House. A new team of Doclings?

[bigdaddy]

I'm still thinking the show will be on 15 years and the last several years House will be running a bar. Mark my words...

So how about it? Will we soon see House with new fellows/Doclings next season (not the one starting this month, the one starting a year from now) or will we hang on to these guys longer?

You are assuming that House casted new underlings for any rational reason, when the reality is, that the producers just wanted something new to increase the ratings.

Really? You have any proof for that? I have proof that adding the new people actually brought the ratings down. Season 3 overall was the most watched, once the new team formed the ratings went down.

 

[Trekker4747]

I'm actually not huge on the POTW/medicine stuff. I mean, I like it and find it intriguing. But the draw of the show to me has always been the character of House, and how well Hugh Laurie plays him. I don't watch for the plots, I watch for the characterizations. I was serious about having an entire season with him in the psychiatric ward. I think the show could do with getting the plots out of the hospital a little bit. Around water coolers in the morning, I don't think anyone talks about the weird and freaky medical dilemma that House solved this week. I think they talk about House...his opinion on it or what he said about it.

I would love to see an episode, which I think could be quite funny, in which we just follow House around on his day off. Grocery shopping, annoying Wilson, getting drunk at the bar, prostitutes, watching re-runs of Baywatch, going to a guitar shop...anything, really. I think something like that, written well, could be one of the best episodes of the show ever. I don't think the writers have the guts, though. They're constrained and controlled by their formula.

Well, I don't think that the "draw of the show" is the medical mystery, certainly it's House himself (and more importantly Hugh's potrayal of him) but what I enjoy about House is watching his process of solving the "medical mystery" some of my favorite episodes remain in the first season -granting my favorite episode has no POTW storyline.)

But I could do with a lot less of the focus on the Doclings, like season 5's focus on "Forteen." But I like watching House solve medical mysteries because of his "process" (when was the last time we had a good DDx/whiteboard scene?) and interactions with POTW -and how sometimes through the POTW House learns a bit about humanity like he's an alien Star Trek character. I could do with less focus on the "Doclings", on Cuddy's baby, on Wilson's exes and dead girlfriend, and the umpteenth time people get on to House about his use of the prescription drugs he needs to take away the pain he has from having a chunk of his leg removed!

House, by far is the most interesting character on TV right now and I could watch Hugh Laurie playing him reading the phone book, I just enjoy more of "House the diagnostician" than "House the man meddling with his fellows' rommantic encounters."

I agree though, a season (probably more-like half-a-season) of House dealing with sick mental patients would be a fascinating arc.

 

[T'Baio]

Well, I definitely agree that Fourteen and Cuddy's baby bullshit have to go. I really enjoy Chase and Cameron's characters, so I don't mind anything dealing with them. But Forman, Thirteen and Cuddy...yeeesh, not good. Cuddy and her baby drama don't even seem like they're from the same show. I say get rid of Thirteen and Cuddy, keep the team as Chase, Cameron and Taub, and either get rid of Forman, or finally promote him once and for all to Cuddy's position. Seeing him become a total power tripping asshole and going against House just because he hates him and having the power over House to actually do it might make Forman interesting.

I also think they need to put House in a totally abusive, completely dependent relationship with a really hot girl who is a total bitch to him.

 

[Trekker4747]

Ooooo. Forman as the Dean of Medicine/in Cuddy's job is a good one! But I like Cuddy. Some of this show's best scenes involve some combination of Cuddy, House and Wilson.

I fine witht he Cuddy/House rommance stuff, just not so much on Cuddy's maternal instincts kicking into overdrive.

 

[Christopher]

You are assuming that House casted new underlings for any rational reason, when the reality is, that the producers just wanted something new to increase the ratings.

Really? You have any proof for that? I have proof that adding the new people actually brought the ratings down. Season 3 overall was the most watched, once the new team formed the ratings went down.

The fact that it did not succeed in boosting ratings does not disprove the premise that it was done with the hope of boosting ratings. As a rule, it stands to reason that most anything a show's producers do is an attempt to increase ratings; they wouldn't do something if they expected it to lower ratings, would they?

 

[pookha]

It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if Thirteen does die in season 7. To do it this year would be too much too soon, but can definitely see a 'progressive illness progresses even faster - dead' arc next year, should there be a next year of course.

That would be profoundly unrealistic. Huntington's disease is not actually fatal in itself, but its symptoms can lead to complications that reduce life expectancy to an average of about 20 years following the onset of symptoms. So there's no reason to expect Thirteen to die while the series is on the air. If she were to leave the show, it would be because her physical and mental deterioration had advanced to the point that she was no longer capable of performing medicine.

she dosnt seem to be near that yet.
unless she declined really fast.

but then again it has been more then a decade since i met someone with it.

nasty disease.

