House — Episode 23 (Season 7): “Moving On” [Season Finale]
The final episode of an unsatisfying season of House was — appropriately enough — unsatisfying. The story, both medical and soap opera, had potential, but it was like everyone gave up two-thirds of the way through.
Afsoun Hamidi, a famous performance artist, is in the middle of an exhibition when she collapses. She is admitted to House’s team at Princeton Plainsboro with arrhythmia, a high hematocrit (too many red blood cells), and “inconsistent RR variability” (a measure of the difference between heart beats). Foreman also thinks that she is crazy and he wants to do a functional MRI to confirm this, but House shoots him down. Other possible diagnoses are an allergic reaction to the paint thinner used in the performance art, or carbon monoxide poisoning from a nearby space heater. House favors the latter and has Afsoun placed in a hyperbaric chamber. Once inside, she becomes sick and vomits. Thirteen suspects infection, but House has caught on to the fact that Afsoun is secretly videotaping everything to make a new piece of performance art.
Chase informs House that Afsoun had a pancreatic cyst that he drained. According to House, the differential now consists of a Coxsackie B viral infection. He also orders a CT scan to check for gallstones — not that he thinks Afsoun has gallstones — but because he’s giving Foreman a chance to scan the lungs to prove his own theory: that pain thinner fumes are the culprit (not that House thinks Foreman is right — he just wants to be there when he’s proven wrong). Sure enough, the CT of the lungs is negative. During the procedure, Afsoun becomes dizzy, pale, diaphoretic (sweaty), tachycardic (elevated heart rate), and hypotensive (low blood pressure). This leads the team to suspect internal bleeding. A colonoscopy is negative and an abdominal ultrasound is also negative. Foreman becomes suspicious and discovers evidence that Afsoun has been secretly blood doping (injecting herself with her own blood) to manufacture symptoms. He also learns that she has been researching Greg House. All to make a more compelling piece of art.
House confronts Afsoun and she admits her deception. But then she tells him that she is really sick, and challenges him to find here true diagnosis. She tells him that she may make up some symptoms, or hide others — but that’s all part of the game. Much to his team’s dismay, House decides to play along. He starts by ordering blood cultures. When Thirteen and Chase are drawing the blood, Afsoun complains of nausea and back pain. A quick physical exam reveals Grey Turner’s sign (bruising of the flanks — indicative of a particularly nasty pancreatitis). Meanwhile, taking a look at Afsoun’s past exhibitions, House has concluded that she has something fatal. A CT scan of the brain shows a mass. House tells her that he’s won the game: she has primary CNS lymphoma with paraneoplastic syndrome. She confirms that House is right.
A little later, House sees that Afsoun is still in the hospital. He asks why, and she mentions that she’s waiting for the nurse to bring her something for her eczema, which seems to have been worsened because of the paint thinner. Looking at the rash, House realizes that it is not eczema. He also realizes that his previous diagnosis was wrong: Afsoun actually has Wegener’s granulomatosis. She is offered radiation therapy and/or steroids for treatment. She initially declines the radiation therapy for fear of mental decline, but is ultimately convinced by Thirteen and her assistant to go for the radiation treatment — and that life may be more important than art.
As usual, major complaints are in red, modest complaints are in blue, and nit-picking ones in green:
As mentioned numerous times before: it’s irresponsible and unprofessional to treat cancer without a definitive biopsy. It’s one thing to accept that from House, but from another doctor at another hospital?
Radiation is not a first-line therapy for Wegener’s granulomatosis. It’s not even a second- or third-line therapy.
Pallor, diaphoresis, tachycardia, hypotension are all signs of an acute anemia (i.e. blood loss) – which they then tried to explain away as a return to her normal state from the increased hematocrit from blood doping. Nonsense. First, the return to her normal state would be a gradual process, not an acute one, so would not trigger these symptoms. Second, her normal state whould be normocythemic (normal blood counts) not anemic (and certainly not acutely anemic), so that explanation doesn’t pass the common sense test.
“Arrythmia” is a vague term. It’s something you’d find in a general review of a topic (such as “Symptoms associated with blood doping”). A doctor of the caliber of House or his team (or frankly any competent cardiologist or generalist) would be specific about what type of arrhythmia it is. Tachycardia? Bradycardia? PSVT? PVCs? WPW? Afib? VFib? Vtach? Torsades? Each has different causes and different treatments.
Once again, a good physical exam on admission would have found several symptoms earlier: the bruising and the rash. A really good physical exam would have found the injection marks.
There are causes of pancreatic cysts other than acute pancreatitis.
A simple blood test can easily confirm carbon monoxide poisoning.
If it was carbon monoxide poisoning, why wasn’t anyone else at the gallery, at least her assistant, also having symptoms? At least headaches?
Coxsackie B virus doesn’t fit her symptoms at all.
If you’re suspecting internal bleeding, why not perform a quick CT — especially since she’s already in the CT machine?
This week’s medical mystery was moderately interesting, but didn’t sustain interest even after it became a game (not that it mattered, since despite threats, she didn’t lie about any symptoms). I give it a B-. The final solution was unimpressive and earns a C. The medicine was superficial and sloppy, and was driven by the plot, not the other way around. It deserves a measly C-. The soap opera was fair, but could have been so much better. The flash forward sequences held a lot of promise — promise that was never really fulfilled. I give it a B.
The review of the previous episode of House
A list of all prior House reviews
May 23rd, 2011 at 10:54 pm
I kept pressing F5 for your review! i think i’m now an addict
This is my first comment… and while i’m at it, i wanted to say thanks for all those incredible reviews! You are doing a fantastic job at helping people like me with limited medical knownledge!
May 23rd, 2011 at 11:00 pm
The opening made me groan. Here we go again, I thought: Start at Point B, then jump back to Point A so we can find out how we end up at Point B. And the lack of the usual opening titles was yet another annoying sign that this was going to be an Extremely Serious Episode.
The performance artist plot line had promise, but the episode didn’t live up to it – diagnosing her didn’t turn out to be the super-mystery that we were led to expect.
House ramming the car into Cuddy’s house – call it a cry for help, a shout of rage, or unloosed repression. I call it stupid. Can anyone say attempted murder? Or assault with a deadly weapon?
Sad to think this was Lisa Edelstein’s swan song – Dr. Lisa Cuddy deserved better.
May 23rd, 2011 at 11:02 pm
I agree, the whole thing felt intensely unsatisfying. I didn’t even really understand House’s behavior throughout the episode.
(SLIGHT SPOILERS)
I can only hope that this ending points to a radical rethink of the show and a totally new direction, because they past few seasons show a writing team that doesn’t really seem to have any idea what to do with the premise as-is. Send House around the world… that could be pretty cool.
May 23rd, 2011 at 11:03 pm
This season finale definitely didn’t impress me! I heard that Cuddy isn’t returning next season.
May 23rd, 2011 at 11:21 pm
I’ve never missed an episode of House, which I watch online after it’s aired. A half hour ago, while it was still airing in California, I read a recap by someone farther East and decided not to bother watching the finale.
It sounded like everything the show has been about for the past two years…medical soap opera and a downer. Especially a downer because of how great this show was in its heyday–by far my favorite TV show ever.
TV writers are experts at what they do, right? So how could they have gone so incredibly off-base with this show? Understandable to do that for a few shows or maybe even a whole season, but you’d think after season 5, they would have grabbed hold of themselves and said, what on earth happened to us?
