Episode Report Card Monty Ashley: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Minus Thirteen
By Monty Ashley | Season 8 | Episode 3 | Aired on 10.17.2011
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.The patient of the week is Wentworth Miller, who plays a mysterious millionaire who just wants to give away everything he owns. He also has a couple of physical ailments going on, but most of the episode consists of people arguing about whether his charitable impulses constitute an actual disease or just the usual nonsensical set of behaviors that drive people on television. Personally, I don't think he's any more crazy than that performance artist from last season, but what the heck. House ends up curing him even though it means he can't milk him for the million dollars he needs to put together a proper team of flunkies.
Speaking of flunkies, his basic team for this episode is composed of Park (from last episode) and Adams (from the prison episode). They have a fairly uninteresting subplot about how Park hates charity and Adams hates not giving things to her to make her twitch. House harasses Thirteen into coming back, but then he lets her leave so she can go live on Mykonos with her girlfriend. I suppose I'm going to have to make some sort of "Isle of Lesbos" joke in the weecap, so watch for that, I guess. Something for everyone to look forward to.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Before we begin the episode proper, let's kick off what will undoubtedly become a running feature: Medical Facts I Got Wrong. As you remember, this is a "weecap," which means it's written in great haste. And I'm not about to check every medical fact that goes by. A lot of the time, I will probably just mention that the doctors spouted some medical jargon without recording any details at all. I figure this is the best way to stay sane, because the alternative would mean going overboard in the other direction by looking up the symptoms of every single thing that comes along to verify that everything is medically plausible. Which it almost certainly isn't.
Anyway: in the last episode, Park was engaged in something I called "the fourth round of kelation." I am informed that I meant "chelation," which is a treatment for metal poisoning. The key is that you have to know what metal is doing the poisoning. Remember how there was talk of both lead poisoning and iron poisoning? Sure you do! Anyway, there you go. "Chelation," not "kelation." Let's see what I get wrong tonight!
So here we go, and... hey, it's Wentworth Miller! He's learning about how to get basic job training. He asks a helpful woman what would happen if he has a history of drug abuse. That's no problem! How about if he needs someone to watch his daughter while he's working or getting an interview? No deal -- child care is his problem. The woman calls him Benjamin as she apologizes for taking a call. Well, it's rude to take a call when you're in the middle of a conversation like that, but I appreciate her finding a way to work in his name. Then she's on the phone with someone named "Oscar," who gets a name even though he's not going to figure into the plot at all. So I guess she just likes calling people by their names a lot. Benjamin leaves and there's an envelope on the ground that says "For Phoenix" on the ground. She hangs up on Oscar because the envelope reveals that the Benjamin Byrd Foundation has left the Phoenix Foundation a cashier's check for one million dollars. I used to know a Phoenix Foundation, but they were three German Magic: The Gathering players. This probably isn't them. Forget I mentioned it. Benjamin has already walked out the door of this job training center.
The woman runs out the door and calls to Benjamin, who's about a block away and not turning around. He's walking away stoically. Then he falls to the ground. She runs to him and rolls him over. "Somebody call an ambulance!"