House: Series Finale. "Everybody Dies." Discussion/Spoilers

[Trekker4747]

I doubt it. They probably called him Moriarty because he killed (or tried to kill) House, in House's hallucination of him in the episode "Moriarty" was also a character-diagnosing foe to House.

 

[137th Gebirg]

House's "Moriarty" was supposed to be the man who shot him at the end of Season 2. (Though never given a name on-screen, that's the character was called Jack Moriarty in the script.)

Ah, yes. Forgot about that one. I guess, particularly because while he was a good foil for House in that episode, it didn't seem to be quite as "epic" as a confrontation between House and a Moriarty-style character should be. The most recent Holmes movie w/ Downy Jr. is a good example of how this should work, not to mention the various other such encounters that have happened in Holmes-based shows over the years.

This guy could have been an excellent adversary for House, had he been an ongoing character throughout the rest of the series. Hell, even Vogler and Tritter got more screen time that him.

 

[sonak]

House's "Moriarty" was supposed to be the man who shot him at the end of Season 2. (Though never given a name on-screen, that's the character was called Jack Moriarty in the script.)

^ A shorter run for the series, ending with "just another day" would have been good too. That was House.

I'd almost argue the Season 6 finale with House and Cuddy hooking up would've been an ideal route to go with a finale.

Early in the show's run that's how I thought it was going to end, with House and Cuddy together.

I hated the torpedoing of that relationship in such a mean-spirited way.

 

[Saul]

In a way House was his own Moriarty. He is constantly fighting himself as we saw in this episode. Fight and live or die. Care for people or push them away. The battle is in his mind.

I was expecting this to be a 2 hour finale and was disappointed that the episode wasn't even extended a little bit. It seemed to rushed and used more to showcase all the characters who used to be on the show.

I can see in a way that this was the producers way of killing House and not killing House. He can make a fresh start. He is smart enough to get away with it. I just felt it all happened too much for a last ever episode. The character deserved more. It's good but weak to what they could have done.

They should have planned out the arc sooner, they knew Hugh Laurie didn't want to come back for a 9th season, why wait so long until it's near the end of the season to clarify that the show was ending whether the producers wanted it to or not.

 

[gh4chiefs]

I'd almost argue the Season 6 finale with House and Cuddy hooking up would've been an ideal route to go with a finale.

Now that you mention that, I remember posting that very comment at the end of season 6. THAT felt like a reasonable and satisfying way to end the series.

Maybe I should buy the DVDs through season 6 and pretend the rest never happened.

 

[JiNX-01]

I'm going to pretend the documentary never happened.

As to the episode, the first 55 minutes sucked. Who got the "brilliant" idea of doing a navel-gazing episode for a finale?

The last 5 minutes ...

 

[Leviathan]

^ I've thought about the Moriarty thing too. What would his name have been on the show?

Holmes = House
Watson = Wilson
Moriarty = ?

Misery.


...actually, it might be bacon. Probably bacon. Can I change my answer?

 

[137th Gebirg]

^^^ Yeah, Kevin Bacon might have been good for the role.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

That's certainly one viewpoint. However there's another viewpoint. House also killed the patient and use the patient's teeth to fake his own death.

Well the patient did offer! And he actually killed himself with the drugs he was so determined to keep using.

this whole Wilson-cancer thing that set everything in motion felt really rushed and not particularly organic

This I agree with. That they had the cancer doctor get cancer seems a little "cute".

not having any sort of resolution with Cuddy was very unsatisfying. I would have given up all of the half dozen or so cameos for one Cuddy/House scene.

What more resolution could there be? Cuddy was a part of his past that it would have been unhealthy for him to remain tied to. Their failed relationship, like his stint at the psychiatric hospital, had been a red herring to which he looked to solve his problems, but which realistically was never going to do that. Besides, she made it clear they were through, even before he drove his car through the front of her house, jeopardizing her life and those of her sister and her child. House going to jail for that and her leaving was the resolution to that arc. What did you think would happen, she'd come back and they'd live happily ever after?

