Episode Report Card Sara M: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Good Friend, Bad Oncologist
By Sara M | Season 6 | Episode 9 | Aired on 11.30.2009
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.House breaks format nicely with an episode from Wilson's perspective as he deals with his best friend's problems, his needy patients, Cuddy's latest mindgame with House as she enlists Wilson to call his realtor ex-wife about finding her a new home to live in with Lucas, and most importantly, treating his friend's mysterious illness. What? Yes, it's true! Wilson has a friend besides House! His name is Tucker, and Wilson saved him from cancer five years ago. When they go out to celebrate, Tucker's arm stops working. It turns out that he has cancer again, except this time it's cancer from the chemotherapy they gave him five years ago. And since he had all that chemo five years ago, he's resistant to it now. So Wilson makes a risky move and gives him double the chemo. That gets rid of the cancer, but it also destroys Tucker's liver. He goes from having six months to live with the wife and daughter he only just reunited with to one day, and he tells Wilson that it's all his fault. But Wilson can make it up to Tucker if he donates part of his liver to save his life. House doesn't want him to do it, but keeps him company as Wilson recovers from the transplant surgery anyway. When Wilson and Tucker are all better, Tucker celebrates his second new lease on life by dumping the wife and daughter for his hot young girlfriend (again) and Wilson celebrates by sticking it to Cuddy for making House sad by buying the loft she wanted out from under her.
Discuss this episode in our forums, then see what vlogger Sean Crespo thinks about House when he has No Prior Knowledge!
Want more? The full recap starts right below!We open on Wilson sleeping while guitar music plays. He wakes up and both he and we discover that the music is actually diegetic and coming from the living room, where House had a late-night craving for some George Michael. When George Michael himself has a late-night craving, it so often leads to him being found semi-conscious in cars and getting in trouble with the police. But House just gets in trouble with Wilson, both for waking him up with the opening strains of "Faith" and also filling Wilson's living room with guitars he retrieved from his apartment. The guy downstairs has got to be livid right now, and yet powerless to do anything about it because of gratitude. House acts like he had no idea that Wilson wouldn't be awake already at 6:33 AM. Wilson says he's sleeping in because he's skipping work to go hunting. House will not let Wilson enjoy his few hours of extra sleep, though, following him into his bedroom to accuse Wilson's hunting partner of being a "self-important jerk" based on the fact that he calls Wilson "Jim" instead of James. I think it's more like House hates the thought of Wilson having another friend. What a Jealous Jerry!
Robert Sean Leonard could not look less awkward in his hunting gear holding that rifle if he tried. He fires at nothing and complains that neither him nor his self-important jerk friend Tucker know anything about hunting or guns. Yet there they are shooting them. That doesn't seem like a good idea at all. Tucker suddenly spots some stock footage of wild turkeys and takes aim. He misses, and then it's "time" for what appears to be his and Wilson's annual ritual. If I were them, I'd distance myself from the wild turkeys first, because everyone knows that wild turkeys are vengeful beasts and they will come after you. But perhaps stock footage of wild turkeys is different. Wilson nails an IV bag of chemotherapy to a tree and Tucker speechifies that exactly five years and six months ago, Wilson told him that if the chemo didn't work, he had six months to live. Six months later, he was still alive. Every year after that, he celebrates with a "new and exciting" activity with Wilson in order to thank him. Because nothing says "thanks!" like a hunting trip in the middle of winter in the woods of New Jersey. Wilson writes "Year 5!" on the chemo bag and steps well away from it as Tucker takes aim and blows the bag away. I guess he's not so bad at shooting after all. He sincerely thanks Wilson before firing off another shot -- this time as the result of his arm suddenly becoming paralyzed. Wilson frets over him while the wild turkeys laugh and laugh. "Karma! Karma!" they gobble.