A.V. Club: Best of the Decade
TV Club: A virtual couch for viewers who sit too close to the screen.
  • House: season 6, episode 7

    "Teamwork"

    November 16, 2009 - 08:11p.m.

    It's never a good sign when a show starts forcing conflicts without adequate justification. Drama should come naturally from established character interactions--external forces obviously come into play, but at its core, conflict is all about people bashing into people ...

    read comments: 111

  • House: season 6, episode 6

    "Known Unknowns"

    November 9, 2009 - 09:11p.m.

    "Known Unknowns" started off on a bad, heh, foot; the acting in the cold open was lousy, and freaky as the swelling hands and feet were, I wasn't exactly keen on spending the next forty minutes trying to solve ...

    read comments: 93

  • House: season 6, episode 5

    "Brave Heart"

    October 19, 2009 - 09:10p.m.

    It's dumb, but the less you have to make your life worth living, the easier it is to live your life. With no significant emotional attachments, you can just glide, not really happy, not really sad, simply coasting from ...

    read comments: 135

  • House: season 6, episode 4

    "Instant Karma"

    October 12, 2009 - 09:10p.m.

    How much do we have to pay for our own good fortune? And how do we know when the bill's coming due? That's what Roy Randall, the Father of the Patient of the Week, is concerned with in ...

    read comments: 88

  • House: season 6, episode 3

    "The Tyrant"

    October 5, 2009 - 09:10p.m.

    James Earl Jones is the title character in this week's House episode, "The Tyrant." Unsurprisingly, he's also the Patient of the Week. He's still as captivating a screen presence as ever, even stuck in a hospital bed ...

    read comments: 124

  • House: season 6, episode 2

    "Epic Fail"

    September 28, 2009 - 09:09p.m.

    There are many reasons not to like Superman Returns: the nonsensical plotting, the reduction of a heroic archetype to mid-level stalker, and the way Brandon Routh and Kate Bosworth wander through the picture like a pair of prom dates too ...

    read comments: 151

  • House: season 6, episode 1

    "Broken"

    September 21, 2009 - 10:09p.m.

    "Lick it. C'mon. Lick it."

    When House first started back in 2004, it had a simple but compelling premise: a driven, acerbic doctor played by Hugh Laurie uses his wit to solve the unsolvable. Sure, he was a misanthrope and he said some nasty things ...

    read comments: 199

  • House: season 5, episode 24

    "Both Sides Now"

    May 11, 2009 - 09:05p.m.

    Squawk.

    I was excited back in the fall when Noel said he was stepping down from regular House coverage; I loved his write-ups, but the chance to do my own was too good an opportunity to pass up. The resulting season ...

    read comments: 220

  • House: season 5, episode 23

    "Under My Skin"

    May 4, 2009 - 09:05p.m.

    I need my pain!

    I'm generally indifferent to cold opens--the routine is so set at this point that there's no real excitement to them--but tonight's seemed especially generic. Pretty ballerina gets dropped on stage, has breathing problems. Woo-hoo. The dialogue was ...

    read comments: 128

  • House: season 5, episode 22

    "House Divided"

    April 27, 2009 - 09:04p.m.

    "Bring an extra pair of pants."

    The best episodes of House are often the ones that have House pitted against himself. Partly it's because the structure of the series is so consistent that any change catches our interest (even if that change is ultimately shallow ...

    read comments: 159

  • House: season 5, episode 21

    "Saviors"

    April 13, 2009 - 09:04p.m.

    Soooo close.
    So, Kutner's still dead. Any chance of House waking up to find last week's suicide in the shower with Patrick Duffy died with "Saviors"' cold open. As Kal Penn heads off to do more valuable things with his ...

    read comments: 65

  • House: season 5, episode 20

    "Simple Explanation"

    April 6, 2009 - 08:04p.m.

     "We'll remember you forever, Eddie."
    And to think, I actually wanted to get out of covering this week. (Sick again. Stupid sinus headache can go screw.)

    Kudos to the Fox marketing department; while the ads were big on convincing us that this week's episode ...

    read comments: 261

  • House: season 5, episode 19

    "Locked In"

    March 30, 2009 - 08:03p.m.

    In your eyes...
    So, anybody out there seen Dark Passage? I, sadly, have not, but I do know the big gimmick; the first hour of the movie is filmed through the eyes of its lead, Humphrey Bogart. (See, the guy doesn't start ...

    read comments: 146

  • House: season 5, episode 18

    "Here Kitty"

    March 16, 2009 - 04:03p.m.

