Day 2 in the (Not Big Brother) House House

24 has finished and its second-rate replacement, The Hades Factor, is hellish. Big Brother is not interesting this year because Nikki will go back into the house, but Pete will win. Unless Glyn does.

So there has to be some interesting addictive TV to watch otherwise I will have to pretend I have read lots of erudite and worthy books during the holidays.

Fortunately, thanks to Nicky Board, I have discovered...

...which I have being watching in 4-hour blocks and will have to keep watching until I have finished all 6 DVDs. (And then I will have to get Series 2 on e-Bay...)

Part of the appeal was to see if Hugh Laurie could carry off anything other than wacky upper-class Englishman against Stephen Fry. And he totally can. Within five minutes you forget it's him and believe he's Dr Gregory House MD. Accent, limp, walking stick, attitude.. all good.

And then you are sucked in. Was the Nun allergic to her tattoo? Or something else? Is that really a tapeworm in the kindergarten teacher's brain? Just how did that woman get African Sleeping Sickness? Did those students really get poisoned by their jeans?

It's a bit like Casualty in that...

Most episodes start outside the hospital, showing the events
leading to the onset of illness for that week's patient. (Wikipedia)

But instead of some (stunt) woman falling off a ladder or rolling (unconvincingly) over the bonnet of a speeding car, House and his team (the dead one from Dead Poets' Society and someone from Neighbours) have to deal with very complex and rare things which they normally solve within the last five minutes, probably accompanied by some very graphic CGI shots zooming internally to focus on organs failing in Dolby Digital Surround Sound.

And then getting better.

Usually watched over by cranky and unbelieving relatives who have to admit, grudgingly, that House was right all along.

Only another 40 episodes to watch before Sky show series 3. Thank goodness for the summer holidays...