Politics is at the heart of House of Cards, the television drama that has now entered its fifth season. The strange thing about watching it unfold on the small screen is that not even for a moment did I feel whatever I was watching isn’t somehow connected to what happens in our own country. Of course, there are no parliamentarians standing on tables or rushing to the well tearing the constitution… but the intensity is similar and familiar.
Frank Underwood is coming to India with the television premiere of House Of Cards Season 5 on Saturday, 3rd June, 5 PM onwards, only on Zee Café!
Even as I watched the first episode of Season 5, the realization of fiction sometimes reflecting the past and sometimes rushing ahead and predicting the future made everything so uncanny about this drama that I muttered, ‘Now, this is real fiction!’ Talk about legislations to ban immigration, declaration of war against a terror organization, minds that plan ahead of expectations, and conversations that promote every kind of fear so long as political gains are got… all this is rather reflective of what seems to be happening in America. And the reviewers from The Atlantic seem to agree with me as they write that “the creators (of Cards) have lucked out—if it can be called that—with Trump having proposed an immigration ban much as Frank Underwood has. And Trump’s darker tone with regards to the menace of terrorism fits with what’s going on in this season”. They call it ‘creepy’ and rightly so because everyone from the Clintons to the Obamas and now the Trump platoon have a place in all that goes on in the span of even a single episode. At the end of the first episode in Season five, when Francis faces the camera, appears to look through and beyond humanity in a cold and distant way, you can feel his words even before you hear them… ‘you’ve nothing to be afraid of…’ and you know that when politicians walk down to shake hands with the masses, there is everything to be afraid of. A reviewer on Vox points out that ‘House of Cards, then, is a show about how every conspiracy theory you’ve ever caught wind of — from the Seth Rich murder to the idea that the Russians have a “pee tape” featuring Donald Trump — is true. And, what’s more, it posits that because so many of them are true, all the politicians in Washington are locked into a kind of mutually assured destruction: You leak my secrets, I’ll leak yours, and we’ll both go down together. It is, in essence, a show where fake news isn’t so fake after all.’
For those who are not aware of, the actors in this drama are all experts at giving restrained performances and watching even one episode is enough for someone to fall in love with the acting prowess of Kevin Spacey (Francis Underwood), Robin Wright (Claire Underwood), Kate Mara (Zoe Barnes), Michael Kelly (Doug Stamper) and all the others. And so you need to know that Frank Underwood is coming to India with the television premiere of House Of Cards Season 5 on Saturday, 3rd June, 5 PM onwards, only on Zee Café!
The first episode begins with the hullaballoo of an American being beheaded by someone who is said to be a sympathizer of ICO. Francis declares that both Joshua Masterson and Zachary Hawthorne have strong connections to ICO abroad and ICO’s growing network domestically and announces challengingly at one point that ‘you will not infect the mind of one more of our young people, because I will not stop until I find you’. This episode has all the drama between the Republicans and the Democrats, the politicians and the press, the government and the people… there are armed searches in wooded areas, tears and anger of the families of the victim and the mother of the perpetrator of this crime who is also perceived as a victim… there are moments when even a cold politician admits his love for his wife and a wife who is bold enough to have sex outside of her marriage… this is one drama that has the power to appeal to a great variation in audience choices.
The power of appeal that I am talking about is to a large extent leaning heavily on loaded dialogues, a racy script, and editing that is mind-blowingly flawless.
Bits of uttered words that include ‘a scoundrel lives in White House’, ‘a noisy press that chooses to dwell on the past’, ‘watch out for each other… and yes, watch each other’, ‘or you will all go down in history as cowards’, ‘I will not yield because I cannot wait’, ‘I don’t care… and I also do not care about your investigative committees’, ‘compassion for the living and respect for the dead’, ‘this is not a time for aggression but reflection’… and a lot of other snippets are simply quotable. I loved it when Francis asks Claire to look through the scope and see the people beyond the gates of his house. He says, ‘Those people want a voice… some for, some against… and they’re looking back across the lawn, toward this house and these windows… all that they want is someone to keep them from what they’re afraid.’ This is one television drama where words win the day and politicians admit that the ‘best statement is no statement’ and that some politicians ‘mistake complaint for leadership’.
HoC – dialogues that can be quoted…
I happen to have watched the earlier seasons and I know that as one glides into the heart of one the tempo of aggressive stances moves much faster and gets colder with each episode. I would agree with DigitalSpy in their assessment that ‘if season five’s first episodes are the calm, there’s one hell of a storm on the way that could see House of Cards revert to its murderous ways of the past. With the cards reshuffled by episode six, forget the Underwoods – it’s unpredictability that reigns…’ There is no calm in the world of politics… and even we in India know how intense this sort of a battle for power can get. For those deciding to watch this drama on the television, Claire and Francis are characters who really care about this power and, therefore, never fail to reach their objective.
House of Cards is a ‘terrifying and intriguing’ tale that has facts posing as fiction popping up at an unnerving frequency until the mind doesn’t know if it is watching something that has actually happened, will happen, or has happened only on the pages of a script. I’m going to watch this season on ZeeCafe for sure. I’ve nothing to be afraid of. #HOConZCafe
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#HOConZCafe
Surprises… cold-blooded surprises!
HoC – a drama of political calculations
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Arvind Passey
03 June 2017
