There will be spoilers, but hopefully you’ve done the right thing and binge-watched ‘House of Cards’ so quickly and voraciously that spoilers aren’t a thing for you anymore…
1. The dance sequenceOne of the best things about ‘House of Cards’ is, honestly, how silly it is – it’s absurd in its darkness, tends towards the melodramatic in moments, and since Zoe left us (RIP never forget) no one wears normal clothes, instead opting, constantly, at all times, to don the most beautiful suits you’ve ever seen.
But this was a new kind of silly. This man was doing some ethically-dubious data surveillance and evidently caught a vibe because we had to watch him dance for an uncomfortable amount of time. No explanation. No context.
When I close my eyes I can still see him.
2. The Republican dude streaming his entire life onto the internet Republican presidential nominee Will Conway presents himself as the centre-right equivalent of a pastel ‘Life, Laugh, Love’ sign. While Frank and Claire constantly have to play Terrible Secret Whack-a-mole, Conway uploads videos of his family, photographs from the campaign trail, and, eventually, the entire contents of his phone to his website. He’s a terrible man with a perfect family and the moment where his wife and youngest child hover just out of frame in one of his seemingly-spontaneous videos, only to enter stage left once the moment is right, is maybe one of my favourites in the season. Conway so different from most of the politicians we meet in ‘House of Cards’, and for a little while he made me embarrassed for the Underwood campaign.
Not for long, though, because:
3. America LOVES Claire UnderwoodThey really, really, really love her. I mean, I can’t pretend I don’t get all the ‘WE LOVE CLAIRE’ signs at the Democratic Convention; if I ever somehow met Robin Wright I would faint like someone who has witnessed the glory of God, but they’re willing to let someone with minimal political experience be Vice President to her monstrous husband’s President. Seeing the delegates shouting their enthusiasm for Claire was a spine-tingling moment, because even after all the murders and lies I still sort of root for Claire.
4. Doug Stamper, in the living room, with the water glass Doug Stamper is what happens when you get your work-life balance all wrong. He takes a dislike to press secretary Seth in such an extreme yet illogical way that I can only assume it’s similar to when your dog growls at a piece of furniture – he just doesn’t like that Seth is there. So when he attacks Seth in his sad little house with the old ‘empty water glass suctioned to the mouth’ move, it’s terrifying.
Doug doesn’t have any limits. He is creepy, and he killed lovely Rachel, and I hope Cashew the guinea pig who belonged to the hacker dude bites his face off while Frank isn’t looking.
5. Freddy stealing the show Nothing gold can stay. Reg E. Cathey appeared only briefly in Season 4, but he still managed to beat someone up and then deliver a verbal smackdown to Frank, and the latter added an extra star onto my rating of this season. It was joyous, unexpected, wonderful. Freddy and the terrible hand Frank Underwood dealt him will never be forgotten.
Edited by Naomi Upton
Image sources:
http://mashable.com/2016/03/07/house-of-cards-season-4-questions/#F.dERMaeqSqO
http://decider.com/2016/03/07/house-of-cards-season-4-netflix-social-media-politics/
http://anthonysoprano.tumblr.com/post/140573231032/but-i-want-to-encourage-every-one-of-you-who-has
http://andreii-tarkovsky.tumblr.com/post/140616503104/house-of-cards-chapter-44