It's terrible.

Robin Wright is superb, Kevin Spacey is believable in every role he plays, he's America's greatest actor, not Meryl Streep, but they can only do so much with the material, which is underwritten and confusing and concerns a plot point that we're not interested in.

How did this HAPPEN?

The loss of showrunner Beau Willimon.

It's like when your favorite act stops working with their hit producer, but even worse, because Willimon wrote, HOC was his baby, and now I don't even know if I can finish the season.

The point being one individual makes a difference.

Willimon launched the franchise, and no one cares about it as much as he does. No one else has the vision. No one else is willing to push for clarity and excellence. Kinda like the endless sequels in the movie theatre, the franchise is not enough. Hell, how many sequels are better than the original? I can only count one, "Godfather II," after that...

And you may disagree, but that's not the point, I don't want to get into an argument over movie trivia, I just want to say we live in a world of individuals, and individuals make a difference. Kind of like Aziz Ansari and "Master Of None." It's his vision, his voice, he cares, which is what makes the series so good. Sure, he occasionally fails, but everybody who reaches for the brass ring does. But when he succeeds, the episode wherein he delineates multiple Thanksgivings at his gay friend's house, from her revelation that she is gay to her family's ultimate acceptance of this fact (and her girlfriend!), is pure genius. We're all imperfect, most even have prejudices, but we overcome them.

At least that's what art tells us. And art rules the universe.

You might think it's corporations, zeros and ones. But isn't it interesting that with all its money Silicon Valley can't get content right. Oh, they can buy it, and they can steal it, they just can't make it. How many bucks has YouTube blown trying to create compelling television...

Some people have it and some people don't.

And even though those without it, and the mediocrities and the sellouts, the compromisers, are constantly clamoring for attention, we know the real thing when we experience it, it touches our heart, titillates our brain, and we hope it never ends and we tell everybody about it, because it's rare and we live for these moments.

I can live without "House Of Cards."

But I can't wait for Beau Willimon's next production.

Close me once, prove your genius once, or over four seasons in Willimon's case, and I'm a believer, I'll give you many chances to fail, because when you ring my bell I never forget it.

And I'm looking to have my bell rung.

We all are.

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