Why would anyone vote for this terrible man?
The odds are against him.
But tis the season for improbable things.
Credit: David Giesbrecht/Netflix
Just look at the polls.
Which makesHouse of Cardsa fitting if imperfect comment on our now.
We find Frank as we find ourselves, flailing through a topsy-turvy primary season.
The public hates him for soaring gas prices.
A righteous opponent (Elizabeth Marvel) is slagging his rotten character and scoring points.
His slippery press secretary (Derek Cecil), certain of doom, is sabotaging him.
Kevin Spacey, that wicked walking wink, remains a spellbinding hoot as Frank.
But more than ever, its the First Lady and Robin Wright who rules this term.
Their conflict not only echoes Claires relationship with Frank but helps to explain it.
Watching her cruelly impose her will on her mother catharsis for the powerlessness she feels with Frank is heartbreaking.
In a gutsy move, Wright doubles down on Claires iciness and scores.
Shes the most perfect realization of the precise and chilly aesthetic minted by co-creator David Fincher.
Wright frames many of the seasons most striking images herself.
She has my vote.
Simpson, arguably the two best dramas on TV right now.
The show is more elliptical in its strategies for relevancy than on-the-nose soapbox pop likeThe Good WifeandScandal.
ButHouse of Cardsexist in its own pocket universe and aims for thematic timelessness, not timeliness.
you might understand why.
It has to transcend our circumstances, or at least, survive them.
The drama is smart about media in the most generic of ways.
It doesnt capture the specific made-for-TV, reality show nature of the 2016 campaign.
Franks narcissism, his bullying, his me-against-the-world solipsism and his us-versus-them populismfeelsfamiliar.
But hes more classically Nixonian than Trumpian in his out-of-control noxiousness.
Theres a bit of scandalous business involving the KKK that comes off as somewhat prescient, but only somewhat.
A political potboiler best served as cold as possible,House of Cardswill always skew toward extreme cynicism.
And who wants more of that?
I probably shouldnt enjoy Frank and Claire as much as I do.
But I cannot tell a lie: I do.
They are catharsis and cautionary tale.
I want them to succeed.
I want them destroyed.
Who will stop them?
It delights me, it indicts me, it is, on many levels, a true guilty pleasure.B+
