House of Cards Season 3 Review, Part 1 (Episodes 1-4): The United States of Underwood

Alas, there's just no good way to review Netflix shows when full seasons are released at once and we're all watching at a different pace. For House of Cards Season 3, I'll be checking in on the show a couple of times—once here at the beginning and again in a couple weeks when I've completed the entire season. The following review does include a few spoilers, but discusses the first four episodes in a somewhat general fashion (mostly so this write-up isn't 4,000 words long).

In the opening scene of House of Cards' third season, Frank Underwood visits his father's grave. It's the sort of event that would make a great photo op for the still-new (and never elected) President of the United States, but Frank keeps the press away. While that suggests the character's desire for privacy, or a real connection with a long-dead family member, Frank quickly lets those of us watching at home know the truth—it's all a façade. You see, Frank says, you have to do the "little things" like visit your father's grave when you're the president, because it makes you seem at least a smidgen "human."

As far as opening scenes are concerned, that's one heck of a mission statement. Frank Underwood isn't really a human being. His wife Claire? Also not really a human being. They're living, breathing, sociopaths. They're political operatives. They're cunning manipulators. But they are absolutely not human in any familiar sense of the concept. While House of Cards occasionally reveals slivers of humanity behind the the political power couple's immaculately pressed suits and amazing hair, the show is so much better off embracing this truth about its two leads while trying to illustrate how other, more human-like characters simply get chewed up and destroyed by the system—or by Frank and/or Claire themselves.

That opening scene gave me real hope for the potential of House of Cards' third season, and after four episodes, I wouldn't necessarily say that potential has been squandered. As I said during this week's episode of our Totally Tubular podcast, this is a show that privileges the full-season storytelling experience wherein early, more boring episodes seem much better in retrospect. So I'm certainly not here to suggest that House of Cardshas lost a step or deserves impeachment.

Nonetheless, if Season 3's first four episodes are any indication of where the show is headed, it is indeed clear that it's tougher to drum up the juicy, soapy drama of Seasons 1 and 2 now that Frank and Claire have made it to the most powerful post in the American political system. As the old saying goes, once you reach the top, there's nowhere to go but down, and while the first four episodes sow the seeds for that free-fall, they aren't quite as compelling as the Underwoods' Season 2 rise to the top.

Of course, it's never easy at the top. Although the Season 3 premiere didn't really follow Frank for a good chunk of its running time, we quickly learned that his presidency hasn't gone particularly smoothly so far. The general malaise of the American people, who are presumably at least somewhat shaken by what happened to ex-President Walker, combined with Frank's pardons and perceived weakness on the economy, made even a visit to The Colbert Report a tough media outing for the president. Claire, who's always looking to do more than just serve as her husband's No. 2, seemingly immediately turned her attention to an open U.N. ambassador slot, but that move was met with immediate skepticism.

By the midpoint of Episode 2, Frank was dealing with a DNC leadership that had no interest in having him run for a second term, while Claire had been snuffed out in her confirmation hearing thanks to the public grandstanding of Senate Majority Leader Mendoza (Benito Martinez), who just happens to be eying a 2016 campaign of his own. But this is House of Cards. Frank immediately went on the offensive, pushing his ambitious, New Deal-esque America Works program to the populace alongside a public admission that he would not run for reelection (a total lie), while Claire, after desperately exhausting all other options, turned to her husband with the hope that he'd confirm her as the ambassador (he did).

That was all great, providing choice opportunities for Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright to do their thing, but I have to admit, it simply wasn't as satisfying as some of their previous gambits. In some regard, that's the point—the Underwoods can't always win. They've idealized the White House for so long that it's effective to show them (and us) that even the most powerful people on the planet can't get everything done exactly how they want. In fact, if there's one thing these first four episodes prove, it's that Frank and Claire are actually hampered by their high-profile positions. People pay attention to the Whip and the VP, but not like they pay attention to the president. The apparatus of the White House is simply too constrained, despite all its legitimate power, to do the kind of damage that Frank and Claire love to trade in.

But while I openly acknowledge that this is the correct note for House of Cards to play, especially early in the season, it's also fair to suggest that this version of the show is less enjoyable to watch. It's not noticeably worse, it's just not as fun. Everyone's mileage may vary here, and it also may depend on which of Season 3's subplots speaks to you the most. With Frank tethered to the Oval Office and the responsibilities that come along with that, House of Cards has already introduced the America Works initiative and a potential overhaul to entitlement programs, a major drone strike, major engagement/tension with Russia, a Supreme Court justice's deteriorating health, and the ever-present swirl of potential candidates and opponents hoping to enter the upcoming 2016 election.

