Tag Archives: passion

Alright so we all know how the fourth season of House of Cards will most definitely be happening because season 3 ends with such a ridiculous cliffhanger that there is literally no other alternative.

This is literally how it ends.

^not really. But Claire, who is most definitely the deuteragonist, has just abandoned Frank and is soon going to be his greatest enemy because of how she was, put simply, his only true ally. Also, I would venture that the guess that she is also the inly person who Frank truly has emotions for, which in Frank’s world and in the way that he acts in it, is a very big weakness (I really bet Frank would love to be a robot and have no emotion at all, just precise calculating and raw efficiency). Anyways here are a few of my predictions:

-Frank relies on Seth and Doug more than ever and places them in the position he had Claire in in effect (minus the emotion)

-Frank does NOT get reelected (either he loses to Heather Dunbar for the Democrats’ nomination or he loses to the Republican contender down the road): my guess would be he loses to Dunbar, who would go on to win (remember the Republicans have no real contender either, with their leader succumbing to corruption charges or some garbage, I think the actor quit). The idea of having a Republican in office however, seems to be an enticing idea as it would seem to bring Frank full circle and he is still eligible to run twice more.

-Frank will definitely continue to control Claire, probably through all that she has to lose (not sure how he will overcome what she knows), and the abortion and the rape thing will definitely seem to continue well into this season. Frank will start off the season definitely as enemies, but something tells me by the end, through some circumstance or another, that they will end up on the same team again.

-Heather Dunbar might be the one who brings Claire and Frank back together because they really truly hate her together and she is definitely not a fan of any of them. The one thing that Claire and Frank have in common is their mutual hunt for power, in fact Claire’s dissatisfaction with the lack of power and responsibility she got as First Lady was one of the reasons she ended up leaving Frank who held all of the power and kept not trusting her with anything, as he kept ignoring anything she said, and the one time he trusted her was when she was the UN Ambassador and got the Israel/Palestine situation further messed up. Heather’s taking of power from the Underwoods might make Frank and Claire realize why they loved each other in the first place: for them to help each other, in effect, take over the world.

In the end, Frank will probably get Claire back, but at a rather high temporary cost: power. But for him, she might be worth it.

And, boy, do sharks love blood

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

*Major Spoilers Ahead!*

Proceed with Caution

Alright so Frank is back in just 12 MORE DAYS!!:) I really can’t wait! Now I am warning you right now that if you do not want to know the extremely juicy details about the upcoming season, stop reading.

Okay.

Here we go.

DOUG IS ALIVE. MARITAL TROUBLES. RUSSIA. CORRUPTION. DEATH. FLYING DONKEYS. UNITED NATIONS. HURRICANES. MORE PROSTITUTES.

Okay, so one of those might have been ever-so-slightly fabricated. But the other ones are completely true and seem to have a very large basis in forming the plot of the next season. First off, Doug is not dead, despite what many people thought. What I always thought was going to happen to Doug is actually what is going to happen: Doug is alive, but so upset over Rachel not liking him back that he reverts to alcoholism, opening the door for Seth to take the reins as Frank’s right-hand-man/servant. The Huffington Post has a very interesting article that highlights the details of each of the upcoming episodes and it can be found here. Russia, to me, seemed to be the next logical step in international affairs for this fictional United States because last season had already dealt with our other country that is a competitor: China. The United Nations was not something that I had thought of, but it seems to make logical sense, especially with Frank officially being the most powerful man in America. Knowing Frank, Claire will rise to be the U.N.’s Secretary-General and those two will rule over all the planet. That seems a little far-fetched, but with Frank’s level of success so far, it would not surprise me if he or Claire gained a significant foothold on the international community through the U.N.

Being perfectly honest, I think Frank will be caught and this season might end up as a loss for him. The mini-series from Britain on which House of Cards is based ends with Francis Urquhart being caught for his corrupt and ambitious crimes and ends with the nation being thrown into turmoil once more. Now the problem with this theory is that this version of House of Cards is NOT a mini-series and has made its producer, Netflix, a large profit. Like most corporations, (here’s looking at you, Disney) Netflix will  probably not just put an end to a good thing (particularly a good thing that’s won several Emmys) that is making lots of money and is only a few years old, and has an entire political universe to explore. Therefore, I think it is more likely that Frank loses reelection in 2016 and then takes the season after his loss to regain power, and then take another season for his second term, and then, finally, after Netflix is happy and Kevin Spacey is sick of it, the show will end, justice will happen, and Frank will either be imprisoned (unlikely to me) or will die a fabulous death that shows that he truly loves his country and especially Claire, who will be prego. Wow I love speculating. Tell me what you think below!!

Rumor has it Frank just goes on a rampage in this season… (not really)

*SPOILERS*

House of Cards season 3 has not actually started yet, but it will be the topic of this passion blog for this spring semester of 2015. On February 27, Frank and Claire will return for a pivotal third season that will be the first full season in which the audience will see Frank in the White House acting as the nation’s second completely-unvoted-for commander-in-chief (s.o. to Gerald Ford, who only lasted 2 years (bet Frank lasts longer)). The previous season ended thrillingly, with Frank giving his predecessor, President Garrett Walker, the ability to effectively save his own skin and have Frank imprisoned. Ultimately, Garrett does not pull the trigger and is forced to resign after his former best friend and teacher, Raymond Tusk, betrays him after Frank’s manipulations on them both. I will make predictions based off the trailer for season three, which you can see here, since there is no true new meat to go off of yet. The most pivotal moment of the trailer is when Claire declares to her husband, “we’re murderers, Francis,” to which Frank responds that they’re survivors. Just like last season, it seems as though Frank and Claire will go through marital issues even though they are no longer chasing power but rather holding it and trying to keep it for themselves. Notably, Doug Stamper does not seem to be in the trailer at all, but this could simply because they want to keep the audience guessing all the way until the 27th at whether or not Rachel actually killed him. Seth Grayson and Gavin Orsay, new characters from season 2, definitely seem like they are wild-cards with regard to how they could help or hurt Francis. Seth is power-hungry, but it remains to be seen just how much he is, and whether this trait would enable him to betray Frank for more power over him. Seth is one of the few that knows the power of power versus the power of money and how power is superior to money, a trait that we as an audience only really see in Frank, Claire, and Doug throughout the series. Gavin is a hacktivist who is starting to wield real control over his former puppet-masters because of the tracker that he has attached to AT&T’s servers through the now-incarcerated Lucas Goodwin. The power that Gavin had over Doug was getting to be greater and greater as last season went along, with him being able to track Doug anywhere and watch his doings with Rachel. Something tells me that sooner or later, Gavin will either become a very great ally or a very great enemy to the Underwoods. Finally some predictions about some loose end characters who lost badly last season: Garrett will have to be pacified, as will Tusk. Frank’s old acquaintance/nuisance Remy Danton will most likely go to the highest bidder and I could maybe even see him going on Gavin’s side if Gavin becomes the bad guy to Frank I see him potentially being.