What I Thought of House of Cards Season 4

Last week I finally finished watching Season Four of House of Cards. I have to say at the top, I was disappointed in the ending, as it seemed to break away from the exciting finale the audience was led to expect and focus the season’s final moments on what had been more of an uninteresting subplot.

It was those final two or three episodes that took away from what started out as one of the most exciting seasons yet. From Claire walking out on Frank in the closing moments of Season Three, to her being won back by the promise of the Vice Presidency and a guarantee of real power, to the contentious brokered Democratic convention, the Underwood’s story arc this season was hitting all the right notes. The brokered convention episodes especially were a high point of not just the season, but the show. (Incidentally, I was struck yet again by how much Claire is reminiscent of Hillary Clinton, and to a lesser degree Frank is of Bill, whether by accident or design.)

And then, after the shot of the Underwoods standing before the cheering delegates at the convention, it seemed as if the writers were at a loss as to how to script the rest of the campaign to fully match the tone up to that point. Apart from a brief scene depicting the interrupted debate—the first in which both presidential nominees along with their running mates participated together—the view of the campaign trail that had been consistent since Season Three largely disappeared. The tension between the Underwoods and Conway centered almost entirely around the threat from ICO (an obvious corollary to ISIS), something moderately interesting by itself but not a topic I was excited to see so much time dedicated to.

And while the final moments of the finale were intense, to say the least, it felt like a dramatic departure from the rest of the season. Conway, the major political threat to the Underwoods (on a show like this, there are no protagonists) didn’t even appear. The entire season had been building toward Election Day, and to have the finale dedicated to a just-introduced hostage situation felt odd and jarring. Plus, since Frank stated in the finale that Election Day was only “a few weeks away”, it will be interesting to see how Season Five is structured. Will the entire season take place within a few weeks—a break from the year-long chronology of past seasons—or will the election merely take place at the beginning or middle of the season, seeming to relegate it to an afterthought in the plot, after building up to it since the beginning of the third season?

I expected Election Day to be the focus of the Season Four finale, so having it punted into next season only ramps up the anticipation further. With the last two seasons in general feeling weaker than the first two—ever since Frank transitioned from seeking the Presidency to working to keep it—it’s an open question whether Season Five will mean a return to what made the show a hit in the first place.