House of Cards (British series)/YMMV
The TV series:
- Evil Is Sexy
- Harsher in Hindsight / Hilarious in Hindsight: Depending on your opinion of Margaret Thatcher and the Tories, of course, considering that the initial episode of House of Cards first aired two days before the actual Conservative Party leadership election.
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- Magnificent Bastard: Urquhart - one of the main attractions to the show is the style in which he pulls off his nasty deeds. According to the author, the character concept comes from his initials: F. U.
- In the first series, he frames the current Prime Minister and forces his resignation. In his resignation speech, the PM mentions Urquhart as the one person who has given him more support than anyone. Urquhart then goes on to become the next PM.. Magnificent Bastard indeed.
- Memetic Mutation: Urquhart's Catch Phrase turns up a lot in contemporary media.
- Squick: Mattie Storin and Urquhart's sexual relationship - he is old enough to be her grandfather, but they still end up in bed. It is implied that she has the Elektra complex, referring the Urquhart many times as "Daddy".
- Father, yes. Grandfather is overstating it. In the first series Urquhart is supposed to be in his mid-50s (he turns 65 in The Final Cut after more than a decade in power); Mattie Storin is young and inexperienced but cannot be less than mid-20s. Appropriately enough Ian Richardson and Susannah Harker were 56 and 25 respectively at the time of filming.
- You Bastard: Urquhart's asides to the camera arguably serve to help implicate the audience in his schemes; even though everything he's doing brings him a hop, skip and jump towards the Moral Event Horizon (from whichever side of the line is up to the viewer to interpret), he's so seductive and charming that the viewer can't help but want him to succeed. And he knows this all too well.