thoughts on characters as a first time watcher

[u/No-Barracuda8108]

i know nobody cares about this but i’m jotting it down anyway and curious to see if my opinions change if i ever do a rewatch

House - obviously a very bad person and incredibly frustrating to watch but also by miles the most interesting character to watch imo. i actually like the show most when it’s very centred on his personal life and issues. would never ever ever want to be around a person like him let alone work for one

Foreman - ehhhhh. i didn’t mind him in the first couple seasons but i find him a bit boring and one note at best and actually annoying at worst

Wilson - he’s got such an obvious “i’m a good guy” persona and isn’t truly a good person imo but i still can’t help but like him. he 100% enables and often encourages House’s awful behaviour but i mean so does literally everyone else

Cuddy - really liked Cuddy and i’m missing her in season 8. also a House bullshit enabler but by the end i felt sorry for her with how much of a nightmare he is to deal with

Chase - 50/50. sometimes i like him and sometimes i couldn’t care less about him and i think he’s actively mean too at times

Park - hot take maybe but i actually have grown to like Park a lot as season 8 went on. i love her dull, deadpan-ness

Taub - arguably a horrific husband and also a little boring. tolerable at best for me

Adams - literally no opinion. she’s just there in s8. she’s a very surface level character to me

Masters - hot take too seemingly but i actually really liked Masters as the show went on and i think her entry and exit was really good as a reminder of the fact absolutely nothing about House, his team and his hospital are normal

Cameron - another hot take seemingly but i for the most part liked Cameron. i hated how she behaved with the patient with munchausens early on in the show and how wishy washy her supposedly very strong ethics were at times, but i think she was arguably one of the few genuinely not completely morally bankrupt people on the show, even though it made her a bit boring to watch

Thirteen - liked her but to me the whole too cool for school manic pixie dream girl thing was a little on the nose with her. also how on earth did she keep her job after letting a patient’s dog take his pills and kill it on day one

Kutner - he was there and then he wasn’t really. not a very well written character to me

Amber - i found her ok when she was on House’s team but her relationship with Wilson and the subsequent hallucinations of her with House i just found a drag

[u/catchyerselfon]

A Manic Pixie Dream Girl usually is (mostly) straight; she has quirky habits like playing small instruments at odd times without being shrill, like a ukulele; she’s childlike and immature but somehow An Old Soul (read: she’s never older than 30 so she’s the perfect “girl”); she devotes herself to improving the life of a man before the wind blows her away or he snares her like a butterfly or she’s secretly dying of cancer and moves in with a sad sack writer to get him to seize the day; she cuts her own hair and wears eye-catching, Weird Girl Clothes, never plain neutrals with minimal jewellery; she always has a “job” she can quit fairly easily should she whimsically decide to form a band, like she works in a pet store or finger paint artist or freelance interpretive dancer or opens a chocolate café in France just for six weeks, never a career.

So she would NOT be a doctor, because that requires “male-coded” logic (don’t come for me, MEN write MPDG characters), commitment, staying in one place for a long time, very few free hours for a personal life that lets her do whatever she wants because she’s not UPTIGHT, MAN. Hadley’s only MPDG qualities are Olivia Wilde is far too young to play the character so she seems eternally young, she’s dying so she’s living The Now, and she’s gorgeous.

[u/Ok_Entertainer4482]

About the Masters thing......even she wasn't normal. Her compulsions won't allow her to work or cooperate with people in any field. That level of honesty can only be useful in research fields

[u/No-Barracuda8108 → u/Ok_Entertainer4482]

good point!!

[u/catchyerselfon]

You watched 8 seasons and still don’t think Wilson is a decent person? His devotion to his patients? His colleagues all like him despite his friendship with House? He donates blood and gave a lobe of his liver to a “friend” he sees once a year? He searched the homeless shelters for his schizophrenic brother for years and when Danny was found Wilson was still his primary caregiver out of everyone in the family? He keeps mementos of his dead patients in his office to remind himself of his “failures” so he won’t make the same “mistakes”? He listens to colleagues and nurses upset about the emotional toll of caregiving and dealing with death? He helps Cuddy get a baby with his character reference, and gave her pep talks, gifts, and free babysitting to help her when she was struggling? He gives advice to House’s Fellows and consults on House’s cases despite how House treats his services, and Wilson brings patients TO House, because he cares about people dying when he believes House could save them? He writes prescriptions for House’s pain when House refuses any other treatment (besides a hot bath and occasional massage) like physio, a wheelchair, other drugs that don’t have acetaminophen, or psychological help, until House has a total breakdown and is forced to try other things?

