House of Cards (2013) - Season 6

Here we are again. You know, if you ignore all the pomp and circumstance, the most perverse thing is that I actually believe in the presidency, its importance, what it means around the world, even symbolically - but I believe in power even more, for its own sake. Gore Vidal once wrote that power is an end to itself, and the instinctive urge to prevail the most important single human trait. I've always told myself that everything I did was for her, but maybe it wasn't. Maybe I love power more.

The cursor starts blinking faster and faster, the empty white screen seems to accuse me of indecision: “are you going to put something on paper or not?” No, I don't know. Yes, later. Help, I don't know what to think of the sixth season of House of Cards (2013). The acting, the images and directing are all okay, but the rest...

It seems the writers of House of Cards (2013) weren't able to make a choice. And that is the reason nothing is resolved. No, that is not really it. The ghost of Frank Underwood hovers over every scene, with every dialogue, over the heads of the main characters. Choices which are being made all seem to lead to Frank. Claire, played by the beautiful and brilliant actress Robin Wright, seems to want to surpass her husband in intelligence and dubious choices. But the only thing that becomes painfully clear is that House of Cards can't do without Frank Underwood.

During the first couple of episodes he is mentioned in almost every dialogue and every scene. Even while eating ribs, you can feel the presence of Frank. While eating soup, on board of Airforce One, in the White House and in the Beast, you cannot escape from Frank. Besides wondering about the presence of Frank, I also constantly ask myself if this season should have been made.

My turn

It was a great ending. Claire Underwood sitting in the Oval Office, speaking directly into the camera and saying: My turn. They should have left it at that, because all the storylines which were open then are still open now, after the sixth season. I can't say too much about that, otherwise I would give away too many spoilers. But believe me when I say that the sixth season was completely redundant. The obvious absence of Frank, the inability of the other cast members to make up for that absence and the inadequate script.



Sometimes you get the feeling you aren't taken seriously as a viewer. Something like: Okay, Frank is gone, deal with it. But as a viewer I don't want to deal with it. I want all storylines to come together, a story with an ending, characters who can make me forget about Frank. In short, I wanted a sixth season where everything converged and a great ending to a great series. House of Cards (2013) deserves a better ending than what it received in the sixth season.

The funny thing is, while I'm writing this I realize we don't see or hear Frank in this sixth season. Not one picture or recording, nothing at all. But that makes the loss only worse instead of less. The whole sixth season revolves around only one person and that is President Francis Underwood. And I can't imagine that was the intention of the writers of the last season. Kevin Spacey wasn't allowed to participate in the last season for reasons known to all. So why not delete him from the show completely.

There’s no better way to overpower a trickle of doubt than with a flood of naked truth.

Now I continually had the feeling he could pop up at any moment from around a dark corner, from behind a door or from a chair that swivels around and look at my with accusing eyes and asking me why I lost faith in him. I want to be honest and don't want to have any doubts later on, so I give the last season of the political drama series a 7.5, or just maybe to honour the fact that even in death Frank couldn't be brought to his knees.

I’ve always loathed the necessity of sleep. Like death, it puts even the most powerful men on their backs.