They got rid of the humor, the differential diagnoses, the clinic patients (and for that matter, all the interesting cases) and those wonderfully engaging mind games they would play on each other. It was a show to engage the mind–it kept me so attentive, just trying to keep up with everything that was happening– and the sense of humor, with a little drama tossed in. Hugh Laurie, wonderful as he has been in so many ipsodes, is better at comedy and wryness than at drama and, sorry to say, no good at carrying off a love scene.
It seems to me that they might have made their worst mistake in the choices for the “new team,” picking very lackluster newcomers who couldn’t really hold the show up. Had they picked Amber and Big Love and, perhaps, Old Fraud, they would have had wonderful new dynamics to deal with. Instead they were forced into the old soap opera cliches…dying beautiful girl, philandering husband…
Scott, thank you so much for the wonderful reviews over the years, which never lost an ounce of quality. I looked forward to these as much as to the show, and in recent years, more.
May 23rd, 2011 at 11:30 pm
Am I the only one that thinks that they opened that hyperbaric chamber AWFULLY fast?
May 23rd, 2011 at 11:33 pm
Pulling Afsoun out of the hyperbaric chamber without resurfacing her was a huge no-no. Air embolism or decompression sickness are pretty likely.
May 23rd, 2011 at 11:34 pm
I’m so chuffed! The little Aussie actually pronounced “Wegener’s” correctly. Bonus! DOCTOR David Foster earned his Snausage this week.
May 23rd, 2011 at 11:45 pm
They made a huge mistake by releasing the car crash scene in the promos earlier last week. Anyone who saw those and the 1st scene with the cops would have instantly put 2 and 2 together and immediately known what the whole episode was building to, which is the kiss of death for a season finale. At least the absolute ending was very, very unexpected to me, so hopefully that represents a new start for the show as well, and they get back to making the POTW the primary storyline the way they did the first few seasons, and let the character development build itself in the background.
May 24th, 2011 at 12:05 am
I think we were all waiting for car crash at the end the beach scene did have some redeeming qualities to it. However i think that even that scene would make for a much better series finale.
and yeah what happen to the clinic paitents,did house not have any clinic paitent this year because he was sleeping with Cuddy. Those used to be my favorite, especially the one in the pilot way back when “your wife is having an affair you idiot”!!!!
May 24th, 2011 at 12:09 am
** SPOILER ALERT **
Are we 100% sure that the car crash was the direct (and only) cause of the police scene? If so, how did Wilson get hurt? Why was it dark (ie a few hours later)? Why was everyone outside instead of in Cuddy’s home? Apologies if I missed something obvious – but I really don’t want to watch the episode again! Any answers appreciated!
May 24th, 2011 at 12:15 am
[H]ow did Wilson get hurt?
I was wondering this myself, so I went back for a look. Although Wilson wasn’t touched by the car, he did fall to the sidewalk, and that’s how he hurt (fractured?) his arm.
May 24th, 2011 at 12:23 am
I do not know why people are so dissatisfied with this episode. I think it meant to make two statements – one that House and Cuddy are over (for good this time) and second that House CAN deal with an issue and move on – but only in his unique House way. If we have to point to a pivotal turning point for the show in the past that would be season 3 finale – the old team is gone something will happen (who knows what?) but House will be just fine. THIS is the same think :) An idea that I think would be cool is: The diagnostic team remains but with a new person in charge (NOT FOREMAN! Oh please not him!) and House satys away giving advise consult and making DD only via phone. He’ll miss the power and the control but he’ll enjoy the game so much! I suddenly had a flashback to the great movie “The Wrestler” Remember that one you guys? A person can only be really happy if he is doing what he loves – not what the others tell him to do or think it is best for him. And is there a better statement to say: “For the love of GOD stop trying to fix me and leave me alone!” than to drive your car past the wall of the house that belongs top the person who tryed the hardest to change you? I mean what was Lisa Cuddy thinking: “House is perfect for me! We have the sexual tension we have the chemistry I’ll just humanize him just a teensy bit and we will live happily ever after. It’s perfect!” Man she does not know the first thing about man does she? Good riddance! I have to remind you guys – I was and am a Huddy fan. But twisting House into a submissive whore is not the Huddy I want. She could have changed – she did change because of him – and he could have changed (he did change because of her) a mutual change to adjust to one another would have been the best for both. Hellas she saw into the future if she did that and she was scared…. My boss is calling. Catch you guys on the flip side.
May 24th, 2011 at 12:40 am
Confused,
It showed wilson diving out of the way of Houses car when he hopped the curb on the way to cuddys house and injuring his wrist, he was holding it too when House walked away.
May 24th, 2011 at 12:42 am
@ Confused (Spoilers also):
I think that we can safely assume that it was the only cause. It was more than enough cause. The house has been badly damaged (no pun intended ;) ), and it would probably not be safe to stay in there. Wilson sprained his wrist when he jumped away from the car when house came driving towards the house and the time-gap is probably just because it would take a lot of time in real-life, and it’s just great for dramatic effect (nice flashforwards in a dark and gritty style).
May 24th, 2011 at 12:54 am
I’m so chuffed! The little Aussie actually pronounced “Wegener’s” correctly.
Well, the “little Aussie” (in real life) has a father and two brothers who are real-life doctors.
May 24th, 2011 at 1:00 am
Wilson was hurt diving out of the way and landing awkwardly on his wrist. You only see Cuddy and Wilson outside, and that’s because she’s giving a statement and he’s receiving medical treatment. In any case, I wouldn’t want to stay in a house that has been potentially compromised from an architectural standpoint. It’s dark out because House rammed her house in the late afternoon, so a few hours later it would be dark.
May 24th, 2011 at 1:05 am
Given that Cuddy won’t be back next year, this episode just feels incredibly frustrating.
And, if they’re hoping to reinvent the show, they had better stop focusing on these utterly boring characters of House’s team. Taub in particular has to be one of the most boringist characters I’ve ever seen in a show, he’s like the Denna Troi of House.
May 24th, 2011 at 1:14 am
@ Mr. Buddwing: Oh, yeah? Ask him to pronounce “Jakob-Creutzfeldt” (reference every third episode from Seasons 1 through 3).
May 24th, 2011 at 2:28 am
What a crappy finale! House is getting worse and worse from season to season. I am quite sure, that House will return to PPTH in the next season, because if he really spent the wohle season abroad, Wilson etc. wouldnt appear any more, and they already signed conrtacts. I just hope that House will end up alive and in the end of the series he wil become a professor.
@ Pronouncing the diaseses: I think 99% of the doctors in the USA and England pronounce illnesses like Creuzfeld-Jakob or Alzheimer´s incorrectly, because they dont understand German pronounciation. It doesnt even bother me, even though I am German.
May 24th, 2011 at 2:56 am
Wilson dodged the car and there was a split second where we see him land on his wrist.
May 24th, 2011 at 3:03 am
Thanks for the clarifications. When I first saw the police scene I thought “oh my goodness House went crazy, seriously hurt a bunch of people and Wilson got caught in the crossfire.” It still makes no sense why it’s hours later (seems like they’d get there sooner). Also unclear why there seems to be a big police/ambulance presence if the only casualty was Wilson’s wrist. Anyway, minor points given the episode’s other major shortcomings.
May 24th, 2011 at 3:18 am
Jumped the Shark. This episode seemed endless. I won’t be watching any more.
May 24th, 2011 at 5:01 am
@Adam
So is Alzheimer’s not pronounced “allz-hai-murz.” That’s how I assumed to pronounce it.
