House of Cards (2013)

Can a bad person become a good president? The answer may be self-evident--or maybe not. Nevertheless, therein lies a compelling new season. We may still have a lot more to learn about Frank Underwood after all.

Thanks to frequent backstabbing, heavy-handed symbolism, and Spacey’s deliciously hammy performance, House of Cards works best as a mordantly funny melodrama.

Spacey plays Underwood with his usual unctuous aplomb, and Claire’s crazy controlled persona is on full display, but with private moments of longing and neediness that are wonderful to behold.

Despite its missteps, House Of Cards’ third season is by far its leanest, most focused, and most absorbing.

Season 3 certainly plays like a show that has a lot more life in it, with many elements set in motion to indicate such should it return.

How far can Frank accommodate her when his own power base is splintering? That will be the most tantalizing plot to follow this season.

The Underwoods--usually robots of ambition, subsisting only on peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches--engage in sex at a moment that would not inspire lustful feelings in more ordinary folk. It’s touches like this that keep the viewer of House of Cards off-balance, eager to fire up the next episode in the Netflix queue. The third season of House of Cards comes up with some formidable foes for Frank Underwood.

The first few episodes sent out for review are the most satisfying to date. Season three moves away from the colorful but ultimately tedious power-tripping of seasons one and two--Frank Underwood is underestimated; Frank Underwood wins; yay, Frank!--and becomes more of a political procedural.

House of Cards has traded in the fun of watching Frank shuck and jive in exchange for accomplishing his long game, which isn’t as fun as watching all the manipulative plays go down on each episode. In certain ways, Frank and Claire are being forced to grow up and have grownup jobs to prove it.

Wright, who already has won an Emmy for the role, remains one of the best parts of the series, while Underwood’s bottomless appetite for dark dealing keeps Spacey so deliciously detestable you can’t help but keep rooting for the bad guy to win.

Sure it’s sudsy drama. But great characters make for great fun in season 3.

While the political dynamics have changed greatly, House of Cards remains an addictive mixture of over-the-top soap opera, wicked dark comedy and sly melodrama.

House of Cards remains a slick and suspenseful--if not exactly layered and nuanced--saga that sucks you in from the start.

Ultimately, House of Cards Season Three is a great continuation of a show that remains deliciously dramatic even with a few glaring flaws.

The show has dispensed with a lot of the real-world elements that made it so coldly compelling.... On the other hand, though, that purging of minor characters is setting the stage for a bigger drama entirely: the showdown between Claire and Frank.... It is a satisfying, slow build, and one that feels not just 13 episodes in the making but three seasons--not just three seasons but 30 years--for the inscrutable Claire Underwood.

Netflix’s soapy House of Cards stumbles out of the gate in its third season with a first hour that’s short on lead character Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey) and long on a supporting player whose foibles are by now a TV cliche.... but the show recovers in its second episode, returning the emphasis to Frank’s political brinksmanship.

Claire, whether she’s riding an inebriated Frank like Seabiscuit or throwing down in a game of beer pong, does exhibit some of that killer instinct we’ve come to know and love.... Given that House of Cards is a series designed to be binge-watched in its entirety, it’s too early to tell whether or not it too has fallen victim to the third season curse.

After all the cream-puff politicians and supposedly brilliant strategists that the Underwoods have fooled all too easily in the first two seasons, a little payback and a little failure plays well for House of Cards.

The series needed a change-up and season 3 provides one, a bit; Frank is not fighting to get somewhere but to stay where he is, and his enemy is not so much a single Big Bad as it is the processes of government and diplomacy. When he’s off-balance, we are, and that makes the plot turns more interesting.

House of Cards is at its best when investigating the uneasy balance of studied, built-up political performance and personal dogmas, obsessions, gripes, and fears, but as many of these masks begin to give way in the story, the series noticeably struggles to keep up its addictive tension.

Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright remain splendid as the central couple, but with their quest for power having succeeded, series architect Beau Willimon seems forced to resort to unconvincing contortions to maintain the drama. Even then, the first half of Season 3 feels flimsy.

In many ways, House of Cards has become an entirely different show between season two and season three, and in ways that seem mostly half-hearted.