 

[nx1701g]

One of the new doclings (either Thirteen or Taub) will not be leaving the series but will take on another role at the hospital.

So are you saying the other one will be leaving? Or just that only one has been mentioned so far?

Only one had been mentioned at the time that I read that.

 

[Christopher]

By the way, where did this term "Doclings" come from? I don't recall hearing that one. I prefer to call them "Houseketeers."

 

[T'Baio]

I just call them the residents. *shrugs*

 

[Scout101]

By the way, where did this term "Doclings" come from? I don't recall hearing that one. I prefer to call them "Houseketeers."

That's been around for quite a while. Seems to fit, IMO. Fits from the perspective of them being younger doctors, and also them just literally following House around like ducklings in a line through the hospital

 

[Christopher]

Oh! I didn't get the Doclings/ducklings connection.

 

[nx1701g]

Didn't House call the fake fellows on the plane in the one episode Doclings?

 

[Trekker4747]

I'll have to review that one tonight to see if he did, I think I picked up the term "Doclings" from Television Without Pitty for the reason someone above said -that they follow House around like ducks following their mother. I beleive TWOP more often, though, calls them "Cottages" -which works too. PD -which does the House medical reviews- calls them "Young Guns".

I like "Doclings" so that's the term I use.

 

[T'Baio]

Didn't House call the fake fellows on the plane in the one episode Doclings?

I'm drawing a blank on that episode. What was the plot, episode title or general idea?

 

[Trekker4747]

Didn't House call the fake fellows on the plane in the one episode Doclings?

I'm drawing a blank on that episode. What was the plot, episode title or general idea?

"Airborne"

House and Cuddy are on a trans-Atlantic flight from a conference back to New Jersey when a mid-air medical emergency calls House's services into employ.

Cuddy thinks the passengers are contracting bacterial meningitis but House isn't so sure but begns diagnosing -calling into service three passengers to bounce ideas off of (a woman to act morally outraged at everthing he does, a kid to imitate a Aussie accent to agree with everything House says and an olive-skinned man who barely speaks English to disagree with everything House says.)

By the end of the ordeal House has determined that all of the "sick passengers" are suffering from conversion disorder (mass hysteria) and were only emulating the symptoms from Cuddy's hysterics. The sick passenger who started off the whole thing simply has the bends from flying too soon after deep-sea diving.

Back in Princeton the Doclings under Froman and Wilson's observation are tending to a woman who ends up having been poisoned by a pipe connected to her neighbors house where they are fumigating.

 

[Iasius]

Didn't House call the fake fellows on the plane in the one episode Doclings?

I'm drawing a blank on that episode. What was the plot, episode title or general idea?

He meant episode #18 in season 3 where Cuddy and House were on a plane.

According to this transcript, House doesn't call them doclings.

 

[Christopher]

I beleive TWOP more often, though, calls them "Cottages" -which works too.

Took me a moment to parse that one.

Am I the only one who likes "Houseketeers?" I can't believe nobody else thought of that one.

 

[nx1701g]

Didn't House call the fake fellows on the plane in the one episode Doclings?

I'm drawing a blank on that episode. What was the plot, episode title or general idea?

He meant episode #18 in season 3 where Cuddy and House were on a plane.

According to this transcript, House doesn't call them doclings.

I suppose its possible that I am misremembering. I do remember though that we even joked about it in one of the discussion threads that they'd finally called them Doclings. It was almost as big as when it was finally Lupus.

 

[bigdaddy]

Question: Has it dawned on anyone that Taub and Thirteen’s three-year fellowships are about to end on House? Do you know if the show plans to follow through on that? And, if so, does this mean Peter Jacobson and Olivia Wilde are leaving? —Mindy
Ausiello: It certainly dawned on me. And it dawned on series creator David Shore — at least it did when I reminded him recently. He says he hasn’t figured out what will happen to Taub and Thirteen after their fellowships expire. Luckily, time is on his side. “It won’t be until the end of the season,” he says, adding that it’s not in his nature to gloss over such plot points. “I don’t like those things to be fake-outs.” What do you think? Do you want Taub and Thirteen to stay on? Or are you hoping they opt to seek greener pastures? Cast your votes in the comments section!

http://ausiellofiles.ew.com/

 

[HappyDayRiot]

Hmmm that's pretty interesting. I don't remember it being stated they only had the three years though - which episode established that?