Game's End

By Aaron 11/28/2007

Two episodes worth of House: as the game begins to come to an end in episode 8, Kutner seizes onto a patient-magician who he is desperate to cure, and House lets him take the case, but if the magician is faking, House says Kutner will be fired. More interesting is House’s game that if the fellows bring him an object, they will receive immunity, and can send two candidates to the block. The object? The thong of Lisa Cuddy. After much scheming from Amber, Taub and Kutner, Cole turns in the red thong of Lisa Cuddy. Who will he send to the block? Meanwhile, House notices that Thirteen is off her game, and that her hand is shaking, and he assumes she is hiding a medical condition. Is it terminal? In the medical realm, House insists the patient is still faking, going so far as to offer himself as a test subject for the supposed bad blood given the patient. Is House right? What if he is wrong?

Episode 9 picks up where 8 left off, with Cuddy now pressuring House to lock down a team and that he needs to choose two of the four remaining fellows to complete his team with Foreman while House pushes for three fellows AND Foreman. Will House fold? A punk rocker who’s music House hates is brought in and the team disregard him as merely a drug addict while House is convinced there is something medically wrong with him. Will this be the first time House is wrong? House pushes the team hard – saying this is the last case, and that he will fire two of them at the end. Who will it be? Cuddy tells House to hire the two males and Chase suggests one of each. Will House follow someone’s advice for once? Foreman says he is tired of House’s games, causing House to keep moving the locale for the diagnosis to get away from Foreman – kind of like he did with that documentary crew. Will Foreman whine to Cuddy?

These last two episodes have led me to back off my long running theory of the old team returning. And with two more episodes in the tank before the strike, it seems like things will stay the same for at least that long. But with decreasing screen time from Chase and Cameron, and even Foreman, it seems very unlikely House will throw back the young uns for the veterans.

At the same time, I’m not sure this team that House chooses can last. There is one dominant personality in the team, and one personality only. The old team was fairly balanced, and you liked all the characters pretty much the same. This team has some characters that are significantly less developed, and less likable than the others – and I am not just talking about their comparison to Foreman. Sure, the show could further develop those characters, but it would take a hell of a lot to make them more appealing than the characters they have been in the first nine episodes. From a cosmetic level, the team is not nearly as good looking as the old team, but I guess the show is supposed to be realistic. That was sarcasm.

The chemistry between House and Thirteen in these last two episodes was ridiculously high. They work so well together and both have such good timing that it almost makes me forget about Cameron. Almost. The Cameron-House spark is still there I think – we are not too many episodes past Cameron declaring her love for House on camera, and in this episode they still have it. Will it develop? Will Thirteen come to the forefront? I really hope Cameron gets jealous and there is some competition there.

These were two really good episodes, and the worst part was that now we have to wait all the way until January for new episodes, with the risk of running out before the writer’s strike comes to an end. The previews do show that there will be a return to the clinic, but a complete return to formula is unclear. Will Chase and Cameron still stop by periodically? Will Wilson get back his time? Who knows?

Could “Avatar” Win Best Picture?

By Brett Hogan

 

Last week, the trailer for James Cameron’s sci-fi experiment “Avatar” debuted. While initially unimpressed with the teaser, I began to wonder: Could this film win best picture? 

 

Buzz has been generating for this movie for years. Years. The technology to make this movie didn’t exist when Cameron conceived it, so he invented it. When is the last time you heard of a director spearheading the invention of anything? The casting started in 2005. Most movies these days, even epics, are done in half that time. I could go on. 

 

The most important thing to take away from all of this is that people are saying this will be the future of movies. Now, I don’t agree with the idea that CGI will become more prevalent than it already is. But I do believe that this will set the bar miles higher for sci-fi. I mean, that is what Titanic did. And that won some awards if memory serves.

 

I’ll bet you’re asking yourself, how can you even suggest that a film like this will win Best Picture when the initial trailer was nothing better than visual stimulation? Well, there are a couple of reasons. First, the Academy has expanded Best Picture to ten films. This doesn’t guarantee anything other than improved chances for most films on the cusp.

 

Second, after last year’s Oscars debacle, which saw the best film of the year, “The Dark Knight,” not only get shafted in awards but nominations as well, the Academy is pulling out all the stops to appease those with the loudest voices in the film industry, the fanboys. Now, the Academy probably didn’t lose anything because of that other than some viewers of the award show. Perhaps if people are again outraged with the winners or nominees, the heads of the Academy would lose their jobs. So this is all about the Academy protecting itself, which is not so outrageous.  

 

 

Third, there is an economic motive here. I’ve heard this film will cost $190 million, not counting the R&D costs associated with Cameron’s inventions or the cost of getting 3-D cameras into every theater in the country. The Academy will do everything in its power to get people into the seats and make this the next “Titanic” or “The Dark Knight.” But the Academy doesn’t have much power, besides nominating and awarding, so they will slap the “Nominated for Best Picture” moniker onto every commercial and print ad to get the people who didn’t believe the critics to relent and see this movie.

 

Of course, all of this is pure conjecture, and no revolutionary film (Terminator 2, Jurassic Park, etc.) has ever won the Best Picture category because it changed the game. Except maybe Titanic. But still, could this movie actually win? My answer is no but a nomination is certain and who knows what could happen from there. We’ll know more come February 2010.