Kevin Spacy and Robin Wright on House of Cards
Full spoilers for all of the second season of House of Cards
ahead
Thoughts on the second season of House of Cards right after I
get back to whipping those votes…
Netflix’s poster boy show, the bold political drama House of
Cards returned on Valentine’s Day for mass consumption. As per the Netflix norm
all of the episodes were released at once just asking for one grand binge
viewing system that has somewhat changed the style of television viewing (of
course this existed before the Netflix phenomenon but I guess it made it “cool”).
As I did with last season I watched House of Cards in fairly short order (this
time in closer succession then last year finishing these in off and on viewing
for three days) and again I found myself mixed. Overall I enjoy the show and
thought it was painless to watch these in such close succession to one another,
but the more reflection given to what was just watched the emptier and emptier
it seems. House of Cards is ultimately too shallow character wise for the sense
of self importance it places upon itself. That along with some strangely stupid
and convoluted plot choices makes the second season of House of Cards a beautiful
but painfully empty thirteen episodes of television.
The first and most confusing aspect of the second season of
the show is how messy the show gets to get to Frank becoming president. This
could have been a simple process, one that could have easily been done by just
continuing most of the plotlines from last season. Instead in the first episode
of the season they kill off Kate Mara’s Zoe Barns. Sure it’s a bold move one
that certainly caught me off guard but, as with the rest of the show it seemed
like an empty surprise. It only took the show six episodes of B plot to
seemingly course correct and forget about Barns in the most unsatisfying way
possible. The Zoe Barns vs. Frank Underwood arc could have been a great season
long arc if handled correctly giving off constant tensions the entire way
through while the rest of the cool political drama could have been put into the
b plot.
What we got though was very messy. I swear there were about
five different A plot arcs across this season each one layering on top of the
next one in more confusing ways. The show tried the Zoe’s pathetic journalist
arc and soon scrapped that, they tried the Frank vs. Raymond Tusk arc but soon relegated
it to the background, they tried the Clair sexual assault arc that was
ultimately quickly turned from an interesting and humanizing B plot to a forgotten
side arc that existed only to benefit Frank, and they tried the Jacky trying
not to be Frank arc that just kind of fizzled out. There was never a clear arc
to get from point A to point B and it seemed as if the show was constantly changing
identities, trying to cram what seemed like a few seasons of potentially great
storylines into one convoluted mess.
This ultimately wouldn’t have been as frustrating though if
I didn’t have the problems I already had and continue to have with this show.
The primary problem is that the show seems very empty character and meaning
wise. As much as I love evil Kevin Spacey being evil, the way the character is
written is so very one note and ultimately it makes the show around it feel
tired and empty. Every time it seemed that the show was trying to humanize
Frank (or for that matter most of the rest of the characters on this show) the
show pulls the rug right from it, as if to say “psych, got ya.” It’s not like I
want Frank to be good and noble or anything but it would nice to have another
character trait or back story element other than Frank is evil and will do anything
possible to gain his goal.
This isn’t just a problem with Frank but with most
characters on this show. It seems that every time that the show tried to do
something for its characters it would always end up undermining the progress in
favor of returning to the one note tick of the character. This is especially
true for the newest addition to the series Jacky who starts to get this more
humanizing with the relationship with Remy she soon goes back to a one dimensional
tick of being Frank’s protégé. Same thing with Claire who gets some great
moments with the sexual assault bill, but ultimately reverts back to being the
ice queen almost instantly and without too much warning. Sure one could argue
that it’s a theme of people can’t generally change, but if that’s the case it’s
not well. There needs to be an emotional core somewhere, something that people
can grasp on to otherwise what is left feels vapid and empty. With House of Cards
I never felt anything throughout the 13 hours that was all that substantive
(even if the show feels that I should take it seriously) and by the end of my
marathon I felt empty inside. There never seems to be anything all that made me
emotionally invested in these characters beyond the fun I have watching these
great actors have fun.
It’s so hard to ignore the emptiness also as the show takes itself
so very seriously. Most of the time the show feels like it should be a fun
piece of pulp fiction, but instead it treats itself so self importantly and so
seriously that it’s hard to have fun with Kevin Spacey’s fun political maneuvers.
The show never seems to earn its seriousness, mostly because of its emptiness,
and thus the show can drag whenever it tries an obvious elaborate metaphor or
analogy or tries to be politically important with a big overarching message.
This show is fun, but it should be more fun than it is and it shouldn’t try to
take itself so seriously, because when it does it feels even emptier in
relation of what it is trying to do.
That all being said, watching House of Cards is an enjoyable
and painless process that I managed to get through quite quickly. Despite the
emptiness the show still looks beautiful and has political moments that are a
whole lot of fun. Despite the convoluted nature of the plot this year, the show
overall does a better job of making it seems as though Frank is making the plan
up on the fly and that he’s not completely all powerful (of course not quite
enough to make him feel vulnerable or desperate which the show never quite achieves).
The show, despite how seriously it takes itself, is fun and has its moments,
and overall I think that season 2 is on par with the first, it does some things
better, like making more of its supporting characters near the middle of the
season, and other things worse, like not having an emotional center like the one
established by Corey Stoll’s character last season. I will be back when season
3 rolls around next year, and I hope the potential downfall of Frank Underwood
(which I assume will happen as it seems he has reached the ceiling of power,
unless they imagine him as something like president of the world) provides more
depth to a fundamentally empty show.
Some other musings:
- One of the worst things the show ends up doing is the journalism arc. Watching these back to back, the “deep internet” thing is kind of awful and involved a whole lot of silliness with a character I had no inkling to care about. I was frustrated but at the same time kind of glad they got rid of Zoe’s bland boyfriend and ultimately I wish that Zoe herself had an arc, as I liked Kate Mara’s work on this show, instead of being killed off in the first episode for shock value.
- I think this show doesn’t work as well with the Netflix streaming model as it wants to think it is. Watching these in a marathon made the flaws of the show stand out to me more as I didn’t have as much breathing room and thus saw more of the ongoing flaws than I would perhaps watching them on a weekly basis. Maybe had the show had forced me to play this out over a longer period of time I wouldn’t have felt as empty near the finish of the season.
- I still like what the actors are able to do on this show despite the thin nature of the characters. I think Kevin Spacey’s performance is very good all around, as are Robin Wright’s and Molly Parker’s and the rest of the supporting class. Spacey’s especially is toned down from last season and despite the thin writing the performance feels more nuanced and slightly less over the top (maybe a lot of it has to do with the diminished southern accent). The cast ultimately clicks and work well together and make most of the fun of this show.
- So why is there a threesome between Frank, Claire and their strange bodyguard? Was this a dream sequence or another elaborate metaphor? I yelled what and laughed quite hard throughout that scene, surprised by the fact that the show would even go to such silly lengths while trying so hard to make me think that this was utterly serious business.
That’s it for me on House of Cards for this year. It may
seem like I’m a little down on the show but ultimately I did enjoy most of it, I’m
just disappointed that the flaws of this show (which is totally my kind of show
subject wise) prevent me from full on loving it.
That’s just me though. What did everyone else think?
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