Well, I’m glad to see this season go. I think House has gotten to the point where its core concept isn’t enough to sustain the show and any additions will just come off as trite last ditch efforts to liven the show back up. Most shows go through that. I know a lot of people were up in arms over the show’s drop in quality, but this season was just super boring. I spent most episodes in a daze with my eyes glazed over.
I’ve heard rumblings that, along with Lisa Edelstein leaving the show, the next season may be the last. To be fair, that might be the internet overreacting, as it is wont to do.
May 24th, 2011 at 5:05 am
First time commenter as well – wanted to add my thanks for producing these reviews. Honestly, aside from Laurie’s acting, these could be the best part of the show for me now! :)
Thanks for your time and attention to detail!
May 24th, 2011 at 5:08 am
Endless, pointless, boring, and misleading.
Perhaps the slate will be wiped clean and the final season can be a good one.
May 24th, 2011 at 5:41 am
First off – I am not defending this episode. Many aspects of it were sloppy, lazy and just left way too many possibilities by the roadside. The ideas had promise, but they weren’t followed through. But we are all saying that, so here is my big picture perspective.
I agree that I miss the old House – the doctor and the show, but a show and character have to change. If they don’t everyone who is saying they don’t like what it has become will be groaning because it has become redundant, and the characters are static and unbelievable for their sheer inability or unwillingness to evolve with experience.
I wondered from the first couple seasons how House would turn out. My major hope in the show ending naturally and not due to untimely canceling was so House (the character) could come to a conclusion. A majorly flawed character has to change, and they are going to step on some toes along the way (by that I mean viewers’ toes).
Was House going to end up happy with Cuddy? Obviously not, and that would have been a cheesy, unreal, idiotic ending that may have possibly challenged LOST for worst finale ever.
But something HAS to change with him. Every season he tries something else, and every season he fails. If indeed season 8 is the last, there are only two outcomes – he succeeds or he dies. Or, I guess, both, so three outcomes.
Season 8 will be like no other and I am welcome to see it. Will I enjoy it as much as the early seasons? Probably not, but I am glad this vehicle is getting me somewhere even if it is falling apart on the way. Please, TV Gods, don’t make it end like LOST.
One thing I think was done well in this episode was the evolution of House’s outlook. In trying to change he tried to “turtle” even more – to suppress himself and wall off real life even more – which is his major problem. I found his realization when he confronted the artist about changing her mind convincing. Melodramatic, yes, but he is a man of extremes and when he decided to lash out he did so in a definitive manner that would cut off his ability to not change.
I’m hoping he leaves the rat race behind and researches rare or unknown diseases and cures in his tropical hideaway – but I’m not betting on it. He would have his mysteries, he would be saving lives, but he would be without all the things he loathes about his practice. And working with primitive / limited equipment would be the type of handicap he would enjoy to make his job more challenging.
May 24th, 2011 at 6:19 am
So does this mean House will be setting up a private practice in the Bahamas, where his medical technique is less cause for alarm?
Perhaps he will be selecting new assistants by redoing his Survivor sequence, only this time it will actually be held on a tropical island!
May 24th, 2011 at 6:47 am
Hell yeah, House finally snapped! I always knew he had it in him.
With a little tweaking, this could’ve (and IMO should’ve) been a great series finale: maybe House could’ve died in the wreck, or killed one of the guests and gotten life in prison for murder.
I guess the start of next season will either be
1) The whole situation is explained away, Cuddy drops the charges (off-screen, of course), and everything is back to normal except for maybe a little extra hand-wringing about House getting himself together.
2) House is on the lam. The whole medical angle is bound to get even weaker as it’s hard to write medical mysteries when House is out of the country.
3) House is in prison. The prison sentence for deliberately driving into a house full of people is measured in years, so he won’t be getting out any time soon. And again, hard to be much of a doctor that way.
I wonder if the writers thought this through…
May 24th, 2011 at 6:47 am
Whatever HOUSE had back in the day, it’s lost it now. It seems like the actors are just putting in time going from one nonsensical scene to another. Season 8 will be the last (if it makes it all the way through).
May 24th, 2011 at 6:54 am
As soon as he started back towards the car, I said to my friend “dude, he’s totally going to smash through the wall like the kool aid man, only, you know, in a car.”
then
then he did
and it was stupid.
Last episode felt more like a finale, was a million times better, and left us on less nonsensical ground for where the next season might lead.
May 24th, 2011 at 7:20 am
terrible episode!!!
Just one thing to the blogger: Tachycardia and bradycardia are not arrythmias. They have regular rhythm, just fast or slow one.
May 24th, 2011 at 7:21 am
I don’t get one thing: if she had Wegener’s and they said it’s curable after a radiation therapy, shouldn’t she get better after the radiation she got for her “cancer” ?
May 24th, 2011 at 7:27 am
Did anyone predict Rachel being also being pregnant?
May 24th, 2011 at 7:29 am
^ I realize that sentence makes no sense, but you can extrapolate what I meant.
May 24th, 2011 at 7:32 am
A B for the soap opera is far more generous than I would have been. I’m extremely disappointed, and I think the show jumped the shark when it went the way of “Moonlighting” and removed the sexual tension by letting the couple hook up, even though at time I was happy about it and liked last season’s finale.
What annoyed me the most about this week’s episode was the way the writers pounded us over the head with the parallel between the artist and House — “Oh LOOK! She is bull-headed and refuses to do something that might make her more healthy because she thinks it will impinge on her art. WOW, that’s just like House and how he puts his career first, at the expense of his relationships!”
I think House is at his best when he’s challenged by those closest to him. He learned to respect Amber, Kutner and M3 particularly because they stood up to him. His best moment with Cuddy was in last year’s season finale, when she chewed him out toward the end, then he crawled back into the rubble and told the POTW that she should let him cut off her leg and that keeping his leg had made him a worse person. From rehab through that episode, House showed growth.
Maybe this season should have ended last week with his leg being cut off. What puzzled me was House’s smile on the beach. What if the last several episodes have been a fantasy? What if he actually went AWOL to the beach after “Bombshells”? Driving the car into the front of someone’s house is such a juvenile breakup fantasy, I’ve never believed his relapse and easy access to and open use of vicodin without work-related repercussions, and all the characters have been going through the motions since that episode. Maybe it’s just my fantasy that we could erase the last eight episodes and go back to the House who had grown and stood up to challenges. My biggest hope would be that Cate (Mira Sorvino) would return from the South Pole and hook up with House. He never looked at a woman with greater fascination than her, when she said something like, “I never said I thought you needed to change.”
May 24th, 2011 at 7:42 am
OK I’m back….Commenters are unusually quite today so I wander – are they stunned or disappointed or relieved it was a “House” ending instead of all the cheese we get served lately instead of good drama? I guess when it comes to fans there will always be happy ones and unhappy ones, or may be wining and content OR may be they type to complain while watching and always trying to look on the worst possible side and the ones trying to find the more positive thing in a bad situation? I thing I forgot what my point was…. Let us discuss medicine just a little bit shall we?
1. Primary CNS lymphoma is easily confirmed or even suspected and diagnosed from the blood work. Anemia is just one suspicious symptom – but all the blood cells will be all over the normal and into the bizarre area.
