House - Episode Highlights

Breaking from the standard format, House gives a lecture to medical students, presenting them with three seemingly separate cases of leg pain. Through this narrative device, the episode reveals House's own backstory, explaining how a misdiagnosis led to the infarction in his thigh, his chronic pain, and his contentious relationship with his ex-girlfriend, Stacy Warner.

House is shot by a former patient's husband and, while undergoing a radical ketamine treatment for his leg pain, experiences vivid hallucinations. He awakens seemingly free of pain and with a renewed, more pleasant personality. The episode blurs the line between reality and hallucination, culminating in the reveal that much of what the audience witnessed was a product of House's mind.

In this two-part season finale, House survives a bus crash with amnesia and is haunted by the memory of a fellow passenger who is dying. "House's Head" is a frantic, surreal journey into House's shattered memory as he tries to identify the patient. The shocking conclusion reveals the patient is Wilson's new girlfriend, Amber. "Wilson's Heart" is a desperate and ultimately tragic race to save her, forcing House to risk his life to uncover the final memory that holds the key to her diagnosis.

While the team deals with a complex case of a dying man and his wife, Dr. Lawrence Kutner is found dead in his apartment from a suicide. The team, especially House, is unable to accept the lack of a rational explanation for his death. House becomes obsessed with finding a reason or a sign he missed, refusing to believe that the suicide was a simple, inexplicable act.

A feature-length premiere set almost entirely within a psychiatric hospital, where House has committed himself to detox from Vicodin and deal with his hallucinations. He clashes with the head doctor, Dr. Nolan (Andre Braugher), and forms unlikely bonds with his fellow patients, including his roommate Alvie (Lin-Manuel Miranda). The episode follows his painful journey of confronting his psychological issues without the shield of his intellect or his drugs.

House assists at the scene of a crane collapse, where he becomes fixated on saving a woman trapped under the rubble. He must perform a risky amputation in the field, a situation that mirrors the choice Cuddy had to make about his own leg years ago. The traumatic event, coupled with the news of Cuddy's engagement, pushes House to the brink, causing him to relapse on Vicodin. However, the episode ends with Cuddy arriving at his apartment and confessing her love for him.

In the series finale, a cornered and desperate House finds himself trapped in a burning building with a deceased patient. Facing an imminent prison sentence that will prevent him from being with the terminally ill Wilson in his final months, House hallucinates conversations with key figures from his past. He must decide whether to escape and face the consequences or give up. He ultimately fakes his own death, sacrificing his career and life as he knew it to be with his friend.