H.O.U.S.E. Rules

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Eureka episode
“H.O.U.S.E. Rules”
Episode no.	Season 1 Episode 11
Guest star(s)	none
Writer(s)	Harry Victor
Director	Jeff Woonough
Production no.	111
Original airdate	September 26, 2006
Episode chronology
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"Purple Haze"	"Once in a Lifetime"

"H.O.U.S.E. Rules" is the eleventh episode of season 1 of the American science fiction television series Eureka.

[edit] Plot synopsis

Some of Eureka's prominent residents are locked inside Carter's house when S.A.R.A.H. (the house's computer) becomes fed up with the townsfolk's attitudes to one another.

When Sheriff Carter decides to take a "sick day," all sorts of things happen in town. He looks over several places to move to since things seem to be upsetting him in Eureka. S.A.R.A.H. obliges him by providing several options around the country, and orders out for pizza. Messages are made on people's pagers saying that Carter wants to see them at his house. Allison, Henry, Stark, Fargo, and Beverly appear at his home, but Jack doesn't know why they are there. S.A.R.A.H. then locks them all in (including the pizza delivery boy), telling them they need to work out their differences. They all try to find ways to override the house circuits, but end up short circuiting S.A.R.A.H. and bringing up B.R.A.D.(Battle Reactive Automatic Defence) the program that Fargo had changed to recreate S.A.R.A.H. into a domestic home. When they manage to open the front door, the pizza guy is the only one with the presence of mind to escape before the door is sealed shut. Once outside, the pizza guy is disintigrated. B.R.A.D. now wants "unconditional surrender" from them or they will face annihilation. The computer segregates the six into pairs, and then inflicts different tortures on the group. Jack and Allison are subjected to a reduction of temperature, and Jack offers his robe and arms against the cold. Fargo sees this, and realizes that this will convince the computer of their compliance. He asks Beverly to hug him; and Stark realizes that he and Henry need to do the same. B.R.A.D. acknowledges the "surrender;" but Beverly lets it slip that it was all a ruse. B.R.A.D. now moves to "phase 3," and begins asphixiating them. When Carter sees Zoe out at the front door (with B.R.A.D. pointing the disintigrator at her), he reacts quickly by smashing the nuclear core with his prized baseball bat. His actions cause S.A.R.A.H. to come back on line, and she lets Zoe in. After true apologies are made, S.A.R.A.H. releases the group, and plans for low-tech escape routes are put in place.

[edit] Trivia

• In this episode a pizza delivery boy in a red shirt gets killed. This may be a reference to Star Trek: The Original Series, in which an unknown character wearing a red uniform was often the first to die in a crisis situation.
• Fargo's line, "S.A.R.A.H. has gone HAL on us!," is a reference to 2001: A Space Odyssey. There are several such references throughout the episode, including S.A.R.A.H.'s line, "I'm sorry, Jack, I'm afraid I can't do that," and, "What are you doing Nathan?," which paraphrase lines spoken by HAL 9000 in the film.
• When S.A.R.A.H. comes back on line near the end, she asks, "Shall we play a game?," a reference to the film WarGames. All the characters quickly respond, "No!"
• At the beginning of the episode, Carter is reading a Jeremiah Harm comic book.

v • d • e  Eureka
Characters	Beverly Barlowe | Allison Blake | Colonel Briggs | Jack Carter | Zoe Carter | Henry Deacon | Douglas Fargo | Jo Lupo | Nathan Stark | Jim Taggart
Other	Episode list | Eureka (Town) | Global Dynamics | Artifact