The current gang*:
*Well, for the most part.
This is a tribute, not an introduction, so I'm addressing this to people who know and love the show. For those of you who haven't seen it and like what you see here, the first five seasons are available on DVD from Netflix and (I presume) Blockbuster. Grab season one and settle in for a fun ride.
The clips on this page are designed to be watched in full-screen mode. After they start playing, click on the little symbol on the video player's tool bar to open them up. The keyboard's left and right arrow keys act as a quick-replay and quick-forward and the up and down arrow keys control the volume.
Resources
There are tons of forums and such around, just do a Google search. Some of the better commercial sites are here and here, and one of the better fan sites is here. Some of the sites are fun in that they keep a running tally of who solved the case, how many 'breach of ethics' were in each show, memorable quotes, who did the background songs, etc.
Trivia
A few things I've picked up:
- One thing I find interesting is that the actors aren't told in advance the direction the show will take, and what makes this especially intriguing is that this was true during the first seven weeks of season four as House weeded out the applicants on the show. The actors, themselves, didn't know whether they'd be 'fired' until the reading of the next script. That is, they were auditioning both on the show and for the show at the same time. The actors in their interviews said that it made them nervous as hell, but it was fun because it was so unique.
- The odd diseases are real diseases. What's surreal is the way these 1-in-a-million calamities show up week after week at the same hospital — but that's showbiz, folks. And the various possibilities the gang considers actually are diseases whose symptoms fit the patient. The show has a whole medical staff doing research to 'flesh out' the story lines.
- It continually amazes me that Hugh Laurie is British. And it isn't his command of the American accent that so impresses me — it's the way he's picked up on our mannerisms and nuance. He feels like the most American actor on the show.
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Let's start with the music. Apart from being a great TV show, it also has superb taste in contemporary songs. Here are a few choice moments. Alanis Morissette performing 'Not As We': In the show, House has a patient who electrocutes himself with a knife in a wall outlet in order to replay a state of enlightenment he attained in a near-death accident a few days before. It gets House to thinking of going to the edge, himself, perhaps to attain an insight as to whether or not an afterlife exists. There's also a shot of Foreman at his new job where he behaves like his former mentor — putting the patient ahead of the rules — and ends up saving the patient's life and getting fired as a result. This is the final few minutes of season four. For those of you unfamiliar with the show, it would take about ten pages to explain the significance behind each scene in this clip, but suffice to say that they all linger from touchingly poignant to profoundly sad. And that's particularly true in hindsight. The only one who looks outright happy is the one who later takes his own life. And there are two things in particular that are significant about this clip: If there was an award for 'Most Meaningful Sentence Of The Season', the sentence I'd give it to wasn't even composed of words. Granted, if you're not a fan of the show it won't mean much, but Cuddy's intake of breath after House blinks his eyes is truly a sublime moment in both scriptwriting and acting. And I wonder if fans of the show truly appreciate what a great gift it was they gave us with that last, lingering shot of Amber radiating a beauty heretofore unseen. It would have been so easy to just move on and not care about the 'lasting images' in our minds, leaving us with that picture of a twisted and dying Amber forevermore. So to give us that last breathtaking shot fading away into the purity of white, erasing the ugliness that had gone before, was something that should be both noted and appreciated. A story of death, with Foreman disliking a death row inmate, now a patient, until House finds a physical reason for his murderous rages. Now Foreman is considering defending the man in court. In the meantime, Cameron hasn't been able to bring herself to tell a patient she's dying from lung cancer. The 'five stages of death' on the whiteboard have been followed by Cameron throughout the show, rather than the patient. By the way, as you probably know, there's a 'Goofs' section on the IMDb where people note goofs in the movies. It's to note that goofs take place in TV Land, as well. In that last clip, watch the bottom card of the deck. It actually changes four times. Twice right at the beginning, then right before and after House draws the card. Apart from the terrific inside-the-body animations the show uses, there's not much need for special effects. In this episode, however, where the patient is at the South Pole, they really outdid themselves. When the scene first opens, you're thinking, "Oh, it's