Foreman had been a bit of a blank slate before — or a black slate, House would say, the constant target of over-the-top racial taunts, the one with the criminal background. His parents and religious affiliation were question marks and his self-serving arrogance, combined with affability, was intriguing. With "Euphoria," some of those blanks have been filled in. He's distanced from his devoutly religious father, his mother is deteriorating, and in these most extreme circumstances, the arrogance crumbles into desperation and fear.
Jennifer Morrison and Lisa Edelstein were stellar in quieter ways. Edelstein's Cuddy is the nay saying authority figure who has to tell House that an autopsy on the dead cop's brain has to wait for the CDC, since the biohazard risk is too high ("Did you call Jack Bauer?" asks House). But she's more than that. When House brings Mr. Foreman to see her to plead for the autopsy, she gives an impassioned speech that demonstrates that while House fights for his patients, she has to think about the risk to others. She is convincing enough that the elder Foreman, if not House, sees her point. But as usual, the show isn't giving us an easy answer, and both sides have valid points of view. Cuddy visits Foreman, who tells her he can't forgive her for not risking whatever punishment she'd get for breaking protocol in order to save her life and Cameron snipes at her (then feels immediately guilty for it) for the same thing.
"Euphoria" gives us a complex look at strength versus fragility. Strong-willed, self-assured Foreman can't hold on to his strength when it's his life and death he's facing. He manipulates Cameron as shamelessly as his "manipulative bastard" boss, only with the added element of putting her life in danger, too. It doesn't make him admirable, but it does make him interesting. The parallels with House disintegrate at some point in the second part of the episode, partly because it's hard to picture House sacrificing someone else's life for the sake of his own, but also because House was willing to die rather than be disabled, but the decision was taken away from him. Foreman says the exact opposite, but picks a proxy who acted on the decision he chose.
Article comments
1 - Morgenstern
Brilliant! I shall be quoting you, if you don't mind. "Cute, petite Cameron, who looks like she's constantly in danger of being knocked flat by the hot air emanating from House, shows a strength of character not always apparent in her "do you like me" or bad-news-avoiding phases." ;o) Love the show, love your analyses, keep up the good work!
2 - Becca
Nice comment that the House/Foreman parallels were not over the top.
Foreman did in fact steal Cameron's article, he quoted from it directly so he must have read it and read it before he submitted his. There is no such thing as "scooped" in academic research, unless you are working on a completely different team.
3 - Diane Kristine
I missed that he quoted from it - Wilson said it was a different focus from Cameron's, and Cameron said Foreman gave her notes for hers, not the other way around, so I didn't pick up on him actually having plagiarized it. In that case, she could have stopped whining and reported him to the journal, so I still say get over it or do something about it.
Morgenstern - thanks, quote away. I won't report you for plagiarism.
4 - Wynn
STEVE LIVED!!!!
5 - Patricia Knox
We may eventually tire of House, but Hugh Laurie? NEVER!
6 - Joan Hunt
Congrats! This article has been placed on Advance.net
7 - Ella
Becca is referring to the scene where Foreman gives his proxy to Cameron and explains his rationale with a quote from her article.
We knew Foreman read Cam's article, but he did not copy it, he did not steal it, he did not plagiarize it. Cameron said he gave her his notes on what she wrote (btw a nice thing to do). So he knew roughly what she was writing. He worked on the case so he knew the case. Furthermore, Wilson has read both articles, he says they are different. If Wilson believed that Foreman had plagiarized Cameron's article are we really to take it that hospital board member Wilson would not have said or done something about it?
Oddly enough, Foreman has expressed the same sentiment which was supposed to distinguish Cameron's article way back in season one when Foreman needed a distraught husband to consent to his wife's surgery. Foreman stopped himself from an extensive medical jargon laden explantation saying that a layperson would not be able to understand the medical reasons sufficiently to give truly informed consent. So even the ideas that Cameron expressed in her article were not unique or previously unknown to Foreman.
The only thing I can see Foreman stealing is the idea for the topic for the article. Upshot, they should all get over it.
8 - Nadav
One issue not mentioned seems to me to stand out in this episode, the building up of Foreman as a House Doppelganger of sorts. In season 1, this was harped upon a little (that episode where they have the same shoes, and so on), and Foreman's non-friendship talk with Cameron was a step in that direction. And not to mention the House-Foreman 4-round battle when the later was supposedly in charge earlier this season.
Now if we've failed to notice hints, now this theme is presented with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer - Foreman's ordeal is quite similar to House's, being left paralytic. House's leg is shot, Foreman has trouble directing his body; both are a result of medical decisions not made by them; both might have been avoided; and so on.
The question is of course - so what? And that remains to be seen. I think it's a consensus that House is less about medicine, as strange as the cases presented may be, and more about people - it's rather a comedy-drama (I hope I'm not the only person cracking up every episode) about people in a medical situation and how that effects them. And lately, I felt that has been in a lull, with the series unable to really find a direction to progress to. And I expect this development comes to fill this void - it will either lead to the characters further developing, or I feel House will be up against the worst enemy of all.
Routine.
9 - Diane Kristine
Not mentioned, Nadav? Other than throughout my review and in Becca's comment you mean? Except I think this is the episode where we see that previous build-up of Foreman as the mini-House start to crumble. And you're wrong, Foreman DID make the medical decision that left his wires crossed. He begged Cameron to do it, and thanked her for doing it.
The ratings that keep reaching a series high week after week would suggest many viewers disagree that it's hitting a lull, and like the direction the show is taking - I'm definitely one of them.
Thanks Ella, that's what I thought. Glad to hear I didn't miss a crucial piece of information that would make me retract my "get over it" feeling.