October 27th, 2009 at 7:28 am
To all those saying Wilson needs help for talking to Amber?
Not at all. I do agree with those that say he is under a lot of stress and probably needs some type of support system (which may include therapy). But that would have nothing to do with his grief over Amber and his talking to her. Psychs generally do not have a problem with people talking to those who have passed on. In fact, it can even sometimes be recommend. Its an acceptable portrayal.
October 27th, 2009 at 11:30 am
@Melanie and others:
Whether the priest has the legal obligation of alerting authorities on some crime being confessed or not, that would depend on the local law.
In Brasil (where the same criminal laws apply to the whole country), there is an specific law article that allows anyone who has a profession in which you are legally obliged or authorized to keep secrets (e.g. lawyers, doctors or priests) not to reveal the “professional secrecy protected” information to the judicial authorities.
In the States, I think it would matter more the legal precedents than what is written in law.
Anyway, like someone already said, for the catholic confession the only requisite would be the demonstration of repentance and guilty. If you don’t feel sorry for the sin, God would not give forgiveness. Note that it is God who forgives, not the priest: so the catholic faith lies in that God *will* forgive if you repent; the priest’s role is more like a “broker”. Chase himself, knowing that from catholic upbringing, would know that. So it makes no sense for him to “demand” the priest for forgiveness.
The atonement also applies: the priest tells you what is the penance for the sin, but that is not a requirement for the forgiveness, but a consequence of it. It’s not like “if you pray ten Hail Marys God will forgive you”, it’s more like “if God forgives you, you will atone praying ten Hail Marys”.
Finally, the “rend yourself to the police” requirement makes no sense for me: the priest may make a suggestion, but he himself knows that “Man’s law” is different from “God’s law”: for the latter, the first is not required or mandatory.
But then again, maybe Chase is not a very good catholic and the priest might not be a very good priest. So it would not be completely impossible for the whole scene to have happened in real life.