2. Wegeners could produce the same infiltrates on the image studies but I really do not buy it will produce all the other symptoms. People with Wegener’s have some non specific symptoms but even when the presentation is odd it is hard to miss or confuse with Lymphoma. Wegener presents with rhinitis, chronic kidney problems (glomerulonephritis – starts slowly but picks up) and pseudo-tumors all over the body (not just in the brain) Blood count is normal ( an ANCA test is needed to confirm) CNS Lymphoma has mainly “brain” symptoms – double vision, seizures, sincopy, vertigo, soos of sensitivity to the hands or face. The blood work usually shows low white count and sometimes anemia (and btw CNS lymphoma is one of the AIDS red flags because it is associated with imuno compromised patients and it is cause by the Epstein Barr virus). And of course a brain biopsy is needed to confirm it before nuking it with radiation.
3. So what caused the pancreatic cysts?
4. Pancreatitis is usually VERY painful. The patient was awfully silent for a person who should be screaming from pain.
5. What caused the Anemia? Wegener does not explain that. Unless she managed to bleed secretly (she might have done so for the “Game”!)…
One thing to notice about the POW is that she is so much like House and presented one of the most interesting medical mysteries the show ever had – a patinet who is trying to deliberately sabotage his doctors giving false symptoms and inventing or causing symptoms just for the fun. Sure they had uncooperative patients before but not for THAT reason. Too bad the season finalle thing ruined that. It also ruined certain aspects of the soap because the Taub subplot was crammed and short. Here are my scores for this episode:
Mystery B- (fainting is getting old no matter what the circumstances) Medicine C- Solution C- (make that D- for the other diagnostic team – the one that treated the lymphoma). Soap A- (because of the botched Taub storyline. Taub is C+ and House/everybody else is A). So long for now. Let us wait and see what season 8 will hold for us.
May 24th, 2011 at 7:45 am
Is it possible that he tried to kill Cuddy ?
May 24th, 2011 at 7:47 am
I got the same feeling that everyone gave up two-thirds of the way through. House said “she has cancer, she’s gonna die.” I looked at the clock, She doesn’t have cancer, she’s not gonna die.
Anybody think it’s strange that the wife is aware that Taub is with other women she still doesn’t use a condom? Maybe she wanted to get him back and that’s how she did it. She wouldn’t be the first woman to try it.
I wonder how they explain away Cuddy next season. Will Wilson be left in charge? that’s the only person I see that’ll hire House back.
May 24th, 2011 at 7:49 am
@Zach
you mean Taub’s X-wive, Thought you were talking about Cuddy’s daughter.
May 24th, 2011 at 7:52 am
Did she lie to House or the team at all during the episode?
May 24th, 2011 at 7:56 am
What would the law say about injuries inflicted during performance art? Isn’t the invitation to ‘do anything’ irrelevant?
BTW, before Yoko Ono met John Lennon c1968 she was already infamous for a performance where the audience was invited to cut her clothes off piece by piece.
I was appalled to learn that was the season finale. I say throw the homicidal bum in prison and let the show take a really new course.
May 24th, 2011 at 8:10 am
Official Comment
mianmar,
Tachycardia and bradycardia are considered arrhythmias. Though the name gets confusing, abnormal rhythm or rate yields an arrhythmia. Here’s the quickest reference I could find, though there are many others:
Clinical Electrocardiography (7th ed.):
“The term bradycardia (or bradyarrhythmia) refers to arrhythmias and conduction abnormalities that produce a heart rate of less than 60 beats per minute.”
and
“At the opposite end of the spectrum from bradyarrhythmias are the tachycardias. These rhythm disturbances produce a heart rate faster than 100 beats/min.”
May 24th, 2011 at 9:02 am
House crashed into a house! A house with 4 adults and a child! Wait, are we still supposed to sympathize with him? What a spoiled a**hole! The show should be renamed ‘Gregory House, A**shole.’
May 24th, 2011 at 9:08 am
Anybody else think that this POTW would have been better placed in season 1 through 4. I can see House and team, “I can cure her all I have to do is set her on fire.” “You can’t do that she’ll die!” She’s fine with it I asked.”
May 24th, 2011 at 9:15 am
That would have been a good ending for the series. House walks off into the sunset.
May 24th, 2011 at 9:40 am
I can’t, I simply refuse to believe that this show’s getting another season. From the network that canceled “Arrested Development”, no less.
Out of entire 40+ minutes, approx. 10 seconds of the season finale weren’t worthless.
Cuddy: It’s a privacy courtain!
Foreman: Wasn’t working.
These two lines were well written. And ONLY these two lines.
I used to like this show, I really did. That’s why I bitch about it.
May 24th, 2011 at 9:43 am
Elle wrote: I’m extremely disappointed, and I think the show jumped the shark when it went the way of “Moonlighting” and removed the sexual tension by letting the couple hook up, even though at time I was happy about it and liked last season’s finale.
Funny you should mention “Moonlighting.” After House’s stunt with the car, I found myself wondering where I’d seen that kind of thing before. Remember how David Addison, who kept denying he was bothered by his failed romance with Maddie Hayes, let loose by smashing the detective agency’s car into the walls of a public garage? Nobody else was around, and the only casualty was the car, not someone’s house. Somehow, that made a lot more sense than House’s homewrecking.
May 24th, 2011 at 9:48 am
I think you are far too much gentle with a B in the soap opera. The Season Finale was awful. Maybe the episode could had been saved if when House crashes the car in Cuddy’s home he accidentally kill Cuddy’s daughter.
May 24th, 2011 at 9:54 am
Follow up:
On May 23, 2011 in an appearance before the press, Camping stated he has reinterpreted his prophecy. In his revised claim, May 21 was a “spiritual” judgment day, and the world will still come to an end October 21, 2011.[39][40] Camping said his company would not return money donated by followers to publicize the failed May 21 prediction. “We’re not at the end. Why would we return it?”He has also predicted judgment days on May 21, 1988, and September 7, 1994. He’s getting closer at least.
May 24th, 2011 at 10:06 am
I can see it coming: “Jump the shark” will soon be replaced by “drive the car into the house” …
May 24th, 2011 at 10:24 am
Did nobody pick up on the significance of House’s final location in the light of Wilson’s earlier comments – “Knowing him he’ll be in a bar. He’ll find one which matches how he feels inside”? Although the rest of Wilson’s prediction – “It’ll be the most dark, depressing hole you can find in New Jersey” – was incorrect, I thought it was a fairly obvious intratextual link (in comparison to the usual sledge-hammer approach to referentiality and allusion in House it was, of course, subtle) from the writers/director.
May 24th, 2011 at 10:45 am
I’m wondering if we’re supposed to think Wilson was wrong about where House would be, or if he was deliberately lying to the police…
I’m wondering about what the next season’s setup will be, considering the casting we know about. I suppose we could see a “five years later” season opener, coming out of Jail and all. (The show already plays fast and loose enough with medical license issues)…
May 24th, 2011 at 10:53 am
“JB
May 24th, 2011 at 7:56 am
Your comment is awaiting moderation. ”
[3 hours later] What did I do to offend the Gods?
May 24th, 2011 at 11:09 am
Another lame show, especially the ending.
And cancer does not cause baldness. Some types of chemo cause baldness. Radiation can cause problems with hair loss, but it is not a 100% thing.
May 24th, 2011 at 11:20 am
@MH
I think they were saying instead of going to a dark place he went to the ocean showing he wasn’t in a dark place, he even turned down the bartender for another drink, has House ever done that before?
May 24th, 2011 at 11:26 am
so,before house crashes into cuddy’s house,we see cuddy and her friends eating,sitting on the table.does this actually means that house could have possibly killed everyone in there?
