timepiececlock (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timepiececlock) wrote2006-05-25 01:48 am
timepiececlock) wrote2006-05-25 01:48 am
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Is it just me, or was this episode more gruesome than normal?
House, season 2 finale
I'm tyring to decide if saying "you anti-semantic bastard" to the next person I get the chance would be funny or simply in bad taste. Being that I love semantics, I think it's a hilarious crack. But the other half of the joke makes fun of a term referencing unfair persecution of a particular cultural subset, and I'm generally against slurs. On the other hand, it doesn't actually mock the particular cultural subset. It mocks the people that oppress them. Or maybe I'm just overanalyzing.
I have mixed feelings about this episode. I liked the individual halucinations (and all the various things they revealed about his deep emotional problems), but the overall plot twist of "none of this is real" was somewhat anti-climactic. I saw it coming a long ways off. I almost *wanted* him to have killed the patient on the table (by the way, eww) if only because my brain was secure in the idea that such a thing would never happen and was longing for the outrageous change.
Actually, that's why this all felt a little underwhelming for me, I think. He could have all the halucinations he wants and they'll never be able to really raise the dramatic tension for me this way because there's certain things that will never change:
1) House will be a cripple
2) House will be a jerk
3) House will never be arrested and tried for manslaughter or wrongful death, because then there'd be no show.
I never really believed the healing was real, or that he was going to get some new lease on life from it, or that he would kill the patient in the end for real no matter how long they hold the camera on the bloated corpse of his victim. Because I *know* that House could never kill anyone on the show.
So, I guess, it feels like a lot of wasted time. They tried to be dramatic but I never left the audience safety zone, never feared for the character or his actions, so the episode was not dramatic. Merely curious. It fails to be stunning.
It also fails on an artistic level-- it lacked balance. It could have been more fluid, more like BTVS's "Restless" episode. I'm not really sure how to express what I'm trying to say here, but... it felt unbalanced. And not in a way that dreams are by their very natures unbalanced and jarring... but unbalanced in a televison episode 40 minute plotline way, where what you see is alright enough, but you know it could have been so much better if done by someone else. Preferrably someone who understands story pacing.
However, it wins at the House characterization level. Although I wasn't all "OMG" or anything by the plotline, I did enjoy the trip through House's brain. What does he fantasize about? What does he fear? How in love with himself is he if he's got his own neuroses psychologically figured out down to the last grain? Even in his own head House still loves to talk about himself as the center of the universe.
I really would like a better look at what he wrote on the window.
Hm... so, the controversial pain treatment he dreamed about will possibly be administered for real during the surgery? Interesting. At least this time he's making the choice himself as to what happens to him under the knife.
Overall, I appreciate what they tried to do here, with reality vs. unreality. Anyttime a pedestrian drama show tries to step outside convention into something supernatural or superreal in storytelling, I approve of it. But I guess I'm not terribly impressed with this episode and my heads not anywhere near exploding because I've seen this done before, and I've seen it done better. It's called "Restless" on B:TVS and it's called "pretty much every third episode" of Farscape.
Seriously, after four seasons of Farscape, a primetime network's attempt at crack is not really crack. It's just...hot mustard. Farscape was crack. FMA was crack. Buffy was sometimes crack. House will never attain FS levels of crack.
I'm tyring to decide if saying "you anti-semantic bastard" to the next person I get the chance would be funny or simply in bad taste. Being that I love semantics, I think it's a hilarious crack. But the other half of the joke makes fun of a term referencing unfair persecution of a particular cultural subset, and I'm generally against slurs. On the other hand, it doesn't actually mock the particular cultural subset. It mocks the people that oppress them. Or maybe I'm just overanalyzing.
I have mixed feelings about this episode. I liked the individual halucinations (and all the various things they revealed about his deep emotional problems), but the overall plot twist of "none of this is real" was somewhat anti-climactic. I saw it coming a long ways off. I almost *wanted* him to have killed the patient on the table (by the way, eww) if only because my brain was secure in the idea that such a thing would never happen and was longing for the outrageous change.
Actually, that's why this all felt a little underwhelming for me, I think. He could have all the halucinations he wants and they'll never be able to really raise the dramatic tension for me this way because there's certain things that will never change:
1) House will be a cripple
2) House will be a jerk
3) House will never be arrested and tried for manslaughter or wrongful death, because then there'd be no show.
I never really believed the healing was real, or that he was going to get some new lease on life from it, or that he would kill the patient in the end for real no matter how long they hold the camera on the bloated corpse of his victim. Because I *know* that House could never kill anyone on the show.
So, I guess, it feels like a lot of wasted time. They tried to be dramatic but I never left the audience safety zone, never feared for the character or his actions, so the episode was not dramatic. Merely curious. It fails to be stunning.
It also fails on an artistic level-- it lacked balance. It could have been more fluid, more like BTVS's "Restless" episode. I'm not really sure how to express what I'm trying to say here, but... it felt unbalanced. And not in a way that dreams are by their very natures unbalanced and jarring... but unbalanced in a televison episode 40 minute plotline way, where what you see is alright enough, but you know it could have been so much better if done by someone else. Preferrably someone who understands story pacing.
However, it wins at the House characterization level. Although I wasn't all "OMG" or anything by the plotline, I did enjoy the trip through House's brain. What does he fantasize about? What does he fear? How in love with himself is he if he's got his own neuroses psychologically figured out down to the last grain? Even in his own head House still loves to talk about himself as the center of the universe.
I really would like a better look at what he wrote on the window.
Hm... so, the controversial pain treatment he dreamed about will possibly be administered for real during the surgery? Interesting. At least this time he's making the choice himself as to what happens to him under the knife.
Overall, I appreciate what they tried to do here, with reality vs. unreality. Anyttime a pedestrian drama show tries to step outside convention into something supernatural or superreal in storytelling, I approve of it. But I guess I'm not terribly impressed with this episode and my heads not anywhere near exploding because I've seen this done before, and I've seen it done better. It's called "Restless" on B:TVS and it's called "pretty much every third episode" of Farscape.
Seriously, after four seasons of Farscape, a primetime network's attempt at crack is not really crack. It's just...hot mustard. Farscape was crack. FMA was crack. Buffy was sometimes crack. House will never attain FS levels of crack.