I think his dedication to the truth is touching and his attitude toward the patient, while perhaps cruel, is at least honest Honest about what? There being no afterlife? Who's to say whether or not that's true? It's a belief any way you slice it. Favorite scene-House and Wilson. I am a firm believer in their platonic friendship.It will survive anything,stealing RX pads,the Lie,anything. Because they do love each other.Period.I love the portrayal of two complicated,complex,flawed men who may not know each other as well as they think they do,and who make a lot of mistakes with each other,but really do care. You don't see that too much anywhere. Also,the dialogue can be taken so many ways.To a casual fan who watches because they just like the show,(my husband),Wilson's line about hurting to see House in pain and House's I love you is easily accepted as just a doctor caring for a patient and getting thanked. But to people invested so heavily in the show that they join this board,(me), it has many meanings.Wilson could be talking about just this la-*test*-('") stunt of House's,or the fact that he sees House in pain(more than one kind of pain), every single day,and it hurts him.House's reply is not a light thank you to me,he means it.Or you can see the slash.Lots of food for thought. Will you marry me? :wink:

The important thing is that H/W is on ur teevee show, gayin' ur canon. Hee! "I love you." I knew that would cause the SQUEEEE!!!! heard 'round the world. It even melted my Hammy little heart. House, you're white. You're male. You're 48. You cannot rock a doo-rag. Thought it was interesting that it was blue, though. 'Cause House is a crip, after all.

Okay, here are my thoughts in no particular order because I'm tired and should be sleeping: 13 got the diagnosis right, but she didn't follow through. By the end of the episode, House knows she won't make that mistake again. He needs people who can get the diagnosis as quickly as she did, so she's not fired. Regarding her "mystery," I have a theory. I'll spoiler tag it just in case: She's related to someone we already know well. For the record, I like her, and I disagree that she is a "Mary Sue." I'm also not entirely sure how that term even applies since she's canon. If we're going to talk about who should be fired for incompetence, how can the former Vet not notice that the dog was ailing? I think the dog looked weak when he was picked up and placed on the bed. I believe the PotW let the dog take the pills. There is no way he could have known it would kill the dog. I think he was ready to give up; there's no way he would have come back from the bathroom to missing pills and not said anything. I think that's why he cheerily agreed to the noobs working his case. I mean, I don't think he'd take his dog to a brand new Vet; why would he agree to be diagnosed by 10 different "student drivers?" Do we KNOW the former Mrs. Ziegler is the dean? I mean, do we know Mercy Hospital is a teaching hospital in the HouseVerse? People are debating if she is one of the three deans Cuddy mentions, but what if the hospital is not led by a dean? (My local hospital has a "President and CEO.") I think it's pretty odd that she fired him out in the hallway. Unprofessional. The afterlife discussion: when Wilson says "You haven't been there," I think he means permanently, because that's what the patient is discussing. Not 97 seconds, but a full-on one-way trip to the Hereafter. House has obviously never discussed any kind of "visions" he had during his other NDEs, so he probably wondered why House would need to have another one. Final death, well, that *IS* very different. The look Wilson gives House when he says "I love you" is kinda "yeah, well if you really love me you will stop pulling this crazy shit." Also, it's pretty common slang when someone gives you something you desperately want. When my friend shows up with an iced coffee from Dunks for me, I gush "OMG I LOVE YOU." And I do love her, but at that moment it is a way to say "thank you for thinking of me." It's not me confessing that I want to swap spit with her. And on this show, I think it is deliberately vague, so that we will each see what we want to see. Interesting that Cuddy delivers her smackdown wearing a high-neck top.

If we're going to talk about who should be fired for incompetence, how can the former Vet not notice that the dog was ailing? I think the dog looked weak when he was picked up and placed on the bed. True & IIRC the vet is now gone, but it wsa 13 who picked the dog up, else maybe the vet would have noticed earlier (she was focused on the procedure with the PotW). Do we KNOW the former Mrs. Ziegler is the dean? Aha! That's where I recognize her from. We don't - she could even be a section head or whatever, unless there's some shot of her door or something we missed where it says "Dean" (okay, who's got the screen caps!). And House implies in late S3 that Mercy isn't a teaching hospital - its the glitterati clinic, though I'm not sure how believable that is. I've seen this mentioned upthread, but no response - there's that scene where 13 tells the PotW not to try to talk - watching it again, I think he might have been trying to tell her about the pills. Anyone?

