House: Season 7

See, this was a perfect example of why sometimes it's best to stop watching a show and catch the rest on DVD. I started to consider cutting House from my "appointment viewing" rotation during Season 5 and then made the move early on in Season 6. It had just ceased to be a show that was consistently worth spending an hour watching week in and week out. And the Internet at large seems to suggest that I was followed off the bandwagon en masse during the mess of inconsistency that was Season 7. I read some reviews for several episodes I just saw, and most critics, by season's end, were saying stuff like, "I don't think I can watch this show again next year, even for a paycheck." On DVD, however, lump viewing sessions allowed me to mostly ignore the shitty episodes and plotlines while still enjoying the enjoyable parts of the season, of which there were still several. I'm sure hindsight helps too; the season began with House and his boss-slash-sparring-rival Cuddy beginning a romantic relationship that never felt natural in the slightest, and I can imagine that this relationship made a lot of fans scoff while it was happening in "real time" so to speak; but while I hadn't read any big spoilers for Season 7 or anything, I know that the Cuddy character has been written off heading into Season 8, and thus the pair was doomed to fail at some point during the 23-episode set in question. This foresight allowed me to just enjoy the ride for what it was without ever getting too invested one way or the other in it. Another thing I find interesting about House - and really about any long-running TV show - is the way in which it has (or hasn't) evolved over the years. TV fans are fickle. We want long-term character development and love a well-told story, but we also lament, constantly, that shows aren't as good as they once were. So showrunners are damned if they make changes and mix things up, but damned if they don't. House happens to be one of the most episodic and procedural-based dramas I watch, and in theory you could insert any Season 7 episode into Season 1 and have it make sense for the most part, sans the inclusion or exclusion of certain characters and longer-running background stories. Or at least I think that's the case; the way some critics waxed nostalgic about the show's early years had me wondering what, really, has changed in either the episodic or season-long formulas. House has always been brilliant but miserable. The same is true of most of his colleagues and employees, to lesser extents. The show has a rather cynical tone overall, but some of the deepest running themes have always been loneliness and unhappiness. Among the main characters, we've seen something like four divorces and seen several other cases where loved ones have died. Even the weekly patients of interest are often facing death without many loved ones at their side (though this may simply be due to the extra casting that would need to occur for extended families to gather at the bedsides of the dying). I guess what I'm getting at is the idea that House was not a feel-good show in 2004, and it isn't one today. Throughout its run, it's been, at best, a show where characters bond over shared miseries and regrets. The currently-airing eighth season has been confirmed as the show's last one, and maybe before I watch it I'll go back and re-visit some episodes from Seasons 1 and 2 just to see if there's been an enormous dip in quality or consistency after all. I mean, I don't disagree that the show has become a bit absurd and a bit melodramatic, but on a per episode basis I guess I haven't really noticed a decline. If anything, the decline has been in my own interest levels for a show that, by and large, hasn't changed very much in seven years. Fickle old me.