House Review: Out of the Chute

I can't believe I gave Wilson credit for cutting House loose in last week's episode. Wilson makes a jellyfish look like the Lord of all Vertebrates. If you look up the word "enabler" in the dictionary you won't find a picture of Wilson and that's because he missed the photo shoot so he could show up in the photo entry for "self-destructing addict" in the background enabling.

Cuddy, apparently, is the only one with any sense right now. I applauded her decision to kick House to the curb. If he's not willing to take responsibility for his own life then there is nothing that anyone can do about it. And preserving the status quo is not the answer.

What we get this week was House dealing with his recent breakup. And by dealing with, I mean not dealing with. He takes all of his money out of the bank, checks into a hotel, and sleeps with a different hooker every hour. And for some reason decides to stage an elaborate fake murder for the benefit of freaking out the concierge. I guess everyone copes in their own way. Of course, all of this boils down to an excuse to show some tna on some very cute girls, so I'm not exactly complaining.

The patient of the week was a bull rider who had some kind of medical mystery. The interesting thing about this story was that Annoying Girl developed a crush on him. You see, her prefrontal cortex recognized him as an evolutionary specimen capable of blah blah blah psychobabble. But considering that she's lived such a sheltered life and has probably never even been on a date before, her reaction was in keeping with her character. And it made her a little more human and kept her from being overtly annoying like usual. So, I kind of liked this angle. Maybe she can get laid so she can get over her naivete and stop her self-righteous finger wagging at Chase.

So, at the end of the episode, House looks like he's going to jump and kill himself. This is the completion of an arc, I suppose, a miniature arc at least, through which his character progressed in this episode. I've always described House as a petulant child, immature, needy, whiny and lashing out when things don't go his way. He's been stuck in the terrible twos for a while now. At the end of this episode, however, he begins behaving like a petulant teenager. So the writers did find a way to make him grow! I'm so proud of our little boy. Of course, this means that he's going to be increasingly risky with not just his own life but the lives of his patients, and he's going to lash out at Cuddy even more. "YOU JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND ME!" Slams door.

My question is: will Cuddy continue to show the same level of resolve and fire his ass when things get out of control?

Second question: The way they were all standing around in the pool at the end, it looked like he jumped into the shallow end. Wouldn't that have broken every bone in his body?