May 24th, 2011 at 12:08 pm
SO disappointed. And the “hoaxy” clip posted on the House/Fox website (w/ a little opener from G. Yaitanes) was such a rip. Made the actual ending a letdown.
I agree–this would have been an incredible Series Finale. But I like the idea that maybe next season won’t be “x months later” but years later.
Not really sorry to see Cuddy go…wonder if they knew she might be leaving and this gave her a good out. I really thought she might lose Rachel in this.
BUT I will say this again–HOUSE LIKES KIDS. He would NEVER have put (child) Rachel in harm’s way. So shame on the writers. I had a whole different scenario in my head (thanks to um, incorrect spoilers that were prompted by fake scenes being “filmed”)
Poor Wilson.
My thoughts are that House is looking to get a quickie divorce outside the US. Those scenes of him on the beach were GORGEOUS.
Taub…..! No condoms?? Seriously???
POTW was so very blah. But I like the change in 13’s demeanor since she came back.
I’m having post-House-Season-Finale-depression. At least I have better episodes saved on my DVR.
And I didn’t finish the House Challenge with a zero. Go me!
May 24th, 2011 at 12:08 pm
First time commenting on the site, just found it yesterday and think it’s amazing.
Everything about this episode left me wanting and in a bad way. The soap part of it was going smooth until the abrupt finish. It made sense in a house sort of way, he’s a childish, churlish jerk who thinks he’s God, but really? After all the crap he’s done this season, from the hooker filled hotel room debauchery to trying to kill himself to forcing Cuddy to watch him get married and all it takes is for him to see Cuddy eating dinner with another man (and her sister and her sister’s husband(?)) for him to go over the deep end and try to destroy her house? It really pushed my WSOD and I definitely couldn’t sympathize. At least the writers gave the relationship a hard and fast closure even though it was abrupt and felt a bit forced.
The medical part of it held so much promise but it was like the artist didn’t even try and they figured her out a little too quickly. The previews led us to believe that her issues combined to make house go crazy on Cuddy, but it seemed like the medical “mystery” was almost an afterthought.
I almost see this going the way of “Royal Pains” with House performing Macguyver medicine in the tropics. I can see him assembling some locals to stand around so that he can yell at them that they’re idiots and then hooking up with some ex-pat only to have his heart crushed again and then go meet a hurricane in a little row boat to end the series. How many times can a guy hit rock-bottom before actually changing?
May 24th, 2011 at 12:08 pm
House identifying with the patient was rather obviously done, but my main complaint is about seeing 4 people having dinner is not equal to them being 2 couples or whatever. Even so, assault to kill is not a proper response for House.
House is Breaking Bad? Not very good to steal from another show. I’m back to watching BB or Game of Thrones. House is dead to me now.
May 24th, 2011 at 1:20 pm
Personally I am under the impression that what happened in this season, except for 13’s bailout, shouldn’t have happened at all. Season 6 actually showed some growth, but the latter part of this season made it seem all for nothing. The latter part of this season only served IMO to bolster one point- That House will do asinine things to himself or others, and is incapable of changing if not for the worst.
As for the medicine, i thought they were just jumping around a lot. I also agree with whoever thought the chamber opening was kind of fast. Plus I thought in a way it started to get predictable, anyone who wasn’t a doctor could’ve foreseen the POTW’s eczema not being eczema.
Pardon if this seems like a rant, but it is.
May 24th, 2011 at 2:08 pm
Absolutely jumped the shark. I’m finished.
May 24th, 2011 at 2:15 pm
It wasn’t that bad (key word on that sentence is that), but it was certainly disappointing for a season finale…i just can’t believe Cuddy goes out of the show like that…
PS: Taub keeps doing a hole-in-one after another…i wonder what’s he gonna do now…
May 24th, 2011 at 3:06 pm
I didn’t think this episode was as bad as most folks around here seemed to think. One thing I blame on the writers, and on television writers in general, is that they do not seem to know how to write a story about a couple. Whether it be House and Cuddy, or Chase and Cameron, or Foreman and 13, or David and Maddie, or Castle and Beckett (next year, I suspect), the writers can’t seem to think of ANYthing to do with a couple when they finally get together, except break them up. Obviously, House has been increasingly self-destructive since Cuddy left him, and while jumping off a hotel balcony may have been some kind of a release he clearly needed an outlet for his rage. Rage is the one thing we have never seen from House before. I kind of liked it.
Of course it made no sense. House’s behavior isn’t supposed to make sense. Fortunately, the writers have always resisted the temptation to give a definitive explanation for what makes House tick. You get tantalizing clues, but never an answer. In that regard, I thought this episode’s clue (in the form of House’s reaction to the patient choosing therapy which might save her life but also damage her brain) was pretty revealing. I think it was this, and the fact that the decision brought the patient happiness, that pushed House over the edge, more than seeing Cuddy having dinner in a foursome.
May 24th, 2011 at 3:52 pm
When Cuddy leaves what happends to Rachel, did they just bring that relationhip out for nothing? Seems like the writers just jump from one idea to another without finishing any.
@antonis
I think House went through the front door, not sure but it was the room next to were they were eating, but someone could have walked over
@headacheslayer
House doesn’t like kids he likes Rachel
May 24th, 2011 at 5:31 pm
From the first scene I thought “House has blown up the PPTH”.
Then I thought that maybe there’s going to be a plot twist. Everybody blame House, but maybe they only saw House while the explosion was caused by someone else.
Cuddy was on the edge through most of the episode. Did she blow up her hospital? Or maybe it was the crazy patient?
I was expecting further plot, that House disappeared, everybody are blaming him and in the next episode he succeds to clear his name and expose the real perpetrator. If it were Cuddy, who would subsequently go to the prison, that would be a great good bye for this character.
And what have we seen? A car stunt in a Dirty Harry manner, except that it was nothing else than pathetic.
For me the series ended with the finale of season 6. The season 7 is like a cheap substitute of a true House m.d. series, although there were a few interesting features. I foresee that the season 8 is going to be either a worthless total failure or they will come up with something that would shock us to our very bones.
May 24th, 2011 at 6:52 pm
Oh, by the way, if House had been forging that many prescriptions for a narcotic, or even getting them legitimately, the pharmacy tracking system would have picked it up. His method made more sense when he was prescribing them for his own patients and then swapping them out for placebos.
May 24th, 2011 at 6:54 pm
uhh, Henry, he went into the dining room.
Also, Cuddy appears to be gesturing to the next room. Cutaway to House’s Head — where he probably watches them leave the room.
Oh that CRAZY DOCTOR!
May 24th, 2011 at 7:00 pm
@Henry, I disagree….he has repeatedly connected with kids, whether it was the autistic boy in Lines in the Sand, or the child “Finding Nemo” in Euphoria. He IS a child and values their honesty.
Of course he connected most with Rachel–after all she’s Cuddy’s child and he’s watched her age over the years (in theory).
House may be crazy in rage over Cuddy but I still say he would never have done something if Rachel could have been caught in the crossfire.
Grr. I think I need to write my own fanfic rewrite of the ending LOL
May 24th, 2011 at 7:03 pm
I’m torn apart on how to evaluate this episode. I admit that I expected something much more crazy from House than to break through the wall (which is slightly insane, of course) when I saw the disappointment and the anger in his eyes.