just a model." But then, as you get nearer, you start thinking, "Well, maybe it's a real wind farm, but not actually at the South Pole." And, at that point, you'd probably be correct. It seems fairly apparent that it's a real helicopter landing at some wind farm, maybe somewhere in Texas on a wintery, snowy day. And, just to reinforce how real it is, watch the camerawork closely as it nears the windmill blades. Is this cameraman brave, or what? Great special effects here. House is interviewing a patient whose only form of communication is beeping 'yes' or 'no' through a computer: I thought the banter between Mark and House was loads of fun. Here are three scenes of them together: Exit question: At the very beginning of the clip, in the restaurant, we note there aren't any candles in view, nor does House smoke. So, where does someone come up with a wooden kitchen match in the middle of a restaurant? Incredibly, unlike a show such as 'Boston Legal', which weaves a handful of Democratic Talking Points into every single episode, 'House' tends to stay out of the political spotlight. The only actor on the show who exercises any sort of judgment at all is House, himself, and he pretty much mocks everything and everybody — as befits his character. In principle, though, House appears to be an enigma:
I would hesitate to slap a label on him, but he certainly comes across as the crusty, staunch conservative, albeit without the moral grounding. As a doctor, though, having seen life and death all around him for years, one would expect him to have something of a cavalier attitude toward death. So perhaps his views regarding abortion and capital punishment have more to do with pragmatism than ideology, theology or principle. In regards to Chase, Cameron and Foreman, they've said very little that could be construed as 'political commentary', except for one remarkably revealing scene. In my opinion, one of the most disturbing aspects of modern conservatism and the New Morality is the way they've sexualized so many innocent, innocuous events. A cancer-ridden 9-year-old girl wants one little kiss before she possibly dies, just to know what it feels like, and just watch the reactions of Foreman and (particularly) Cameron when Chase delivers the news that he complied: What a scandal! Cameron was shocked, she'll tell you, shocked! And, as an example of this leap we're being taught to make, please note this exchange: Chase: She asked me to kiss her. House: I rest my case. A regular 9-year-old girl does not have sex on the brain, not when a doctor's threading a catheter through her vein. An innocent 9-year-old girl merely wants a kiss and the crusty old prude immediately assumes it's sexual in nature? That's the direction we're being pushed; where even a hug or a kiss is automatically deemed sexual, and males are deemed predatory unless immediately proven otherwise. Well, even though Dr. Buttwipe ignored Chase's opinion and put the poor thing through a humiliating rape test, the Great Hobbled One did come up with a miracle cure at the end and the day was saved: The background song is 'In The Deep' by Bird York. And did you see the little girl kiss Chase's neck ever so gently? I'm surprised Foreman and Cameron didn't pin him to the ground and call for the Rape Squad. The camera didn't show it, but I have to imagine Cameron was again holding her hands to her mouth, fighting back the tears of outrage and shame over the depths to which humanity had sunk. "When I'm president," she's thinking to herself, "I'm going to make sure that scum like this are locked away permanently! Any male who even looks at a female other than his wife will be immediately imprisoned under my benevolent and compassionate reign!" But I stray. Overall, politically, I'd have to — and it stuns me to say this about a Hollywood product — admit that the show is relatively neutral. Apparently, David Shore, the originator and producer, has discovered one of the Great Secrets of Life™ that so few producers have grasped: If you aren't blatantly ideological, you can actually appeal to everybody! Such a concept, mine boy! And it's a secret many have yet to learn. I was over at a friend's house a few years ago and caught part of 'Boston Legal', thought it was great and was planning on doing the Netflix thing and giving it a run, but I just couldn't take the incessant liberal drool emanating from my speakers every 10 minutes. As I said, it's like the writers were ticking off a list of Democratic Talking Points. "War in Iraq is bad — check!" "Global warming will kill us any minute — check!" "President Bush is an imbecilic madman — double-check!" Kudos to David Shore for stepping outside the Hollywood box. Most reviews tend to use the word 'opposites' when describing House and Wilson, but I don't see it that way. I prefer the word askew. Here's a perfect example of their quirky, askew friendship: Who knew? Admittedly, there haven't been many hot babes as patients on the show. One, though, certainly springs to mind. Watch it… if you dare! And to finish up this little tribute… Fool Me Once… Dept. Jeez, when it comes to hot babes and the writers pulling a fast one on us, you'd think we'd learn! |