My Overview of Seasons 1 Through 7 of House MD - The Best Episodes

January, 2011

Dear Carle -

Thanks for your exploration of my obsession.  Actually, the show's creators were up front about creating the characters based on Holmes and Watson (House and Wilson).  However, the show ended up diverging from the formula in that his team became his Watson.  I like the original team the best--they were the team for the first three seasons. The original premise was "a doctor who hates his patients."

Speaking of Holmes, there was one season finale that had House shot by a patient who never had a name, but his name in the script was Moriarty.

A large part of my obsession comes from identifying strongly with House, particularly during those periods when I am forced to walk with a cane.  And also downing large quantities of pills.  House is easily bored, and yes, retreats into drugs, booze and music (Hugh Laurie is a practiced musician so they wrote that in).  If I had to pick one episode from the first season to watch, it would be "Three Histories." It's brilliantly done and tells House's back story.

Season 2 has an amazing amount of good episodes.  My absolute favorite (you won't have to guess why) is "House Vs. God" Ep. 19 or so. "Autopsy" is also great; based on the idea of doing an autopsy on a living person. The other episode from Season 2 is "All In," which uses a swanky hospital do as a background.

You'll note that while there is some sexual tension between House and Cameron (his employee) and Cuddy (his boss), there is also a strong homoerotic tension between House and Wilson.  The writers have played around with this concept ever since Season 2.  That is the aspect that has caught my heart, like any pre sexual fan girl.

From Season 3, my favorite episode that can be taken out of context is Ep. 9, "Informed Consent", co-starring Joel Grey.  He is incredible, as is the entire episode.

Finally, the episodes that got me hooked in the first place: the Season Four two-part finale "House's Head/Wilson's Heart." You'll notice some cast changes, because at the end of Season Three all of the regular team (Foreman, Chase, Cameron) left and House formed a new team.  Foreman came back to work for House, while Chase and Cameron worked in different areas of the hospital.

These are some of my favorite episodes, and I would guess the ones that reveal the most about myself.

Last season (#6) House kicked Vicodin and became a "nicer" person, which means considerably less interesting.  Suddenly he was madly in love with Cuddy for twenty years  (the earlier premise for the first five seasons was they had a one-night stand in college) and at the end--literally THE LAST FIVE MINUTES OF THE SEASON FINALE--she showed up, declaring her everlasting love.

This season (#7) shows them in their relationship.  The "Patient Of The Week" is now a throwaway part of the episode so we can concentrate on the soap opera of the characters' lives.  House is now happy happy happy, and I can only hope that somebody important dies.

 Season 7, Episode 1 "Now What".

Oh, and as for realism, he was drinking while he was on Vicodin, he kept drinking after he was off of it, was drinking until he blacked out at the end of last season (his therapist didn't seem particularly perturbed) and is happily drinking like a normal person now.  There's a lot of other things I could rant about--the show's treatment of mental illness is, pardon the pun, crazy-making.