[PoochJD]

Hi,

For those of you following "House" on Five, any of you who watched or recorded last night's (23rd March 2006) episode (Episode 10 - Failure To Communicate), will undoubtedly have noticed a major transmission problem! Before I go on to explain, I should mention that almost everyone in the UK was affected, irrespective of whether you watched on analogue, Freeview, Cable, or Sky! As such, I hope the following info is of some use. Some plot points are mentioned below, but nothing that should affect anyone's viewing and/or enjoyment of the episode!

Right, basically, around 10:25pm, for approximately 5-6 minutes, there was a major transmission problem, from Five's Transmission Headquarters. The first problem, happened not long before the end of the second part of the episode. As House hounds his ex-wife Stacy, about why she isn't wearing her favourite necklace, the scene ends, and then cuts to (this week's) patient, screaming in agony. At this point, the sound of the screaming is heard over an aerial shot of the hospital, at night time. You will note, that the scene pauses, "rewinds", then stops, for about 30 seconds, before continuing a few seconds back, with House and Stacy at the airport.

Secondly, the scene continues, as the patient tries to tell Dr Cameron about a "metallicy taste" in his mouth. Again, the scene "pauses", then cut's out, and goes to black.

Next, the scene continues again, but as Dr Cameron works out what he is trying to say, the scene then cuts abruptly into the middle of an advert break.

It was at this point, that Five realised that something majorly wrong had occurred at their end. The abrupt cut into a three minute sequence of adverts, was to give them time to hopefully rectify the problem.

Thankfully, once the ad-break ends, we return to the normal Five "House" Title Card, and the episode resumes right back, at the end of House's and Stacy's verbal fight in the airport, over her missing necklace, and just prior to the aerial night time shot of the hospital, with the patient's screams, and Dr Cameron's discovery of the patient's "metallicey taste".

Now, I have been in contact with Five this morning, who were rather frustrated that this problem had occurred during one of their most popular shows. They had had several complaints, queries and viewer issues, highlighting the issue, and they are already investigating to see what happened. At the moment, there are no plans to repeat this episode, prior to next Thursday night's Episode 11. However, they may sneak-in a repeat of Episode 10, if they can, at some point, in the next six days. This may be late-at-night, or potentially a mid-morning/mid-afternoon timeslot. As such, I would recommend that fans keep a very close eye on Five's schedules over the next few days, just in case a repeat is scheduled at the last minute!

Finally, as I was able to record the entire episode, I have been able to cleverly edit-out all the problematic material that intruded upon last night's transmission, to make a 99% perfect epsiode. Bar a single split-second glitch, I have managed to remove all the mistakes, and prepare a good-quality edit!

Now, I'd be willing to loan-out this "edited" (not censored) episode, to die-hard House fans, if they would like to see it. I won't be able to fulfill everyone's requests, but will try to work out something for those in need of a "clean" episode, if they are recording the entire Season to keep (for example).

Those of you who are interested, please PM me first, and I will then try to sort something out for you all. However, this offer is not guaranteed! I can't promise that everyone will be helped out. As long as you are all aware of this, then I will do my best.

Thanks for reading this message!


Pooch

[aprout]

cheers for that Pooch. It was very annoying when watching it last night. I was shouting at the tv; "*** ARE YOU DOING!!?"

But, I have to say I was very impressed (& pleasantly surprised) that they went back to where the problems began & started the show again. It's doubtful the audience would get as good treatment on ITV or C4.

to Five for rectifying the problem so well.

[domtheone]

I had this on my Humax Box, basically i let the programme record 15 mins, rewind and playback, skipping the adverts and finisihn the programme just about in real time. Most stuff on CH4/5 I watch this way

For a moment I thought my HD was playing silly buggers, well wierd

Glad to have the offficial answer though

Hi Pooch,

I thought I was going mad when I watched this last night. My husband was doing Sudoku with half an eye on the screen and hadn't noticed anything unusual!!!!! I wondered just what was happening when scenes were repeated and not in sequence.

I stopped the programme to make a cup of coffee. He was still stuck in the airport but was not sat with his girl friend and the patient had been choking; it seemed House had finally realised what "bear" and stain" were by the look on his face. Resumed watching and immediately Sky put up a message "Instant Rewind not available" I was recording something else at the time, which had nearly finished, but had 6% still on the planner. I could not resume watching so missed what must have been only 5 or 10 minutes, it was so maddening. Please, please let me know what happened. I assume as always that House would come up with the correct diagnosis just as the patient was about to die but I would like to know what "bear" and "stain" meant and what was his illness.

Clever you to be able to sort it all out. Thank you for offering all of us a chance to borrow your edited version. However, I just need to know those last few minutes, please Pooch.

[PoochJD]

Cynthia,

Have sent you a PM.


Pooch