Had they used this entire finale season to set the end up, instead of just the last four or six episodes it would have worked better.

Yep, agree. The season started off excellently and the end feels right to me, but in between there were at least several weeks where I thought "we are wasting the last season on insignificant episodes here."

I think the conspiracy theories about House planning everything are weak at best, considering the lengthy inner dialogues he was having throughout most of the episode. Also, he had no way of knowing that Foreman and Wilson were going to find him in the burning building, or that the roof was going to collapse at that moment. I think him faking his death was poorly written and overly convenient certainly, but not a conspiracy. It made me smile due to the overt similarity to the Holmes mythos however.

It's not a "conspiracy theory," clearly it's what the episode presented as having happened. House deliberately manipulated Wilson and Foreman into "not helping" him, but they actually were helping him by acting exactly as he knew they would. And at every point he left them clues to follow. "Even when the plan wasn't working, it was working."

No he didn't plan for the roof to fall through, which is why after it does and he's lying there in pain with the flames licking his feet, he seriously considers just giving up and dying for real. The inner dialogue is him remembering where he is and what's going on through the heroin and reflects his subconscious mind at work: his desires to give up, to die, to fail, to be loved, to be saved, to change, etc.

House knows better than anyone that people don't change unless they are forced to. So he sets up for himself circumstances that will force him to change or die. He kills himself without actually killing himself. He didn't go there to die and then decide to fake his death instead, it was the other way around. He went there to fake his death and almost decided to die.

 

[Random_Spock]

House's "Moriarty" was supposed to be the man who shot him at the end of Season 2. (Though never given a name on-screen, that's the character was called Jack Moriarty in the script.)

I'd almost argue the Season 6 finale with House and Cuddy hooking up would've been an ideal route to go with a finale.

Early in the show's run that's how I thought it was going to end, with House and Cuddy together.

I hated the torpedoing of that relationship in such a mean-spirited way.

Me too. It was terrible. I really don't know why they went and did that, it didn't make any sense then, and it still doesn't.

Wasn't a fan of the special before the ep either... didn't mind most of the behind the scenes stuff, but one of the executive producers (don't know his name) and Hugh Laurie kind of rubbed me the wrong way attitude wise for some reason. They seemed to be pretty arrogant -_-, and it just kind of made the whole thing not the most fun to watch.

Didn't like how they explained the relationship between House and Cuddy. It seemed to be slip shod (not the word I was looking for, but it'll do), and they seemed to avoid it in a way. Saying that if House would have stayed in a relationship with Cuddy, that it would have been boring.

is all I can say there. There were better ways for them to have handled that relationship than the way that they did there. It was bad writing period. No excuse for it.

They could have had them break up, and then House react to it in his usual way... but just not in an as extreme way as he did. That was going way too far.

The finale was ok, with House realizing that he had a life to live, outside of the hospital, with Wilson, who was sadly dying of cancer (that was the saddest part of the finale, I still gave a damn about him (Wilson, that is)).

Heck the best part of the finale was during House's 'funeral', everyone was saying nice stuff about him... and for a bit, Wilson did as well... and then he just came out with the truth and called him (House) out on his behavior and treatment of others. He really deserved what he got there from his friend (Wilson). It takes a real friend to call someone out like that.

I'm going to pretend the documentary never happened.

As to the episode, the first 55 minutes sucked. Who got the "brilliant" idea of doing a navel-gazing episode for a finale?

The last 5 minutes ...

That's pretty much me as well, it seemed rather arrogant and off putting (didn't mind the other actors and such, but still...).

Navel-gazing? Do you mean, weak on plot and such? I thought it was some what better than the shit fest we got during seasons 7 and 8.

Definitely .

