This week’s triumphant return of House to the Monday night lineup opened with a group of teenage girls (who seemed as if they’d be more at home on My Super Sweet Sixteen) trying to get into a band’s concert after-party. Amid the hustle and bustle of teenage drama, the headstrong one of the pack (played by Annabelle Attanasio), along with her token sidekick, cut the line and join the band in the elevator. Fast-forward to the following morning, when, during a recitation of the night’s exploits, Little Miss Headstrong notices her hands and feet have swollen to the size of balloons and summarily collapses.

Episode Summary

Our party-prone patient regains consciousness in Princeton-Plainsboro, with the diagnostics team doing its best to figure out the cause of her swollen appendages. House (Hugh Laurie), just before his departure with Cuddy (Lisa Edelstein) and Wilson (Robert Sean Leonard) for a medical conference, diagnoses her with Rhabdo disease and, satisfied, hobbles away.

Unfortunately, a CT scan disproves House’s snappy diagnosis, and so the rest of the diagnostics team is left to deal with the patient while House is gone. The team goes through the usual hoops, juggling between a low potassium count, bulimia and Rickettsia (a fever-inducing disease contracted from dogs).

While the team slogs through various tests to determine a diagnosis that fits, House, Cuddy and Wilson arrive at their conference, where House is determined to do something about his feelings for Cuddy. His plans are sadly smashed when he finds that Cuddy is not alone in her room –- she’s with her new boyfriend, Lucas (Michael Weston), House’s private investigator from Season 5.

Returning to Princeton-Plainsboro, the team is struggling to find a diagnosis for their partier’s predicament. When the patient begins to bleed internally, the team loses direction and is unsure of the next step. Of course, at that exact instant, House, miles away, has what must now be called “the House moment,” and instantly realizes what’s wrong with the patient, who he’d only really inspected through telephone calls. He diagnoses her with a bad reaction to oysters she ate during her night cavorting, with the intense reaction due to genetic Hemachromatosis.

The episode closes with what we all really wanted to see: Chase and Cameron finally talking. Chase, with baited breath, finally tells Cameron that he was the cause of Dibala’s death. Cameron, horrified, backs away from Chase as the screen fades to black.

What Worked

The House-Cuddy tension has been a long-standing theme in House, and the curveball of Lucas’ return as Cuddy’s new boyfriend was something that no one saw coming.

What Didn’t

I’m aware that on TV shows, in many episodes where certain characters are not at the forefront of the plot, they fade into the background. The background, though, is not where Dr. Foreman belongs — it doesn’t suit his character’s personality.

Predictions

The open-ended ending with Cameron and Chase means that something big is going to happen; whether it’s an explosion between the two of them over Dibala or possibly something worse, we won’t know until next Monday.