House: Season 1 vs. Season 3.

Watching these in juxtaposition is kind of a crazy move.  Watching "formerly snarky but not that mean and definitely interested in patients' well being even if he pretends not to be" season 1 House versus "viciously nasty, horrible, unethical and the worst friend/boss and coworker on earth" season 3 House is almost more painful than just watching season 3 unknowing of the possibilities of season 1.

Interesting, though, (while watching season 1) to finally get the background on the Cameron situation (ouch, I can't even imagine asking a boss out on a date, let alone how the date went), and the leg situation. 

Hate the current (season 3) "going to jail" storyline, hate the dude playing the cop (have always hated him), and just hate where it's all going.

Think it's kind of hilarious, how people always complain about Grey's Anatomy having "out there" cases to drive the storyline.  Hello, that's EVERY WEEK (seasons 1 and 3!!) on House; all the patients wind up being diagnosed with some never-heard-of-before, never-will-again disease, after first being thought to have 3 or 4 other only-sort-of-heard-of diseases. 

And EVERY episode it's "start him on these treatments" "but if we're wrong he'll die" "but do it anyway."  I mean, at SOME POINT, does that not become an actual medical problem for a hospital?  For that to be their STANDARD way of treatment? 

Honestly, I find Grey's more believable.  I do like the snark of House better in some ways, when it's just snark.  But when it's gotten to the level of nasty it's currently at (in season 3 obviously), it's cringeworthy and I almost can't watch.

Comments

[Girl Detective]

Yeah, I hate the cop and this story line too, but if they're playing him up as an addict, then it does add to the realism. I just hope they're not going to do something where the cop gets sick and House is the only one who can save him.

Funny thing about the medicine. I mentioned to my dad, an allergist, the ep with the kid who was allergic to everything and how he gave her PB. My dad said, "oh, she had [whatever that light thing was called]" so perhaps the medicine isn't as out there as all that--they're just playing dumb for drama.

[Dani]

"House" is almost a throwback to the medical dramas that I grew up with in the 70s and 80s. As Duff said, the structure is very predictable as far as how many different treatments they will try before they hit on the right one.

As far as whether the medicine is realistic, I honestly don't care. I don't watch "House" or "Grey's Anatomy" for the medical drama. For me, the hospital is just a setting for the relationships between the characters. Unless a patient came in spurting neon green blood, I wouldn't know if the medicine was real, anyway. Now, I think shows like the various CSI clones should be realistic because they don't go into the character relationships, but I don't know anything about forensics so they could be lying to me, too :-).