House - Season 3 (Hugh Laurie) - Region 2 DVD

The thinking behind the show is simple. Laurie’s Dr House is as reluctant, snide and miserable a medical practitioner as you’re likely to find, although he happens to be a genius at solving the unsolvable cases. Along with his small team of doctors, each episode generally sees House as a medical mystery, with said team scrabbling to find the answers to devilishly complicated illnesses and diseases.

But House’s skill is its characters as well as its at-times ingenious plotlines. Hugh Laurie aside, Omar Epps, Jesse Spencer and Jennifer Morrison are terrific as House’s long-suffering staff, while Robert Sean Leonard’s Dr Wilson and Lisa Edelstein’s Dr Cuddy are equally strong as his only friend and boss respectively.

The third season of House shakes things up quite a lot though. A good chunk of it, for instance, is concerned with Laurie’s Doctor coming under investigation from a detective who takes a dislike to House’s methods. Plus there’s also a superb episode set mid-flight, and plenty of character issues to deal with too. No plot spoilers here, though!

In short, House is, and remains a triumph, by turns funny, dramatic and moving. And Laurie, surely in the role of a lifetime, is simply brilliant. Series four can’t come quickly enough. --Simon Brew