House of Cards? Bum Deal

I know it’s just light entertainment but the third series of House of Cards is heavy going. What I wanted to see was Kevin Spacey’s acting. And to be fair it’s there; Spacey’s Frank Underwood is evil, hilarious, vulnerable, cynical, scheming. He brings the character to incredibly vivid life.

But two pieces of ballast really weigh the whole thing down.

First: the storyline that sets up a clumsy caricature of Vladimir Putin (President Petrov) as Underwood’s geopolitical nemesis is little more than an exercise in anti-Russian propaganda.

Petrov is portrayed as insanely petty and irrational. As a condition for cooperating with the Americans in the Middle East he demands the resignation of the First Lady as US Ambassador to the UN.

Petrov’s reasoning? It doesn’t matter to him but he knows that it matters to President Underwood. International diplomacy reduced to a squabble between children.

All of the usual Bond-movie stereotypes of Russia get an airing. At a reception in the White House Petrov drinks like a fish. In his dealings with Underwood he is paranoid and irascible – Spacey’s character, in comparison is calm and reasoned.

What’s really going on here is that the writers are playing off the cheap stereotypes of Vladmir Putin that have been represented by the Western Media over the past two years.

Petrov is portrayed as a vain, macho buffoon. He stubs out his cigar on the wall in white house – sometimes a cigar is not just a cigar.

He lifts up his shirt to show off his bullet and bayonet wounds to Spacey and describes killing a man in Afghanistan with his bare hands. It would be funny if it wasn’t already being done, day in day out on every infotainment report about Putin from BBC to Fox to Sky News.  

My problem is not that there may be some truth in these portrayals; rather it is that with a character as interesting as Frank Underwood and an actor as gifted as Kevin Spacey at their disposal it is a just not good enough for the writers to resort to this species of crappy hack journalism.

The episode where the actual members of Pussy Riot appear (as themselves) in the White House to protest against president ‘Petrov’ is only the most obvious and insultingly stupid moment in this lazy excuse for plotting.  

Playing to the contemporary American gallery’s desire for geopolitical success in some real/imagined confrontation with Russia in this way is basically propaganda and as such is a completely wasted opportunity.

Second: far too much ponderous soul searching takes place.

The sub plot involving Doug, the President’s assistant’s convalescence, grieving and eventual hunt for and murder of an ex-girlfriend, drags along at a snail’s pace. He spends the entire 13 episodes in one state of pain or another and this is a problem for me because I had stopped caring at the outset.

It would have been far more economical to have had the threat posed to Spacey by the ex-girlfriend and the assistant snuffed out at the end of the 2^nd series. 

A scheming, psychopathic genius like Frank Underwood would have sorted that out in a heartbeat before moving to invade North Korea.

The disintegration of the president’s relationship with the first lady is similarly drawn out and signposted. Of course the sheer brilliance of Spacey’s acting – particularly at moments such as the scene in the oval office in the final episode where he tells his wife “without me you are nothing!” – salvages something of value but the fact remains: the primary focus of what is supposed to be a political drama is nothing more than a private melodrama.

This is disappointing because the premise of House of Cards – a President halfway between Faust and Machiavelli married to a cross between Lady Macbeth and Medea – could go in any direction. I mean, they don’t have to invade North Korea but this is supposed to be a show about politics.

This is the dilemma: I would watch/listen to Kevin Spacey reading the shipping report. But season three of House of Cards is nothing more than a hybrid of anti – Russian propaganda and soap opera. 

If another season of House of Cards is made I think I’ll pass. I can always go back to Se7en and Beyond the Sea.