Ahead of the season 4 premiere on March 4, we take a look back at a difficult third season of House of Cards on Netflix.
A man walks into the JOE office. He has an idea for a feature, looking at the third series of House of Cards, and turns to the Editor.
“Frank Underwood?” he says. “More like, Frankly Underwhelmed.”
The editor looks up, disappointment writ large across his brow, his eyes denying the words that his mouth speaks.
“You should lead with that.”
Note: There are massive spoilers here
Last year, I made the mistake of starting Season 3 of House of Cards whilst in the middle of rewatching (for the third or fourth time) The West Wing.
Same office, very different beast, like stepping from a warm bath into a freezing cold shower.
You’d never see Jed Bartlet take a piss on the grave of his father, but when we meet Frank Underwood in this series he’s leaking all over his ancestry and icily staring down the camera and beckoning us on like a belligerent prizefighter.
Just moments into the first episode, it’s a highlight of the entire series.
Having Frank reach the office of President negates so much of what made the first two seasons great – the grab for power.
The backstabbery; the cloak and dagger meetings; Doug’s quietly conniving yet vulnerable nature; Miss Barnes; Peter Russo’s boozy humanity; Cashew, the guinea pig that just don’t give a f**k; Raymond Tusk’s comeuppance and THAT moment in the underground train station.
It was all wonderful fun, but that sense of mischief is largely absent from the latest batch of episodes, only coming to the fore when an underused Lars Mikkelson is on screen as the Russian President, Viktor Petrov.
Anyone else think he looks like a cross between Lee Dixon and Jack Charlton?
Where it used to sizzle in its first two years, season 3 plodded, dropping lukewarm plot devices like the Jordan Valley peacekeeping mission and the tiresome, utterly preposterous America Works program halfway through.
Instead, the focus is on the relationship between Frank and Claire, a Presidential nomination process that promises a lot more heft than it delivers, Remy’s tepid exit and Doug’s human bankruptcy.
We’ve really entered the realm of fantasy when the incoming Chief of Staff can take a few days off to do a Jame Gumb down south and return to work like a banker coming back from a lunch meeting.
Like Frank, Buffalo Bill was happy to put skin in the game
Yet there are reasons for optimism ahead of Season 4’s premiere.
Season 3 felt like a holding season, a palate cleanser before the main course of Frank finally answering for the murders of Zoe and Peter, Claire turning from closest ally to worst enemy, the end of Lucas’s prison time and surely, surely Raymond Tusk is not done yet.
That’s the hope, because the chilly and distant season 3 was a tough watch.
It felt like a series of half ideas that left us with an emasculated, greying Frank at the end and no sign anywhere of a knockout desk punch.
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