House of Cards

It took me until this week to get around to seeing House of Cards: not the original British version, but the Netflix-produced one I actually have access to. Political shows are not my thing, you see. They rank higher than legal or doctor shows as a group, but only just. So in spite of hearing that it was really good, I simply didn't bother until I needed something to occupy my brain while doing something fairly mindless.

It is really stinking good. Kevin Spacey is as amazing as always, the plot manages to be interesting even when it has no business being interesting, and the script - ah!

I might have mentioned at some point that I prefer entertainment that gives me credit for having a brain. There are lines which don't need to be finished, and others that don't even need to be said. This has a lot to do with my (apparently) peculiar way of thinking, but hitting such obvious points drags down my opinion of a program. There's also the absurd idea many directors seem to have that you need to be told how you should feel about what's going on. This ranges from sidekick characters mugging an emotion to cue the viewer's reaction, to interrupting a shot of a beautiful dance performance with a cut to the judges for whatever expression they happen to have. This is annoying on a different and more basic level than the assumption that you, the viewer, can't follow basic trains of thought. Both are annoying. House of Cards does neither.

The interesting thing about assuming the audience understands what's going on without spelling everything out means that the makers of the show can do it too! It is a lovely thing to be able to relax into a show, assured that the plot and interactions will proceed intelligently, that plot twists will make sense, and that I can trust them to provide an enjoyable ride without those bumps of logic which in a mystery are clues to what's happening but in most shows are just structural weakness.

Me, watching a series about politicians. Weird.