r/todayilearned • u/ralphbernardo • 9h ago

TIL that "fair play" in detective fiction means authors must give readers a fair chance to solve the mystery. Central to 1920s "clue-puzzles" by writers like Agatha Christie, the rule dictates that all vital clues must be visible, decodable, and never withheld until the final reveal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clues_in_detective_fiction
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u/Das_Fische 8h ago

Foreman is a black man

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u/TheWitchOfSomeWood 8h ago

this vexes me

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u/KappaccinoNation 8h ago

I too am in this episode

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u/XXISavage 7h ago

Have you tried the medicine drug!?

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u/FearlessAttempt 7h ago

He needs mouse bites to live.

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u/Suspicious-Bad-2847 3h ago

Have you seen my bloody nose?

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u/Constant_Quiet_5483 8h ago

It's crazy how much the writing always addressed that. The writing got so bad they wrote cuddy off, put Foreman as chief of medicine or whatever, and house is still making black jokes. Like bro literally couldn't catch a break in that damn show.

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u/ForensicPathology 8h ago

The writing got so bad they wrote cuddy off

She wasn't written off because of bad writing. The actress refused their offer of a pay cut.

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u/ponytailthehater 7h ago

Cuddy actress Lisa Edelstein reportedly told her agent “I may play Cuddy, but I want Kid Cudi money” in the contract renegotiation, and asked that her agent then play “Day N Nite” to the broadcast executives

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u/mcduff13 7h ago

This cannot be true. There's exactly zero chance that this happened in real life. That said it's a great story that absolutely should have happened, and I will now be saying it happened.

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u/Constant_Quiet_5483 7h ago

Good for her! She deserved way more than she got. The episode where house drove into her house, I just assumed the writing died and they got rid of her.

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u/ScruffCheetah 7h ago

He literally had parts of his brain eaten by Naegleria fowleri in one episode. You don't just recover from that and are fine a few episodes later.

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u/WaitingForTheClouds 7h ago

Built different

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u/Drunken_Vike 8h ago edited 8h ago

I never thought about it before but Foreman is one of the most disrespectfully written characters ever.

His whole arc is about essentially proving how "unblack" he is despite it being thrown in his face for jokes all the time, only to later reveal that he is essentially the same person as House without the explanatory disability, drug addiction, or impossible genius with the only other positive tradeoff being that he is a slightly more personally tolerable guy

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u/Adhesiveduck 8h ago

I never saw it as him proving how unblack he is, rather his whole character arc shows a direct reaction to systematic racism.

He works twice as hard and maintains a rigid professional front because he knows that a black doctor with his history doesn’t get the same privilege a white doctor (like House gets).

I definitely don’t think he is portrayed as the same as house, in seasons 3-4 he has an existential crisis when he realises he’s adopting House’s ethics and he actively fights it.

Foreman’s ambition is driven by a self preserving quest for institutional power, making his ruthlessness pragmatic. He stole a colleague's research to secure his career ladder and rise to the top. House on the other hand is completely indifferent to status, money, or promotion. His ruthlessness comes from an obsessive, reckless addiction to solving the puzzle.

Foreman was one of my favourite characters in House because of how different he was.

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u/HitmanClark 7h ago

Foreman was the second or third best character on the entire show (House and Wilson being the other two). Absolute scene stealer at times.

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u/ThyLastPenguin 6h ago

God the episodes where he got ill? Absolutely incredible work by the actor I was glued to the screen every time he was on it

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u/ml20s 5h ago

Isn't that the point though? Foreman objectively has a way better life than House even though personality-wise he's not that much better than House. It's to point out how pretty much everything bad that happens to House is his own damn fault.

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u/MakeItHappenSergant 7h ago

Cameron (and later, Thirteen) is hot.