All the Colors of the Racist Rainbow - 
by Kat
At first I wasn't all that happy with this episode of House. It had a clipped pace to it that wasn't very appealing, all the interesting action happened in the first half-hour, and some of the subplots were pretty strained. They tried to get all earnest with Serious Issues, like race dynamics. House is not a show built for Serious Issues, unless it's taking the piss out of them and letting Hugh Laurie be a sarcastic, nasty man. But then I rethought it and yes, while the show stumbled over itself trying to be progressive, we got a few steps closer to what we all want out of this show: Cuddy and House knockin’ boots! So I guess it was a pretty good episode, after all.
Go Cuddy, go Cuddy, kickin’ ass, stayin’ fit - OH! You’ve got a pain! But youuuuu’re still going! Yay Cuddy! Of course, she ruins it all for me by being a raging classist bitch to her handyman. She won’t let him go, even though his asthma is acting up. She doesn’t want to be embarrassed at her dinner party tonight by a leaky roof. The poor guy agrees to stay and finish, and Cuddy goes inside, where she has another pain. It just looks like PMS to me, since she’s indicating pain at her right ovary. (Look at me, talking like a doctor.) Then she starts choking and coughing. Yeah right. Who do you think you are, Six Feet Under? Obviously she’s fine, just a little taken aback when Alfredo falls off the roof.
Cuddy accompanies Alfredo in the ambulance, and figures out he’s not paralyzed, at least. However, his fingers are turning purple. Alfredo asks if that’s bad, and Cuddy responds by staring, terrified, at the EMT. Terrified staring is TV-speak for ‘yes.’
When they get to the hospital, House, Cuddy, and Wilson talk about the case and use lots of complicated medical speak that I don’t understand, but that’s OK. What’s important to know is that House sexually harasses the bejeezus out of Cuddy here (she’s still wearing her workout clothes).
Chase is trying to treat Alfredo, but the guy does not want to be in the hospital. His mom and little brother are there, and Alfredo is explaining that he has to work, as he’s the breadwinner for the family. Chase doesn’t understand this language of the poor people and gets all huffy. Later, Cuddy gets all frantic and orders the most extreme course of action for Alfredo – drugs that help with blood clotting that she thinks is causing his dying fingers. Of course, she second-guesses herself later as she talks with Stacy. Meanwhile, House is discussing Alfredo with Wilson. I really like Wilson as House’s sounding board, and it looks like the Cuddy-Stacy relationship might be paralleling that. This is good, because this show needs more sympathetic female characters. And by “more,” I mean “one, just one, oh please oh please before Cameron turns me into a complete misogynist.”
B-story time, and this time it stars Foreman. His issue: racism. He has a clinic patient, an older African-American man who refuses to take medication that’s specifically targeted to African-Americans. He’s sick of whitey propagating lies to the black man. Actually, his argument is a little tenuous, but it’s just a setup for Foreman to get in a fight with House later.
Back to Alfredo now. He can’t feel his right arm, and Chase determines that he’s got a bleed in his brain. Immediate surgery ensues. Gosh, this show is all about drilling into people’s heads. Wow, this one got graphic, with blood spurting out of Alfredo’s skull everywhere. Good thing I’m prepared, with my Tuesday Night Puke Bucket right here by my bed.
And I’m gonna need it. After the surgery Cameron checks up on Alfredo, and the magic stethoscope-camera shows us some nasty pustules on his lungs. Cuddy thinks it’s from stress brought on by his fall from her roof. House mocks her (and I think he kind of has a point) for making Alfredo’s illness all about her. I know Cuddy’s only doing it out of guilt, but still. Get over, be a doctor now. Foreman proposes that Alfredo has pneumonia, since that can cause purple fingers. Oooh! Oooh! That happened to me once! I was 17 and thought I had a cold, but I was really tired too and had to lie down in the hall every time I tried to leave my room, and my mom thought I was just lazy, but finally when my hands turned purple she took me to the doctor’s office and they were all like, “uh, she has advanced pneumonia, maybe you should take your first-born to the ER now,” and man, the therapy bills since then have been astonishing.
Um, where were we? Oh yeah, Cuddy agrees that it’s pneumonia since Alfredo’s asthma was acting up before he fell. House has her and Cameron go to Alfedo’s house to see if there are any guilty bacteria there. More interestingly, House, Chase and Foreman head over to Cuddy’s house, on the rather dubious theory that Alfredo is there a lot and may have become infected there. They pass by Stacy and Wilson on their way out. Wilson tells Stacy what’s up, and Stacy first seems surprised, then suspicious of House’s interest in Cuddy. Wilson basically tells her that she doesn’t get to care about House and Cuddy, at least not that way. Again, I love the interactions between the older characters – you can see the shared history and affection between them. That’s some good acting.
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