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The Best Episodes of House Season 5

Every episode of House Season 5 ranked from best to worst. Discover the Best Episodes of House Season 5!

Binge this in 17h 35m•Peaking at 9.6/10

Dr. Gregory House, a drug-addicted, unconventional, misanthropic medical genius, leads a team of diagnosticians at the fictional Princeton–Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in New Jersey.

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Episode Rankings

  1. #1 Fan Favorite
    House Season 5 Episode 1 - Dying Changes Everything
    8.3/10(3804 votes)

    #1 - Dying Changes Everything

    S5:E1

    In the aftermath of personal tragedy, Wilson resigns from the hospital... and from his friendship with House. Meanwhile, Thirteen struggles with her personal medical problems while helping treat an executive assistant with a similar situation to her own.

    Director:Deran Sarafian
    Writer:Eli Attie

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  2. House Season 5 Episode 2 - Not Cancer
    8.1/10(3421 votes)

    #2 - Not Cancer

    S5:E2

    The team deals with an organ donor whose organs prove fatal, and the two surviving patients. Meanwhile, House hires a private detective to spy on Wilson, but hears a few things about himself that he'd rather not.

    Director:David Straiton
    Writers:David Shore, Lawrence Kaplow

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  3. House Season 5 Episode 3 - Adverse Events
    7.9/10(3273 votes)

    #3 - Adverse Events

    S5:E3

    A painter's undiagnosed illness affects his work, and House and his team must look at the man's paintings to determine what's wrong with him.

    Director:Andrew Bernstein
    Writers:Dustin Paddock, Carol Green

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  4. House Season 5 Episode 4 - Birthmarks
    8.9/10(4299 votes)

    #4 - Birthmarks

    S5:E4

    While en route to his father's funeral, House must help the team with a differential diagnosis on a young Chinese girl who has collapsed under mysterious circumstances.

    Director:David Platt
    Writers:Doris Egan, David Foster

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  5. House Season 5 Episode 5 - Lucky Thirteen
    8.4/10(3619 votes)

    #5 - Lucky Thirteen

    S5:E5

    Thirteen brings her one-night stand to the hospital after the woman has a seizure. However, the woman admits she slept with Thirteen just so she could get to House and have him diagnose her condition. Meanwhile, House continues to pay Lucas to spy on Wilson.

    Director:Greg Yaitanes
    Writers:Liz Friedman, Sara Hess

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  6. House Season 5 Episode 6 - Joy
    8.4/10(3538 votes)

    #6 - Joy

    S5:E6

    An ailing man suffers from blackouts and sleepwalks, leading the team to wonder if his sleepwalking is a symptom, or how the man is becoming exposed to something else. When the man's daughter grows ill as well, the team must provide a diagnosis before both die. Meanwhile, Cuddy adopts a newborn but when the birth mother displays a rash, she has to make a decision between putting the mother or daughter at risk.

    Director:Deran Sarafian
    Writer:David Hoselton

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  7. House Season 5 Episode 7 - The Itch
    8.1/10(3207 votes)

    #7 - The Itch

    S5:E7

    The team must treat an agoraphobic who refuses to leave his house, and have to work around Cuddy, who is less than thrilled at having hospital equipment relocated. Meanwhile, House is plagued by an itch, and Cameron and Chase have relationship issues.

    Director:Greg Yaitanes
    Writer:Peter Blake

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  8. House Season 5 Episode 8 - Emancipation
    7.9/10(3127 votes)

    #8 - Emancipation

    S5:E8

    While Foreman takes on a pediatric case on his own, the rest of the team deals with a 16-year-old factory manager and emancipated minor who collapses at work. When Foreman's patient takes a turn for the worse, he's forced to question whether he can deal with the situation on his own, or if he needs House's help.

    Director:James Hayman
    Writers:Pam Davis, Leonard Dick

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  9. House Season 5 Episode 9 - Last Resort
    8.9/10(4727 votes)

    #9 - Last Resort

    S5:E9

    A gun-wielding man from the waiting room at the Princeton-Plainsboro clinic takes House, Thirteen and several patients from the waiting room hostage in Cuddy's office. The man claims to be sick with a long undiagnosed illness and demands medical attention from the best doctor in the hospital, threatening to kill any hostages necessary along the way.

