I tend to go on long, extended rants about tv shows- partly because it's a topic that is safe to discuss and disagree with, and partly because I end up spending a lot of time watching a show. So when it disappoints me, I feel like all of the time that I've spent watching the show has been wasted.
The king of rants for me is Battlestar Galactica (BSG), which was so brilliant the first year and a half, and then nosedived into a preachy, whiny self-righteous show that made no sense whatsoever. They spent the first year proclaiming that the Cylons had a plan... and then decided to drop whatever that plan was. I don't know what happened halfway through season 1, but whoever ran the show lost everything that made it so appealing. And...
But, I digress. This post is about House of Cards, on Netflix. I finished season 3 today, and... it's not as awful as BSG. The last episode isn't quite as frustrating as the final episode of the Sopranos. But it was disappointing, to the point that I may not watch a season 4.
First, the good parts. Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright are fantastic. Michel Kelly has been great as Doug Stamper. And finally, in season 3 they have competent foes, both at home (Heather Dunbar) and abroad (the Russian President).
But the season was disappointing, for the following reasons (spoilers after the jump break):
1) They wasted 1/2 the season on Doug- his recovery, slipping back to alcoholism, working with Dunbar... and in the end, NOTHING CHANGED. He went back to working for Underwood, went back to being his loyal pit bull, and went back to putting his loyalty above all else. After spending the entire season without Rachel, they spent over half the final episode with her- only for Doug to kill her and render his entire plothook as needless. The writers could have had Doug kill her at the end of last season and changed nothing, except to give the show a lot more time for... well, anything else.
2) The first two seasons were about the Underwood plotting and conniving together. This season has been about the world and reality fighting their conniving. But instead of focusing on that, so much of the non-Stamper time was spent on their marriage. Which- it's not that interesting. I prefer the Underwoods against the world- not Francis vs. Claire.
3) Not to mention that Claire remains the single most unlikable character on a tv show. Francis is pure ambition- get in his way and he'll gut you. But Claire has shown a cruel streak throughout the series that was more vicious than Underwood.
This season, in addition to her cruelty, she's added incompetence and whining to her repertoire. She hurt both her husband and the US with her attacks on Petrov, she got fooled by the Russian Ambassador- and, when her husband needs her, she decides now to be upset that she sacrificed her ambition for Francis?
The weird thing is that I think the writers are expecting the audience to root for Claire- but I was agreeing with everything Francis said at the end of the episode.
(Note: The fact that Robin Wright- Princess Buttercup- makes such a vile character of Claire amazes me)
(Note 2: It would have been brilliantly meta if Cary Elwes had played Adam Galloway)
4) The characters I really enjoyed that are still around- Heather Dunbar, Remy, Jackie Sharp, Mendoza- were either dropped or limited to cameos at the last episode. They've spent three years building up these other characters- why drop them all at the last episode?
OK- Rant over. I've spent 39 episodes on this show. Unless I hear that season 4 is awesome, I don't expect to see any more.
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