Still, as I said last week, House’s fragility is underpinned, the brilliant doctor has weak spots that overwhelm himself and let him lose control of his actions. The picture that is drawn of House changed from him being a self-loathing egomaniac to a generally-loathing misanthropist since the source of his torture is not his leg anymore but the failing relationships with people around him. While he is still interested in riddles and mysteries, he is not obsessed anymore, given the fact that he has to cope with more than just his hurting leg – this, of course, influences his persona in general.
The downward spiral might continue, it had its stops in the past and then went on – I’m very interested whether this cesura in his life will REALLY change him or if the depressive component stays and eventually drives him into the only option possible: suicide
May 24th, 2011 at 7:59 pm
Very sad for some very good actors – and they are mostly good. I couldn’t believe how much I fast forwarded through this season. I think its over for me. I don’t care where Gregory House goes next season.
May 24th, 2011 at 8:22 pm
@headacheslayer
I think he liked the autistic kid because of the way he was can’t care what people think lives in his own world.
So what I meant to say was he doesn’t like most kids, he didn’t like Rachel when he thought she was dumb untilll she lied to Cuddy. Course he did get along with the two kids in two stories but he doesn’t treat them like kids. I think there like everyone else he only likes the ones that are interesting there just more so than the parents.
May 24th, 2011 at 8:29 pm
Also I think the reason he drove the car in the house is even though he has marred and has hookers ocer all the time he never connected with any of them, he even told his wife he doesn’t sleep with married women, meaning he hasn’t moved on adn then he sees she has.
I still didn’t like this one.
And with the kids what I mean is if you like all kids it doesn’t mean much to the ones that matter, if you don’t like most kids it means more to the few you do like.
May 24th, 2011 at 9:19 pm
I couldn’t have cared less about the POTW. She was pretentious and annoying — just like performance “art”. (And what is she really? She is a low-budget indie film maker. Film making is an art that has existed for 100 years. The only reason she is considered new, and cutting edge, is because her movies make no damn sense.)
Maybe this makes me kind of a scary guy, but House’s actions throughout the episode made perfect sense to me. For one thing, he’s really stoned, which naturally affects his judgement. For the next thing, he is in denial about how hurt he is by Cuddy dumping him. She pushed him to confront those feelings.
His crazy act at the end made sense to me. It wasn’t just an explosion of jealousy at seeing her with another man. It was the devastating realization that Cuddy really could move on. She is capable of experiencing happiness. It made him insane with rage. She loved him, but just couldn’t live with him, and now she is really going to move on.
PLEASE do not interpret my statement of “understanding” as one of approval. I wonder if, in the next season, he will be brutally questioned about what he did — hopefully by Wilson — and will claim that if he had seen everyone still at the table, then he planned to hit the brakes at the last moment and “only” shatter the windows, rather than plow into the room? (Not that flying glass can’t cause very serious injuries.)
This claim of course wouldn’t excuse anything. (For one thing, Rachel is a toddler. She might have been in the room — perhaps playing under the table the way little kids like to do — and he wouldn’t have
seen her, and would almost certainly have killed her.)
An insane and utterly selfish destructive act. Done to destroy forever ANY good feeling between him and Cuddy, because if she won’t love him, then by God he will see to it that she HATES him!
This is Greg House we are talking about here. In case no one has noticed over the past seven years, well, he is not a very nice man. Just because you are a genius doesn’t make you a good person.
May 24th, 2011 at 9:22 pm
Taub keeps doing a hole-in-one after another…i wonder what’s he gonna do now…
Gee, I don’t know … maybe run for governor of California? (I generally refrain from political humor, but com’n, at least one of you must have marveled at the parallel… )
May 24th, 2011 at 9:50 pm
DS gave a post finale interview and apparently House should be excused for his criminal behavior because you know he was all upset and stuff about his ex moving on. Conclusion? The producers and writers have no moral compass. Sad.
May 24th, 2011 at 10:08 pm
@Buddwing: THAT’s funny!
May 24th, 2011 at 10:16 pm
Next season House becomes the doctor on a cruise ship. And we have The House Boat.
May 24th, 2011 at 10:33 pm
I clapped when he went Kool Aid Man’d Cuddy’s house, that is rare for me.
Easily could have been a series finale.
May 24th, 2011 at 11:18 pm
I don’t see any evidence that Rachel was even in the House.
May 25th, 2011 at 12:21 am
I truly hated this episode, a fitting end to a season that I truly hated! I do have a bit of a forlorn hope for next season.
May 25th, 2011 at 12:40 am
What a completely bizarre episode. The medical mystery was atrocious and boring (and, yes, obviously lighting someone on fire is a crime, even if they say it’s okay, to whoever asked), and the ’soap opera’ … well, we’ll see. It has me hooked for the beginning of next season (which will indeed be the last), although honestly I agree with everyone who’s said this works better as a series finale. It is hard to see how the show can possibly go on without a quite stupid plot contortion or something.
May 25th, 2011 at 12:44 am
And another thought:
I thought this season was excellent until Cuddy and House broke up. Masters was annoying, but otherwise, I thought it was a slight improvement over S6 and a big one over S5. Those who hated it should probably go back and rewatch the past few to see how much of an improvement there’s been since the end of Season 4….
Even if you think the House/Cuddy romance plotline was so-so or worse, the actual medical episodes were back and pretty good and even inventive and close to the early seasons in quality (if not accuracy) from time to time, at least in the first half of the season. But after Cuddy dumped House, it just drove off a cliff — which I’m sure was part of the point. it will be interesting to see how they recover the pieces and reassemble them in S8.
May 25th, 2011 at 12:44 am
“Is it possible that he tried to kill Cuddy ?”
I don’t think so. I think that House felt that Cuddy “broke” him when Stacey conspired with her to perform surgery on his leg against his will… so in return for Cuddy breaking House, House broke Cuddy’s house.
May 25th, 2011 at 12:58 am
I enjoyed “House” the first few seasons when he played the part of a capable, employable doctor. Sure, it frequently strained one’s credulity, all part of the entertainment.
There is no longer much redeeming value for the show. It seems to be written by some high school students — perhaps even English students — who were given that cast of characters and told to do something with them that would end in 44 minutes. The one rule would be that they’d never seen “House.”
That could make the decline of the show a bit easier to understand; otherwise, I can’t fathom the reason it no longer holds any promise for even one more “good” episode. Those HS kids aren’t “creative” writers.
May 25th, 2011 at 1:03 am
Also, to everyone complaining about how bad the show is and how it sucks and how inept the writers are: don’t watch it. And don’t come on to forums dedicated to the show to complain about how bad it is.
If it’s really so bad, it must be a waste of your time to watch and think about it – so why do you bother? Just…don’t.
May 25th, 2011 at 2:07 am
Rule of House# I don’t have a f$*%ng clue: Always end a terrible season/episode with an absolutely ridiculous and over the top event, like self-surgery, or jumping from a window into a pool, or, even better (or worse depending on how you look at it) crashing a car into someone’s house.
May 25th, 2011 at 2:34 am
@Eric: To be fair, the complaints here aren’t like the ones you’d see on, say, YouTube–we aren’t people angrily lashing out, watching things we hate just so we can rant about hating them. I think the people complaining here are doing so out of love. You can critically assess something you love, and even complain about it (a spouse, for example!)–it doesn’t mean you’re going to strike it forever from your life.