    "It's the last time you'll see these!"
    Cats are weird. My folks have a Siamese, she's been with the family for years, and every time I come to visit, she just stares at me. Then she runs away; it's like she's evovled from feral ...

    read comments: 89

  • House: season 5, episode 17

    "The Social Contract"

    March 9, 2009 - 04:03p.m.

    We want you to leave Maggie Siff alone.
    They say "Honesty is the best policy," but what the really mean is, "Honesty is the best policy, unless it makes me feel bad." House has got a lot of mileage out of the way its title character's blunt ...

    read comments: 97

  • House: season 5, episode 16

    "The Softer Side"

    February 23, 2009 - 02:02p.m.

    I guess he's been watching season 5 too.
    As anyone who's ever found themselves on the wrong side of a stereotype can tell you, gender roles kind of suck. Don't like sports? You're not a real man. Don't like dolls? You're not much ...

    read comments: 135

  • House: season 5, episode 15

    "Unfaithful"

    February 16, 2009 - 02:02p.m.

    "Do you think you're who they say you are?"
    This isn't the first religious patient House has treated; you have to wonder at this point if he isn't collecting them. I'd say he's trying to kill the faith one believer at a time, but if ...

    read comments: 109

  • House: season 5, episode 14

    "The Greater Good"

    February 2, 2009 - 03:02p.m.

    This could’ve been a great episode. The cold open was solid—a chef-in-training passes out during a lecture, and for an added bonus, diagnoses her symptoms while they happen. And the ending, with Wilson finding the courage to finally ...

    read comments: 93

  • House: season 5, episode 13

    "Big Baby" 

    January 26, 2009 - 02:01p.m.

    Whenever a network TV show tries to give us a cynical hero, they always surround that hero with softening influences. With House, it’s his team, and Cuddy, and, of course, Wilson; while House always sees the worst in everyone ...

    read comments: 78

  • House: season 5, episode 12

    "Painless"

    January 19, 2009 - 03:01p.m.

    And that's a clause to protect _you_.
    Annnnd we're back. Quick recap for those with short memories: when we left off in December, Cuddy had become foster mother to a dead teen's newborn daughter, 13 and Foreman had given in to their throbbing biological urges ...

    read comments: 93

  • House: season 5, episode 11

    "Joy To The World"

    December 9, 2008 - 09:12p.m.

    Just how hard is it to be kind? And what sort of person are you if you can't manage it? "Joy To The World" is all about the little things–underage drinking, teenage pregnancy, virgin births, and bullying–but ...

    read comments: 103

  • House: season 5, episode 10

    "Let Them Eat Cake"

    December 2, 2008 - 09:12p.m.

    Here's what Noel said back at the end of season 4: "But as always, House is ultimately about House, and how he lives with himself. In a callback to the season-opener's "go into the light" business, House imagines ...

    read comments: 96

  • House: season 5, episode 9

    "Last Resort"

    November 25, 2008 - 10:11p.m.

    So there's this guy–with a gun–and he busts into Cuddy's office while House is screwing around with her desk, and he asks for Cuddy, and House is all like, "Pfft, enjoy my sarcasm!" and the guy ...

    read comments: 78

  • House: season 5, episode 8

    "Emancipation"

    November 18, 2008 - 09:11p.m.

    We get two PotWs in "Emancipation": a sixteen year-old girl with seizures and a confusing history, and a little boy with stomach pains. The former is for House and his lackeys to solve, the latter is Foreman's chance to ...

    read comments: 66

  • House: season 5, episode 7

    "The Itch"

    November 11, 2008 - 09:11p.m.

    I don't think we can deal with a happy House. Sure, there are moments of satisfaction, enlightenment, the occasional fleeting delight, but actually honest-god happiness? Feh. His brief reunion with Stacy in the second season was notable largely for ...

    read comments: 70

  • House: season 5, episode 6

    "Joy"

    October 28, 2008 - 09:10p.m.

    Nearly missed out tonight; I figured the postponed Game 5 would give me the evening off, and then the ole Tivo red eye popped on. Game 5 was post-postponed. Baseball is weird.

    But hey, new House, good times for all ...

    read comments: 127

  • House: season 5, episode 5

    "Lucky Thirteen"

    October 21, 2008 - 09:10p.m.

    So, bisexuals, then. Bisexuals.

    Squee!

    I was worried about this week. "Birthmarks" was so very, very excellent, and the preview of "Lucky Thirteen" seemed to be selling some kind of Silk Stalkings style fantasy. We accept a certain level of ...

    read comments: 106

  • House: season 5, episode 4

    "Birthmarks"

    October 14, 2008 - 09:10p.m.

    Wilson is an idiot.

