If there's one amazing thing the House writers manage every week, it's making me believe that this time House is really going to learn a lesson.

And sure enough, I really believed that maybe this time House would learn how dangerous his obsession with finding the answer is, after seeing how dangerous the Patient of the Week's obsession with getting a diagnosis was. But that final scene with the POTW taking a breath proves that once again, House learned the lesson for all of five minutes.

Now, I do think that House felt bad about nearly killing Thirteen and maybe if she'd died, he'd have finally learned that lesson. But she survived and will be fine and that was enough for House to shrug it off.

I'm not sure how I felt about this episode. On the one hand, it certainly was exciting and interesting to watch, even if the various clinic patient hostages were never given a chance to do much of anything except scream. On the other hand, if House hasn't learned anything at all at the end...what was the point?

Much as I adore Cuddy and House together, I'd hate to think that the entire point of the episode was to make Cuddy realize how much she cares about House! (I did love when the SWAT guy pwned Cuddy with "Hope your boyfriend knows what he's doing." I'm glad he wasn't portrayed as an idiot.)

Okay okay, I know, the point of the episode was for Thirteen to decide that she wants to live, to realize that she's not ready to die. And although I like Thirteen, for some reason, that moment of revelation made me roll my eyes. It felt a bit...well, contrived is a silly word to use for a drama like House, but it's the only word I can think of that fits.

I guess my problem was that this felt more like a House-centric episode, but the payoff was for Thirteen. (And why haven't we gotten that Kutner-centric episode yet, huh? I demand more Kutner!)

I was also bothered by House handing the gun back to the POTW. Yes, House can be dangerously suicidal when he feels like it, but he's not generally homicidal, if you see the difference. While it was perfectly in-character for him to decide to keep diagnosing, no matter what, it didn't make sense for him to not at least shoo the clinic patient out before he did it. I could see him allowing Thirteen to stay because she's a doctor too, but not the guy from the clinic.

I will be glad to wave goodbye to the self-destructive Thirteen, however, so that's a good thing to come out of the episode. And I look forward to seeing where they're going with the Huntington's drug trial storyline.

There were a number of things I enjoyed in "Last Resort," like seeing all of House's ducklings in one room. Too bad Chase and then Foreman backed out, because I would have liked to see them all work together for an entire episode.

I also loved how House and Thirteen got so involved in diagnosis at several points that they entirely forgot they were hostages. Those small moments were an excellent reminder that they're both very good doctors and experts at what they do.

And there was intriguing drama in Thirteen allowing herself to be used as the drug guinea pig and House's reactions to that. In his own special way, he showed Thirteen that he cares about her, at least as much as House is capable of caring about anyone. "Why are you still alive?" was a bit callous, but hey, it's Gregory House, what do you expect?

Bar none, the best line of the entire episode was House's "If you ask me, keeping an open line of communication is the best way to resolve conflict." I came very close to falling off the couch at how perfectly Hugh Laurie (have I mentioned lately that I think he's a genius?) delivered the line. It had exactly the right amount of fake sincerity.

The second best moment was "I've never been anywhere south of Florida," and the way House's and Thirteen's heads turned in unison. It was a beautifully timed bit of humor to break the tension.

(I award an honorable mention to "It only hurts if your diagnosis is wrong." "Win-win.")

Yes, we all know the hostage situation is a classic "very special" episode of shows such as House, but for all that, this was a good version of that cliché. It did serve to move forward several ongoing storylines, it was filled with tension, and it had an explosion at the end. You can't go wrong with a good explosion.