    Director:Katie Jacobs
    Writers:Eli Attie, Matthew V. Lewis

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  10. House Season 5 Episode 10 - Let Them Eat Cake
    8.1/10(3186 votes)

    #10 - Let Them Eat Cake

    S5:E10

    The team takes on the case of a fitness guru on an all-natural diet who collapsed while filming a video. Meanwhile, Foreman conducts Huntington's Disease drug trials and Thirteen signs on as a subject, Cuddy is forced to move into House's office, and Kutner uses House's name to run an online medical-advice website.

    Director:Deran Sarafian
    Writers:Russel Friend, Garrett Lerner

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  11. House Season 5 Episode 11 - Joy to the World
    8.2/10(3489 votes)

    #11 - Joy to the World

    S5:E11

    House and his team deal with a bullied girl who collapses during her school's Christmas program. Meanwhile, Foreman and Thirteen grow closer during the Huntington's disease drug trials, House gives a patient a gift, the staff wonder who gave House a special gift, and Cuddy gets an unexpected gift.

    Director:David Straiton
    Writer:Peter Blake

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  12. House Season 5 Episode 12 - Painless
    7.9/10(3137 votes)

    #12 - Painless

    S5:E12

    House and the team try to diagnose a man living with severe, chronic pain; Thirteen and Foreman explore their complicated relationship; Cuddy discovers that caring for her baby leaves her with little time to run the hospital.

    Director:Andrew Bernstein
    Writers:Thomas L. Moran, Eli Attie

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  13. House Season 5 Episode 13 - Big Baby
    7.8/10(3023 votes)

    #13 - Big Baby

    S5:E13

    Cuddy decides to spend more time at home to take care of her newly adopted baby and passes some of her day-to-day responsibilities off to Cameron, including supervising House. Cameron is forced to play House’s games and becomes involved in a power struggle as he and the team take on the case of a Special Education teacher who collapsed after spitting up blood in the middle of class. As House tests Cameron’s tolerance for his extreme measures, the patient continues to fall ill and House insists the teacher’s seemingly inherent goodness is actually a pathology.

    Director:Deran Sarafian
    Writers:Lawrence Kaplow, David Foster

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  14. House Season 5 Episode 14 - The Greater Good
    7.8/10(3013 votes)

    #14 - The Greater Good

    S5:E14

    House and the team take on the case of a woman who collapsed in the middle of a cooking class, and they soon learn she is a highly-renowned cancer researcher who recently gave up her entire career in order to pursue her own personal happiness. Though the team struggles to understand how the woman could give up saving lives for the sake of her own contentment, each grapple with the pursuit of happiness (or lack thereof) in their own lives. As the patient’s condition continues to worsen, so does Thirteen’s as she begins to suffer serious and life-threatening reactions to the experimental Huntington’s Disease clinical trial. Meanwhile, Cuddy attempts to make House’s life miserable for him in retaliation for his part in her own unhappiness.

    Director:Lesli Linka Glatter
    Writer:Sara Hess

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  15. House Season 5 Episode 15 - Unfaithful
    8.3/10(3329 votes)

    #15 - Unfaithful

    S5:E15

    When a priest who runs a homeless shelter sees a bleeding Jesus hovering at his doorstep, he is admitted to the ER. House takes on the case as a distraction for the team while he confronts Foreman and Thirteen about their relationship. The team soon learns the priest had been involved in a molestation scandal that caused him to lose his faith. However, just as they are about to dismiss his case, the patient’s condition takes a drastic turn for the worse, and House grapples with his past and his belief

    Director:Greg Yaitanes
    Writer:David Hoselton

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  16. House Season 5 Episode 16 - The Softer Side
    8.5/10(3349 votes)

    #16 - The Softer Side

    S5:E16

    A patient with both male and female DNA has the team stumped. Meanwhile, House starts acting nicely, raising Cuddy's and Wilson's suspicions that something is terribly wrong.

    Directors:Deran Sarafian, Greg Yaitanes
    Writer:Liz Friedman

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  17. House Season 5 Episode 17 - The Social Contract
    8.6/10(3465 votes)

    #17 - The Social Contract

    S5:E17

    House and the team take on the case of Nick, a book editor who loses his inhibitions. The team realizes Nick has frontal lobe disinhibition, which causes him to speak his mind having no control over what he says and making him just like House. Meanwhile, House suspects Wilson and Taub are keeping something from him.

