A good twist can save an episode. Such is the case in “Brave Heart.” With the Dibala drama over, Chase struggles with the fact that he, you know, killed a man, while House believes that he’s hearing things. But the best moment comes in the medical mystery (Click here to read more…)

This episode moves back towards the traditional format of focusing on the medical mystery to a degree that we haven’t seen this season. It’s a bit of an exhale for the season, as “Instant Karma” concentrates on traditional “House” issues: namely, rationality versus superstition.

Spoilers after the jump.

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Fact: The old team was better than the new team. The latest episode of “House”—possibly the strongest medically based episode of “House” since the second season—is proof of this. Part of what makes “House” unique is that even though it is a medical show, it is more about the truth. “The Tyrant” is layered in its exploration of the concept, and the manner in which each team member’s action forces another action makes the episode flow beautifully.

SPOILERS AFTER THE JUMP

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The first episode of season six rebuilt House as a reformed character. The second episode, “Epic Fail,” is the focused on the opposite process; instead, it destroys House’s team so that by the end of it you’re left with a situation that looks oddly familiar. Or, as House says in the episode four preview: “Oh my god, it’s three years ago … Does that mean I’m still crazy?”

SPOILERS AFTER THE JUMP
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Pitchfork is closing out its list on best albums of the decade tonight, and it isn’t too difficult predict what’s going on there. Here are my 19 guesses in something roughly resembling chronological order: (Click here to read more…)

Painkillers is a weekly feature on the television show “House” focusing on the episode’s medical mystery and the show’s character development.

One day, two and a half years ago, the producers of “House” decided to develop Hugh Laurie’s character. That turned out to be a terrible idea. Not that developing the character was a bad idea, just the way they did. For its first three seasons, “House” never dropped the ball … excepting that instance, the twelfth episode of the third season.

The episode, “One Day, One Room,” about House’s interactions with a rape victim, had no medical mystery, and its sole purpose was to develop the character of House, which it only did minimally. “Broken”—the first episode of the sixth season, which premiered Monday—does everything which that earlier episode was supposed to do, except better.

SPOILERS AFTER THE JUMP (Click here to read more…)

Tomorrow, Shattuck Cinemas will begin showing “It Might Get Loud” by director Davis Guggenheim, who also directed and produced the Academy Award-winning “An Inconvenient Truth.” The film focuses on three guitarists you might have heard of: the Edge (U2), Jimmy Page (the Yarbirds, some other band that doesn’t actually title all of their albums) and Jack White (the White Stripes). You can read the full Daily Californian review online here.

The showtimes for Shattuck Cinemas are (2:15), (4:40), 7:00 and 9:25. Parentheses denote matinee showings.

“It Might Get Loud” Trailer [YouTube]

Quentin Tarantino’s “Inglourious Basterds,” starring Brad Pitt, opened today at both Shattuck Cinemas and California Theatre--you know, so people living on the other side of the block can see it too. You can expect a review of it this coming Monday from the Daily Cal, so keep your eyes peeled and julienned.

The showtimes for Shattuck Cinemas are (12:50), (4:00), 7:20 and 10:20. The showtimes for California Theatre are (12:30), (3:40), 7:00 and 10:00. Parantheses denote matinee showings. (Click here to read more…)

At approximately 10 p.m. PST, Pitchfork released their final installment of their top tracks of the decade: the top 20. Not that a lot of the choices were huge surprises, considering that in the speculation surrounding the final selections, a lot of people guessed what would be included.

So what was their ultimate choice? Well, their pick for number one was (Click here to read more…)

The New York Times is reporting that Les Paul, legendary architect of the electric guitar, died today. He was 94.

Times music critic Jon Pareles writes that Paul made his “breakthrough” with the solid-body electric guitar in either 1940 or 1941. This first guitar would evolve and become a model for Gibson, a guitar company that sells Les Pauls to this day. (Click here to read more…)