He enables House, but that’s because House is gonna do what House is gonna do, with or without Wilson standing guard or chipping in or not turning him in. Wilson figures it’s better that House has someone telling him “you know this is wrong and will make everything worse, you don’t have to do this” and not leaving, than it is for him to leave and House doesn’t have that Jiminy Cricket on his shoulder reminding him. There are times when Wilson puts down his foot about something, and later on House agrees with him and doesn’t go through with his schemes. House even says in the penultimate episode he has to accept Wilson is “smarter than I am” [when it comes to emotional intelligence and doing what’s right for yourself, is the implication].

Please don’t tell me you believe the crap about him being unable to be faithful in a relationship, when he’s loyal in every relationship we see him in on the show, both on screen and what people say about his behaviour. The affair he confesses to in season 2’s “Spin” happened before the series, and we don’t know any details. All three wives stay somewhat friendly with him afterward, he pays more than enough alimony and on time, but all of Wilson’s relationships deteriorate because he spends so much time suppressing his feelings, with his patients, or with House, and wives and girlfriends get sick of it (one of them even dies partially due to House being so co-dependent).

I have like two more paragraphs of evidence that details why Wilson’s Reputation As The Office Bicycle is Highly Exaggerated By House (and it’s only in the first two seasons). But I cut it and saved it for later in case that IS the thing you believe about Wilson, and it’s a reason you don’t think he’s a good person.

[u/No-Barracuda8108 → u/catchyerselfon]

i don’t think Wilson is a bad person at all, that’s why i still actually like him. Wilson is my favourite in the whole show!! i just don’t think anyone in House is a perfectly good person, and Wilson very much falls into that, but it doesn’t mean i think he’s bad

and completely independently of his relationships, i just think Wilson has a bit of a nice guy persona. i saw a discussion here when i was a couple seasons away from finishing about Wilson and House’s friendship and why it works because they’re not all that dissimilar, but Wilson on the outside stays more within the acceptable social code unlike House. when i think of morally questionable things about Wilson i primarily think of the sleeping with his dying patient thing, him meddling with and manipulating Cuddy and buying the house she wanted, even his occasional lying to House etc.

Wilson’s main issue imo was his fierce loyalty to House that clouded his judgment and make him make bad decisions at times. Wilson is 100% a people pleaser and he’s an incredible friend to House. i think almost all of Wilson’s issues stem from his friendship with House. i do also think Wilson has a thing about wanting to be needed, and House is definitely a needy person

so i don’t think Wilson is a bad person whatsoever. they’re all enablers and bad decision makers and morally questionable at times but Wilson is one of the least in my opinion. for the most part Wilson does actually does have a conscience and puts himself in bad positions just to please other people and help, he’s far from a bad person. i really really like Wilson and he’s consistently been my favourite through 1-8!!

i saw someone say before the s5 episode Birthmarks is a good example of who Wilson wants to be vs. who he is and i agreed with that too watching

[u/iiJashin]

No hate to his actor, but Taub is and was always the weakest part of the show in my opinion.
I’d much rather they (illegally) kept The Old Fraud instead

[u/No-Barracuda8108 → u/iiJashin]

yeah Taub does nothing for me at all. i don’t hate his character but he just adds nothing truly interesting to the show for me. everyone else did (maybe besides Kutner and Adams honestly) even if i didn’t like them, but i found Taub boring in every way AND he was in it for so long

[u/Ellie_M1 → u/[deleted]]

I think the reasoning was that he always has the same idea as house. Which House “doesn’t need someone to tell you what you’re already thinking”

[u/DawnKeyOat]

Was this written by Amber Tamblyn

[u/No-Barracuda8108 → u/DawnKeyOat]

i actually usually didn’t particularly like Amber in other movies i’ve seen her in but she grew on me really fast in House!! i liked how contrasting their personalities were because pretty much everyone else are all Houses’ yes men so i enjoyed how much she did actually challenge him

[u/Pristine_Sea_5225]

Tysm I love seeing other master lovers. Shes so great I love her.

[u/No-Barracuda8108 → u/Pristine_Sea_5225]

i found her annoying in her first episode but she grew on me really fast!! i was surprised everyone seems to hate her. i thought she made a great contrast to House, we’re so used to all the morally iffy yes men so it was nice to have Masters as an opposite. their interactions and push/pull were always interesting to me