House is the only tv show I have ever bought a DVD of (and I’ve bought every season), the only one I check ratings for, the only one I read a blog about, the only one I worry about when I see it struggling. It’s the only show I watch that isn’t on the 2 stations I get–i.e., the only show I bother to watch on the internet. I remember sitting on my bed in my minuscule grad school apartment, watching House for the first time, completely engrossed. I remember telling my mother, “It’s like CSI, but with doctors. And the main character is AWFUL!” My father knows every detail of every POTW from every season, I have shed tears for Greg House on many occasions, and my 3-year-old daughter always asks where Jeeves is every time she sees Dr. House. House has been part of my life for a long time and I complain because it hurts to see it in decline.
Those of us who are complaining are still hanging on–we’re among the 8 million viewers who are still here. The other 8+ million from House’s peak years have left because they don’t care anymore, and don’t care enough to complain. I think my complaints are a better testimony to the greatness of the show than their silence is.
My apologies for using up so much space on a non-medical train of thought . . . it’s this kind of drivel that has spoiled the show, right? :-)
May 25th, 2011 at 3:03 am
@Eric
We like she show, we just don’t like some episodes and hope they’ll het better
May 25th, 2011 at 3:42 am
Dr. R: I”ll add it to the list.
May 25th, 2011 at 4:45 am
So either next season will start with House weaseling out of the whole “attempted murder” thing somehow, and the huge outburst will have been meaningless (lame) or he’ll be in prison or Tahiti and basically unable to continue being a doctor (impractical story-wise).
I suppose they have to let him off the hook somehow, but in what possible realistic scenario would someone be able to dodge prison after doing that? The last we heard from Cuddy, she’s going to press charges, and since she won’t be around next season, they won’t be able to film either a trial OR a potential decision to drop charges. Maybe this means House stays on the run.
May 25th, 2011 at 4:46 am
…for that matter, even if Cuddy wanted to let him off, the cops would still come after him. No prosecutor would decline to prosecute an open-and-shut attempted murder case just because the victim wasn’t cooperating.
May 25th, 2011 at 5:58 am
I think that the writers of the show were drawing a parallel between the patient’s performance art and House’s actions. Think of his driving the car into Cuddy’s house as an act of performance art.
I just think that the show has turned for the worse over the past year or two. The soap opera element has taken over and the medicine is second place. The older, more successful shows centered on curing the patient. More recent shows focus excessively on the personal lives of the characters. In order to keep things “interesting,” the writers keep ratcheting up the “drama.” This is hard to do (hard to do well), and all of these artificial and extreme plot developments are substitutes for really good character development, which is much harder to write. It is the script equivalent of overacting.
If the show stayed true to its initial premise — curing the patient, all of this nonsense in the lives of the characters could have been avoided.
Responding to the statement: “Tachycardia and bradycardia are not arrythmias. They have regular rhythm, just fast or slow one.” Very few tachycardias and bradycardias have a regular sinus rhythm, and the defining characteristic of these symptoms is not simply the heart rate (I’m sure you’ve gotten your heart up to 160 bpm during exercise), but the fact that the heart is misfiring usually due to a problem with (or effecting) the electrical pathways of the heart.
May 25th, 2011 at 6:23 am
I thought Wilson was precisely correct: House went somewhere that matches how he feels inside. House is, in fact, now HAPPY.
Of course, *we* are not, but I doubt he cares.
wg
May 25th, 2011 at 6:55 am
This whole season just seemed off kilter and out of sync. In my mind the series ended with the Season 6 finale. If you wanted a “happy” ending you had one. If you didn’t, you could always believe he went back on the drugs and was back in his fantasy.
Hard to see where they are going from here in any kind of a believable way (even with a healthy does of willing suspension), especially if the cast changes go through.
May 25th, 2011 at 7:36 am
House will beat the rap by telling the judge that he was driving a Toyota. :-) (Even though he wasn’t).
May 25th, 2011 at 12:05 pm
Based on what most of you seem to think, the show hasn’t been worth watching since the third or fourth season. So why do you keep watching?
I agree that this was episode was hard to like. We’ll see what they do with it in the next season, if there is indeed really a next season…
Also: guys, Cuddy leaving as a season regular does NOT mean she will never be in any more episodes ever again!
May 25th, 2011 at 12:18 pm
OTOH, Cuddy won’t be back in Season 8! YAYAYAY!!!!! All they had to do was cut her per-show salary. I mean, if they’d figured that out earlier we could have been rid of her AGES ago!
May 25th, 2011 at 12:56 pm
@Eric: You wrote, “Based on what most of you seem to think, the show hasn’t been worth watching since the third or fourth season. So why do you keep watching?”
My answer: I thought last week’s show was really good. I thought this week’s show stank. I suppose I am like a rat in a Skinner box, responding to random reinforcement.
Following up on my post a couple of weeks ago (http://www.politedissent.com/archives/7383#comment-1045894), I included Dr. Scott’s ratings for the last two weeks and reanalyzed his ratings for all seven seasons. Results: this season comes out lowest both in terms of means and medians for all four categories (mystery, solution, medicine overall, soap).
May 25th, 2011 at 1:23 pm
The series used to be great, so I got addicted to it. As an addict, I stopped paying attention to the fact that my drug’s quality is getting worse, I only wanted more of it, for longer…
Oh, happy were the days when I would spend 20 hours watching the series, no sleeping, no getting out, just an episode after an episode till an entire season was over. :)
I explained elsewhere that for me the series was mostly about medical mysteries and the thrill of solving them. Characters were important as long as they got involved in solving medical mysteries. Alas, the mysteries were getting less engaging, and other than that the ’soap’ content was getting more and more… diluted? The series jumped the shark when House and Cuddy split up, with House on Vicodin. Again. You see, time goes on, times change, and people should go along with it and if not change, than at least adapt a tad. And here, everything kind of got stuck in a stasis, on no, it is worse, it has returned to some worn out formula, House-on-Vicoding-with-no-Cuddy, as if the writers didn’t know how to deal with the Huddy thing. Same old story. Sorry to say, but what comes to my mind is a saying in my native tounge: ‘’so stale as a reheated steak”.
At some point I just started begging silently, ”oh please please please stop this when it is not too late, let us remeber House forever as a masterpiece of a procedural drama, and not as a lukewarm run-of-the-mill nonsense!”
By the way: thanks a lot for the site Scott; thank you for the reviews and the space where all those brilliant commentaries were written.
May 25th, 2011 at 1:25 pm
I am responding to posts like Tweedledumb:
“I enjoyed “House” the first few seasons when he played the part of a capable, employable doctor… There is no longer much redeeming value for the show. It seems to be written by some high school students — perhaps even English students — who were given that cast of characters and told to do something with them that would end in 44 minutes. The one rule would be that they’d never seen “House.””
and
Dr R’s “I truly hated this episode, a fitting end to a season that I truly hated! ”
or Adam’s “House is getting worse and worse from season to season.”
etc. etc. etc…
I thought this season – until Cuddy and House broke up – was better than any other since at least four. And no offence to Dr. Scott (I obviously love and value his reviews or I wouldn’t be here!) but his ratings aren’t particularly objective or comprehensive. I mean, there are three rather ill-defined categories for the medical aspect of the show and only one for the actual raison d’etre of any TV show, namely the drama, which is systematically devalued on this site as ’soap opera’. So tracking his ratings is a bit of a farce…
May 25th, 2011 at 2:49 pm
@Eric: I like farce. ;-)
May 25th, 2011 at 4:11 pm
Wegener granlomatosis doesnt fit AT ALL!
