January 31, 2007
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House
We watched an unusual episode of House last night. Instead of a medical mystery to diagnose, the plot was driven by two relationships between doctor and patient: House and a rape victim, and Cameron and a terminal homeless man. As the young girl was processing through the ugliness she made a connection with House and refused to speak to any medical personnel except him. Their conversations ranged from the meaning of life, the existence of God, eternity, to justice, the problem of evil, and abortion. In juxtaposition to House’s patient is the homeless man who wants to spend a night in the hospital. He refuses pain medication in the last hours/days of his life for a very odd reason. He has no family and no friends and wants to be remembered. If he took the medicine, it would be an everyday, forgettable cancer death. In his search for significance he chooses to go through the pain. There is also an element of atoning for his past in the decision.
After we turned the TV off, we sat and talked for half an hour about the consistencies and inconsistencies of the philosophical positions presented. We put our reluctant 15 year old on the spot – how do you answer these valid questions?
At 4:30 a.m. my husband woke me up to talk about it more. “I figured it out,” he quietly exclaimed. “I want to meet this writer. We were focusing on the wrong storyline. The man is a Christ figure. What did he keep saying? ‘Remember me.’ He was doing what his father said. He wouldn’t take the vinegar. She washed his wounds after he died. His death was significant. And how did the show begin? With STDs in young, middle and old people. What is our disease and how is it transmitted? So House persuaded the girl that life is not significant in contrast to the old man who had no expectations but to die with significance.”
Did anyone see this? What did you think?
[Added later: Donna at Quiet Life also blogged about this episode here. MFS at MentalMultivitamin blogged about it here.]
Comments (8)
Well, Carol, you ARE the person who got me interested in watching this show, so yes, I saw it! I was more interested in the storyline ab/ the raped girl, because she was asking House questions of eternal value, I thought. My impression was that House was very disillusioned about God because He “allowed” House’s father to mistreat him. It was also interesting that the girl’s questioning him re: eternity was what broke through his brusque exterior. I did find it a rather quick and easy finish for House to tell Cuddy that the girl had decided to get an abortion. I don’t think she would have made THAT decision quite so easily.
I watched the first part…falling asleep before the end…missing these crucial conversations. I guess you know that Donna over at Quiet Life posted about the show too.
I am going to try and find a rerun. Please let us know if your husband makes contact with the writer.
FWIW I like House over Grey’s because I tire of the soap opera nature of GA, even though House’s character is so renegade. He’s a *disruptive physician* and *they* dont stay on staff at any hospital very long.
Dana in GA
I have never heard of house before……I like the fact that you discussed the show as a family though! I pray that we do that as we grow as a family. Even if we never do get cable but only discuss movies.
Great comments Carol. I would have enjoyed your conversation very much.
Thank you for putting it so well.
Also….
I knew there was a thread running thru the two stories but couldn’t put my finger on it.
I’m going to watch it again with Emma and hope to glean more from it.
We watched this eagerly anticipated episode (all month, we’ve been seeing the promos that say “all new episode January 30″ and wondereing aloud why we had to wait sooo long). We also discussed it, but didn’t get as far into figuring it out as you and your husband did. Great insight about the dying man.
I posted a blog about a House episode in December of 2005, here. I don’t have time to analyze last night’s episode in much depth, so I thought these former comments might apply.
sorry, I didn’t get the link right. It’s http://maplegrove.blogspot.com/2005/12/dr-house-and-god.html
Sandy
Hey! It was so good to hear from you! Yes I’m back into the school rutine…get up at 6:45 take a shower…eat breakfast and walk down to my 8:00 class of the wonderful Theory! haha…actually I’m finding that I’m enjoying it much more now…its very interesting to see the way different songs are structured. I’m even starting to hear Themes and when they come back into play…when the composer is in a cadence or a coda. It’s been a great learning experience in just my second week! Womans Choir is going well…I’ve really been enjoying it! As I’ve been away from my family(they out of the country) God has been teaching me to depend more on him…a hard lesson but a good one. I hope everything has been going well in LG. God bless…
luvs