I think there was some ambiguity there. Either that or poor/faulty writing, which I for one absolutely refuse to believe is possible of TPTB on this show. Well, I don't think they're infallible, but I also don't think that there's anything close to bad writing happening there. It was clear that House had something to talk to the patient about and if it had been "in your FACE!!" I don't think he would have been quite so quietly anxious about it. There are any number of things he could have seen and I'm curious about all of them, but I have no idea if we'll find out about it or not. I'd like to think we would, but either way I don't think they were unclear at all about House's experience, they just didn't tell us what he saw. I'd find it interesting if he saw the guy and *he* was the one thumbling his nose. And the thing that I really LOVE about cut-throat-bitch is the complete lack of flirtiness between House and her. Mazal Tov! After 4 seasons, TPTB have finally managed to create a single, female character that doesn't find House attractive. I like her better than Cam and 13, not only but mainly because of this. At what point was it revealed that 13 or any of the other female candidates found House attractive? I believe the PotW let the dog take the pills. There is no way he could have known it would kill the dog. I think he was ready to give up; there's no way he would have come back from the bathroom to missing pills and not said anything. I'm really leaning towards this. It was the first thought that popped into my head and it stuck there. I have no idea if that's what we were supposed to take from it, but it all adds up. PotW wasn't an idiot and he seemed to have his wits about him. He wouldn't have forgotten. If the pills were gone, he would have asked about them if he'd really wanted them. I have come to the conclusion that I cannot stand 13. I knew from the beginning that she wouldn't be fired, but she really is a Mary Sue. Even though she killed her patient, it happened in a way that wasn't really her fault, like it was Chase's in The Mistake. I desperately wanted House to actually fire her. Barring that, I wish he could have explained better why he was keeping her on. This whole Mary Sue thing is just baffling to me. I don't see what makes her a Mary Sue other than just the vague idea that characters people don't like are hit with the Mary Sue label by default. His explanation for keeping her was suitable for me. It didn't sound so far off from the similar explanations he's given to the other three in moments where he, they are all three have fucked up. Iirc, he told Foreman something very, very similar just last season, didn't he? Actually, I love the Ann Dudek character. She is a female House. I would rather see this than a "new" Cameron. Is she the new Cameron because she's pretty and brunette and young? Because it seems to me that she's the new Foreman, with just two weeks of cocky instead of three years. True & IIRC the vet is now gone, but it wsa 13 who picked the dog up, else maybe the vet would have noticed earlier (she was focused on the procedure with the PotW). Ignoring the fact that a guy died and still treating it like a game then that would be the number 1 reason to get rid of her right there. House would want someone who would pick up the small things and who better to pick up on a sick dog than a vet, no matter where her attention was supposed to be. I've seen this mentioned upthread, but no response - there's that scene where 13 tells the PotW not to try to talk - watching it again, I think he might have been trying to tell her about the pills. Anyone? I think it's possible, but I really don't think so. Or, rather, I don't think he would be telling her because he suddenly found it relevant and didn't want to die. I think the guy wanted to die. And I think that at that point, the worms were the last thing on his mind since he thought that he'd been diagnosed with something much worse.

I just realized something - the dog's name is Hoover. I think Iwas blocking it. Appalling pun, & he vacuumed up the pills? Couldn't they have come up with something more creative?

Can anyone explain to me why he fired the female team (minus 13)?

Actually, I'm rather motivated myself now to go see if there's been any research into NDEs in people who were or were not on meds or otherwise had altered chemistry at the time. Bedawyn, if you do find anything out, I'd love to hear it. I liked Omar Epps tonight. I loved the way he showed the fish-out-of-water aspect of Foreman trying to run a team, getting aggravated with their slowness and lapsing into House-snarls--then immediately trying to be the "nice guy" and say encouraging things to them. It cracked me up after Differential #1, when the pseudo-ducklings came up with lame or useless ideas, then Foreman directed them on the exact -*test*-('")s to run--then said, "Good job!" Even the pseudo-ducks looked confused, like, "Huh? What did we do?" I think that Foreman was under the impression that what House did was "easy" in terms of running the differentials, leading the team, etc. and that he could do it so much better than House given the chance. Only when he had to fly solo and do it on his own, he realized that it wasn't so easy after all. As a side note: did the tall-ish guy on the men's team (not the plastic surgeon, not the old fraud, not Kal Penn, not the black Mormon) even get any lines or visibility in last week's episode? Because he seemed to have just...appeared this week. Weird. Ah yes, the grumpy Doctor Without Borders dude. I thought the same thing. I didn't like him and he didn't seem to add anything. I'm thinking he's got to be out of there soon. Loved the way House and Wilson watched Cuddy as she walked away – the way they both tilted their heads. Can you blame them? I can't imagine any person, gay or straight, who wouldn't take a moment to check out Cuddy's junk in the trunk. It's mesmerizing! I pretty much did the same thing at home. I was thinking "DAMN" as she walked away. :-)