    I got a guy I work with at the library hooked on House over the summer. We've talked about the series as he goes through the seasons (benefit of working at a place with an ...

    read comments: 128

  • House: season 5, episode 3

    "Adverse Events"

    September 30, 2008 - 09:09p.m.

    Hey, remember last week how cool that private detective character was? How he brought an interesting new dynamic to the show, and made a nice Wilson surrogate for our troubled hero? That really was swell.

    I want him gone now ...

    read comments: 98

  • House: season 5, episode 2

    "Not Cancer"

    September 23, 2008 - 08:09p.m.

    Confession: I don't really like House's cold opens. I find them kind of boring, to be honest. The best episodes have a medical mystery equally as compelling as all the behind-the-scenes stuff, but the reason I love the ...

    read comments: 94

  • House: season 5, episode 1

    "Dying Changes Everything"

    September 16, 2008 - 08:09p.m.

    Sherlock Holmes needs John Watson, but Watson has never needed Holmes. Of course Sherlock's the flashier of the pair: a crime-solving genius whose intellect and instinct allow him to elevate deduction to a kind of magic. Watson's just ...

    read comments: 106

  • House: season 4, episode 16

    "Wilson's Heart"

    May 19, 2008 - 08:05p.m.



    POW: Amber (a.k.a. Cutthroat Bitch), a saucy young diagnostician.

    SUS: Racing heart, runny nose, jaundice, back-rash, pole-leg.

    Fate: Death by drug-poisoning, kidney failure and heart-stoppage.

    So…end of the line for CB, who ended this season as SP ...

    read comments: 229

  • House: season 4, episode 15

    "House's Head"

    May 12, 2008 - 09:05p.m.



    Let's get this out of the way: Yes, the premise of this week's House–and apparently next week's season finale–isn't too far removed from the Season Two finale "No Reason," in which almost the entire ...

    read comments: 136

  • House: season 4, episode 14

    "Living The Dream"

    May 5, 2008 - 08:05p.m.



    Even though the formulaic nature of House means that the show can get dull and frustrating at times, it also means that when the formula gets shaken up even a little, it's all the more exciting. Hence the difference ...

    read comments: 82

  • House: season 4, episode 13

    "No More Mr. Nice Guy"

    April 28, 2008 - 10:04p.m.



    When I reviewed the last episode of House way back in February, I suggested that the creative team was starting to repeat itself, and that rather than trying to whip up a few more episodes after the strike, they should ...

    read comments: 82

  • House: season 4, episode 12

    "Don't Ever Change"

    February 5, 2008 - 10:02p.m.



    I'm not sure I understand Fox's plan of burning off its last three Season Four Houses in the space of a week, but at least the close succession of Sunday's "Frozen" and tonight's "Don't ...

    read comments: 75

  • House: season 4, episode 11

    "Frozen"

    February 3, 2008 - 11:02p.m.



    I just spent the last eight hours watching–and blogging–Super Bowl coverage, so forgive me if this House write-up is a little shorter than usual. But don't take the briefness as a knock on the episode itself, because ...

    read comments: 56

  • House: season 4, episode 10

    "It's A Wonderful Lie"

    January 29, 2008 - 09:01p.m.



    Hey, it's Christmas again! How nice of House to remind us that Scrooge knows no season. (Noel's traveling this week, by the way, which is why I'm filling in. Plus, he already has a MacBook and an ...

    read comments: 104

  • House: season 4, episode 9

    "Games"

    November 27, 2007 - 10:11p.m.



    And so we reach endgame on the team-search, but not before an episode that considers the nature of games themselves, and whether it's better to play admirably or to win at all costs.

    Frustrated by House's seemingly endless ...

    read comments: 105

  • House: season 4, episode 8

    "You Don't Want To Know"

    November 20, 2007 - 11:11p.m.



    In addition to dealing with the pernicious influence of House on his ex-team, this season has periodically continued to explore House's alternating fascination and repulsion with the supernatural. In season four's first episode, House induced a near-death experience ...

    read comments: 81

  • House: season 4, episode 7

    "Ugly"

    November 13, 2007 - 10:11p.m.



    It's been a couple of months since I blogged about House's season four premiere (now filed under "House" instead of "Other Shows" in the TV Club archives, by the way), and in that time, House has more or ...

    read comments: 116

  • House: season 4, episode 1

    "Alone"

    September 25, 2007 - 09:09p.m.



    When our intrepid leader Mr. Phipps first announced the list of shows we'd be covering here at the Club, House was the omission that raised the most eyebrows: After all, it's America's favorite medical mystery series, featuring ...

    read comments: 30