DAMMIT DAMMIT DAMMIT. They killed off my favorite character!
The thing that pissed me off is the whole blip of a 'memorial' they showed at the end. Apparantly that confused a lot of people into wondering if Kal Penn was actually still alive. (He is.)
It was worth it to see Meat Loaf in that particular role. Heh.
"As you may have read in Robert Parker's Wine Newsletter, 'Donaghy Estates tastes like the urine of Satan, after a hefty portion of asparagus.'" Jack Donaghy, 30 Rock
Originally posted by whatever The thing that pissed me off is the whole blip of a 'memorial' they showed at the end. Apparantly that confused a lot of people into wondering if Kal Penn was actually still alive. (He is.)
My sister texted me and asked if he was still alive....when I said yes, she asked why they have a memorial to him on the website. I explained it was just the character's memorial (they even showed "Lawrence Kutner: 19whatever-2009") on the clip of the website they showed at the end.
My money is on: He was suicidal his entire life because of his parent's murder. He only stayed alive to testify at the murderer's parole board. Once the murderer died, he had no reason to live.
GREAT shock, I had read about SOMEBODY on a big show killing themselves, but had no clue it would be on a show I actually watch.
Meatloaf was great. It's surprising how good an actor he can be.
F*CK!!! Kutner was my favorite character and was the ONE I was hoping would stay around the longest. I always said those three (Taub, 13 and Kutner) were a short term solution to add life into the show and that the original three would be back eventually. I think with Kutner's death, 13's Huntington's disease getting worse and Taub's general indecisiveness, all three will be back by the end fo the season.
And if House falls into ANYONES bed, it had BETTER be Cuddy's!!
I was surprised, I was starting to feel the show was in kind of a rut, and this was a great shot in the arm, and I can't wait to see where the show goes from here. I also feel that the original three will be back eventually.
Ladies and gentlemen, the following public service message is brought to you by your friends from D-Generation X, who would like to remind each and every one of you that if you're not down with that, we've got two words for you... For those not fully in the know: Kutner being killed off wasn't creative's choice; Kal Penn wanted out (ausiellofiles.ew.com) since he's lined up a position in the Obama White House as an associate director in the office of public liaison (of all things), and I wish him well. While I enjoyed Kutner greatly like most, I like the way this played out, and the audience reactions have been quite appropriate, because suicide is very often random, senseless, and unexplainable just as it appeared to the characters.
I don't see this as the start of slowing pushing out the New Ducklings in favor of the Old Ducklings. Taub & Thirteen are going to be around for a while, I'm sure, and there's still a lot of unexplored territory to consider for both characters (Taub in particular). In the meantime, Kutner's suicide should set up the rest of the season nicely.
smark/net attack Advisory System Status is: Elevated (Holds; June 18, 2006) While the switch from Cena to RVD should alleviate some complaints, the inevitability of the belt's return to Cena (note where Summerslam is this year) and the poor initial showing by the new ECW are enough to keep the indicator where it is for now. The pieces are in place, though, especially on RAW, for improvements to be made to the IWC's psyche in the near future.
Haven't been watching these live, or even same day (or even same week) this season, because they've been not so good. Didn't work so well with this one, which I'm sure was the idea - this show has lost it's buzz (because it's not been so good) and this at least gets everything talking.
I understand the message that with some suicides, none of the people closest can tell it's coming. Although, as a PSA they're trying to pretend it to be, since all it's saying is 'people die sometimes, feel free to be sad about it.' It only works as The Mystery Even House Can't Solve (Until He Does) and even then it feels a bit forced.
The suicide itself feels more fake, more like some of the other ludicrous plot twists this season. I will accept friends and family can't see suicides coming some of the time, but the people watching the shows are neither friends or families. We get a much closer to omniscient look of the characters' life - with Kutner, we've seen him go to the house of someone he once bullied and we've seen him recover from a traumatic situation by going home and eating cereal and watch TV. Unless the point they're trying to make is actually 'some suicide victims don't even know they're about to kill themselves until five seconds before they do - doesn't life suck for them!', it's a cheap shock death to get people to care about this show.
Maybe if this show was at the level it was previous seasons, I'd be willing to give it more of a benefit of the doubt. But this fits with most of the rest (the previous week's episode was uncommonly good, got my hopes up) and I don't look forward to the rest of the season playing around with this.
Doesn't Thirteen still have that medical condition where sh'e only got a year or so still to live? She'll probably be gone by the middle of next season, or sooner, I assume.
Taub has already shown that he wants to leave, but he can't afford to just yet. Maybe he'll get a job offer doing something else and take that.
This will leave it open for the original three to all come back to working for House.
As for the episode, I like Kal Penn and I hate to see him go. Out of the new guys, he was the more interesting character and I think it sucks that they had to kill him, but his new job sounds pretty cool and how can anyone turn down something like that.
Originally posted by StaggerLeeSo, can we do fantasy booking about the "WHY?"?
My money is on: He was suicidal his entire life because of his parent's murder. He only stayed alive to testify at the murderer's parole board. Once the murderer died, he had no reason to live.
I think Cutty nailed it: Kutner was the most like House, and, as with the earlier assistants, that's a giant burden to bear. He couldn't deal with it.
Plan B: He was alone. Thirteen, a girl with a debilitating disease, had someone. Taub, who cheated on his wife, had someone. Kutner had his geek home. That's it. I think the morning hit him particularly hard, and he wanted out.
"To be the man, you gotta beat demands." -- The Lovely Mrs. Tracker
Aw man. That was gripping and cheap at the same time. I respect the ambition of doing something like this, and I liked everybody's reactions, but having a death like that still feels like dramatic cheating. Plus they just killed Amber less than a year ago -- feels distressingly ER'y. But it was neat how they did a major character death without any of the requisite melodrama, bathos, goodbye scenes, etc. (at least not BEFORE he actually died).
Originally posted by whateverThe thing that pissed me off is the whole blip of a 'memorial' they showed at the end.
So weird! Apparently Kutner touched all our lives?
I was sorta wondering if the "dog being sick" was a reference to the Benoit suicide / murders and the texts to his friends about the dog being outside or whatever. If so that is two of my favorite shows that seemed to have storylines influenced by that horrible incident (this in addition to Shane on the Shield)
Meltzer reported a 1.5 rating for Monday's show. I'm with CRZ in thinking that TUF/UFC shouldn't be seen as a major threat to the WWE on Mondays. Frank