I have watched many episodes from the beginning of the series, not when they aired but over several months last year when I was unemployed. I didn't see all of them and stopped watching shortly after the new interns were chosen (13 and the rest) because I found the original interns much more interesting and it was disappointing not having them around full time anymore. I've seen a few later ones here and there.

I will likely tune into the finale tonight, mostly because all my other shows have ended for the season and I have nothing else to watch. It should be interesting.

Not to mince words but given that they're full-fledged doctors they're not "interns" they're in a fellowship so they're fellows.

Anyway, I found the Retrospective good and the final episode was interesting. When it seemed like House was dead it sort-of made sense especially when Wilson began his rant on what an ass House "was." It seemed to fit and to make sense given that House was an ass and all (but, again, I argue that's slightly "re-writing" the character he was in the first season) but when Wilson got the text I laughed as that ending somehow makes even more sense.

It's sad that Wilson is still going to die in a few months (I would have expected a last-minute miracle cure or something) and after that who knows where House will go from there, I'd suspect he'll do some doctoring in another country sort of like Bruce Banner or something.

Cuddy's absence in House's hallucinations/funeral I think sort of stuck-out. She was a major part of the show for most of its run so one would have expected to see her. I'm also a bit disappointed that we didn't hear "You Can't Always Get What You Want" played as that was another of House's sayings/tropes along with "Everybody lies."

For a finale I'd rate it as "Good." I think as show finales go it did things mostly the best to end the show on somewhat of an expected tone and mood and it did it without assassinating a character or doing something stupid or pretty much rendering all of the previous episodes pointless. The season I'd say was Average as it you could feel the show was weighted by the tighter budget, new cast, the storyline(s) they had set them selves up with and by trying "too hard." It had many post-shark jumping moments in it of pure ridiculousness.

The series? I'm going to land on Excellent there, but only in terms of that 5-point scale. Pushed I'd give it 4-1/2 stars, an A-, etc. I think the show lost some footing in season 5 and once House got out of the Asylum I don't think it ever really completely recovered.

House, it's been a good run ad it's sad to see such a good show with such a talented actor sort of cough and wheeze to the finish-line but it was... Fun.

A shame we didn't get to see Cuddy though. I wonder what happened with Lisa Edelstein that made an appearance not come to fruition.

Her and the show's producers must not have left on the best of terms since I don't even think she was asked to come back for the finale. Though she was in the Retrospective.

Same. I was hoping to see her in one way or another during the episode.

Looks to have been that way . It stinks that her character got the short end of the stick in the end. Such a damn shame.

So House does end up with Wilson.


Too bad Lisa Edelstein couldn't have been on it, her absence was glaring with all the other old cast people back.

A neat ending to a rather mediocre episode.

I didn't like the "Wilson gets cancer" storyline thrust on us in the last four episodes. He deserved better as a character. He was neglected except for tragic storylines.(cancer and Amber dying)


the show had been running out of gas for a while and was well past its peak.

Yep . The best part of the episode. The two of them going out on the road and living life to the fullest.

Definitely. It was like a giant black hole and I noticed how they (the writers, etc.) treated the relationship aspect during the retrospective, and it's like they didn't really want to touch it.

I didn't either. Poor guy pretty much got neglected a lot during the series. He truly did deserve more.

So true. I haven't watched it since season 6. I only watched the finale to see what was going to happen. Other than that, I didn't really care -_-.

House was dead for me, which is sad, since I watched the show from the first episode, I did give up during part of it when it screwed up, but I came back once things were starting to look better... but then they had to drive the show off of the metaphorical cliff so to speak. That was the last straw, and I hadn't looked back since. Until last night.

Never felt that kind of hatred for a show, until this one. Sure I've disliked when shows start to go downhill, but this one is a first in the sense of not even caring enough to even watch it.

 

[Trekker4747]

Wasn't a fan of the special before the ep either... didn't mind most of the behind the scenes stuff, but one of the executive producers (don't know his name) and Hugh Laurie kind of rubbed me the wrong way attitude wise for some reason. They seemed to be pretty arrogant -_-, and it just kind of made the whole thing not the most fun to watch.