I certainly don't mind it when the show dives earnestly into policy debates, which is why I was fond of everything associated with America Works, but I'm not as charmed by the possibility that everyone working with/around Frank will become an opponent as 2016 approaches; ditto for much of the stuff happening with the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, the concentration on the U.S.'s relationship with Russia offered a fine mix of hits and misses. It was fascinating to watch Frank try to manipulate the Russian leadership in the same way that he messed with Walker in Season 2, only to flail a bit because the Russian president has such a presence himself (his very public kissing of Claire was a total dick/boss move).

It's not as if House of Cards has morphed into The West Wing—but it IS getting closer to that seminal series than ever before. And given House of Cards' history, I'm willing to bet that some of the less-interesting stuff in Season 3's first four episodes will have a much greater impact in the back half of the season. I just wonder how much the show is going to have to contort itself to put Frank and Claire in moderately powerless positions, or how it's going to keep the stakes high enough when they're still relatively comfortable in their positions. It's a tricky path to chart. Spacey and Wright are still great, but that's something I'll be looking forward to throughout the duration of Season 3.

The good news is that while House of Cards has already hit a few bumps in its A-stories, it's also brought forth some solid stuff for its supporting players. The biggest news, of course, is that my main dude Doug Stamper (Michael Kelly) survived the beating he took from the now-gone Rachel at the tail end of Season 2.

Not only is Doug back, but the show has recommitted to making him a significant part of the story, dedicating a big chunk of the premiere to the character and then tracking his long, difficult recovery process in the next three as well. The decision to frame much of the first episode with Doug's perspective was a fantastic one, not only because it gave us a whole lot of Kelly but also because it emphasized that Doug's struggles aren't just physical. Though Claire and Frank sent him some flowers and maybe stopped by a few times, there's a real distance between Doug and the Underwoods that Doug was already starting to feel at the end of Season 2, and having to watch Frank on Colbert or call the emergency number only to have Seth (Derek Cecil) answer was just excruciating.

The scene in the premiere where Doug basically threw his well-intentioned brother out of the apartment, only to awkwardly utter, "Uh... send me some pictures of the kids," was a great signal that even though all that time with the Underwoods and on K Street have made Doug less human than most, he still has something left; you can really sense the betrayal he feels, toward the Underwoods as well as toward Rachel for what she did to him. It's so bad that he's hiring hookers to shoot bourbon into his mouth. That's dark stuff. Still, watching him start to pull himself back together and eventually plot against Frank, Claire, and Seth was one of the better elements of "Chapter 30," and I'm sure that'll continue to be the case. Doug Stamper, ladies and gentlemen!

Doug's return is definitely the bigger story here, but Jimmi Simpson's hacker Gavin is also back for more, slaving away at the FBI and working with Doug on the side to try to find Rachel, and the two of them couldn't be a better pair. Simpson and Kelly have great chemistry, and that duo is so mismatched that pairing them up works every time. And now that Gavin is the insider and Doug is kind of on the outside, flipping their past roles, I like the duo even more.

Meanwhile, Jackie (Molly Parker) and Remy (Mahershala Ali)'s tumultuous love affair (now fully in the "off" stage) continues to be compelling enough for a mid-level story on a show with a number of stories. Jackie had more to do in Season 3's opening episodes than Remy, which is absolutely fine, and I love that she made sure that everything she did for Frank in Season 2 didn't happen all for naught. House of Cards has done a tremendous job of killing off/moving on from some excellent performers over the past two years, but it still has a rock-solid cast.

Ultimately, I could dig further into things that annoyed or bored me a little about these opening four episodes, but that's my typical House of Cards experience. I like this show, and sometimes I really like it. But it often keeps the audience at a distance, and I found that to be especially true early on in Season 3, even while the series remained entirely watchable. Of course, there's still a long way to go; a lot can change in nine episodes. Until the end of the season!

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HOUSE OF NOTES

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– Frank and Claire had solo sex! That's a novelty for this show. Their physical interactions are the perfect mix of sensuality and horror. Again: not human.

– Speaking of the Underwoods' sex lives, Meechum (Nathan Darrow) doesn't have much to do yet. Some of you might be disappointed by that.

– House of Cards really knows how to incorporate brief and charming scenes amid the darkness and the nastiness. Claire playing beer pong with the Secretary of State (Jayne Atkinson) was one of those moments, as was Doug trying to fix his injured arm with duct tape and a wooden spoon (though I guess that was also pretty dark, all things considered).

– The show's more on-the-nose tendencies really came through in Frank's tantrum in the church at the end of Episode 4. Not only was that scene a pretty clear lift from The West Wing, but the statue falling and breaking could not have been more obvious. Take a knee, show.

– Can you imagine the news coverage if a real sitting president delivered a speech in which he looked directly into the camera and said, "THE AMERICAN DREAM HAS FAILED YOU?" That took some major, major stones by Mr. F.U.

– As always, these episodes looked beautiful. House of Cards' sleek, cold version of Washington, D.C. looks really great on-screen.

Well, what'd you folks think of the first four episodes? How quickly are you watching?