By this point, I'm kind of tired of being a wet blanket. But I'm really not enjoying this whittling down of people that I maybe, someday, might give a shit about. Right now they're just cluttering up the show and being tossed into dramatic turns that I should care about, but don't because I have no connection to them. To compare and contrast, in the pilot and the first few episodes of the S1, I could immediately embrace the characters---all the characters---because I was getting to know all of them at once. The dynamic of introducing an entire soccer team's worth of players and expecting me to bond while teasing me with the original folks lingering, tauntingly, in the wings is just counter-productive. Dramatically, I'm not sure it works for "13" to be in such dispair at the end of the episode. I know nothing about her, not even her name, so how can I possibly be upset on her behalf that they lost their patient? I think there's a reason that it took so long in the first few seasons for the original team to lose a patient; we had to know those characters good and well for an accidental death to really resonate. I had to know their strengths, their weaknesses, their work ethic, their previous brilliant saves and their philosophies before I could begin to put a patient death into perspective for those characters. How on earth am I supposed to do this at the current stage of the game? bailey, you took the words right out of my mouth. I just didn't give a damn, and I feel like I should have. Give me the friggin character's name before you ask me to feel sorry for her . The thing about CCF is that it's the things that we do know about them that raises other questions and makes them more interesting. We were given small bits of info early on and could start to put their actions into context with their background and yet we still knew that there was/is more to their stories. That's how it should be done- not this "she's an enigma wrapped in a riddle crap". I'm really bitter about 13...does it show?

Except when House chooses point blank to give it. I do accept that this hasn't always been the case. During the Shitter arc may be the exception, but it could be looked at as House trying to distance himself and all the turmoil he creates, whether he intends to or not, away from Wilson in an effort to get Shitter to leave him alone. Maybe it came off as cold and heartless, but Wilson manages the same thing with all the hovering he does. He's beating his head against a brick wall because he good and well wants to and House and Cuddy are the only people he has left because he 'can't just date a person' as was said in a wonderful fic I read a couple of days ago. He's so afraid of being alone but, at the same time, hasn't done anything to ensure he won't be eventually. Being alone, on the other hand, has never really bothered House. He's used to it. It's become a comfort zone. And Wilson can't understand that, so it's House who has the problem when it's possible he may be trying to keep them both out of trouble. Wilson's the one who keeps bringing himself into House's crap. House sure as hell doesn't pull him. He didn't pull Stacy, either, for that matter, not that that mattered. Cuddy seemed to eventually figure out what Stacy was doing to House, but Wilson never did. It's far more comfortable for him to believe that House simply doesn't want to be happy. Cue lecture, lecture, lecture (say nothing of Hallucination!Wilson, who merely found something else to bitch about and insisted House wanted to instead). It didn't seem to occur to him that Stacy was asking House to help her cheat on her husband--the very same guy she left him for. But, then, hey--when's Wilson ever had a problem with cheating? Or Stacy with double standards? House wanted to marry Stacy or he didn't want her at all. I can completely understand his motivations there.

At what point was it revealed that 13 or any of the other female candidates found House attractive? Nothing revealing, just my impression. If we take the two main new females, (the other ones didn't really have screentime alone with House), for example, the way they talk to him, gestures, looks etc. - for me it was pretty obvious 24 sees House like a teacher/boss/dad, nothing sexual, whiles 13 has that teasing flirty smile about her whenever she talks to him. YMMV, naturally. Anyway, her character as a whole makes me yawn.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks Wilson has bigger problems than House. Particularly right now. He's been living in a hotel for the past two years, but he wants to talk about House being afraid to face himself? That, to me, smacked of hypocrisy.That's one of my pet peeves too, Angelfierenze. How is the stability of having lived in the same apartment for ten years somehow worse than a thrice-divorced man living in a hotel??? :roll: I'm pretty sure that she is a former vet who then went back to school to get her medical degree. She's as qualified as the rest of them.Yes. She said, "He knows I used to be a vet." not I am just a vet. She was a vet who then went to (human :) ) medical school and is now a doctor.

Do we KNOW the former Mrs. Ziegler is the dean? Heehee! I saw this episode and freaked out. I would love if she's Foreman's dean of medicine. We'd have our speechwriters covered, wouldn't we? Sam's girlfriend would be House's boss and Toby's former wife would be Foreman's boss. Now we need, um, Janel Maloney to play another dean. The I love you scene. It's possible I squeed and watched the scene again JUST TO MAKE SURE I HEARD it. Beautiful stuff, there. And it really could have been played as a joke, but it was done seriously and quite beautifully, IMHO. I tend to think of Wilson and House as platonic friends, but still. I'm almost kind of hoping they go elsewhere with that because you don't see that very often on TV. I'm starting to enjoy the new kids a bit more. I think we're past introductions and we're starting to see their personalities shine quite a bit. Awww, and Scooter! "These were the best two weeks of my life." Awwww. Also, I can't tell you how much I loved Cuddy and House arguing: HOUSE: Wilson! I'm going to pluck the eye out of a crippled guy! WILSON: Good times! *confused expression.*