| "Euphoria (Part 1)" | |
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| House episode | |
| Episode no. | Season 2 Episode 20 |
| Directed by | Deran Sarafian |
| Written by | Matthew V. Lewis |
| Original air date | May 2, 2006 |
| Guest stars | |
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| Season 2 episodes | |
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| List of House episodes | |
"Euphoria (Part 1)" is the twentieth episode of the second season of House, which premiered on the Fox network on May 2, 2006. This episode is the first half of a two-episode story arc, the second half being "Euphoria (Part 2)". The only other two-part episodes are "House's Head" and "Wilson's Heart" in season four; and "Broken" in season six.
Officer Joe Luria is shot while pursuing a criminal identified only as "Baby Shoes". The bullet fractures on his bullet-proof vest, sending shards into his skull, and earning him a trip to the ER. Prior to being shot, Joe is acting very strangely, laughing while attempting to apprehend "Baby Shoes" and reading incorrect Miranda Rights. As he is on the ground, bleeding from the face, he still continues to laugh incessantly, proving this is not a character flaw, but a serious disorder.
As the doctors in the ER attempt to stop the bleeding, Joe's giddiness persists, causing House to take interest in the case. The nature of the symptoms lead the team to consider carbon monoxide poisoning. Chase and Cameron are assigned to tend to the patient while House sets out to investigate Joe's workplace, and he sends Foreman to Joe's apartment to see if he can find anything that would explain the symptoms. Joe's living conditions turn out to be a cesspool, with uneaten food, trash, dirty plumbing facilities, rust, and general disarray. Foreman checks for a gas leak, but finds nothing, until he notices a closed off shed on the roof. Inside is a hydroponic greenhouse Joe is using to grow large quantities of marijuana.
House's brief investigation of the precinct reveals nothing, mainly because he is there trying to get several speeding tickets reversed "due to his disability". While Joe's partner deals with the paper work, House notices that Joe's desk is next to an air conditioner, and that the stagnant water in it has not been cleaned in sometime. The team then successfully diagnoses Legionnaires' disease, the bacteria for which were growing in the cooled water in the AC unit, and cures it. As Chase and Foreman check on the treatment, they discover that Joe is going blind despite not being aware of it (Anton–Babinski syndrome), leading the team to believe there is an underlying neurological problem.
After an MRI is ruled out, due to the bullets still lodged in Joe's head, the team run more tests, after which House tells them to meet him in the morgue. As the team continues to discuss symptoms and possibilities, House is searching through the corpses. After finding a suitable one, he puts on rubber gloves, a set of earplugs, and produces a Ruger revolver, shooting the corpse in the head to Chase and Cameron's surprise, but seemingly to Foreman's amusement. As the team goes to test the MRI on the corpse, House begins to suspect that Foreman has contracted the same illness that Joe has. Due to the bullet fragments in the corpse, House's test breaks the MRI machine.
As Officer Luria begins to bleed from his bullet wounds (a side effect of the heparin House gave him), Foreman breaks out into laughter, earning odd looks from Chase and Cameron. House then realizes Foreman is infected, and puts him along with Joe in an isolation chamber. Because Foreman has no bullet fragments in his skull, the team is able to perform an MRI on him, but it is inconclusive. They also perform a grey matter brain biopsy on Foreman, but that is inconclusive as well. Joe, in increasing pain, asks Foreman if he is going to die. Foreman responds that he will not die, because if Joe dies, so will he.
As Joe's pain gets progressively worse, Foreman becomes more angry and desperate, culminating in stabbing Cameron with an infected syringe, in the hopes of infecting her so she will have to go back to Joe's apartment in order to save herself, which she does. Meanwhile, Joe develops a new symptom, hyperalgesia, and must be put under a coma so he will not die from the sheer pain.
House then confronts Cameron at Joe's apartment after realizing where she has gone. After hearing that Joe keeps a large quantity of bread on hand, House deduces that Joe regularly feeds pigeons in order to obtain their stool, which he uses as fertilizer for his illegal marijuana-growing operation. He orders Cameron to bring back some pigeon stool, suspecting it to be harboring cryptococcus.
Unfortunately, tests prove that it is not cryptococcus. As Cameron is delivering this news, Joe has a heart attack. Foreman, alone in the isolation chamber, desperately tries to save him, but fails. The episode ends with Foreman, still afflicted by the illness that just killed Joe, pumping Joe's chest, attempting to revive him.
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