Monthly Archives: March 2015

I watched almost all of season 3 in the few days of spring break. And by that I mean that I watched 12 of the 13 episodes of House of Cards Season 3 in a two-day period over break. Can you say

(yes you can)

?

Indeed, I did binge-watch this TV show very very badly. I mean how can you not when Netflix gives you a introduction (which I sadly can’t find) that is as sweet as the one they use to introduce season 3 to the viewer. Anyways I will now begin the rather enjoyable process of recapping this season in a few words, and I plan on using the next passion blog post to predict stuff for Season 4 (which yes there DEFINITELY will be). So.

Therefore,

Spoilers ahead.

UN Ambassadors. Treaties. AmWorks. Horndog Russian president. Pussy Riot (humor me I couldn’t resist). Heather Dunbar (who was not memorable last season so I was really confused at first). Sex. Money. The usual jazz. A somewhat pseudo-homoerotic author. Marriage probs.

Whoo felt good to get those out. Anyways. Claire wants to be UN ambassador, Senate denies her, Frank uses recess appointment, Horny Russian pres doesn’t like her, forces Frank to remove her for a treaty to go through. Frank really want treaty. Russia like being a-hole. Frank trade lot for treaty. Me talking like caveman. Anyways that basically sums up the international part of last season (oh yeah, Pussy Riot makes an appearance too and dumps their wine on the floor, jerks), so I will move onto the home front.

Frank wants to run, but the Democratic leaders don’t want him to. He pulls Jackie in to be his VP if she hurts Heather Dunbar, the solicitor-general from last season who brought down Walker and nearly Frank, who turns out to be his main competitor. Frank uses illegal hurricane money to support his program AmWorks to gain public support. It works, but a hurricane almost hits, so Frank has to sign a bill which removes his money and loses his program. Frank then announces he’s running (he had already announced he wasn’t running earlier, see here) again and uses the initial success of AmWorks for support. To gain support, Frank hires an author Tom to write about his program, and the author somehow ends up writing about his marriage to Claire, who after many things, including being used as a popularity tool for Frank’s campaign and being forced to resign from the UN Ambassadorship, begins to reeeeeally hate Frank. The season ends on a truly surprising turn. Claire comes to talk to Frank about how she is really dissatisfied with doing nothing while he holds all the power and she put just as much work into their (really his) rise. This has been a recurring theme throughout the whole series. Claire is power-hungry too. So, with her hatred of him and dissatisfaction with where she’s at, Claire leaves Frank after helping him win the Iowa Caucus. Whoo. That was long. Can’t wait to conjecture about next season.

…I had a busy weekend, but definitely didn’t want to write another passion blog about House of Cards if I hadn’t watched any of the third season yet. But now, I have officially lost my HoC Season 3 virginity and, with two episodes under my belt, am now ready to talk about it. Now then…

SPOILERS AHEAD

Frank is now the president. Doug is alive. Claire wants to be the UN ambassador. Frank only has 18 months in office before elections. The Democratic Leadership is really not a big fan of Frank. Frank’s approval ratings are lower than Walker’s when Walker resigned. Frank literally only seems like he has four allies: his wife, his on-off friend/fortune-hunter Remy Danton, his Chief of Staff Seth Grayson, and his old Chief of Staff turned alcoholic Doug Stamper. Other than that, Frank is not a well-liked man right now, Neither party likes him. He is too liberal for the Republicans and too conservative for the Democrats. Then the ultimate insult comes his way: the Democratic leadership tells Frank that they do not want him to run for office in 2016. They tell him that it is his choice, but that if he ran, they would not support him. This does not go over well with Frank. Frank then starts a ploy (I would assume) that would have him not run again, but get his economic agenda, America Works (so real-life, crap-sounding, I know right), up and running. My assumption is that Frank will use this “no politics” move to earn back the trust of the American people and then turn back on his decision to not run for office two more times (yes he can do that check the Constitution) and be the second-longest tenured president in history (FDR obviously). In other news, Doug is an alcoholic again. And he also clearly has some thing for prostitutes. Being prescribed Percocet for his broken forearm and not telling the prescriber of his previous addictive tendency spells the beginning of the end for Doug. It made him like intoxication again and caused him to drink alcohol (weirdly out of a syringe from a prostitute ¯\_(ツ)_/¯) reviving his long-dead alcoholism which I think will slowly destroy either a) him or b) Frank and then therefore him. Basically Doug is screwed in my opinion. Even if he miraculously came back to his normal self, Rachel (his FIRST prostitute) is still out there to cause him reputational (I know that’s not a word, don’t judge me) or emotional harm, which will make him less useful to Frank than Seth, who has Doug’s old job and most likely will not give it up.

Side note: Where are Walker and Tusk. It makes mention of the fact that Frank “liberally used” pardons on several occasions, but I’m just surprised we haven’t seen his predecessor or previous competitor at all. Like where are they? I will be sure to blog more about this after Spring Break, when I can really get down to the business of binge watching this show.

me in a week lolol