Originally written on November 1, 2006.
The Lead In: A young, mixed race, married couple are finishing up dinner in a diner when the diner is robbed. Playing the hero, the young man attacks the robbers and wins only to find his wife lying on the floor unable to breathe.
The Plot: Thinking the wife, Tracy (Jurnee Smolett) could be having an infection that only shows up when she is active; Foreman puts her on the treadmill. Even though she complains of abdominal pains, and the husband, Bobby (Scott Rinker) screams, Foreman makes her continue running. Soon the husband has similar pains and, as it turns out, has the same illness.
Tracy later has a hallucination that Bobby’s pill-popping racist father is in the hospital telling her to leave Bobby alone, and for Bobby to not touch the girl as he begins to break his arm. From the hallucination, she goes into a coma.
The team eventually decides that they need to do a biopsy of Tracy’s brain stem, but they need Bobby’s permission to do so. There is much discussion of the ethics behind this, because Bobby may grant permission to do so simply because it could help cure him. It is decided that Wilson may do the asking as he has a way with people. Bobby refuses the biopsy, afraid of the risks, and decides that they should do it on him. The problem is that he does not yet have those symptoms and would have to go off meds to do so.
A biopsy isn’t needed as Bobby’s intestines begin to rot and a new diagnosis is given. It turns out that the two lovers are related and Bobby’s dad isn’t so racist after all. In fact, he is Tracy’s father as well and the illness is related to the incest.
Oooh.
The subplot: On one of his clinic stints, House ticks off a patient (David Morse) who calls House on his perpetual rudeness. In retribution, House gives the patient a rectal thermometer and leaves work before it is extracted.
The patient raises crap with Cuddy who tries to make House apologize. House refuses and ticks the patient off even more. Turns out the patient is actually Detective Tritter who nails House for speeding at the end of the episode. Well, speeding and drug possession, for carrying his pills without a prescription. The episode ends with House being arrested.
The Subplot Part II: House notices Wilson chatting up a pretty nurse and automatically suspects they are dating. This irritates House because a) House is alarmed that Wilson will screw up another relationship or b) House fears Wilson will wind up in a happy relationship and not need him anymore.
Much betting goes on between House and Foreman as to the actual nature between Wilson and the nurse until it is disclosed that it is Foreman who is dating the woman.
The rating: ***
This episode seemed a little off to me. The actual patients seemed to take a bigger back seat to the internal bickering and subplots. The incest conclusion seemed more tabloid than usually allowed on the show, and in the end, I didn’t particularly care about the patients at all.
The whole Detective Tritter arrests House plot should prove very interesting though.
The excuse: I watched the episode after having driven some 600 miles to my parent’s house. Watching with them is an interesting experience as they tend to talk loudly through the proceedings. That and the exhaustion made my viewing experience a little lax and most assuredly has an effect on this review.
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