Probably the British accent. They tend to do that.

 

[JiNX-01]

Navel-gazing? Do you mean, weak on plot and such? I thought it was some what better than the shit fest we got during seasons 7 and 8.

Definitely .

By navel-gazing I was referring to suffering through an hour of current and former cast members popping up to remind us that House had a lousy bedside manner, was a self-centered jerk, ... blah blah blah. They were in a burning building, and they couldn't even make that interesting.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

Bringing back Stacy and Cameron was much better than bringing back Cuddy would have been. It really brought home the point that it's nonsense to think Cuddy was House's one true love, or the only one who could love him, etc. The series was about House and his struggle with his own nature, not about whose boyfriend he is or isn't.

 

[Trekker4747]

It was a nice surprise to see Stacy back (though as someone said above, I suspect she was filling the Cuddy role in his hallucinations/inner dialogue.)

But part of what made House's (over)-reaction to losing Cuddy was that he lost Stacy and he didn't go on a bender and end up in prison due to his actions he just became slightly more of a miserable ass. House's reactions to losing Cuddy was just way, way, over the top and never jived with me on being true to the character.

 

[Agent Richard07]

Cuddy was still a huge part of House's life and not seeing her did indeed stand out. I hope we get more on what happened with Edelstein.

They should have planned out the arc sooner, they knew Hugh Laurie didn't want to come back for a 9th season, why wait so long until it's near the end of the season to clarify that the show was ending whether the producers wanted it to or not.

At first, this season wasn't being written as the last and I believe Laurie did say that he wouldn't mind coming back for a 9th. Once they got word that this would indeed be the end, they were able to put their closing arc into motion.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

It's worth noting that Stacy was going to stay with him and he chose to send her back to her husband because he knew he'd only end up hurting her. The decision was his, and really he'd had years before that to resign himself to having lost her. Also, when Cuddy broke up with him he had just freshly relapsed in his drug addiction. (That's actually why she broke up with him, IIRC.) But I still do agree it was an overreaction. Whether it was out of character given the circumstances and his state of mind, maybe, maybe not.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

Cuddy was still a huge part of House's life

In what way, exactly?

and not seeing her did indeed stand out.

Yeah, it stood out as indicating that she's not a huge part of his life anymore! She was gone and she was not coming back. They'd both moved on.

 

[Trekker4747]

Cuddy was still a huge part of House's life and not seeing her did indeed stand out. I hope we get more on what happened with Edelstein.

From what I've read she was asked but declined. The "break-up" between her and the producers was messy. Presumably they drove an Oldsmobile through her dining room.

(That's actually why she broke up with him, IIRC.)

Her break-up with him was actually a combination of him relapsing but mostly due to her realizing he's a selfish ass who'd "never be there for her."

 

[Agent Richard07]

Cuddy was still a huge part of House's life

In what way, exactly?

and not seeing her did indeed stand out.

Yeah, it stood out as indicating that she's not a huge part of his life anymore! She was gone and she was not coming back. They'd both moved on.

When I said "still a huge part of his life", I didn't mean "presently". She was his boss for about a decade, maybe longer, and eventually became his girlfriend. Outside of Stacy, she was a bigger part of his life than pretty much everyone else he saw. That's why her not being there came off as trouble with the actress as opposed to a choice that served the story. I guess you could dismiss her absence as him blocking her out subconsciously, but still...

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Loved everything from the "death" scene and funeral on, but the rest was kind of "meh." Felt more like a season finale than a series one.

As soon as the phone started ringing at the funeral I got a big smile on my face and guessed what was coming. His text message was great and got a big laugh. The two songs at the end were perfect, as was House and Wilson riding off together.

It was an enjoyable ending, but I was hoping for more. I voted episode: good / season: average / series: excellent.