1 no kidney involvement
2 no lung involvement
3 no signs of sinusitis
4 no loss of other senses such as hearing
5 Involvement of pancreas????
Might as well call it fantasy granulomatosis!
May 25th, 2011 at 4:13 pm
I think it was a pleasantly freaky episode.
May 25th, 2011 at 4:16 pm
http://www.hulu.com/watch/244092/the-morning-after-house-season-7-dubbed#s-p1-sr-i1
This is pretty funny. A “dubbed” summary of House season 7 in 2 min.
May 25th, 2011 at 4:23 pm
@ Alex S.
I shouldn’t have cared less about the PotW – but the actor made her more compelling, perhaps than she should have been. There was something painfully honest about her; although it was bullshit (especially as analysed by 13), the bullshit wasn’t cynical. IMO.
Maybe this makes me kind of a scary guy, but House’s actions throughout the episode made perfect sense to me.
I agree with pretty much everything you said here. They would keep trying to coerce him into expressing himself … let it all out … like letting out pressurised wounded rage would be a good thing for anyone except the wounded. Who tend to repress for good reasons.
May 25th, 2011 at 4:43 pm
Why does everyone seem to assume he ended up in the Bahamas? New Jersey is on the coast…
May 25th, 2011 at 4:59 pm
Barrytown: NJ doesn’t have palm trees
May 25th, 2011 at 5:00 pm
RAK: nice clip
Well, that’s it for me. Back in a few months for part two of the House deathwatch
May 25th, 2011 at 5:07 pm
Have a nice summer, everyone!
May 25th, 2011 at 6:06 pm
House has big “balls” to do that kind of thing.I hope that there will more and more of him in the future.
May 26th, 2011 at 1:13 am
It’s more than just House’s character. All the characters have taken dives. It’s like the writers want to say, House was right in those beginning years, when he continually tried to prove that everybody was more screwed up and lonely than they wanted to admit. Cuddy, Chase, Foreman, Wilson, Thirteen, Masters, Taub….with the exception of Taub, whose relationships aren’t really relationships and who certainly never rates high on the happiness scale, everyone is alone and lonely and in the dumps. The entire theme of the dramatic part of the show is depression, which could be an interesting concept, I guess, if it were entertaining and thought-provoking to watch. But again, not what I got into the series for. I only watch four TV shows total, or did this year. Uncertain if House and Glee will still be on the list in the fall. But while House was great, it was amazing. Hard to even think of writers being that utterly clever, TV actors that talented, cameramen on a TV series that creative. Even the music was always cleverly picked and carried out the themes in wonderful ways.
@Eric, I truly am glad that you’ve enjoyed this season more than the previous ones. But please do grant us our kvetching space.
May 26th, 2011 at 7:54 am
@Eric Given that there is no way to objectively measure artistic content, analyzing Scott’s ratings is no more farcical than any other opinion poll. The only difference is that Elle measured one person’s opinion over 7 years rather than many people’s opinion over a short period of time.
May 26th, 2011 at 8:04 am
Eric states that he’s tired of hearing people complain that the show hasn’t been very good since seasons 3 or 4.
He then says “I thought this season – until Cuddy and House broke up – was better than any other since at least four. ” (By the way, “until Cuddy and House broke up” basically only accounts for half of season 7)
Well played, Eric.
May 26th, 2011 at 6:13 pm
Been reading here a few months, been watching House only this and last season and many comments here say the show has ‘jumped the shark.’ I, in only months, have witnessed the shark-jumping and have really come to dislike the House character– love Hugh Laurie–can’t stand House. He is selfish, self-centered, destructive (to himself and others) and has some seriously undiagnosed(?), untreated (??) psych problems beside Vicodin addiction.
Clearly, the intended character development is supposed to take us deeper into House’s psychosis while not actually explaining anything–we just get left with he’s getting batshittier by the minute, and that is wholly unsatisfying.
Cuddy’s codependent back-and-forth is also annoying and I’ll be glad to see LE leave the show if only to make the point that enough-is-enough–House is crazy and dangerous and only fake-medicine brilliant.
The show would be more interesting I think if the played the drama out to reasonable conclusions–same goes for the medicine. The original premise of the show I assume is ‘brilliant, troubled physician and best diagnostician on Earth learns to become human,’ and that outline seems to have been cast to the wind along with actual medicine.
May 26th, 2011 at 6:16 pm
Well, that was a load of rubbish! I thought the very least he’d done at the beginning was to have blown up PP! I was disappointed all this series and the end was no different. The writers have destroyed this series.
May 26th, 2011 at 7:57 pm
mcb, I don’t think you’re quite fair. There were many good lines in this episode, and in that regard, a good season finale (for being season 7).
You mentioned the privacy curtain, but also the moments with the hairbrush, House grabbing it from his apartment and delivering it. I can’t recite them. And yes, it’s a bit pathetic referring to a hairbrush as a highlight of one episode, but anyway. I had many good chuckles which sort of threw me back to season 1 (where there was much witty dialogue). That’s not to blame season 7: Even season 2 onwards did lose it a bit.
It’s a bit sad to have come to and end with House. I hadn’t seen all the seasons until now, so I just caught up with the end. Scott seems to become more and more critical to both the medical aspect and the show itself, it seems. :P Perhaps he’s growing old and moody? ;)
May 26th, 2011 at 10:45 pm
Thanks, Scott, for another season of A+ reviews.
The episode would have had better possibilities if they abandoned Action House in favor of good ol Mind Games House and confined him to his bed for the entire show. With the team going between him and the patient. Performance medicine vs performance art.
May 27th, 2011 at 3:53 am
I always thought that the writers needed to get House out of the hospital setting and its formulaic stories. I also really enjoyed his ‘clinic’ hours. They were simple and medically relevant but House could still be a jackass.
I haven’t been able to watch the season finale yet but it sounds like they may be attempting to reinvent the show which is what I think it desperately needs. If he goes rogue as a field doctor and seeks out medical mysteries to stick his nose into that could work. His team can still take cases on their own…but that sounds like a step backward so I can’t quite envision what they are going to do.
May 27th, 2011 at 6:16 am
It was obvious that the car crash wasn’t why the cops were there.
My bet is there was another accident after that and this time, it was the hospital.
May 27th, 2011 at 6:52 am
Episode 22 was absolute brilliance and this was absolute crap. :(
May 27th, 2011 at 1:29 pm
Completely off topic to anything here but I was wondering… the subject of Laurie’s incredible eye colour has come up several times over the years. Both my mom and my brother have very similar eye colour to Laurie’s when seen in photos, and my mom’s are always that colour in life. They may appear somewhat more blue or more grey depending on the colour of clothing or makeup she is wearing, but they don’t appear to change too drastically. If you compare from one photo to another you can see that her eyes are still the same actual colour, and that it is a trick of perception that makes them appear to change colour depending on the colours around her.
However, my brother’s eyes actually do seem to be different colours at times, depending on moods or state of health as well as surrounding colour. To a layman who has peered into both sets of eyes and found them to be the same icy blue with no apparent traces of green or brown flecks or rings (unlike my own hazel eyes, which up close appear similar to looking into pond water with all kinds of gold and brown spots and rings) I am wondering:
Is the way some people’s eyes appear to change colour with mood or health a trick of perception, or is there actually something medical to explain it – like higher or lower blood flow in the eye making the colour appear brighter or darker? In my experience, this only seems to happen with the palest and clearest of blue eyes, and as mentioned in the familial example above, not even always then…