House’s team also notices the decline in House’s physical condition. When House falters mid-sentence, his leg suddenly giving out, House retreats to his default position. "I tripped," he deflects, covering badly.
House diverts focus from himself by jumping into the diagnosis of the young patient, a boy whose dreams seem to have been pulled straight from the X-Files archive. (Not surprising, since this episode was directed by Daniel Sackheim, a veteran X-Files director/producer). Ignoring the more exotic symptoms, House pursues the simpler diagnostic path provided by the kid’s rectal bleeding. Ordering routine testing stuns the team, especially Cameron, who goes off to clinic duty.
Astonished to encounter Richard, now ambulatory and being treated for Addison’s disease (which House had diagnosed), Cameron discovers Wilson and Cuddy’s deception. As Cuddy argues that they’re only trying to teach House a little humility, Cameron rightly maintains that House isn't like "everyone else". He is unique. He needn't be taught a lesson. She reveals that House’s “failure” with Richard has affected him; put him off-kilter in the aftermath of all that’s happened to him. “He’s dismissing symptoms; he’s in pain…” I liked Cameron here — protective of House, who she knows is a lot more fragile than he would ever reveal.
The first scene between House and Cuddy explores everything I love about their relationship. "What's up with the leg?” she asks simply, visiting House in his office. Ignoring the subject, House deflects, teasing her about her maternal aspirations. She allows the teasing, ignoring it, knowing that it’s a cover. "You're in denial," she prods, refusing to let it drop, as House would want.
Finally exposed, House drops the façade, granting her access. Their actual conversation is less important than the subtext, eloquently expressed via body language and glance. She pushes to do some tests; he lies, telling her that he’s got it under control. Finally he tells her that he’s fine; that if there was a problem with the leg, he’d do something about it. She knows that he’s lying, but she has no recourse but to accept his answer. Her teary eyes express her worry about him; that she knows it’s all going to hell for him — and there’s not a damn thing she can do about it. (Cuddy’s not quite convinced at this point that she should expose the deception.)
As House’s leg gives him more and more difficulty, he becomes increasingly distracted and more and more uncomfortable with the attention being cast upon him. He continues to falter with the diagnosis as his confidence vanishes along with the promise of a life without pain. Cameron warns Wilson and Cuddy that they had better figure out how to restore House’s confidence before it’s too late. (That she does so with an amusingly self-referential Blackadder quip is a delight.)
Article comments
1 - Phillip Winn
Very perceptive, simply amazing. What a show, and what a review!
2 - Sue
Again, another great review. I always get greater insight into the show after I read your reviews.
There was a great scene in the beginning, when House came back into his house. We didn't see his face as he grabbed his thigh. We didn't need to see it; we grimaced along with him.
We get to see House's private moments, the few seconds when he thinks no one is looking, when he can not help but grimace and withdraw in pain. Hugh Laurie is so brilliant in these moments.
As a chronic pain sufferer, three months of pain relief is worth whatever it takes to achieve it. House knew that Ketamine existed, and he could have tried it before. Did he try it because he was already going to have anesthesia? Was he at a point in his life that he was willing to sacrifice his mind for his body? Or, did he even consider that he could lose his ability to diagnose patients? Did Foreman's brush with death have anything to do with House's decision? In House's dream, Cuddy gave him the Ketamine. When we saw what really happened it was House who asked for the Ketamine. In the beginning of Meaning, House thanked Cuddy for "curing him." It really wasn't Cuddy who did it if House asked for it.
In this episode, was House lamenting his own decision to get the Ketamine, or Cuddy's decision to give it to him?
In this episode, the trust between House and Wilson diminished a little more. Wilson didn't give House the pills in Meaning, but here he is offering them to him. House knows Wilson believes he is experiencing the "pangs of middle age." Wilson offered the pills to fit into his own agenda. If House had asked Wilson again for the pills, would Wilson have said yes? I doubt it. House kept writing Rxs for the pills because he still knew that Wilson would not give them to him if he asked for them. Wilson's trickery about the previous case made House mistrust him even more.
3 - Barbara Barnett
Thank you Phillip for your kind words.
Ann--I agree that the Wilson's actions drove House's actions in the next many episodes. House saw no recourse but to do what he did (rightly or wrongly). He felt trapped and backed into a corner.
House took a big gamble asking for the ketamine and he lost big time. I think that in his hallucination, he asked himself whether it was possible to find meaning in life. Was he throwing his life away? Or should he take a chance on renewing himself. I think the scene in which he made that decision (the part of the hallucination, anyway) was when he was in the car with the shooter's wife, joining her as she died in the car. As his life slipped away (both in the hallucination) and in his own reality as he lay bleeding to death on the floor, he "chose life" and fought back, not giving into the "easy choice" of death. He held on. That's what Wilson was talking about in "Meaning" (and something House must've disclosed to Wilson at some point.
But I think that what happened during the hallucination (and what I think had been his own research into the experimental procedure) made him want to try it. Even after the ketamine failed, House continued in Season three (in the spring) to seek out other ways to overcome the pain ("Insensitive" and "Half-Wit" for example).
4 - susanne
Wow!! Again another great review for a great and heartbreaking ep
I felt so sorry for House and I really just wanted to smack Wilson (but I love him). I have the feeling that Cuddy was torn between not telling him and wanting to tell him. I loved Cameron in this episode being so protective or House and understanding how vunerable he was. I liked it how she stood up to them.
Hugh Laurie just surprises me everytime I can never get sick of him..I am still shocked/surprised that he hasn't yet won an emmy!
5 - ann uk
It seems to me that House would have an easier ride if he were a musical or artistic genius as society expects them to be eccentric. But House is a genius in a rule ridden, method driven profession, His relations with other doctors are like Sherlock Holmes's with the Scotland Yard detectives- they admire him , but distrust him because they can't understand the intuitive leaps by which he solves his cases.And yet, like Holmes, his intuitions are based on extensive research and wide knowledge.( like reading Hindi !)