    Director:Andrew Bernstein
    Writer:Doris Egan

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  18. House Season 5 Episode 18 - Here Kitty
    8.1/10(3223 votes)

    #18 - Here Kitty

    S5:E18

    Morgan works in a nursing home with a pet cat who only sleeps next to people if they are about to die - and does so with alarmingly accuracy. When it seems the cat has predicted her own death, Morgan, convinced she is about to die, fakes a seizure in order to get to House to have him diagnose her before it’s too late.

    Director:Juan José Campanella
    Writer:Peter Blake

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  19. House Season 5 Episode 19 - Locked In
    9.1/10(5137 votes)

    #19 - Locked In

    S5:E19

    A man awakens in New York after a bicycle accident unable to move or communicate in any way. House, himself injured in a motorcycle mishap, occupies the hospital bed next to Lee and quickly annoys the doctors treating them both by insisting that Lee has “locked-in” syndrome.

    Director:Dan Attias
    Writers:Russel Friend, Garrett Lerner, David Foster

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  20. House Season 5 Episode 20 - Simple Explanation
    9.1/10(5395 votes)

    #20 - Simple Explanation

    S5:E20

    Charlotte, an older woman who has spent the last six months taking care of her dying husband Eddie, is rushed to Princeton Plainsboro after collapsing from respiratory failure. The couple becomes a double mystery for the team when Eddie begins to improve as Charlotte’s condition worsens. The previously unthinkable becomes real when it seems that Charlotte will die before Eddie, and the team will be forced to make a difficult decision.

    Director:Greg Yaitanes
    Writer:Leonard Dick

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  21. House Season 5 Episode 21 - Saviors
    8.2/10(3240 votes)

    #21 - Saviors

    S5:E21

    Cameron postpones her vacation with Chase in order to ask House to accept the case of an environmental radical who collapsed at a protest with unexplainable symptoms. Although suspicious of her motives, House agrees. Since she pushed him to take the case so emphatically, House forces Cameron to take the lead and run many of the tests on the patient. Meanwhile, House is unsure of Wilson’s new healthy diet.

    Director:Matthew Penn
    Writer:Eli Attie

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  22. House Season 5 Episode 22 - House Divided
    9.0/10(4266 votes)

    #22 - House Divided

    S5:E22

    The team takes on the case of a deaf 14-year-old named Seth who collapsed after he started “hearing” explosions while competing in a wrestling match. When the team tries to test him for seizures, Seth loses vision in one eye, complicating House’s bunk theory of “Exploding Head Syndrome.” As his condition worsens, the team has an ethical disagreement about the patient and his mother’s adamant decision to forego cochlear implants to supplement his hearing. When the prospect of giving Seth the ability to hear for the first time in his life arises, House and the team are faced with a resounding decision. Meanwhile, House’s lack of sleep starts to play tricks on his mind, but he finds his insomnia may be a gift instead of a burden

    Director:Greg Yaitanes
    Writers:Liz Friedman, Matthew V. Lewis

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  23. House Season 5 Episode 23 - Under My Skin
    9.2/10(4625 votes)

    #23 - Under My Skin

    S5:E23

    House and the team take on the case of a ballerina whose lungs collapse in the middle of a performance. When the treatment causes her skin to fall off, the dancer faces not only the prospect of never dancing again but also of dying an agonizing death. The team must use their imaginations to carefully choreograph ways to test and treat her delicate body without killing her. Meanwhile, House continues to suffer from what he thinks is insomnia, and he is willing to go to desperate measures to cure it.

    Director:David Straiton
    Writers:Pam Davis, Lawrence Kaplow

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  24. House Season 5 Episode 24 - Both Sides Now
    9.6/10(8178 votes)

    #24 - Both Sides Now

    S5:E24

    House and the team are intrigued by Scott, a man whose left brain and right brain operate independently, leaving him with two distinct personalities and no control over some of his actions. As the two sides of Scott’s brain struggle for dominance, his warring personalities make it increasingly difficult for the team to figure out what is causing the unique problem. The team is forced to use some unusual methods to get him to cooperate with their necessary testing. Meanwhile, when House refuses to make an appearance in the clinic, Cuddy takes an unconventional approach to force House to make up the time with a particular patient.

    Director:Greg Yaitanes
    Writer:Doris Egan

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Season 5 Ratings Summary

"Dying Changes Everything" is the best rated episode of "House" season 5. It scored 8.3/10 based on 3804 votes. Directed by Deran Sarafian and written by Eli Attie, it aired on 9/16/2008. This episode is rated 0.2 points higher than the second-best, "Not Cancer".