TV Recap: ‘House,’ “Brave Heart”

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More than any of the other episodes featuring Chase, Cameron and Foreman working together this season, “Brave Heart” felt like the band was really back together.We had Cameron’s bleeding heart pushing the buttons of House and the patient, some House and Cuddy squabbling and great House-Wilson stuff. And though the episode wasn’t overly great, it still felt nice to see the structure flow in a classic House way. The patient this week, Donny, had been living on the edge because all the men in his family die around age 40 of heart attacks. Thus, he’s jumping (parkouring?) around on rooftops, probably eating/drinking whatever he wants and avoiding any sort of emotional relationship. But he’s right on the brink of the time he’s supposedly going to bite it — and there is nothing wrong.

Of course while the team tries to figure out what’s wrong with the guy, they’re visited by an old flame who tells them that Donny actually does have a son(!) even though he doesn’t know. The baby mama is worried that her son might have the same disease or issues, so he’s tested as well in hopes of figuring out what’s wrong with both of them. Meanwhile, Cameron butts in and thinks that Donny should know that he has a son and vice versa, which annoys everyone around.

House isn’t overly interested in this case because he doesn’t think there is anything wrong with Donny. In fact, after getting frustrated with the differentials and Cameron’s prodding about the son, House takes it upon himself (with Chase’s reluctant help) to lie to Donny, telling him he has a fake disease that can be cured by a simple medication (which are really just mints). Donny buys it, is discharged — and then dies.

Foreman and House do the autopsy in hopes of figuring out what the hell happened with Donny (they had already dug up his male family members to investigate) only to find that Donny is actually alive! Holy crap. Turns out his heart beat dropped to a level so low that folks thought he was dead, but he was not. Donny then rips out his own tooth with some forceps! Crazy. However, House eventually figures out that Donny has a “self-destruct button,” an aneurysm in his head that grows and grows and grows until it finally just stops the heart. Case solved. Donny and son share a moment. Awww.

On the non-case front, House deals with two issues: hearing whispers and having to do rounds again to get his license back. The first freaks him out enough that midway through the episode he’s willing to quit again. The whispers he hears inside Wilson’s shine to Amber are that bad. He moves out to the couch, and it doesn’t really work. But eventually he finds that it was Wilson all along, talking to Amber before he went to bed. Once ole Jimmy knew that House knew, he tried to screw with him by convincing him it was time to go back to the loony bin! Oh, James. Either way, this actually leads House to talk to his dead father before he goes to sleep the following night, as he’s finally ready to give up all the bad stuff between them in hopes of remembering his dad as a good man.

At the hospital, Cuddy forces House to do rounds in hopes of getting his license back, but the rounds resident isn’t as tough as the people at the loony bin — they give in after like 20 minutes of House’s antics. Cuddy then decides to supervise House himself, but she eventually gives in as well, but for what reason it wasn’t really clear. Just because she wants to do House? I’m not really sure.

On the Chase front, in this one he’s unwilling to treat the patient because Donny’s in the same room as Dibala. So instead he tries to drink himself silly, avoid any contact with Cameron and really just place himself in an increased state of sloppiness. He goes to church in hopes of getting some sort of absolution, but no dice. He’s screwed unless he turns himself in it seems.

Random thoughts:

• As much as I love me some Olivia Wilde, this effort was so much better without Thirteen.
• WHERE IS TAUB!!!!!!?>??>!?!?!?1?! NOT COOL.
• At this point, Hugh Laurie and Jesse Spencer are carrying the show, let’s hope some other characters get some love (WILSON!) soon.